Republic (6.497-6.499)

Well, he said, that is no very slight thing to have achieved before taking his departure. He would not have accomplished any very great thing either,[*] I replied, if it were not his fortune to live in a state adapted to his nature. In such a state only will he himself rather attain his full stature[*] and together with his own preserve the common weal. The causes and the injustice of the calumniation of philosophy, I think, have been fairly set forth, unless you have something to add.[*] No, he said, I have nothing further to offer on that point. But which of our present governments do you think is suitable for philosophy? None whatever, I said; but the very ground of my complaint is that no polity[*] of today is worthy of the philosophic nature. This is just the cause of its perversion and alteration; as a foreign seed sown in an alien soil is wont to be overcome and die out[*] into the native growth,[*] so this kind does not preserve its own quality but falls away and degenerates into an alien type. But if ever it finds the best polity as it itself is the best, then will it be apparent[*] that this was in truth divine and all the others human in their natures and practices. Obviously then you are next, going to ask what is this best form of government. Wrong, he said[*] I was going to ask not that but whether it is this one that we have described in our establishment of a state or another. In other respects it is this one, said I; but there is one special further point that we mentioned even then, namely that there would always have to be resident in such a state an element having the same conception of its constitution that you the lawgiver had in framing its laws.[*] That was said, he replied. But it was not sufficiently explained, I said, from fear of those objections on your part which have shown that the demonstration of it is long and difficult. And apart from that the remainder of the exposition is by no means easy.[*] Just what do you mean? The manner in which a state that occupies itself with philosophy can escape destruction. For all great things are precarious and, as the proverb truly says, fine things are hard.[*] All the same, he said, our exposition must be completed by making this plain. It will be no lack of will, I said, but if anything,[*] a lack of ability, that would prevent that. But you shall observe for yourself my zeal. And note again how zealously and recklessly I am prepared to say that the state ought to take up this pursuit in just the reverse of our present fashion.[*] In what way?

At present, said I, those who do take it up are youths, just out of boyhood,[*] who in the interval[*] before they engage in business and money-making approach the most difficult part of it, and then drop it—and these are regarded forsooth as the best exemplars of philosophy. By the most difficult part I mean discussion. In later life they think they have done much if, when invited, they deign to listen[*] to the philosophic discussions of others. That sort of thing they think should be by-work. And towards old age,[*] with few exceptions, their light is quenched more completely than the sun of Heracleitus,[*] inasmuch as it is never rekindled. And what should they do? he said. Just the reverse. While they are lads and boys they should occupy themselves with an education and a culture suitable to youth, and while their bodies are growing to manhood take right good care of them, thus securing a basis and a support[*] for the intellectual life. But with the advance of age, when the soul begins to attain its maturity, they should make its exercises more severe, and when the bodily strength declines and they are past the age of political and military service, then at last they should be given free range of the pasture[*] and do nothing but philosophize,[*] except incidentally, if they are to live happily, and, when the end has come, crown the life they have lived with a consonant destiny in that other world. You really seem to be very much in earnest, Socrates, he said; yet I think most of your hearers are even more earnest in their opposition and will not be in the least convinced, beginning with Thrasymachus. Do not try to breed a quarrel between me and Thrasymachus, who have just become friends and were not enemies before either. For we will spare no effort until we either convince him and the rest or achieve something that will profit them when they come to that life in which they will be born gain[*] and meet with such discussions as these. A brief time[*] your forecast contemplates, he said. Nay, nothing at all, I replied, as compared with eternity.[*] However, the unwillingness of the multitude to believe what you say is nothing surprising. For of the thing here spoken they have never beheld a token,[*] but only the forced and artificial chiming of word and phrase, not spontaneous and accidental as has happened here.

But the figure of a man equilibrated and assimilated to virtue’s self perfectly, so far as may be, in word and deed, and holding rule in a city of like quality, that is a thing they have never seen in one case or in many. Do you think they have?By no means.Neither, my dear fellow, have they ever seriously inclined to hearken to fair and free discussions whose sole endeavor was to search out the truth[*] at any cost for knowledge’s sake, and which dwell apart and salute from afar[*] all the subtleties and cavils that lead to naught but opinion[*] and strife in court-room and in private talk.They have not, he said. For this cause and foreseeing this, we then despite our fears[*] declared under compulsion of the truth[*] that neither city nor polity nor man either will ever be perfected until some chance compels this uncorrupted remnant of philosophers, who now bear the stigma of uselessness, to take charge of the state whether they wish it or not, and constrains the citizens to obey them, or else until by some divine inspiration[*] a genuine passion for true philosophy takes possession[*] either of the sons of the men now in power and sovereignty or of themselves. To affirm that either or both of these things cannot possibly come to pass is, I say, quite unreasonable. Only in that case could we be justly ridiculed as uttering things as futile as day-dreams are.[*] Is not that so? It is. If, then, the best philosophical natures have ever been constrained to take charge of the state in infinite time past,[*] or now are in some barbaric region[*] far beyond our ken, or shall hereafter be, we are prepared to maintain our contention[*] that the constitution we have described has been, is, or will be[*] realized[*] when this philosophic Muse has taken control of the state.[*] It is not a thing impossible to happen, nor are we speaking of impossibilities. That it is difficult we too admit. I also think so, he said. But the multitude—are you going to say?—does not think so, said I. That may be, he said. My dear fellow, said I, do not thus absolutely condemn the multitude.[*] They will surely be of another mind if in no spirit of contention but soothingly and endeavoring to do away with the dispraise of learning you point out to them whom you mean by philosophers, and define as we recently did their nature and their pursuits so that the people may not suppose you to mean those of whom they are thinking.