Phaedrus — Plato

p. 374before going to sleep he has allayed the passionate element, if he has a quarrel against any one — I say, when, after pacifying the two irrational principles, he rouses up the third or rational element before he takes his rest, then, as you know, he attains truth most nearly, and is least likely to be the sport of fanciful and lawless visions. In that opinion I entirely agree.

In saying this I have been running into a digression ; but the point which I desire to note is that in all of us, even in good men, there is such a latent wild-beast nature, which peers out in sleep. Pray, consider whether I am right, and you agree with me in this view. Yes, I agree. Remember then the character which we assigned to the democratic man.

He was supposed from his youth upwards to have been trained under a miserly parent, and to have encouraged the saving appetites, and discountenanced the lighter and more ornamental ones ? True. And then he got into the company of a more refined, licentious sort of people, and he took to wantonness, and began to have a disHke of his father's narrow ways.

At last, being a better man than his corruptors, he came to a mean, and led a life, not of lawless and slavish passion, but of regular and successive indulgence. That was our view of the way in which the democrat was generated out of the oligarch ? Yes, he said ; and that is still our view.

And now, I said, years will have passed away, and you must imagine this man, such as he is, to have a son, who is brought up in his father's principles ; and then further imagine the same thing to happen to the son which has already happened to the father — he is seduced into a perfectly lawless life, which is termed perfect liberty ; and his father and friends take part with his moderate desires, while others assist the opposite ones.

At length, these dire magicians and tyrant-makers begin to fear that they will be unable to hold the youth, and then they contrive to implant in him a master passion, to be lord over his idle and spendthrift desires — like a monster drone ^'^ having wings. That is the only image which will depict him and his lusts. Yes, he said, that is the best, the only image of him.

p. 375And while the other lusts amid clouds of incense and perfumes and garlands and wines, and all the dissoluteness of social life are buzzing around him and flattering him to the utmost, there is implanted in him the sting of desire, and then this lord of the soul is in a frenzy — madness is the captain of the guard — and if he discerns in his soul any opinions or appetites which may be regarded as good, and which have any sense of shame remaining, he puts an end to them, and casts them forth until he has purged away temperance and brought in madness to the full.

Yes, he said, that is the way in which the tyrannical man is generated. And is not this the reason why of old love has been called a tyrant ? Yes, perhaps. Further, I said, has not a drunken man also the spirit of a tyrant ? True. And you know that a man who is deranged and not right in his mind, will fancy that he is able to rule, not only over men, but also over the gods ? True.

And the tyrannical man comes into being just at that point when either under the influence of nature, or habit, or both, he becomes drunken, lustful, passionate ? Exactly. Such is the man and such is his origin. And next, how does he live ? That, as people facetiously say, you may as well tell me.

I imagine, I said, as the next step in his progress, that there will be feasts and carousals and revellings, and courtesans, and all that sort of thing ; love is the lord of the house within him, who orders all the concerns of the soul. That is certain. Yes ; and every day and every night desires grow up many and formidable, and their demands are many. They are indeed, he said. His revenues, if he has any, are soon spent. True. Then he borrows money, and his estate is taken from him. Of course.

p. 376When he has nothing left, must not his desires, crowding in the nest like young ravens, be crying aloud for food ; he, goaded on by them, and especially by love himself on whom they dance attendance, is at his wits* end to discover whom he can defraud or despoil of his property, in order that he may gratify them ? Yes, that is sure to be the case.

He must have money, and no matter how, if he is to escape horrid pangs and pains. He must. And as in himself there was a succession of pleasures, and the new got the better of the old and took away their rights, so he being younger will claim to have more than his father and his mother, and if he has spent his own property, he will take a slice out of theirs. No doubt of that.

And if his parents will not suffer this, then he will try to cheat and deceive them. Very true. And if he cannot, then he will plunder and force them. Yes, probably. And if the old man and the old woman hold out against him, will he be very careful of doing anything which is tyrannical? Nay, he said, I should not feel at all comfortable about his parents. But, O heavens !

Adeimantus, on account of some newfangled love of a harlot, who is anything but a necessary connection, can you believe that he would strike the mother who is his ancient friend and necessary to his very existence, and would place her under the authority of the other, when she is brought under the same roof with her ; or that, under like circumstances, he would do the same to his withered old father, first and most indispensable of friends, for the sake of some blooming love of a youth who is the reverse of indispensable ?

Yes, indeed, he said ; I believe that he would. Truly, then, I said, a tyrannical son is a blessing to his father and mother. Yes, indeed, he replied. He first takes their property, and when that fails, and pleasures are beginning to swarm in the hive of his soul, then he