Str. Just as the captain of a ship keeps watch for what is at any moment for the good of the vessel and the sailors, not by writing rules, but by making his science his law, and thus preserves his fellow voyagers, so may not a right government be established in the same way by men who could rule by this principle, making science more powerful than the laws? And whatever the wise rulers do, they can commit no error, so long as they maintain one great principle and by always dispensing absolute justice to them with wisdom and science are able to preserve the citizens and make them better than they were, so far as that is possible. Is not this true?

Y. Soc. There is no denying the truth of what you have just said.

Str. And those other statements cannot be denied, either.

Y. Soc. What statements?

Str. That no great number of men, whoever they may be, could ever acquire political science and be able to administer a state with wisdom, but our one right form of government must be sought in some small number or one person, and all other forms are merely, as we said before, more or less successful imitations of that.

Y. Soc. What do you mean by that? I did not understand about the imitations a little while ago, either.

Str. And yet it is quite a serious matter if after stirring up this question we drop it and do not go on and show the error which is committed in relation to it nowadays.

Y. Soc. What is the error?

Str. I will tell you what we must investigate; it is not at all familiar or easy to see, but let us try to grasp it nevertheless. Tell me this: Assuming that the form of government we have described is the only right form, don’t you see that the other forms must employ its written laws if they are to be preserved by doing that which is approved of nowadays, although it is not perfectly right?

Y. Soc. What is not perfectly right?

Str. That no citizen shall dare to do anything contrary to the laws, and that he who does shall be punished by death and the most extreme penalties. And this is perfectly right and good as a second choice, as soon as you depart from the first form of which we were just speaking. Now let us tell in some detail how this which we called the second choice comes about. Shall we do so?

Y. Soc. By all means.

Str. Let us return once more to the images which we always have to use in portraying kingly rulers.

Y. Soc. What images?

Str. The noble captain of a ship and the physician who is worth as much as many others. Cf. Hom. Il. 12.514: ἰητρὸς γὰρ ἀνὴρ πολλῶν ἀντάξιος ἄλλων. The image of the physician was used above, 293. The image of the captain (for the Greek κυβερνήτης had an importance commensurate with that of the captain, rather than of the pilot, in modern times) has just been used. See also Plat. Rep. 6.488 A; Plat. Laws 12.963 B. Let us make a simile of them and use it to help us to discover something.

Y. Soc. What is your simile?

Str. Now consider what comes next. When the year of office has passed for each set of rulers, there will have to be sessions of courts in which the judges are chosen by lot either from a selected list of the rich or from the whole people, and the rulers will have to be brought before these courts and examined as to their conduct in office, and anyone who pleases can bring against the captains an accusation for failure to command the ships during the year in accordance with the written laws or the ancestral customs, and similarly against the physicians for their treatment of the sick; and if any of them is found guilty, the court shall decide what his punishment or his fine shall be.

Y. Soc. Surely anyone who consents voluntarily to hold office under such conditions would richly deserve any penalty or fine that might be imposed.

Str. And then, in addition to all this, there will have to be a law that if anyone is found to be investigating the art of pilotage or navigation or the subject of health and true medical doctrine about winds and things hot and cold, contrary to the written rules, or to be indulging in any speculation whatsoever on such matters, he shall in the first place not be called a physician or a ship captain, but a star-gazer, This passage obviously refers to the trial of Socrates. The word μετέωρα was used by those who made all sorts of general accusations against Socrates (see Plat. Apol. 18 B, 19 B, with its reference to the of Aristophanes), and the reference of the words διαφθείροντα ἄλλους νεωτέρους to the accusation brought against him by Miletus, Anytus, and Lycon (Plat. Apol. 24 C: φησὶ γὰρ δὴ τοὺς νέους ἀδικεῖν με διαφθείροντα) is perfectly plain. a kind of loquacious sophist, and secondly anyone who is properly qualified may bring an accusation against him and hale him into court for corrupting the young and persuading them to attack the arts of navigation and medicine in opposition to the laws and to govern the ships and the sick according to their own will; and if he is found to be so persuading either young or old contrary to the laws and written rules, he shall suffer the most extreme penalties. Nothing, they say, ought to be wiser than the laws; for no one is ignorant of medicine and the laws of health or of the pilot’s art and navigation, since anyone who pleases can learn the existing written rules and ancestral customs. Now if these regulations which I speak of were to be applied to these sciences, Socrates, and to strategy and every part of the entire art of hunting and to painting or every kind of imitation and to carpentry including every kind of utensil-making, or even to husbandry and all the art that is concerned with plants, or if we were to see an art of horse-breeding conducted by written rules, or herdsmanship in general or prophecy or everything that is included in the art of serving, or draught-playing or the whole science of number, whether arithmetic or plane geometry or solid geometry or problems of motion—what would you think of carrying on all these in such a way, by written rules and not by knowledge?

Y. Soc. Clearly all the arts would be utterly ruined, nor could they ever rise again, through the operation of the law prohibiting investigation; and so life, which is hard enough now, would then become absolutely unendurable.

Str. Here is a further point. If we ordained that each of the aforesaid arts must be carried on by written rules and that the observance of our written rules be under the charge of the man who is elected or chosen by lot, but he should disregard the written rules and for the sake of some gain or to do a favor to some one should try to act contrary to them, without possessing any knowledge, would not this be a greater evil than the former?

Y. Soc. Most assuredly.

Str. Such states, then, it seems, if they are to imitate well, so far as possible, that true form of government— by a single ruler who rules with science—must never do anything in contravention of their existing written laws and ancestral customs.

Y. Soc. You are quite right.

Str. Then whenever the rich imitate this government, we call such a state an aristocracy; and when they disregard the laws, we call it an oligarchy.

Y. Soc. Yes, I think we do.

Str. And again, when one man rules according to laws and imitates the scientific ruler, we call him a king, making no distinction in name between the single ruler who rules by science and him who rules by opinion if they both rule in accordance with laws.

Y. Soc. Yes, I think we do.

Str. Accordingly, if one man who is really scientific rules, he will assuredly be called by the same name, king, and by no other; and so the five names of what are now called the forms of government have become only one. What are called five distinct forms of government are resolved into one—the one right form of which all others are imitations (297 C). This is to be sought in some small number or one person (ibid.). We have found it in the really scientific monarchy, and the other so-called forms of government, being merely imitations of this, require no names of their own.

Y. Soc. So it seems, at least.

Str. But when a single ruler acts in accordance with neither laws nor customs, but claims, in imitation of the scientific ruler, that whatever is best must be done, even though it be contrary to the written laws, and this imitation is inspired by desire and ignorance, is not such a ruler to be called in every instance a tyrant?

Y. Soc. Certainly.

Str. Thus, we say, the tyrant has arisen, and the king and oligarchy and aristocracy and democracy, because men are not contented with that one perfect ruler, and do not believe that there could ever be any one worthy of such power or willing and able by ruling with virtue and knowledge to dispense justice and equity rightly to all, but that he will harm and kill and injure any one of us whom he chooses on any occasion, since they admit that if such a man as we describe should really arise, he would be welcomed and would continue to dwell among them, directing to their weal as sole ruler a perfectly right form of government.

Y. Soc. Certainly.

Str. But, as the case now stands, since, as we claim, no king is produced in our states who is, like the ruler of the bees in their hives, by birth pre-eminently fitted from the beginning in body and mind, we are obliged, as it seems, to follow in the track of the perfect and true form of government by coming together and making written laws.

Y. Soc. Yes, I suppose we are.

Str. Can we wonder, then, Socrates, at all the evils that arise and are destined to arise in such kinds of government, when they are based upon such a foundation, and must conduct their affairs in accordance with written laws and with customs, without knowledge? For every one can see that any other art built upon such a foundation would ruin all its works that are so produced. Ought we not rather to wonder at the stability that inheres in the state? For states have labored under such conditions for countless ages, nevertheless some of them are lasting and are not overthrown. Many, to be sure, like ships that founder at sea, are destroyed, have been destroyed, and will be destroyed hereafter, through the worthlessness of their captains and crews who have the greatest ignorance of the greatest things, men who have no knowledge of statesmanship, but think they have in every respect most perfect knowledge of this above all other sciences.

Y. Soc. Very true.

Str. Is it, then, our duty to see which of these not right forms of government is the least difficult to live with, though all are difficult, and which is the most oppressive, although this is somewhat aside from the subject we had proposed for ourselves? On the whole, however, perhaps all of us have some such motive in mind in all that we are doing.

Y. Soc. Yes, it is our duty, of course.

Str. By the same method I think all that is different and alien and incompatible has now been eliminated by us from the science of statesmanship, and what is precious and akin to it is left. Herein are included the arts of the general and of the judge and that kind of oratory which partakes of the kingly art because it persuades men to justice and thereby helps to steer the ship of state. Now in what way shall we most easily eliminate these and show him whom we seek alone by himself and undisguised?

Y. Soc. Clearly we must do this somehow.

Str. Then if it is a question of trying, he will be shown. But I think we had better try to disclose him by means of music. Please answer my question.

Y. Soc. What is it?

Str. Then the kingly process of weaving must be described, its nature, the manner in which it combines the threads, and the kind of web it produces.

Y. Soc. Evidently.

Str. It has, apparently, become necessary, after all, to explain a difficult matter.

Y. Soc. But certainly the explanation must be made.

Str. It is difficult, for the assertion that one part of virtue is in a way at variance with another sort of virtue may very easily be assailed by those who appeal to popular opinion in contentious arguments.

Y. Soc. I do not understand.

Str. I will say it again in another way. I suppose you believe that courage The word ἀνδρεία has a much wider meaning than the English courage. Like the Latin virtus, it embraces all qualities which are desirable in a perfect man, especially the more active and positive virtues. When applied to one particular kind of virtue it is applied to courage, but throughout this discussion it is used in the wider sense, for which there is no single English equivalent. is one part of virtue.

Y. Soc. Certainly.

Str. And, of course, that self-restraint is different from courage, but is also a part of virtue of which courage is a part.

Y. Soc. Yes.

Str. Now I must venture to utter a strange doctrine about them.

Y. Soc. What is it?

Str. That, in a way, they are in a condition of great hostility and opposition to each other in many beings.

Y. Soc. What do you mean?

Str. Something quite unusual; for, you know, all the parts of virtue are usually said to be friendly to one another.

Y. Soc. Yes.

Str. Now shall we pay careful attention and see whether this is so simple, or, quite the contrary, there is in some respects a variance between them and their kin?

Y. Soc. Yes; please tell how we shall investigate the question.

Str. Among all the parts we must look for those which we call excellent but place in two opposite classes.

Y. Soc. Say more clearly what you mean.

Str. Acuteness and quickness, whether in body or soul or vocal utterance, whether they are real or exist in such likenesses as music and graphic art produce in imitation of them—have you never yourself praised one of them or heard them praised by others?

Y. Soc. Yes, of course.

Str. And do you remember in what way they praise them as occasion offers?

Y. Soc. Not in the least.

Str. I wonder if I can express to you in words what I have in mind.