Laws (1.624-1.628)

Ath. To whom do you ascribe the authorship of your legal arrangements, Strangers? To a god or to some man?

Clin. To a god, Stranger, most rightfully to a god. We Cretans call Zeus our lawgiver; while in Lacedaemon, where our friend here has his home, I believe they claim Apollo as theirs. Is not that so, Megillus?

Meg. Yes.

Ath. Do you then, like Homer,[*] say that Minos used to go every ninth year to hold converse with his father Zeus, and that he was guided by his divine oracles in laying down the laws for your cities?

Clin. So our people say. And they say also that his brother Rhadamanthys,—no doubt you have heard the name,—was exceedingly just. And certainly we Cretans would maintain that he won this title owing to his righteous administration of justice in those days.

Ath. Yes, his renown is indeed glorious and well befitting a son of Zeus. And, since you and our friend Megillus were both brought up in legal institutions of so noble a kind, you would, I imagine, have no aversion to our occupying ourselves as we go along in discussion on the subject of government and laws. Certainly, as I am told, the road from Cnosus to the cave[*] and temple of Zeus is a long one, and we are sure to find, in this sultry weather, shady resting-places among the high trees along the road: in them we can rest ofttimes, as befits our age, beguiling the time with discourse, and thus complete our journey in comfort.

Clin. True, Stranger; and as one proceeds further one finds in the groves cypress-trees of wonderful height and beauty, and meadows too, where we may rest ourselves and talk.

Ath. You say well.

Clin. Yes, indeed: and when we set eyes on them we shall say so still more emphatically. So let us be going, and good luck attend us.

Ath. Amen! And tell me now, for what reason did your law ordain the common meals you have, and your gymnastic schools and military equipment?

Clin. Our Cretan customs, Stranger, are, as I think, such as anyone may grasp easily. As you may notice, Crete, as a whole, is not a level country, like Thessaly: consequently, whereas the Thessalians mostly go on horseback, we Cretans are runners, since this land of ours is rugged and more suitable for the practice of foot-running. Under these conditions we are obliged to have light armour for running and to avoid heavy equipment; so bows and arrows are adopted as suitable because of their lightness. Thus all these customs of ours are adapted for war, and, in my opinion, this was the object which the lawgiver had in view when he ordained them all. Probably this was his reason also for instituting common meals: he saw how soldiers, all the time they are on campaign, are obliged by force of circumstances to mess in common, for the sake of their own security. And herein, as I think, he condemned the stupidity of the mass of men in failing to perceive that all are involved ceaselessly in a lifelong war against all States.

Clin.If, then, these practices are necessary in war,—namely, messing in common for safety’s sake, and the appointment of relays of officers and privates to act as guards,— they must be carried out equally in time of peace. For (as he would say) peace, as the term is commonly employed, is nothing more than a name, the truth being that every State is, by a law of nature, engaged perpetually in an informal war with every other State. And if you look at the matter from this point of view you will find it practically true that our Cretan lawgiver ordained all our legal usages, both public and private, with an eye to war, and that he therefore charged us with the task of guarding our laws safely, in the conviction that without victory in war nothing else, whether possession or institution, is of the least value, but all the goods of the vanquished fall into the hands of the victors.

Ath. Your training, Stranger, has certainly, as it seems to me, given you an excellent understanding of the legal practices of Crete. But tell me this more clearly still: by the definition you have given of the well-constituted State you appear to me to imply that it ought to be organized in such a way as to be victorious in war over all other States. Is that so?

Clin. Certainly it is; and I think that our friend here shares my opinion.

Meg. No Lacedaemonian, my good sir, could possibly say otherwise.

Ath. If this, then, is the right attitude for a State to adopt towards a State, is the right attitude for village towards village different?

Clin. By no means.

Ath. It is the same, you say?

Clin. Yes.

Ath. Well then, is the same attitude right also for one house in the village towards another, and for each man towards every other?

Clin. It is.

Ath. And must each individual man regard himself as his own enemy? Or what do we say when we come to this point?

Clin. O Stranger of Athens, for I should be loth to call you a man of Attica, since methinks you deserve rather to be named after the goddess Athena, seeing that you have made the argument more clear by taking it back again to its starting-point; whereby you will the more easily discover the justice of our recent statement that, in the mass, all men are both publicly and privately the enemies of all, and individually also each man is his own enemy.

Ath. What is your meaning, my admirable sir?

Clin. It is just in this war, my friend, that the victory over self is of all victories the first and best while self-defeat is of all defeats at once the worst and the most shameful. For these phrases signify that a war against self exists within each of us.[*]

Ath. Now let us take the argument back in the reverse direction. Seeing that individually each of us is partly superior to himself and partly inferior, are we to affirm that the same condition of things exists in house and village and State, or are we to deny it?

Clin. Do you mean the condition of being partly self-superior and partly self-inferior?

Ath. Yes.

Clin. That, too, is a proper question; for such a condition does most certainly exist, and in States above all. Every State in which the better class is victorious over the populace and the lower classes would rightly be termed self-superior, and would be praised most justly for a victory of this kind; and conversely, when the reverse is the case.

Ath. Well then, leaving aside the question as to whether the worse element is ever superior to the better (a question which would demand a more lengthy discussion), what you assert, as I now perceive, is this,—that sometimes citizens of one stock and of one State who are unjust and numerous may combine together and try to enslave by force those who are just but fewer in number, and wherever they prevail such a State would rightly be termed self-inferior and bad, but self-superior and good wherever they are worsted.

Clin. This statement is indeed most extraordinary, Stranger; none the less we cannot possibly reject it.

Ath. Stay a moment: here too is a case we must further consider. Suppose there were a number of brothers, all sons of the same parents, it would not be at all surprising if most of them were unjust and but few just.

Clin. It would not.

Ath. And, moreover, it would ill beseem you and me to go a-chasing after this form of expression, that if the bad ones conquered the whole of this family and house should be called self-inferior, but self-superior if they were defeated; for our present reference to the usage of ordinary speech is not concerned with the propriety or impropriety of verbal phrases but with the essential rightness or wrongness of laws.

Clin. Very true, Stranger.

Meg. And finely spoken, too, up to this point, as I agree.

Ath. Let us also look at this point: the brothers we have just described would have, I suppose, a judge?

Clin. Certainly.

Ath. Which of the two would be the better—a judge who destroyed all the wicked among them and charged the good to govern themselves, or one who made the good members govern and, while allowing the bad to live, made them submit willingly to be governed?

Ath.And there is a third judge we must mention (third and best in point of merit),—if indeed such a judge can be found,— who in dealing with a single divided family will destroy none of them but reconcile them and succeed, by enacting laws for them, in securing amongst them thenceforward permanent friendliness.

Clin. A judge and lawgiver of that kind would be by far the best.

Ath. But mark this: his aim, in the laws he enacted for them, would be the opposite of war.

Clin. That is true.

Ath. And what of him who brings the State into harmony? In ordering its life would he have regard to external warfare rather than to the internal war, whenever it occurs, which goes by the name of civil strife? For this is a war as to which it would be the desire of every man that, if possible, it should never occur in his own State, and that, if it did occur, it should come to as speedy an end as possible.

Clin. Evidently he would have regard to civil war.

Ath. And would anyone prefer that the citizens should be obliged to devote their attention to external enemies after internal concord had been secured by the destruction of one section and the victory of their opponents rather than after the establishment of friendship and peace by terms of conciliation?

Clin. Everyone would prefer the latter alternative for his own State rather than the former.

Ath. And would not the lawgiver do the same?

Clin. Of course.

Ath. Would not every lawgiver in all his legislation aim at the highest good?

Clin. Assuredly.

Ath. The highest good, however, is neither war nor civil strife—which things we should pray rather to be saved from—but peace one with another and friendly feeling. Moreover, it would seem that the victory we mentioned of a State over itself is not one of the best things but one of those which are necessary. For imagine a man supposing that a human body was best off when it was sick and aged with physic, while never giving a thought to the case of the body that needs no physic at all! Similarly, with regard to the well-being of a State or an individual, that man will never make genuine statesman who pays attention primarily solely to the needs of foreign warfare, nor will he make a finished lawgiver unless he designs his legislation for peace rather than his peace legislation for war.

Clin. This statement, Stranger, is apparently true; yet, unless I am much mistaken, our legal usages in Crete, and in Lacedaemon too, are wholly acted towards war.