Republic

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.