Republic

Shall we, then, lay it down that all the poetic tribe, beginning with Homer,[*](Cf. 366 E. Gorg. 471 C-D, Symp. 173 D.) are imitators of images of excellence and of the other things that they create,[*](Or about which they versify, playing with the double meaning of ποιεῖν.) and do not lay hold on truth? but, as we were just now saying, the painter will fashion, himself knowing nothing of the cobbler’s art, what appears to be a cobbler to him and likewise to those who know nothing but judge only by forms and colors[*](For the association of χρώματα and σχήματα Cf. Phileb. 12 E. 47 A, 51 B, Laws 669 A, Soph. 251 A, Meno 75 A with Apelt’s note, Cratyl. 431 C, Gorg. 465 B, Phaedo 100 D, Aristot. Poet. 1447 a 18-19.)?Certainly.And similarly, I suppose, we shall say that the poet himself, knowing nothing but how to imitate, lays on with words and phrases[*](Cf. Symp. 198 B, Apol. 17 C. The explicit discrimination of ὀνόματα as names of agents and ῥήματα as names of actions is peculiar to Soph. 262. But Cf. Cratyl. 431 B, 425 A, Theaet. 206 D. And in Soph. 257 B ῥήματι is used generally. See Unity of Plato’s Thought, pp. 56-57. Cf. Euthydem. 304 E with Symp. 187 A, Phaedr. 228 D, 271 C and my note in Class. Phil. xvii. (1922) p. 262.) the colors of the several arts in such fashion that others equally ignorant, who see things only through words,[*](Cf. What Plato Said, p. 593 on Soph. 240 A.) will deem his words most excellent, whether he speak in rhythm, meter and harmony about cobbling or generalship or anything whatever. So mighty is the spell[*](Cf. 607 C, Laws 840 C, Protag. 315 A-B.) that these adornments naturally exercise; though when they are stripped bare of their musical coloring and taken by themselves,[*](Cf. Gorg. 502 C εἴ τις περιέλοι τῆς ποιήσεως πάσης τό τε μέλος καὶ τὸν ῥυθμόν, 392, Ion 530 b, Epicharmus apud Diog. Laert. iii. 17 περιδύσας τὸ μέτρον ὃ νῦν ἔχει, Aeschines, In Ctes. 136 περιελόντες τοῦ ποιητοῦ τὸ μέτρον, Isoc. Evag. 11 τὸ δὲ μέτρον διαλύσῃ with Horace, Sat. i. 4. 62 invenias etiam disiecti membra poetae, Aristot. Rhet. 1404 a 24 ἐπεὶ δ’ οἱ ποιηταὶ λέγοντες εὐήθη διὰ τὴν λέξιν ἐδόκουν πορίσασθαι τήνδε τὴν δόξαν. Sext. Empir., Bekker, pp. 665-666 (Adv. Math. ii. 288), says that the ideas of poets are inferior to those of the ordinary layman. Cf. also Julian, Or. ii. 78 D, Coleridge, Table Talk: If you take from Virgil his diction and metre what do you leave him?) I think you know what sort of a showing these sayings of the poets make. For you, I believe, have observed them.I have, he said. Do they not, said I, resemble the faces of adolescents, young but not really beautiful, when the bloom of youth abandons them?[*](Aristot. Rhet. 1406 b 36 f. refers to this. Cf. Tyrtaeus 8 (6). 28 ὄφρ’ ἐρατῆς ἥβης ἀγλαὸν ἄνθος ἔχῃ, Mimnermus i. 4 ἥβης ἄνθη γίγνεται ἁρπαλέα; Theognis 1305: παιδείας πλουηράτου ἄνθος ὠκύτερον σταδίου Xen. Symp. 8. 14 τὸ μὲν τῆς ὥρας ἄνθος ταχὺ δήπου παρακμάζει, Plato, Symp. 183 E τῷ τοῦ σώματος ἄνθει λήγοντι ) By all means, he said. Come, then, said I, consider this point: The creator of the phantom, the imitator, we say, knows nothing of the reality but only the appearance. Is not that so? Yes. Let us not, then, leave it half said but consider it fully. Speak on, he said. The painter, we say, will paint both reins and a bit. Yes. But the maker[*](The δέ γε has almost the effect of a retort.) will be the cobbler and the smith. Certainly. Does the painter, then, know the proper quality of reins and bit? Or does not even the maker, the cobbler and the smith, know that, but only the man who understands the use of these things, the horseman[*](Cf. Aristot. Eth. Nic. 1094 a 10-11 καθάπερ ὑπὸ τὴν ἱππικὴν ἡ χαλινοποιικὴ. . .)? Most true. And shall we not say that the same holds true of everything? What do you mean? That there are some three arts concerned with everything, the user’s art,[*](For the idea that the user knows best see Cratyl. 390 B, Euthydem. 289 B, Phaedr. 274 E. Zeller, Aristotle(Eng.) ii. p. 247, attributes this pertinent observation to Aristotle. Cf. Aristot. Pol. 1277 b 30 αὐλητὴς ὁ χρώμενος. See 1282 a 21, 1289 a 17. Coleridge, Table Talk: In general those who do things for others know more about them than those for whom they are done. A groom knows more about horses than his master. But Hazlitt disagrees with Plato’s view.) the maker’s, and the imitator’s. Yes. Now do not the excellence, the beauty, the rightness[*](So in Laws 669 A-B, Plato says that the competent judge of a work of art must know three things, first, what it is, second, that it is true and right, and third, that it is good.) of every implement, living thing, and action refer solely to the use[*](For the reference of beauty to use see Hipp. Maj. 295 C ff.) for which each is made or by nature adapted? That is so. It quite necessarily follows, then, that the user of anything is the one who knows most of it by experience, and that he reports to the maker the good or bad effects in use of the thing he uses. As, for example, the flute-player reports to the flute-maker which flutes respond and serve rightly in flute-playing, and will order the kind that must be made, and the other will obey and serve him. Of course. The one, then, possessing knowledge, reports about the goodness or the badness of the flutes, and the other, believing, will make them. Yes.

Then in respect of the same implement the maker will have right belief[*](πίστιν ὀρθήν is used because of πιστεύων above. It is a slightly derogatory synonym of δόξαν ὀρθήν below, 602 A. Cf. 511 E.) about its excellence and defects from association with the man who knows and being compelled to listen to him, but the user will have true knowledge.Certainly.And will the imitator from experience or use have knowledge whether the things he portrays are or are not beautiful and right, or will he, from compulsory association with the man who knows and taking orders from him for the right making of them, have right opinion[*](This does not contradict book V. 477-478. For right opinion and knowledge cf. 430 B and What Plato Said, p. 517, on Meno 98 A-B.)?Neither.Then the imitator will neither know nor opine rightly concerning the beauty or the badness of his imitations.It seems not.Most charming,[*](χαρίεις is ironical like χαριέντως in 426 A and καλόν in Theaet. 183 A, but Glaucon in his answer takes it seriously.) then, would be the state of mind of the poetical imitator in respect of true wisdom about his creations.Not at all.Yet still he will none the less[*](Note the accumulation of particles in the Greek. Similarly in 619 B, Phaedo 59 D, 61 E, 62 B, 64 A, Parmen. 127 D, Demosth. xxiii. 101, De cor. 282, Pind. Pyth. iv. 64 A, Isoc. Peace 1, Aristot. De gen. et corr. 332 a 3, Iliad vii. 360.) imitate, though in every case he does not know in what way the thing is bad or good. But, as it seems, the thing he will imitate will be the thing that appears beautiful to the ignorant multitude.Why, what else?On this, then, as it seems, we are fairly agreed, that the imitator knows nothing worth mentioning of the things he imitates, but that imitation is a form of play,[*](Cf. on 536 C, p. 214, note b.) not to be taken seriously,[*](Cf. 608 A.) and that those who attempt tragic poetry, whether in iambics or heroic verse,[*](For ἐν ἔπεσι cf. 607 A, 379 A, Meno 95 D.) are all altogether imitators.By all means.In heaven’s name, then, this business of imitation is concerned with the third remove from truth, is it not?Yes.And now again, to what element[*](The antithesis of περί and πρός marks the transition.) in man is its function and potency related?Of what are you speaking?Of this: The same magnitude, I presume, viewed from near and from far[*](Cf. Protag. 356 A, 523 C.) does not appear equal.Why, no.And the same things appear bent and straight[*](Cf. Tennyson (The Higher Pantheism) For all we have power to see is a straight staff bent in a pool. For the illusions of sense, and measurement as a means of correcting them Cf. Phileb. 41 E-42 A f., 55 E, Protag. 356 C-D, Euthyphro 7 C.) to those who view them in water and out, or concave and convex, owing to similar errors of vision about colors, and there is obviously every confusion of this sort in our souls. And so scene-painting in its exploitation[*](ἐπιθεμένη helps to personify σκιαγραφία. Cf. Gorg. 464 C.) of this weakness of our nature falls nothing short of witchcraft,[*](Adam’s leaves no magic art untried is misleading. ἀπολείπειν is here used as in 504 C. For the idiomatic οὐδὲν ἀπολείπει see p. 200, note b, on 533 A.) and so do jugglery and many other such contrivances.True.And have not measuring and numbering and weighing[*](Cf. Xen. Mem. i. 1. 9.) proved to be most gracious aids to prevent the domination in our soul of the apparently[*](Cf. Protag. 356 D ἡ τοῦ φαινομένου δύναμις ) greater or less or more or heavier, and to give the control to that which has reckoned[*](λογισάμενον: Cf. Laws 644 D, Crito 46 B.) and numbered or even weighed?Certainly.But this surely would be the function[*](Cf. Vol. I. p. 36, note a. Of course some of the modern connotations of function are unknown to Plato.) of the part of the soul that reasons and calculates.[*](For λογιστικοῦ cf. on 439 D.)Why, yes, of that.And often when this has measured[*](See p. 448, note c, and my Platonism and the History of Science, p. 176.) and declares that certain things are larger or that some are smaller than the others or equal, there is at the same time an appearance of the contrary.Yes.And did we not say[*](436 B, Vol. I. p. 383.) that it is impossible for the same thing at one time to hold contradictory opinions about the same thing?And we were right in affirming that.

The part of the soul, then, that opines in contradiction of measurement could not be the same with that which conforms to it.Why, no.But, further, that which puts its trust in measurement and reckoning must be the best part of the soul.Surely.Then that which opposes it must belong to the inferior elements of the soul.Necessarily.This, then, was what I wished to have agreed upon when I said that poetry, and in general the mimetic art, produces a product that is far removed from truth in the accomplishment of its task, and associates with the part in us that is remote from intelligence, and is its companion and friend[*](Cf. 604 D, Phaedr. 253 D and E.) for no sound and true purpose.[*](Cf. Lysias ix. 4 ἐπὶ μηδενὶ ὑγιεῖ and for the idiom οὐδὲν ὑγιές on 523 B, p. 153, note f.)By all means, said he. Mimetic art, then, is an inferior thing cohabiting with an inferior and engendering inferior offspring.[*](Cf. 496 A, and on 489 D, p. 26, note b.) It seems so. Does that, said I, hold only for vision or does it apply also to hearing and to what we call poetry? Presumably, he said, to that also. Let us not, then, trust solely to the plausible analogy[*](Cf. Phaedo 92 D διὰ τῶν εἰκότων.) from painting, but let us approach in turn that part of the mind to which mimetic poetry appeals and see whether it is the inferior or the nobly serious part. So we must. Let us, then, put the question thus: Mimetic poetry, we say, imitates human beings acting under compulsion or voluntarily,[*](Cf. 399 A-B, Laws 655 D, 814 E ff., Aristot. Poet. 1448 A 1-2 ἐπεὶ δὲ μιμοῦνται οἱ μιμούμενοι πράττοντας ἀνάγκη δὲ τούτους ἢ σπουδαίους ἢ φαύλους εἶναι, ibid. 1449 b 36-37 f.) and as a result of their actions supposing themselves to have fared well or ill and in all this feeling either grief or joy. Did we find anything else but this? Nothing. Is a man, then, in all this of one mind with himself, or just as in the domain of sight there was faction and strife and he held within himself contrary opinions at the same time about the same things,[*](See What Plato Said, p. 505, on Gorg. 482 A-B.) so also in our actions there is division and strife[*](Cf. 554 D, and p. 394, note e, on 586 E.) of the man with himself? But I recall that there is no need now of our seeking agreement on this point, for in our former discussion[*](439 B ff.) we were sufficiently agreed that our soul at any one moment teems with countless such self-contradictions. Rightly, he said. Yes, rightly, said I; but what we then omitted[*](Plato sometimes pretends to remedy an omission or to correct himself by an afterthought. So in Book V. 449 B-C ff., and Tim. 65 C.) must now, I think, be set forth. What is that? he said. When a good and reasonable man, said I, experiences such a stroke of fortune as the loss of a son or anything else that he holds most dear, we said, I believe, then too,[*](387 D-E.) that he will bear it more easily than the other sort. Assuredly. But now let us consider this: Will he feel no pain, or, since that is impossible, shall we say that he will in some sort be moderate[*](This suggests the doctrine of μετριοπάθεια as opposed to the Stoic ἀπάθεια. Joel ii. 161 thinks the passage a polemic against Antisthenes. Seneca, Epist. xcix. 15 seems to agree with Plato rather than with the Stoics: inhumanitas est ista non virtus. So Plutarch, Cons. ad Apol. 3 (102 cf.). See also ibid. 22 (112 E-F). Cf. Horace, Odes ii. 3. 1 aequam memento rebus in arduis servare mentem, and also Laws 732 C, 960 A.) in his grief? That, he said, is rather the truth.

Tell me now this about him: Do you think he will be more likely to resist and fight against his grief when he is observed by his equals or when he is in solitude alone by himself?He will be much more restrained, he said, when he is on view. But when left alone, I fancy, he will permit himself many utterances which, if heard by another, would put him to shame, and will do many things which he would not consent to have another see him doing. So it is, he said. Now is it not reason and law that exhorts him to resist, while that which urges him to give way to his grief is the bare feeling itself? True. And where there are two opposite impulses[*](Cf. Laws 645 A, Phaedr. 238 C, and for the conflict in the soul also Rep. 439 B ff.) in a man at the same time about the same thing we say that there must needs be two things[*](The conflict proves that for practical purposes the soul has parts. Cf. 436 B ff.) in him. Of course. And is not the one prepared to follow the guidance of the law as the law leads and directs? How so? The law, I suppose, declares that it is best to keep quiet as far as possible in calamity and not to chafe and repine, because we cannot know what is really good and evil in such things[*](Cf. Apology, in fine.) and it advantages us nothing to take them hard, and nothing in mortal life is worthy of great concern,[*](Cf. Laws 803 B and Class. Phil. ix. p. 353, n. 3, Friedländer, Platon, i. p. 143.) and our grieving checks[*](Höffding, Outlines of Psychology, p. 99, refers to Saxo’s tale of the different effect which the news of the murder of Regner Lodbrog produced on his sons: he in whom the emotion was the weakest had the greatest energy for action.) the very thing we need to come to our aid as quickly as possible in such case. What thing, he said, do you mean? To deliberate,[*](Cf. Herod. i. 20 πρὸς τὸ παρεὸν βουλεύηται.) I said, about what has happened to us, and, as it were in the fall of the dice,[*](Cf. Eurip. Electra 639 and fr. 175 πρὸς τὸ πῖπτον, Iph. Aul. 1343 and Hippol. 718 πρὸς τὰ νῦν πεπτωκότα, Epictet. ii. 5. 3. See also Stallbaum ad loc.) to determine the movements of our affairs with reference to the numbers that turn up, in the way that reason indicates[*](Cf. 440 B, 607 B, Herod. i. 132.) would be the best, and, instead of stumbling like children, clapping one’s hands to the stricken spot[*](Cf. Demosthenes’ description of how barbarians box iv. 40 (51), ἀεὶ τῆς πληγῆς ἔχεται.) and wasting the time in wailing, ever to accustom the soul to devote itself at once to the curing of the hurt and the raising up of what has fallen, banishing threnody[*](Cf. Soph. Ajax 582 θρηνεῖν ἐπῳδὰς πρὸς τομῶντι πήματι with Ovid, Met. i. 190: sed immedicabile vulnus Ense recidendum est.) by therapy. That certainly, he said, would be the best way to face misfortune and deal with it. Then, we say, the best part of us is willing to conform to these precepts of reason. Obviously. And shall we not say that the part of us that leads us to dwell in memory on our suffering and impels us to lamentation, and cannot get enough of that sort of thing, is the irrational and idle part of us, the associate of cowardice[*](Cf. on 603 B, p. 450, note a.)? Yes, we will say that. And does not the fretful part of us present[*](ἔχει in the sense of involves, admits of, as frequently in Aristotle’s Metaphysics. ) many and varied occasions for imitation, while the intelligent and temperate disposition, always remaining approximately the same, is neither easy to imitate nor to be understood when imitated, especially by a nondescript mob assembled in the theater? For the representation imitates a type that is alien to them.

By all means.And is it not obvious that the nature of the mimetic poet is not related to this better part of the soul and his cunning is not framed[*](For πέπηγεν cf. 530 D.) to please it, if he is to win favor with the multitude, but is devoted to the fretful and complicated type of character because it is easy to imitate?It is obvious.This consideration, then, makes it right for us to proceed to lay hold of him and set him down as the counterpart[*](ἀντίστροφον is used as in Aristot. Rhet. 1354 a 1.) of the painter; for he resembles him in that his creations are inferior in respect of reality; and the fact that his appeal is to the inferior part of the soul and not to the best part is another point of resemblance. And so we may at last say that we should be justified in not admitting him into a well-ordered state, because he stimulates and fosters this element in the soul, and by strengthening it tends to destroy the rational part, just as when in a state[*](Cf. p. 412, note d.) one puts bad men in power and turns the city over to them and ruins the better sort. Precisely in the same manner we shall say that the mimetic poet sets up in each individual soul a vicious constitution by fashioning phantoms far removed from reality, and by currying favor with the senseless element that cannot distinguish the greater from the less, but calls the same thing now one, now the other.By all means.But we have not yet brought our chief accusation against it. Its power to corrupt, with rare exceptions, even the better sort is surely the chief cause for alarm.How could it be otherwise, if it really does that? Listen and reflect. I think you know that the very best of us, when we hear Homer[*](Cf. p. 420, note a, on 595 B-C.) or some other of the makers of tragedy imitating one of the heroes who is in grief,[*](For ἐν πένθει cf. Soph. El. 290, 846, Herod. i. 46.) and is delivering a long tirade in his lamentations or chanting and beating his breast, feel pleasure,[*](Cf. Phileb. 48 A.) and abandon ourselves and accompany the representation with sympathy and eagerness,[*](See the description in Ion 535 E, and Laws 800 D.) and we praise as an excellent poet the one who most strongly affects us in this way.I do know it, of course.But when in our own lives some affliction comes to us, you are also aware that we plume ourselves upon the opposite, on our ability to remain calm and endure, in the belief that this is the conduct of a man, and what we were praising in the theatre that of a woman.[*](This is qualified in 387 E-388 A by οὐδὲ ταύταις σπουδαίαις. Cf. also 398 E.)I do note that.Do you think, then, said I, that this praise is rightfully bestowed when, contemplating a character that we would not accept but would be ashamed of in ourselves, we do not abominate it but take pleasure and approve? No, by Zeus, he said, it does not seem reasonable.

Oh yes,[*](Cf. Vol. I. p. 509, note b, on 473 E.) said I, if you would consider it in this way. In what way? If you would reflect that the part of the soul that in the former case, in our own misfortunes,[*](Cf. Isoc. Panegyr. 168 for a different application.) was forcibly restrained, and that has hungered for tears and a good cry[*](This contains a hint of one possible meaning of the Aristotelian doctrine of κάθαρσις, Poet. 1449 b 27-28. Cf. κουφίζεσθαι μεθ’ ἡδονῆς Pol. 1342 a 14, and my review of Finsler, Platon u. d. Aristot. Poetik, Class. Phil. iii. p. 462. But the tone of the Platonic passage is more like that of Ruskin, Sesame and Lilies: And the human nature of us imperatively requiring awe and sorrow of some kind, for the noble grief we should have borne with our fellows, and the pure tears we should have wept with them, we gloat over the pathos of the police court and gather the night dew of the grave.) and satisfaction, because it is its nature to desire these things, is the element in us that the poets satisfy and delight, and that the best element in our nature, since it has never been properly educated by reason or even by habit, then relaxes its guard[*](This anticipates the idea of the censor in modern psychology.) over the plaintive part, inasmuch as this is contemplating the woes of others and it is no shame to it to praise and pity another who, claiming to be a good man, abandons himself to excess in his grief; but it thinks this vicarious pleasure is so much clear gain,[*](Cf. τῇ δ’ ἀσφαλείᾳ κερδανεῖς Eurip. Herc. Fur. 604, which is frequently misinterpreted; Herod. viii. 60. 3.) and would not consent to forfeit it by disdaining the poem altogether. That is, I think, because few are capable of reflecting that what we enjoy in others will inevitably react upon ourselves.[*](For the psychology Cf. Laws 656 B and on 385 C-D.) For after feeding fat[*](Cf. 442 A.) the emotion of pity there, it is not easy to restrain it in our own sufferings. Most true, he said. Does not the same principle apply to the laughable,[*](Cf. Vol. I. p. 211, note f, La Bruyère, Des Ouvrages de l’esprit (Oeuvres, ed. M. G. Servois, i. p. 137): D’où vient que l’on rit si librement au théâtre, et que l’on a honte d’y pleurer?) namely,that if in comic representations,[*](In the Laws 816 D-E Plato says that the citizens must witness such performances since the serious cannot be learned without the laughable, nor anything without its opposite; but they may not take part in them. That is left to slaves and foreigners. Cf. also Vol. I. p. 239, note B, on 396 E.) or for that matter in private talk,[*](I.e. as opposed to public performances. Cf. Euthydem. 305 D ἐν δὲ ἰδίοις λόγοις, Theaet. 177 B, Soph. 232 C ἔν γε ταῖς ἰδίαις συνουσίαις, and Soph. 222 C προσομιλητικήν with Quintil. iii. 4. 4. Wilamowitz, Antigonos von Karystos, p. 285, fantastically says that it means prose and refers to Sophron. He compares 366 E. But see Laws 935 B-C.) you take intense pleasure in buffooneries that you would blush to practise yourself, and do not detest them as base, you are doing the same thing as in the case of the pathetic? For here again what your reason, for fear of the reputation of buffoonery, restrained in yourself when it fain would play the clown, you release in turn, and so, fostering its youthful impudence, let yourself go so far that often ere you are aware you become yourself a comedian in private. Yes, indeed, he said. And so in regard to the emotions of sex and anger, and all the appetites and pains and pleasures of the soul which we say accompany all our actions,[*](Cf. 603 C.) the effect of poetic imitation is the same. For it waters[*](Cf. 550 B.) and fosters these feelings when what we ought to do is to dry them up, and it establishes them as our rulers when they ought to be ruled, to the end that we may be better and happier men instead of worse and more miserable. I cannot deny it, said he. Then, Glaucon, said I, when you meet encomiasts of Homer who tell us that this poet has been the educator of Hellas,[*](Isocrates, Panegyr. 159, says Homer was given a place in education because he celebrated those who fought against the barbarians. Cf. also Aristoph. Frogs 1034 ff.) and that for the conduct and refinement[*](The same conjunction is implied in Protagoras’s teaching, Protag. 318 E and 317 B.) of human life he is worthy of our study and devotion, and that we should order our entire lives by the guidance of this poet, we must love[*](For the μέν Cf. Symp. 180 E, Herod. vii. 102.) and salute them as doing the best they can,[*](The condescending tone is that of Euthydem. 306 C-D.) and concede to them that Homer is the most poetic[*](Aristotle, Poet. 1453 a 29, says that Euripides is τραγικώτατος of poets.) of poets and the first of tragedians,[*](Cf. 605 C, 595 B-C.) but we must know the truth, that we can admit no poetry into our city save only hymns to the gods and the praises of good men.[*](Cf. Laws 801 D-E, 829 C-D, 397 C-D, 459 E, 468 D, Friedländer, Platon, i. p. 142, and my review of Pater, Plato and Platonism, in The Dial, 14 (1893) p. 211.)

For if you grant admission to the honeyed muse[*](Cf. Laws 802 C τῆς γλυκείας Μούσης. See Finsler, Platon u. d. aristot. Poetik, pp. 61-62.) in lyric or epic, pleasure and pain will be lords of your city instead of law and that which shall from time to time have approved itself to the general reason as the best.Most true, he said. Let us, then, conclude our return to the topic of poetry and our apology, and affirm that we really had good grounds then for dismissing her from our city, since such was her character. For reason constrained us.[*](See on 604 C, p. 455, note h.) And let us further say to her, lest she condemn us for harshness and rusticity, that there is from of old a quarrel[*](For the quarrel between philosophy and poetry Cf. Laws 967 C-D, Friedländer, Platon, ii. p. 136. It still goes on in modern times.) between philosophy and poetry. For such expressions as

the yelping hound barking at her master and mighty in the idle babble

of fools,

the mob that masters those who are too wise for their own good,