Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. I — G. R. S. Mead (1906)

"By a stroke of luck also he saw the soul of Odysseus, which had obtained the last lot of all, come to make its choice. From memory of its former labours it had given itself a rest from love of renown, and for a long time went about to find the life of a man in private life with nothing to do with public affairs, and with great difficulty found one lying in a corner and thus passed over by all the rest ; on seeing it, it declared that it would have done the same even if it had had first turn, and been glad to do it.

" And Er said that of the rest of the brutes also in like fashion some of them passed into men, and some into one another, the unrighteous ones changing into wild ones, and the righteous into tame ; in fact, there were intermixings of every kind.

"When, then, all the souls had chosen their lives according to the number of their turn, they went in order to Lachesis ; and she sent along with them the daimon each had chosen, as watcher over his life and bringer to pass of the things he had chosen. And

1 Notice the "lion "and "eagle" are selected as types — they being typical sun-animals, as we have already seen.

2 The fabled engineer of the Trojan Horse.

the daimon first of all brought the soul to Clotho, set it beneath her hand and the whirling of the spindle, thus ratifying the fate each soul had chosen in its turn. And after he had attached it to her, he brought it to the spinning of Atropos, thus making its destinies1 irreversible.

621. — "Thence [Er] went, without turning, [down] beneath the Throne2 of Necessity, and when he had passed down through it, and the others had also done so, they all passed on to the Plain of Forgetfulness (Lethe) in a frightful and stifling heat ; for it was bare of trees and vegetation of every kind.

" As it was now evening they camped by the River Heedlessness whose water no vessel can hold.3 They were all, however, compelled to drink a certain quantity of its water ; those who are not safeguarded by prudence drink more than their quantity, while he who keeps on drinking it forgets everything.

"When they had fallen asleep and midnight had come, there was thunder and earthquake, and thence suddenly they were carried up into birth [genesis] some one way some another, like shooting stars.

" Er, however, was prevented from drinking the water ; but in what manner and by what means he got back to his body he could not say, only, suddenly waking in the morning, he found himself lying on the pyre."

1 ret tiriK\(ixr6fVTa. — a play on

2 This is probably a symbol of the heaven-plane.

3 o5 T)> S5o>p ayydov ovSh ffTfyttv. So this is usually translated ; but as the souls drink of it, the appropriateness of the rendering is not very apparent. On the other hand, artytiv is used of things that are water-tight — e.g. houses and ships ; hence " whose water no vessel can keep out." The " vessel " might thus stand for the ship of the soul ; and if so, we are in contact with an Egyptian idea. The River is in the Desert — the reverse of the Nile and Egypt, of Osiris and Isis, their Typhonean counterparts.

COMMENTARY

The question that one naturally asks oneself is: Did Plato conclude his great treatise on the Ideal State with a popular legend in jest, or had he some deeper purpose ? I cannot but think that he was jesting seriously. Is it too wild a supposition that he is hinting at things which he could not disclose because of his oath ? Those who knew would understand ; those who did not would think he was jesting simply, and so the mysteries would not be disclosed.