Republic

If, then, we are to use the women for the same things as the men, we must also teach them the same things.Yes.Now music together with gymnastic was the training we gave the men.Yes.Then we must assign these two arts to the women also and the offices of war and employ them in the same way.It would seem likely from what you say, he replied. Perhaps, then, said I, the contrast with present custom[*](Reformers always denounce this source of wit while conservative satirists maintain that ridicule is a test of truth. Cf. e.g. >Renan, Avenir de la Science, p. 439 Le premier pas dans la carrière philosophique est de se cuirasser contre le ridicule, and Lucian, Piscator 14 No harm can be done by a joke; that on the contrary, whatever is beautiful shines brighter . . . like gold cleansed, Harmon in Loeb translation, iii. 22. There was a literature for and against custom (sometimes called συνήθεια) of which there are echoes in Cicero’s use of consuetudo, Acad. ii. 75, De off. i. 148, De nat. deor. i. 83.) would make much in our proposals look ridiculous if our words[*](ᾖ λέγεται: cf. on 389 D.) are to be realized in fact. Yes, indeed, he said. What then, said I, is the funniest thing you note in them? Is it not obviously the women exercising unclad in the palestra together with the men, not only the young, but even the older, like old men in gymnasiums,[*](Cf. Theaetetus 162 B, and the ὀψιμαθής or late learner in Theophrastus’ Characters xxvii. 14 Loeb. Euripides Andromache 596 ff. denounces the light attire of Spartan women when exercising.) when, though wrinkled and unpleasant to look at, they still persist in exercising? Yes, on my word, he replied, it would seem ridiculous under present conditions. Then, said I, since we have set out to speak our minds, we must not fear all the jibes[*](Cf. Propert. iv. 13 Muller.) with which the wits would greet so great a revolution, and the sort of things they would say about gymnastics and culture, and most of all about the bearing of arms and the bestriding of horses. You’re right, he said. But since we have begun we must go forward to the rough part of our law,[*](For a variation of this image cf. 568 D.) after begging these fellows not to mind their own business[*](Plato plays on his own favorite phrase. The proper business of the wit is to raise a laugh. Cf. Symposium 189 B.) but to be serious, and reminding them that it is not long since the Greeks thought it disgraceful and ridiculous, as most of the barbarians[*](Cf. Thucydides i. 6, Herodotus i. 10. Sikes in Anthropolgy and the Classics says this was borrowed from Thucydides, whom Wilamowitz says Plato never read. Cf. Dio Chrys. xiii. 226 M. For ἐξ οὗ cf. Demosthenes iv. 3, Isocrates v. 47.) do now, for men to be seen naked. And when the practice of athletics began, first with the Cretans and then with the Lacedaemonians, it was open to the wits of that time to make fun of these practices, don’t you think so? I do. But when, I take it, experience showed that it is better to strip than to veil all things of this sort, then the laughter of the eyes[*](Lit. what (seemed) laughable to (in) the eyes.) faded away before that which reason revealed to be best, and this made it plain that he talks idly who deems anything else ridiculous but evil, and who tries to raise a laugh by looking to any other pattern of absurdity than that of folly and wrong or sets up any other standard of the beautiful as a mark for his seriousness than the good. Most assuredly, said he.

Then is not the first thing that we have to agree upon with regard to these proposals whether they are possible or not? And we must throw open the debate[*](Cf. 607 D δοῖμεν . . . λόγον.) to anyone who wishes either in jest or earnest to raise the question whether female human nature is capable of sharing with the male all tasks or none at all, or some but not others,[*](Plato as elsewhere asks whether it is true of all, some, or none. So of the commingling of ideas in Sophist 251 D. Aristotle (Politics 1260 b 38) employs the same would-be exhaustive method.) and under which of these heads this business of war falls. Would not this be that best beginning which would naturally and proverbially lead to the best end[*](ἀρχόμενος . . . τελευτήσειν: an overlooked reference to a proverb also overlooked by commentators on Pindar, Pyth. i. 35. Cf. Pindar, fr. 108 A Loeb, Laws 775 E, Sophocles, fr. 831 (Pearson), Antiphon the Sophist, fr. 60 (Diels).)?Far the best, he said. Shall we then conduct the debate with ourselves in behalf of those others[*](This pleading the opponent’s case for him is common in Plato. Cf. especially the plea for Protagoras in Theaetetus 166-167.) so that the case of the other side may not be taken defenceless and go by default[*](Apparently a mixture of military and legal phraseology. Cf. ἐκπέρσῃ in Protagoras 340 A, Iliad v. 140 τὰ δ’ ἐρῆμα φοβεῖται, and the legal phrase ἐρήμην καταδιαιτᾶν or οφλεῖν.)? Nothing hinders, he said. Shall we say then in their behalf: There is no need, Socrates and Glaucon, of others disputing against you, for you yourselves at the beginning of the foundation of your city agreed[*](ὡμολογεῖτε: cf. 369 E f. For κατὰ φύσιν cf. 370 C and 456 C. The apparent emphasis of φύσις in this book is of little significance. Cf. Laws, passim.) that each one ought to mind as his own business the one thing for which he was fitted by nature? We did so agree, I think; certainly! Can it be denied then that there is by nature a great difference between men and women? Surely there is. Is it not fitting, then, that a different function should be appointed for each corresponding to this difference of nature? Certainly. How, then, can you deny that you are mistaken and in contradiction with yourselves when you turn around and affirm that the men and the women ought to do the same thing, though their natures are so far apart? Can you surprise me with an answer to that question? Not easily on this sudden challenge, he replied: but I will and do beg you to lend your voice to the plea in our behalf, whatever it may be. These and many similar difficulties, Glaucon, said I, I foresaw and feared, and so shrank from touching on the law concerning the getting and breeding of women and children. It does not seem an easy thing, by heaven, he said, no, by heaven. No, it is not, said I; but the fact is that whether one tumbles into a little diving-pool or plump into the great sea he swims all the same. By all means. Then we, too, must swim and try to escape out of the sea[*](Cf. the πέλαγος τῶν λόγων Protagoras 338 A. Similarly Sidney Smith: cut his cable, and spread his enormous canvas, and launch into the wide sea of reasoning eloquence.) of argument in the hope that either some dolphin[*](An allusion to the story of Arion and the dolphin in Herodotus i. 24, as ὑπολαβεῖν perhaps proves. For ἄπορον cf. 378 A.) will take us on its back or some other desperate rescue. So it seems, he said. Come then, consider, said I, if we can find a way out. We did agree that different natures should have differing pursuits and that the nature of men and women differ. And yet now we affirm that these differing natures should have the same pursuits. That is the indictment. It is.