Republic

But as to the violation of the oaths[*]( Iliad 4.69 ff.) and the truce by Pandarus, if anyone affirms it to have been brought about by the action of Athena and Zeus, we will not approve, nor that the strife and contention[*](ἔριν τε καὶ κρίσιν is used in Menexenus 237 C of the contest of the gods for Attica. Here it is generally taken of the Theomachy, Iliad xx. 1074, which begins with the summons of the gods to a council by Themis at the command of Zeus. It has also been understood, rather improbably, of the judgement of Paris.) of the gods was the doing of Themis and Zeus; nor again must we permit our youth to hear what Aeschylus says—

1. A god implants the guilty cause in men
2. When he would utterly destroy a house,

as, for example, a body by food and drink and toil, and plants[*](Cf. Laws 765 E.) by the heat of the sun and winds and similar influences—is it not true that the healthiest and strongest is least altered?Certainly.And is it not the soul that is bravest and most intelligent, that would be least disturbed[*](ταράξειε suggests the ἀταραξία of the sage in the later schools.) and altered by any external affection?Yes.And, again, it is surely true of all composite implements, edifices, and habiliments, by parity of reasoning, that those which are well made and in good condition are least liable to be changed by time and other influences.That is so.It is universally[*](πᾶν δή generalizes from the preceding exhaustive enumeration of cases. Cf. 382 E, Parmenides 139 A.) true, then, that that which is in the best state by nature or art or both admits least alteration by something else.So it seems.But God, surely, and everything that belongs to God is in every way in the best possible state.Of course.From this point of view, then, it would be least of all likely that there would be many forms in God.Least indeed.But would he transform and alter himself?Obviously, he said, if he is altered. Then does he change himself for the better and to something fairer, or for the worse[*](So Aristotle Met. 1074 b 26.) and to something uglier than himself? It must necessarily, said he, be for the worse if he is changed. For we surely will not say that God is deficient in either beauty or excellence. Most rightly spoken, said I. And if that were his condition, do you think, Adeimantus, that any one god or man would of his own will worsen himself in any way? Impossible, he replied. It is impossible then, said I, even for a god to wish to alter himself, but, as it appears, each of them being the fairest and best possible abides[*](Cf. Tim. 42 E ἔμενεν, which suggested the Neoplatonic and Miltonic paradox that the divine abides even when it goes forth.) for ever simply in his own form. An absolutely necessary conclusion to my thinking. No poet then, I said, my good friend, must be allowed to tell us that

1. The gods, in the likeness of strangers,
2. Many disguises assume as they visit the cities of mortals.

1. for the life-giving sons of Inachus, the Argive stream.

Consider, said I; would a god wish to deceive, or lie, by presenting in either word or action what is only appearance? I don’t know, said he. Don’t you know, said I, that the veritable lie, if the expression is permissible, is a thing that all gods and men abhor? What do you mean? he said. This, said I, that falsehood in the most vital part of themselves, and about their most vital concerns, is something that no one willingly accepts, but it is there above all that everyone fears it. I don’t understand yet either. That is because you suspect me of some grand meaning, I said; but what I mean is, that deception in the soul about realities, to have been deceived and to be blindly ignorant and to have and hold the falsehood there, is what all men would least of all accept, and it is in that case that they loathe it most of all. Quite so, he said. But surely it would be most wholly right, as I was just now saying, to describe this as in very truth falsehood—ignorance namely in the soul of the man deceived. For the falsehood in words is a copy[*](Cf. Aristotle De Interp. 1. 12 ἔστι μὲν οὖν τὰ ἐν τῇ φωνῇ τῶν ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ παθημάτων σύμβολα. Cf. also Cratylus 428 D, 535 E, Laws730 C, Bacon, Of Truth: But it is not the lie that passes through the mind but the lie that sinketh in and settleth in it that doth the hurt.) of the affection in the soul, an after-rising image of it and not an altogether unmixed falsehood. Is not that so? By all means. Essential falsehood, then, is hated not only by gods but by men. I agree. But what of the falsehood in words, when and for whom is it serviceable so as not to merit abhorrence? Will it not be against enemies? And when any of those whom we call friends owing to madness or folly attempts to do some wrong, does it not then become useful to avert the evil—as a medicine? And also in the fables of which we were just now speaking owing to our ignorance of the truth about antiquity, we liken the false to the true as far as we may and so make it edifying.[*](Cf. Phaedrus 245 A μυρία τῶν παλαιῶν ἔργα κοσμοῦσα τοὺς ἐπιγιγνομένους παιδεύει, Isocrates xii. 149 and Livy’s Preface. For χρήσιμον Cf. Politicus 274 E. We must not infer that Plato is trying to sophisticate away the moral virtue of truth-telling.) We most certainly do, he said. Tell me, then, on which of these grounds falsehood would be serviceable to God. Would he because of his ignorance of antiquity make false likenesses of it? An absurd supposition, that, he said. Then there is no lying poet in God. I think not. Well then, would it be through fear of his enemies that he would lie? Far from it. Would it be because of the folly or madness of his friends? Nay, no fool or madman is a friend of God. Then there is no motive for God to deceive. None. From every point of view[*](Generalizing from the exhaustive classification that precedes.) the divine and the divinity are free from falsehood. By all means.

Then God is altogether simple and true in deed and word, and neither changes himself nor deceives others by visions or words or the sending of signs in waking or in dreams.I myself think so, he said, when I hear you say it. You concur then, I said, this as our second norm or canon for speech and poetry about the gods,—that they are neither wizards in shape-shifting nor do they mislead us by falsehoods in words or deed? I concur. Then, though there are many other things that we praise in Homer, this we will not applaud, the sending of the dream by Zeus[*](Hom. Il. 2.1-34. This apparent attribution of falsehood to Zeus was an Homeric problem which some solved by a change of accent from δίδομεν to διδόμεν. Cf. Aristotle Poetics 1462 a 22.) to Agamemnon, nor shall we approve of Aeschylus when his Thetis[*](Cf. Aeschylus Frag. 350. Possibly from the Ὅπλων κπίσις.) avers that Apollo singing at her wedding,

foretold the happy fortunes of her issue

1. Their days prolonged, from pain and sickness free,
2. And rounding out the tale of heaven’s blessings,
3. Raised the proud paean, making glad my heart.
4. And I believed that Phoebus’ mouth divine,
5. Filled with the breath of prophecy, could not lie.
6. But he himself, the singer, himself who sat
7. At meat with us, himself who promised all,
8. Is now himself the slayer of my son.

Concerning the gods then, said I, this is the sort of thing that we must allow or not allow them to hear from childhood up, if they are to honor the gods[*](We may, if we choose, see here a reference to the virtue of piety, which some critics fancifully suppose was eliminated by the Euthyphro. Cf. Unity of Plato’s Thought, note 58.) and their fathers and mothers, and not to hold their friendship with one another in light esteem. That was our view and I believe it right. What then of this? If they are to be brave, must we not extend our prescription to include also the sayings that will make them least likely to fear death? Or do you suppose that anyone could ever become brave who had that dread in his heart? No indeed, I do not, he replied. And again if he believes in the reality of the underworld and its terrors,[*](For the idea that death is no evil Cf. Apology, in fine, Laws 727 D, 828 D, and 881 A, where, however, the fear of hell is approved as a deterrent.) do you think that any man will be fearless of death and in battle will prefer death to defeat and slavery? By no means. Then it seems we must exercise supervision[*](Cf. 377 B.) also, in the matter of such tales as these, over those who undertake to supply them and request them not to dispraise in this undiscriminating fashion the life in Hades but rather praise it, since what they now tell us is neither true nor edifying to men who are destined to be warriors. Yes, we must, he said. Then, said I, beginning with this verse we will expunge everything of the same kind:

1. Liefer were I in the fields up above to be serf to another
2. Tiller of some poor plot which yields him a scanty subsistence,
3. Than to be ruler and king over all the dead who have perished,

1. Lest unto men and immortals the homes of the dead be uncovered
2. Horrible, noisome, dank, that the gods too hold in abhorrence,

1. Ah me! so it is true that e’en in the dwellings of Hades
2. Spirit there is and wraith, but within there is no understanding,

1. Sole to have wisdom and wit, but the others are shadowy phantoms,

1. Forth from his limbs unwilling his spirit flitted to Hades,
2. Wailing its doom and its lustihood lost and the May of its manhood,

and:

1. Under the earth like a vapor vanished the gibbering soul,

1. Even as bats in the hollow of some mysterious grotto
2. Fly with a flittermouse shriek when one of them falls from the cluster
3. Whereby they hold to the rock and are clinging the one to the other,
4. Flitted their gibbering ghosts.

Then we should be right in doing away with the lamentations of men of note and in attributing them to women,[*](Cf. Plat. Rep. 398e.) and not to the most worthy of them either, and to inferior men, in that those whom we say we are breeding for the guardianship of the land may disdain to act like these.We should be right, said he. Again then we shall request Homer and the other poets not to portray Achilles, the son of a goddess, as,

1. Lying now on his side, and then again on his back,
2. And again on his face,

Drifting distraught on the shore of the waste unharvested ocean,

clutching with both hands the sooty dust and strewing it over his head,

1. Calling aloud unto each, by name to each man appealing.

1. Ah, woe is me, woeful mother who bore to my sorrow the bravest,

1. Out on it, dear to my heart is the man whose pursuit around Troy-town
2. I must behold with my eyes while my spirit is grieving within me,

1. Ah, woe is me! of all men to me is Sarpedon the dearest,

1. Fated to fall by the hands of Patroclus, Menoitius’ offspring.