Phaedrus — Plato

p. 200the sentiment of Thrasymachus, when originally he blamed justice and praised injustice ; but I appear not to understand him. I wish, he said, that you would hear me as well as him, and then I shall see whether you and I agree.

For Thrasymachus seems to me to have been charmed by your voice, like a snake, sooner than he ought to have been ; and I am not yet satisfied with the account which has been given of the nature of justice and injustice. Leaving^the rewards and results of them^, I want to know_what_tKey, either of them, are in themselves, ano^traTpower they have in "the soul. If you please, then, I will revive the argumerif "oT Thrasymachus.

And^^rsJLl will ^ speak of the nature and origin of justice according to the com- — mon view of tHem. Secondly, I will show that all men who practice justice do so against their will, and not as a good, but as a necessity. And thirdly, I will maintain that there is reason in this, for in their view, the life of the unjust is better far ^. than the life of the just. That is only what they say, Socrates, for I myself am not of their opinion.

But still I acknowledge that I am perplexed when I hear the voices of Thrasymachus and myriads of others dinning in my ears; and, on the other hand, I have never yet heard the thesis that justice is better than injustice maintained in a satisfactory way.

If I could hear the praises of justice and injustice considered in themselves, then I should be satisfied, and you are the person from whom I expect to hear this; and therefore I will praise the unjust life to the utmost of my power, and the manner in which I speak will indicate also the manner in which I desire to hear you praising justice and censuring injustice. Will you say whether you approve of this ?

Indeed I do ; nor can I imagine any theme about which a man of sense would oftener wish to converse. I am delighted, he replied, to hear you say that, and shall begin by speaking of the nature and origin of justice. They say that to do injustice is, by nature, good ; to suffer \ injustice, evil ; but that the evil is greater than the good.

And \ when men have done and suffered and had experience of both, not being able to avoid the one and obtain the other, they think that they had better agree with one another to have neither, and thence arise laws and covenants among them ; and that which is ordained by law they term lawful

THE REPUBLIC 20I and just. This, as they affirm, is the origin and nature of justice, arising out of a mean or compromise between the best of all, which is to do and not to suffer injustice, and the worst of all, which is to suffer without the power of retaliation ; and justice, being in a mean between the two, is tolerated not as a good, but as the lesser evil, and honored by reason of the inability of men to do injustice.

For no man who is worthy to be called a man would submit to such an agreement if he were able to resist ; he would be mad if he did. This, Socrates, is the received account of the nature and origin of justice.

Now that justice is only the inability to do injustice will best appear if we imagine something of this kind : suppose we give both the just and the unjust entire liberty to do what they will, and let us attend and see whither desire will lead them ; then we shall detect the just man in the very act ; the just and unjust will be found going the same way, — following their interest, which all natures conceive to be their good, and are only diverted into the path of justice by the force of law.

The liberty which we are supposing may be most conveniently given to them in the form of such a power as is said to have been possessed by Gyges,^ the ancestor of Croesus, ^ the Lydian. For Gyges, according to the tradition, was a shepherd and servant of the king of Lydia, and, while he was in the field, there was a storm and earthquake, which made an opening in the earth at the place where he was feeding his flock.

He was amazed at the sight, and descended into the opening, where, among other marvels, he beheld a hollow brazen horse having doors, at which he, stooping and looking in, saw a dead body, of stature, as appeared to him, more than human, and having nothing on but a gold ring ; this he took from the finger of the dead, and reascended out of the openg ing.

Now the shepherJs met together, according to custom, that they might send their monthly report concerning the flock to the king; and into their assembly he came having the ring on his finger, and as he was sitting among them he ^ chanced to turn the collet of the ring towards the inner side of the hand, when instantly he became invisible, and the others began to speak of him as if he were no longer there. He » Gyges (gl'jez). ' Croesus (6th century B c.) : a king of Lydia in Asia Minor, whose wealth became proverbial in all languages.

p. 202was astonished at this, and again touching the ring he turned the collet outward and reappeared ; thereupon he made trials of the ring, and always with the same result ; when he turned the collet inwards he became invisible, when outwards he reappeared.

Perceiving this, he immediately contrived to be chosen messenger to the court, where he no sooner arrived than he seduced the queen, and with her help conspired against the king and slew him, and took the kingdom. Suppose now that there were two such magic rings, and the just put on one of them and the unjust the other ; no man is of such adamantine temper that he would stand fast in justice, — that is what they think.

No man would dare to be honest when he could safely take what he liked out of the market, or go into houses and lie with any one at his pleasure, or kill or release from prison whom he would, and in all respects be like a god among men. Then the actions of the just would be as the actions of the unjust ; just or unjust would arrive at last at the same goal.

And this is surely jigreat^oof tliat a man is just,jiot willingly or because he. thinks. that justice is any good to him individually, but of necessity, for wherever any one thinks that he can safely be unjust, there he is unjiist. For all "mgn'TJelieve in their hearts that injustice is far more profitable to the individual than justice, and he who takes this line of argument will say that they are right.

For if you could imagine any one having such a power, and never doing any wrong or touching what was another's, he would be thought by the lookers on to be a most wretched idiot, although they would praise him to one another's faces, and keep up appearances with one another from a fear that they too might be sufferers of injustice. Enough of this.

Now, if we are to form a real judgment of the life of the just and unjust, we must isolate them ; there is no other way ; and how is the isolation to be effected? I answer: Let the unjust man be entirely unjust, and the just man entirely just ; nothing is to be taken away from either of them, and both are to be perfected for the fulfillment of their respective parts.

First, let the unjust be like other distinguished masters of ^ crafts ; like the skillful pilot or ph)^ician, who knows his ^ own powers and attempts only what is within their limits, and who, if he fails at any point, is able to recover himself. So let the unjust make his unjust attempts in the right way, and