Timaeus — Plato

One form of virtue, four of vice. 1 39 as we are near the spot at which we may see the truth in the Republic ir. clearest manner with our own eyes, let us not faint by the Socrates, way. • Glaucon. Certainly not, he replied. Come up hither, I said, and behold the various forms of vice, those of them, I mean, which are worth looking at. 1 am following you, he replied : proceed. I said, The argument seems to have reached a height from which, as from some tower of speculation, a man may look down and see that virtue is one, but that the forms of vice are innumerable ; there being four special ones which are deserving of note. What do you mean? he said. I mean, I rephed, that there appear to be as many forms of As many the soul as there are distinct forms of the State. forms of the soul as of How many? the State. There are five of the State, and five of the soul, I said. What are they? The first, I said, is that which we have been describing, and which may be said to have two names, monarchy and aristocracy, accordingly as rule is exercised by one distinguished man or by many. True, he replied. But I regard the two names as describing one form only ; for whether the government is in the hands of one or many, if the governors have been trained in the manner which we have supposed, the fundamental laws of the State will be maintained. That is true, he replied.

BOOK V.

Republic V. Socrates, Glaucon, Adeimantus. The community of women and children.

The saying ' Friends have all things in common ' is an insufficient solution of the problem.

Such is the good and true City or State, and the good andsteph. true man is of the same pattern ; and if this is right every "^4-9 other is wrong ; and the evil is one which affects not only the ordering of the State, but also the regulation of the individual soul, and is exhibited in four forms. What are they? he said. I was proceeding to tell the order in which the four evil forms appeared to me to succeed one another, when Polemarchus, who was sitting a little way off, just beyond Adeimantus, began to whisper to him : stretching forth his hand, he took hold of the upper part of his coat by the shoulder, and drew him towards him, leaning forward himself so as to be quite close and saying something in his ear, of which I only caught the words, ' Shall we let him off, or what shall we do ? ' Certainly not, said Adeimantus, raising his voice. Who is it, I said, whom you are refusing to let off? You, he said. I repeated \ Why am I especially not to be let off? Why, he said, we think that you are lazy, and mean to cheat us out of a whole chapter which is a very important part of the story ; and you fancy that we shall not notice your airy way of proceeding ; as if it were self-evident to everybody, that in the matter of women and children * friends have all things in common.' And was I not right, Adeimantus? Yes, he said ; but what is right in this particular case, like everything else, requires to be explained ; for community may be of many kinds. Please, therefore, to say what sort of community you mean. We have been long

' Reading In hyli eIttov.

TJie diffic2ilty of tJic subject.

141 expecting that you would tell us something about the family Republic r. life of your citizens — how they will bring children into the Socrates, world, and rear them when they have arrived, and, in ql^ucon^"^' general, what is the nature of this community of women and thrasymachildren — for we are of opinion that the right or wrong ^^^^' management of such matters will have a great and paramount influence on the State for good or for evil.

And now, since the question is still undetermined, and you are taking in hand another State, we have resolved, as you heard, not to let you go until you give an account of all this. To that resolution, said Glaucon, you may regard me as saying Agreed. And without more ado, said Thrasymachus, you may consider us all to be equally agreed. I said, You know not what you are doing in thus assailing me: What an argument are you raising about the State!

Just as I thought that I had finished, and was only too glad The feigned that I had laid this question to sleep, and was reflecting how so^ates^ fortunate I was in your acceptance of what I then said, you ask me to begin again at the very foundation, ignorant of what a hornet's nest of words you are stirring. Now I foresaw this gathering trouble, and avoided it.

For what purpose do you conceive that we have come The goodhere, said Thrasymachus, — to look for gold, or to hear dis- ThraT macourse ? chus. Yes, but discourse should have a limit. Yes, Socrates, said Glaucon, and the whole of life is the only hmit which wise men assign to the hearing of such discourses.

But never mind about us ; take heart yourself and answer the question in your own way : What sort of community of women and children is this which is to prevail among our guardians? and how shall we manage the period between birth and education, which seems to require the greatest care? Tell us how these things will be.

Yes, my simple friend, but the answer is the reverse of easy ; many more doubts arise about this than about om* previous conclusions. For the practicability of what is said / may be doubted ; and looked at in another point of view, ( whether the scheme, if ever so practicable, would be for the 1 best, is also doubtful. Hence I feel a reluctance to approach