Laws

Ath. The method of our legislation requires that we should deal next with the judicial proceedings connected with all the transactions hitherto described. The matters which involve such proceedings have been stated[*](Plat. Laws 842e.) in part (those, namely, which concern farming and all industries dependent thereon), but we have not stated as yet the most important of such matters; so our next step must be to state them in full, enumerating in detail what penalty must attach to each offence, and before what court it must be tried.

Clin. True.

Ath. It is, in a sense, a shameful thing to make all those laws that we are proposing to make in a State like ours, which is, as we say, to be well managed and furnished with all that is right for the practice of virtue. In such a State, the mere supposition that any citizen will grow up to share in the worst forms of depravity practiced in other States, so that one must forestall and denounce by law the appearance of any such character, and, in order to warn them off or punish them, enact laws against them, as though they were certain to appear,—this, as I have said, is in a sense shameful. But we are not now legislating, like the ancient lawgivers, for heroes and sons of gods,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 713b.)—when, as the story goes, both the lawgivers themselves and their subjects were men of divine descent: we, on the contrary, are but mortal men legislating for the seed of men, and therefore it is permitted to us to dread lest any of our citizens should prove horny-hearted and attain to such hardness of temper as to be beyond melting; and just as those horn-struck[*](i.e. hard-shelled; seeds struck by a beast’s horn were vulgarly supposed to become horny and unfit for cooking.) beans cannot be softened by boiling on the fire, so these men should be uninfluenced by laws, however powerful. So, for the sake of these gentlemen, no very gentle law shall be stated first concerning temple-robbery, in case anyone dares to commit this crime. That a rightly nurtured citizen should be infected with this disease is a thing that we should neither desire nor expect; but such attempts might often be made by their servants, and by foreigners or foreigners’ slaves.

Ath. Chiefly, then, on their account, and also as a precaution against the general infirmity of human nature, I will state the law about temple-robbing, and all other crimes of a like kind which are hard, if not impossible, to cure. And, in accordance with our rule as already approved,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 718b.) we must prefix to all such laws preludes as brief as possible. By way of argument and admonition one might address in the following terms the man whom an evil desire urges by day and wakes up at night, driving him to rob some sacred object— My good man, the evil force that now moves you and prompts you to go temple-robbing is neither of human origin nor of divine, but it is some impulse bred of old in men from ancient wrongs unexpiated, which courses round wreaking ruin; and it you must guard against with all your strength. How you must thus guard, now learn. When there comes upon you any such intention, betake yourself to the rites of guilt-averting, betake yourself as suppliant to the shrines of the curse-lifting deities, betake yourself to the company of the men who are reputed virtuous; and thus learn, partly from others, partly by self-instruction, that every man is bound to honor what is noble and just; but the company of evil men shun wholly, and turn not back. And if it be so that by thus acting your disease grows less, well; but if not, then deem death the more noble way, and quit yourself of life. As we chant this prelude to those who purpose all these unholy deeds, destructive of civic life, the law itself we must leave unvoiced[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 871a.) for him who obeys; but for him who disobeys we must suffer the law, following on the prelude, to utter aloud this chant: Whosoever is caught robbing a temple, if he be a foreigner or a slave, his curse shall be branded on his forehead and on his hands, and he shall be scourged with so many stripes as the judges decree, and he shall be cast out naked beyond the borders of the country; for, after paying this penalty, he might perchance be disciplined into a better life. For no penalty that is legally imposed aims at evil, but it effects, as a rule, one or other of two results,— it makes the person who suffers it either better or less bad.[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 862d., Plat. Laws 934a.) But if any citizen is ever convicted of such an act,—that is, of committing some great and infamous wrong against gods, parents, or State—the judge shall regard him as already incurable, reckoning that, in spite of all the training and nurture he has had from infancy, he has not refrained from the worst iniquity.

Ath. For him the penalty is death, the least of evils; and, moreover, by serving as an example, he will benefit others, when himself disgraced and removed from sight beyond the borders of the country; but his children and family, if they shun their father’s ways, shall be honored, and honorable mention shall be made of them, seeing that they have done well and bravely in leaving the ways of vice for those of virtue. That the goods of any such criminal should be confiscated would not be fitting in a State in which the allotments must remain always identical and equal in number. Whosoever is held to have done a wrong which deserves a money-fine must pay the fine exacted when the fine comes within the limits of the surplus he has over when his allotment has been equipped, but not what exceeds this: the precise facts in such cases the Law-wardens must find out from the registers,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 745a; Plat. Laws 745b.) and they must inform the judges of the true state of each case, in order to prevent any allotment falling out of cultivation through lack of money. And if any man is held to deserve a larger fine, in case none of his friends are willing to go bail or, by clubbing together, to pay the sum and set him free, then we must punish him by long imprisonment, of a public kind, and by measures of degradation; but no one shall be absolutely outlawed for any single crime, even though he be banished from the country.[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 865e ff., Plat. Laws 877c ff.) The punishments to be inflicted shall be death, or imprisonment, or stripes, or seats or stations or exposures of a degrading kind at temples or at outermost boundaries, or money-fines of the kind we have stated,—where such punishments are required. In cases where the penalty is death, the judges shall be the Law-wardens together with the court of last year’s magistrates selected by merit.[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 767d.) In respect of these cases the younger lawgivers must attend to the indictments and summonses and all such matters, and the procedure involved, while it is our task to regulate by law the method of voting. The votes shall be cast openly, and, before this takes place, our judges shall be seated, facing the plaintiff and defendant, in a closely-packed row in order of seniority, and all the citizens who have leisure to do so shall attend and listen attentively to the trials. One speech shall be made by the plaintiff first, and secondly one by the defendant; and after these speeches the oldest judge shall lead off with his survey of the case, in which he shall review in detail the statements made; and after the oldest, each of the other judges in turn must discuss every point which he has noticed in which either of the litigants has been guilty of making any kind of omission or blunder in his statement; and he that has no such criticism to make shall pass on the task of reviewing to his neighbor;

Ath. and when such of the statements as the judges have pronounced relevant have been confirmed by affixing to the documents the signatures of all the judges, they shall lay them up at the altar of Hestia. On the morrow again they shall assemble at the same place and discuss the case, and they shall make their pronouncements in the same manner, and shall again sign the statements. And after doing this thrice,—during which proceedings they shall pay full attention to evidence and witnesses,—each of the judges shall cast a sacred vote, promising by Hestia to give just and true judgment to the best of his power; and thus they shall bring to its end this form of trial. Next to cases which concern religion come those which concern the dissolution of the polity. Whosoever enslaves the laws by making them subject to men, and makes the State subject to a faction, and acts illegally in doing all this by violence and in stirring up civil strife,—such a man must be deemed the worst of all enemies to the whole State. And the man who, though he takes part in none of these doings, yet fails to observe them, while he has a share in the chief offices of State, or else, though he observes them, fails to defend his country and punish them, owing to his cowardice,—a citizen of such a kind must be counted second in order of badness. Every man who is of the least worth shall inform the magistrates by prosecuting the plotter on a charge of violent and illegal revolution: they shall have the same judges as the temple-robbers had, and the whole trial shall be conducted just as it was in their case, and the death penalty shall be imposed by a majority of votes. As a summary rule, the disgrace or punishment inflicted on a father shall not descend upon his children, except in a case where not only the father, but his father and grandfather before him, have all been condemned on a capital charge: in such a case, the children, while retaining their own property, excepting only the allotment with its full equipment, shall be deported by the State to their original country and State. And from the sons of citizens who happen to have more than one son over ten years old, ten shall be chosen by lot—after application made by the father or by the paternal or maternal grandfather,—and the names thus chosen shall be sent to Delphi; and that man whom the oracle names shall be established as the allotment-holder in the house of those departed,—be it with happier fortune!

Clin. Very good.

Ath. Moreover, a third general law shall be laid down, dealing with the judges to be employed and the manner of the trials, in cases where one man prosecutes another on a charge of treason; and concerning the offspring, likewise, whether they are to remain in their country or be expelled, this one law shall apply to the three cases of the traitor, the temple-robber, and the man who wrecks the State laws by violence. For the thief also, whether he steals a great thing or a small, one law and one legal penalty shall be enacted for all alike[*](But cp. Plat. Laws 859b ff., Plat. Laws 933e ff.): first, he must pay twice the value of the stolen article, if he loses his case and possesses enough property over and above his allotment wherewith to pay; but if not, he must be put in prison until either he has paid the sum or has been let off by the prosecutor. And if a man be cast in a suit for theft from the State, on obtaining pardon from the State, or after payment of double the sum stolen, he shall be let out of prison.

Clin. How comes it, Stranger, that we are ruling that it makes no difference to the thief whether the thing he steals be great or small, and whether the place it is stolen from be holy or unhallowed, or whatever other differences may exist in the manner of a theft; whereas the lawgiver ought to suit the punishment to the crime by inflicting dissimilar penalties in these varying cases?

Ath. Well said, Clinias! You have collided with me when I was going, as it were, full steam ahead, and so have woken me up. You have reminded me of a previous reflection of mine, how that none of the attempts hitherto made at legislation have ever been carried out rightly—as in fact we may infer from the instance before us. What do I mean to imply by this remark? It was no bad comparison we made[*](Plat. Laws 720a.) when we compared all existing legislation to the doctoring of slaves by slaves. For one should carefully notice this, that if any of the doctors who practice medicine by purely empirical methods, devoid of theory, were to come upon a free-born doctor conversing with a free-born patient, and using arguments, much as a philosopher would, dealing with the course of the ailment from its origin and surveying the natural constitution of the human body,—he would at once break out into a roar of laughter, and the language he would use would be none other than that which always comes ready to the tongue of most so-called doctors: You fool, he would say, you are not doctoring your patient, but schooling him, so to say, as though what he wanted was to be made, not a sound man, but a doctor.

Clin. And in saying so, would he not be right?

Ath. Possibly, provided that he should also take the view that the man who treats of laws in the way that we are now doing is schooling the citizens rather than legislating. Would he not seem to be right in saying that, too?

Clin. Probably.

Ath. How fortunate we are in the conclusion we have now come to!

Clin. What conclusion?

Ath. This,—that there is no need to legislate, but only to become students ourselves, and endeavor to discern in regard to every polity how the best form might come about, and how that which is the least elaborate possible. Moreover, we are now allowed, as it seems, to study, if we choose, the best form of legislation, or, if we choose, the least elaborate. So let us make our choice between these two.

Clin. The choice we propose, Stranger, is an absurd one: we should be acting like legislators who were driven by some overpowering necessity to pass laws on the spot, because it is impossible for them to do so on the morrow. But for us (if Heaven will) it is quite possible to do as bricklayers do, or men starting on any other kind of construction,—that is, to collect material piecemeal, from which we may select what is suitable for the edifice we intend to build, and, what is more, select it at our leisure. Let us assume, then, that we are not now building under compulsion, but that we are still at leisure, and engaged partly in collecting material and partly in putting it together; so that we may rightly say that our laws are being in part already erected and in part collected.

Ath. In this way, Clinias, our survey of laws will at any rate follow nature’s course more closely. Now let us consider, I adjure you, the following point about legislators.

Clin. What point?

Ath. We have in our States not only the writings and written speeches of many other people, but also the writings and speeches of the lawgiver.

Clin. Certainly.

Ath. Are we, then, to pay attention to the compositions of the others— poets, and all who, either with or without meter, have composed and put on record their counsels concerning life,—but to pay no attention to those of the lawgivers? Or should we not attend to them above all others?

Clin. Yes, far above all.

Ath. But we surely do not mean that the lawgiver alone of all the writers is not to give counsel about what is noble, good and just, teaching what these are, and how those who intend to be happy must practice them.

Clin. Of course he must do so.

Ath. Well then, is it more disgraceful on the part of Homer and Tyrtaeus and the rest of the poets to lay down in their writings bad rules about life and its pursuits, and less disgraceful on the part of Lycurgus and Solon and all the legislators who have written?

Ath. Or rather, is it not right that, of all the writings which exist in States, those which concern laws should be seen, when unrolled, to be by far the fairest and best, and all other writings to be either modelled on them or, if disagreeing with them, contemptible? Are we to conceive that the written laws in our States should resemble persons moved by love and wisdom, such as a father or a mother, or that they should order and threaten, like some tyrant and despot, who writes his decree on the wall, and there is an end of it? So let us now consider whether we are going to try to discuss laws with this intention—showing zeal, at any rate, whether or not we may prove successful; and if, in proceeding on this course, we must meet with mishap, so be it. Yet we pray that it may be well with us, and if God wills, it shall be well.

Clin. You are right: let us do as you say.

Ath. First of all, since we have started on it, we must examine closely the law about temple-robbers and all forms of thieving and wrongdoing; nor should we be vexed by the fact that, although we enacted some points while legislating, there are some points still under consideration: for we are in process of becoming lawgivers, and may perhaps become so, but we are not lawgivers as yet. So if we agree to consider the matters I have mentioned in the way I have mentioned, let us so consider them.

Clin. Most certainly.

Ath. In respect of goodness and justice as a whole, let us try to discern this,—how far we now agree with ourselves, and how far we differ (for we should certainly say that we desire, if nothing else, to differ at least from the majority of men), and how far also the majority agree or differ among themselves.

Clin. What differences of ours have you in mind?

Ath. I will try to explain. Concerning justice in general, and men, things, or actions that are just, we all agree that these are all beautiful, so that no one would be regarded as saying what was wrong even if he should maintain that just men, however ugly in body, are quite beautiful in respect of their very just character.

Clin. Would not that be right?

Ath. Perhaps; but let us observe this,—that if all things which belong to justice are beautiful, that all includes for us passions[*](i.e. sufferings.) nearly as much as actions.

Clin. Well, what then?

Ath. Every just action, in so far as it shares in justice, practically in the same degree partakes of beauty.

Clin. Yes.

Ath. It is agreed also—if our argument is to be consistent— that a passion which shares in justice, becomes, so far, beautiful.

Clin. True.

Ath. But if we agree that a passion though just is unseemly, then justice and beauty will be at discord, when just things are called most unseemly.

Clin. What do you mean by that?

Ath. It is not hard to grasp. The laws we enacted a short time ago might seem to enjoin what is absolutely contrary to our present statements.

Clin. What statements?

Ath. We laid it down[*](Plat. Laws 854b.) that it is just to put to death the temple-robber and the enemy of the rightly-enacted laws; and then, when we were minded to enact a host of similar rules, we held our hand, since we perceived that such rules involve passions infinite both in number and in magnitude, and that, although they are eminently just, they are also eminently unseemly. Thus the just and the beautiful will seem to us at one moment wholly identical, at another, utterly opposed, will they not?

Clin. I am afraid so.

Ath. Thus it is that by the multitude the beautiful and the just are flung apart, and inconsistent language is used about them.

Clin. It certainly seems so, Stranger.

Ath. Then let us look again at our own view, and see how far it is consistent in this respect.

Clin. What kind of consistency, and in respect of what, do you mean?

Ath. I believe that I expressly stated[*](Plat. Laws 731c, Plat. Laws 734b: cp. Aristot. Nic. Eth. 1109b.30 ff.) in our previous discourse,—or, if I did not do it before, please assume that I now assert—

Clin. What?

Ath. That all bad men are in all respects unwillingly bad; and, this being so, our next statement must agree therewith.

Clin. What statement do you mean?

Ath. This,—that the unjust man is, indeed, bad, but the bad man is unwillingly bad.[*](In what follows, the Athenian, adopting the Socratic dictum that vice is involuntary (cp. Plat. Tim. 86e ff.), applies it to the special vice of injustice; but here his view is found to conflict with the popular view which distinguishes between voluntary and involuntary acts of injustice, and assigns to them different legal penalties. If this popular distinction is wrong, the lawgiver must either (a) simply apply the Socratic rule, and enact that all unjust acts are involuntary and deserve therefore equal penalties, or (b) draw a new distinction, which Ath. proceeds to do in 861 E ff. (see note ad loc.).) But it is illogical to suppose that a willing deed is done unwillingly; therefore he that commits an unjust act does so unwillingly in the opinion of him who assumes that injustice is involuntary—a conclusion which I also must now allow; for I agree that all men do unjust acts unwillingly; so, since I hold this view—and do not share the opinion of those who, through contentiousness or arrogance, assert that, while there are some who are unjust against their will, yet there are also many who are unjust willingly,—how am I to prove consistent with my own statements? Suppose you two, Megillus and Clinias, put this question to me—If this is the state of the case, Stranger, what counsel do you give us in regard to legislating for the Magnesian State? Shall we legislate or shall we not? Legislate by all means, I shall reply.

Ath.Will you make a distinction, then, between voluntary and involuntary wrongdoings, and are we to enact heavier penalties for the crimes and wrongdoings that are voluntary, and lighter penalties for the others? Or shall we enact equal penalties for all, on the view that there is no such thing as a voluntary act of injustice?

Clin. What you say, Stranger, is quite right: so what use are we to make of our present arguments?

Ath. A very proper question! The use we shall make of them, to begin with, is this—

Clin. What?

Ath. Let us recall how, a moment ago, we rightly stated that in regard to justice we are suffering from the greatest confusion and inconsistency. Grasping this fact, let us again question ourselves,—As to our perplexity about these matters, since we have neither got it clear nor defined the point of difference between those two kinds of wrongdoing, voluntary and involuntary, which are treated as legally distinct in every State by every legislator who has ever yet appeared,—as to this, is the statement we recently made to stand, like a divine oracle, as a mere ex cathedra statement, unsupported by any proof, and to serve as a kind of master-enactment[*](Literally, to legislate down (i.e. over-rule the popular objection to our Socratic view).)? That is impossible; and before we legislate we are bound first to make it clear somehow that these wrong-doings are two-fold, and wherein their difference consists, in order that when we impose the penalty on either kind, everyone may follow our rules, and be able to form some judgment regarding the suitability or otherwise of our enactments.

Clin. What you say, Stranger, appears to us to be excellent: we ought to do one of two things,—either not assert that all unjust acts are involuntary, or else make our distinctions first, then prove the correctness of that assertion.

Ath. Of these alternatives the first is to me quite intolerable—namely, not to assert what I hold to be the truth,—for that would be neither a lawful thing to do nor a pious. But as to the question how such acts are two-fold,—if the difference does not lie in that between the voluntary and the involuntary, then we must try to explain it by means of some other distinction.[*](The proper distinction to be drawn (as Ath. proceeds to argue) is not that between voluntary and involuntary acts of injustice (since there are no such voluntary acts), but that between injuries (βλάβαι, acts causing loss) and acts of injustice. Injustice is really a quality of the agent rather than of the act, and (like all vice) is a form of un-reason: as the slave of un-reason, the unjust man is never a free agent. Hence the task of the lawgiver is two fold, (1) to make good the injuries, and (2) to cure the agent of his injustice by restoring the power of reason (moral sense) in his soul.)

Clin. Well, certainly, Stranger, about this matter there is no other plan we can possibly adopt.

Ath. It shall be done. Come now, in dealings and intercourse between citizens, injuries committed by one against another are of frequent occurrence, and they involve plenty of the voluntary as well as of the involuntary.

Clin. To be sure!

Ath. Let no one put down all injuries as acts of injustice and then regard the unjust acts involved as two-fold in the way described, namely, that they are partly voluntary and partly involuntary (for, of the total, the involuntary injuries are not less than the voluntary either in number or in magnitude); but consider whether in saying what I am now going to say I am speaking sense or absolute nonsense. For what I assert, Megillus and Clinias, is not that, if one man harms another involuntarily and without wishing it, he acts unjustly though involuntarily, nor shall I legislate in this way, pronouncing this to be an involuntary act of injustice, but I will pronounce that such an injury is not an injustice at all, whether it be a greater injury or a less. And, if my view prevails, we shall often say that the author of a benefit wrongly done commits an injustice; for as a rule, my friends, neither when a man gives some material object to another, nor when he takes it away, ought one to term such an act absolutely just or unjust, but only when a man of just character and disposition does any benefit or injury to another,—that is what the lawgiver must look at; he must consider these two things, injustice and injury, and the injury inflicted he must make good so far as possible by legal means; he must conserve what is lost, restore what has been broken down, make whole what is wounded or dead; and when the several injuries have been atoned for by compensation, he must endeavor always by means of the laws to convert the parties who have inflicted them and those who have suffered them from a state of discord to a state of amity.

Clin. He will be right in doing that.

Ath. As regards unjust injuries and gains, in case one man causes another to gain by acting unjustly towards him, all such cases as are curable we must cure, regarding them as diseases of the soul. And we should affirm that our cure for injustice lies in this direction—

Clin. What direction?

Ath. In this,—that whenever any man commits any unjust act, great or small, the law shall instruct him and absolutely compel him for the future either never willingly to dare to do such a deed, or else to do it ever so much less often, in addition to paying for the injury. To effect this, whether by action or speech, by means of pleasures and pains, honors and dishonors, money-fines and money-gifts, and in general by whatsoever means one can employ to make men hate injustice and love (or at any rate not hate) justice,—this is precisely the task of laws most noble. But for all those whom he perceives to be incurable in respect of these matters, what penalty shall the lawgiver enact, and what law?

Ath. The lawgiver will realize that in all such cases not only is it better for the sinners themselves to live no longer, but also that they will prove of a double benefit to others by quitting life—since they will both serve as a warning to the rest not to act unjustly, and also rid the State of wicked men,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 957e, Plat. Rep. 410a)—and thus he will of necessity inflict death as the chastisement for their sins, in cases of this kind, and of this kind only.

Clin. What you have said seems very reasonable; but we should be glad to hear a still clearer statement respecting the difference between injury and injustice, and how the distinction between the voluntary and the involuntary applies in these cases.

Ath. I must endeavor to do as you bid me, and explain the matter. No doubt in conversing with one another you say and hear said at least thus much about the soul, that one element in its nature (be it affection or part) is passion, which is an inbred quality of a contentious and pugnacious kind, and one that overturns many things by its irrational force.

Clin. Of course.

Ath. Moreover, we distinguish pleasure from passion, and we assert that its mastering power is of an opposite kind, since it effects all that its intention desires by a mixture of persuasion and deceit.

Clin. Exactly.

Ath. Nor would it be untrue to say that the third cause of sins is ignorance.[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 864d., Plat. Laws 908e; Aristot. Nic. Eth. 1110b.18 ff.) This cause, however, the lawgiver would do well to subdivide into two, counting ignorance in its simple form to be the cause of minor sins, and in its double form—where the folly is due to the man being gripped not by ignorance only, but also by a conceit of wisdom,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 732a, Plat. Phileb. 48e.) as though he had full knowledge of things he knows nothing at all about,—counting this to be the cause of great and brutal sins when it is joined with strength and might, but the cause of childish and senile sins when it is joined with weakness; and these last he will count as sins and he will ordain laws, as for sinners, but laws that will be, above all others, of the most mild and merciful kind.

Clin. That is reasonable.

Ath. And pretty well everyone speaks of one man being superior, another inferior, to pleasure or to passion; and they are so.

Clin. Most certainly.

Ath. But we have never heard it said that one man is superior, another inferior, to ignorance.[*](i.e. ignorance is not regarded as an active force (like passion or pleasure) capable of opposing reason and tyrannizing over the soul.)

Clin. Quite true.

Ath. And we assert that all these things urge each man often to go counter to the actual bent of his own inclination.

Clin. Very frequently.

Ath. Now I will define for you, clearly and without complication, my notion of justice and injustice. The domination of passion and fear and pleasure and pain and envies and desires in the soul, whether they do any injury or not, I term generally injustice; but the belief in the highest good— in whatsoever way either States or individuals think they can attain to it,—if this prevails in their souls and regulates every man, even if some damage be done, we must assert that everything thus done is just, and that in each man the part subject to this governance is also just, and best for the whole life of mankind, although most men suppose that such damage is an involuntary injustice. But we are not now concerned with a verbal dispute. Since, however, it has been shown that there are three kinds of sinning, we must first of all recall these still more clearly to mind. Of these, one kind, as we know, is painful; and that we term passion and fear.[*](Cp.Plat. Phileb. 40d, Plat. Phileb. 40e.)

Clin. Quite so.

Ath. The second kind consists of pleasure and desires; the third, which is a distinct kind, consists of hopes and untrue belief regarding the attainment of the highest good. And when this last kind is subdivided into three,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 863c, Plat. Laws 863d.) five classes are made, as we now assert; and for these five classes we must enact distinct laws, of two main types.

Clin. What are they?

Ath. The one concerns acts done on each occasion by violent and open means, the other acts done privily under cover of darkness and deceit, or sometimes acts done in both these ways,—and for acts of this last kind the laws will be most severe, if they are to prove adequate.

Clin. Naturally.

Ath. Let us revert next to that point from which we digressed,[*](i.e. Plat. Laws 857b.) and proceed with our enactment of the laws. We had, I believe, laid down the laws dealing with those who plunder the gods and with traitors, and also with those who wreck the laws with intent to overthrow the existing constitution. An act of this kind a man might commit when mad, or when suffering from some disease or from excessive senility, or in a state of childishness, whereby he is no better than a madman. If any case of this kind is ever brought to the notice of the selected judges, either on the information of the doer of the act or on that of him who is pleading for the doer, and if it be judged that he was in this state of madness when he broke the law, then he shall certainly pay for the damage he has done, but only the exact sum, and he shall be acquitted of the other charges, unless it be that he has killed a man and has not purged his hands from blood: in this case he shall depart into another country and place, and dwell there as an exile for a year; and should he return within the time fixed by the law or set foot at all within his own country, he shall be put in the public jail by the Law-wardens for the space of two years, and not let out of jail until after that time.

Ath. We need not hesitate to enact laws about every class of murder on similar lines, now that we have made a beginning. First we shall deal with the cases that are violent and involuntary. If a man has killed a friend in a contest or in public games—whether his death has been immediate or as the after-effect of wounds,—or similarly if he has killed him in war or in some action of training for war, either when practicing javelin-work without armor or when engaged in some warlike maneuver in heavy armor,—then, when he has been purified as the Delphic rule on this matter directs, he shall be accounted pure. So too with respect to all doctors, if the patient dies against the will of his doctor, the doctor shall be accounted legally pure. And if one man kills another of his own act, but involuntarily,—whether it be with his own unarmed body, or by a tool or a weapon, or by a dose of drink or of solid food, or by application of fire or of cold, or by deprivation of air, and whether he does it himself with his own body or by means of other bodies,— in all cases it shall be accounted to be his own personal act, and he shall pay the following penalties. If he kill a slave, he shall secure the master against damage and loss, reckoning as if it were a slave of his own that had been destroyed, or else he shall be liable to a penalty of double the value of the dead man,—and the judges shall make an assessment of his value,—and he must also employ means of purification greater and more numerous than those employed by persons who kill a man at games, and those interpreters[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 759c.) whom the oracle names shall be in charge of these rites; but if it be a slave of his own that he has killed, he shall be set free after the legal purification. And if anyone kill a free man involuntarily, he shall undergo the same purifications as the man that has killed a slave; and there is an ancient tale, told of old, to which he must not fail to pay regard. The tale is this,—that the man slain by violence, who has lived in a free and proud spirit, is wroth with his slayer when newly slain, and being filled also with dread and horror on account of his own violent end, when he sees his murderer going about in the very haunts which he himself had frequented, he is horror-stricken; and being disquieted himself, he takes conscience as his ally, and with all his might disquiets his slayer—both the man himself and his doings. Wherefore it is right for the slayer to retire before his victim for a full year, in all its seasons, and to vacate all the spots he owned in all parts of his native land;

Ath. and if the dead man be a Stranger, he shall be barred also from the Stranger’s country for the same period. If a man willingly obeys this law, he that is nearest of kin to the dead man, having the supervision of the performance of all these rules, shall pardon him and live at peace with him, and in doing so he will be acting with perfect propriety; but if a man disobeys, and dares, in the first place, to approach the altars and to do sacrifice while still unpurified, and if he refuses, further, to fulfil the times appointed in exile, then the next of kin to the dead man shall prosecute the slayer for murder, and in case of conviction all the penalties shall be doubled. And should the nearest relative fail to prosecute for the crime, it shall be as though the pollution had passed on to him, through the victim claiming atonement for his fate; and whoso pleases shall bring a charge against him, and compel him by law to quit his country for five years. And if a Stranger involuntarily kills a Stranger who is resident in the State, whoso pleases shall prosecute him under the same laws; and if he be a resident alien, he shall be exiled for a year, while if he be altogether a Stranger—whether the man slain be a Stranger or resident alien or citizen—in addition to the purifications imposed, he shall be barred for all his life from the country which ordains these laws; and if he transgresses the law, and comes back to it, the Law-wardens shall punish him with death; and if he has any property, they shall hand it over to the next of kin of the victim. And should he come back unwillingly, in case he be shipwrecked off the coast of the country, he shall camp with his feet in the sea, and watch for a ship to take him off; or in case he be brought in by people forcibly by land, the first magistrate of the State that meets with him shall loose him, and send him out over the border unharmed. If a person with his own hand kills a free man, and the deed be done in passion, in a case of this kind we must begin by making a distinction between two varieties of the crime. For murder is committed in passion by those who, on a sudden and without intent to kill, destroy a man by blows or some such means in an immediate attack, when the deed is at once followed by repentance; and it is also a case of murder done in passion whenever men who are insulted by shameful words or actions seek for vengeance, and end by killing a man with deliberate intent to kill, and feel no repentance for the deed.

Ath. We must lay it down, as it seems, that these murders are of two kinds, both as a rule done in passion, and most properly described as lying midway between the voluntary and the involuntary. None the less, each of these kinds tends to resemble one or other of these contraries; for the man who retains his passion and takes vengeance, not suddenly on the spur of the moment, but after lapse of time, and with deliberate intent, resembles the voluntary murderer; whereas the man who does not nurse his rage, but gives way to it at once on the spur of the moment and without deliberate intent, has a likeness to the involuntary murderer; yet neither is he wholly involuntary, but bears a resemblance thereto. Thus murders done in passion are difficult to define,—whether one should treat them in law as voluntary or involuntary. The best and truest way is to class them both as resemblances, and to distinguish them by the mark of deliberate intent or lack of intent, and to impose more severe penalties on those who slay with intent and in anger, and milder penalties on those who do so without intent and on a sudden. For that which resembles a greater evil must be more heavily punished, that which resembles a lesser evil more lightly. So our laws also must do likewise.

Clin. They must, most certainly.

Ath. Returning, then, to our task, let us make this pronouncement:—If a man with his own hand slay a free man, and the deed be done in rage without deliberate intent, he shall suffer such other penalties as it is proper for the man to suffer who has slain without passion, and he shall be compelled to go into exile for two years, thereby chastising his own passion. And he that slays in passion and with deliberate intent shall be treated in other respects like the former, but shall be exiled for three years—instead of two, like the other,—receiving a longer period of punishment because of the greatness of his passion. As regards the return home, in such cases it shall be on this wise. (It is a difficult matter to legislate for with exactness; for sometimes the more dangerous of the two murderers in the eye of the law might prove the more gentle and the gentler the more dangerous, and the latter might have committed the murder more savagely, the former more gently; though as a rule matters turn out in the way we have stated: so, regarding all these regulations the Law-wardens must act as supervisors). When the period of exile in each case has elapsed, they must send twelve of their number to the borders of the country to act as judges—they having made during the interval a still closer investigation into the actions of the exiles;

Ath. and these men shall serve also as judges in regard to the matter of giving them pardon and admitting them back; and the exiles must abide by the verdicts of these magistrates. And if either of them, after his return, again yields to rage and commits the same act, he shall be exiled, and never again return; and if he returns, he shall suffer the same fate as the returned Stranger.[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 855c.) He that slays a slave of his own shall purify himself; and if he kill another man’s slave in rage, he shall pay to the owner twice the damage. And if anyone of all these types of slayers disobeys the law and, being unpurified, defiles the market and the games and other sacred assemblies, whoso pleases shall prosecute both that member of the dead man’s kindred who permits this and the slayer himself, and shall compel the one of them to exact, and the other to pay, double the amount of the money-fines and of the other exactions[*](Such as the costs of the purification-rites.); and the sum so paid he shall keep for himself as the law directs. If a slave kills his own master in rage, the kindred of the dead man shall treat the slayer how they please,—save that they must not in any wise let him live,—and shall be held guiltless. And if a slave kill a free man (other than his master) in rage, his masters shall hand over the slave to the kindred of the dead man, and they shall be compelled to put the criminal to death, doing so in whatever manner they choose. If in a fit of rage a father or mother slays a son or daughter by means of blows or some kind of violence,—an occurrence which, though rare, does sometimes happen,—the slayer must make the same purifications as the other slayers, and be exiled for three years; and when the slayers have returned, the wife must be separated from the husband and the husband from the wife, and they must never again have a child, nor shall they ever share a home with those whom the slayer has robbed of child or brother, nor shall they take part in their worship; he that is disobedient and impious concerning this matter shall be liable to an action for impiety at the hands of whoso pleases. And if a husband in a fit of rage kills his wedded wife, or if a wife in like manner kills her husband, they must undergo the same purifications, and remain exiled for three years. And when one who has committed such a crime returns, he shall never take part in worship with his children, nor sit at table with them; and if either the parent or the child disobeys, he shall be liable to a charge of impiety at the hands of whoso pleases.

Ath. And if in rage a brother kill a brother or a sister, or a sister kill a brother or a sister, it shall be declared that they must undergo the same purifications and banishment as have been ordained for parents and children,—namely, that the homicide shall never share in the house or in the worship of those brothers or parents whom he has robbed of brothers or of children; and if anyone disobeys, he will rightly and justly be liable to the law laid down concerning such cases of impiety. If any man gets into such an uncontrollable rage with his parents as actually to dare to kill a parent in the madness of his rage, then, in case the dead person before dying voluntarily acquits the culprit of murder, he shall be held pure, after he has purified himself in the same manner as those who have committed an involuntary murder, and done as they in all other respects; but in case the dead person does not so acquit him, then he that has done such a deed is liable to a number of laws: for outrage he will be liable to most heavy penalties, and likewise for impiety and temple-robbing, since he has robbed his parent of life; so that if to die a hundred deaths were possible for any one man, that a parricide or a matricide, who did the deed in rage, should undergo a hundred deaths would be a fate most just. Since every law will forbid the man to kill father or mother, the very authors of his existence, even for the sake of saving his own life, and will ordain that he must suffer and endure everything rather than commit such an act,— in what other way than this can such a man be fittingly dealt with by law, and receive his due reward? Be it enacted, therefore, that for the man who in rage slays father or mother the penalty is death. If a brother kill a brother in fight during a civil war, or in any such way, acting in self-defence against the other, who first started the brawl, he shall be counted as one who has slain an enemy, and be held guiltless; so too, when a citizen has killed a citizen in like manner, or a Stranger a Stranger. And if a citizen kill a Stranger in self-defence, or a Stranger a citizen, he shall be accounted pure in the same way. So likewise, if a slave kill a slave; but if a slave kill a free man in self-defence, he shall be liable to the same laws as he that kills a father. And what has been said about remission of the charge in the case of the murder of a father shall hold equally good in all such cases—if any man voluntarily acquit any culprit of this charge, the purifications for the culprit shall be made as though the murder were involuntary, and one year of exile shall be imposed by law. Let us take this as an adequate statement respecting murder-cases that involve violence, and are involuntary and done in passion. Next to these we must state the regulations regarding such acts when voluntary and involving iniquity of all kinds and premeditated,—acts caused by yielding to pleasure or lust or envy.

Clin. You are right.

Ath. First, let us once more state, as best we can, how many these causes are likely to be. The greatest is lust, which masters a soul that is made savage by desires; and it occurs especially in connection with that object for which the most frequent and intense craving afflicts the bulk of men,—the power which wealth possesses over them, owing to the badness of their nature and lack of culture, to breed in them countless lustings after its insatiable and endless acquisition. And of this lack of culture the cause is to be found in the ill-praising of wealth in the common talk of both Greeks and barbarians; for by exalting it as the first of goods,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 697b, Plat. Laws 831c; Aristot. Pol. 1323a.25 ff; Aristot. Nic. Eth. 1098 b 13 ff.) when it should come but third, they ruin both posterity and themselves. The noblest and best course of all in all States is that the truth should be stated about wealth,—namely, that it exists for the sake of the body, and the body for the sake of the soul; so that, while the objects for which it really exists are goods, yet wealth itself will come third, after goodness of body and of soul. So this law will serve as an instructor, to teach that the man who intends to be happy must seek not to be wealthy, but to be justly and temperately wealthy; and if this were so, no murders that needed purging by murders would occur in States. But, as things now stand, this love of riches is—as we said[*](Plat. Laws 831c; cp. Aristot. Pol. 1271a.17.) when we began this subject—one cause, and a very great cause, which produces the most serious of trials for willful murder. A second cause is the temper of the ambitious soul, which breeds envies that are dangerous associates for the man that feels the envy, in the first place, and dangerous also for the best citizens in the State. Thirdly, fears bred of cowardice and iniquity have wrought many murders,—in cases where men do or have done things concerning which they desire that no one should share their secret; consequently, if there are any who might expose their secret, they remove them by death, whenever they can do so by no other means. Concerning all these matters, the preludes mentioned shall be pronounced, and, in addition to them, that story which is believed by many when they hear it from the lips of those who seriously relate such things at their mystic rites,—that vengeance for such acts is exacted in Hades,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 722d: whereas the law coerces, its prelude seeks to persuade.) and that those who return again to this earth[*](This implies the (Pythagorean) doctrine of re-incarnation: cp. Plat. Laws 904c, Plat. Rep. 614e ff., Plat. Tim. 90e ff.) are bound to pay the natural penalty,—each culprit the same, that is, which he inflicted on his victim,—and that their life on earth must end in their meeting a like fate at the hands of another.

Ath. To him who obeys, and fully dreads such a penalty, there is no need to add to the prelude by reciting the law on the subject; but to the disobedient this is the law which shall be stated in the written code:—Whosoever of deliberate intent and unjustly slays with his own hand any of the tribesmen shall, in the first place, be debarred from the lawful assemblies, and shall not defile either temples or market or harbors or any other place of meeting, whether or not any person warns off the doer of such deeds—for he is warned off by the law, which is, and always will continue, warning him thus publicly, on behalf of the whole State; and the man who fails to prosecute him when he ought, or fails to warn him of the fact that he is thus debarred, if he be of kin to the dead man on either the male or female side, and not further removed than a cousin,[*](Cp. Plat. Laws 877c Plat. Laws 877d.) shall, first, receive upon himself the defilement and the wrath of the gods, since the curse of the law brings also upon him that of the divine voice, and, secondly, he shall be liable to the action of whosoever pleases to punish him on behalf of the dead man. And he that wishes to punish him shall duly perform all that concerns the observance of the purifications proper therefore, and whatsoever else the god prescribes as lawful in these cases, and he shall recite the pronouncement of warning; and thus he shall go and compel the culprit to submit to the execution of the penalty according to law. That it is necessary that these proceedings should be accompanied by certain invocations and sacrifices to those gods whose concern it is that murders should not occur in States, it is easy for the lawgiver to demonstrate: who these gods are, and what method for bringing such prosecutions would be the most correct in point of ritual,—this the Law-wardens, in conjunction with the interpreters and seers and with the god, shall ordain; and so they shall bring these prosecutions. And the judges in these cases shall be the same persons who form—as we described[*](Plat. Laws 855c.)—the final court of trial for robbers of temples. He that is convicted shall be punished by death, and he shall not be buried in the land of the victim, because of the shamelessness as well as impiety of his act. If the culprit flees and refuses to come up for judgment, he shall be exiled with an unending exile; and if any such person sets foot in the country of the murdered man, he of the dead man’s relatives or of the citizens that first meets with him shall slay him with impunity, or else bind him and hand him over to those magistrates who have judged the case, to be slain. The prosecutor, in a murder-charge, must at once demand bail from the defendant; and the latter shall provide three substantial securities—as approved by the court of the judges in such cases—, who guarantee to produce him at the trial; and if a man be unwilling or unable to provide these sureties, the court must take, bind and keep him, and produce him at the trial of the case.

Ath. If a man does not slay another with his own hand, but plots death for him, and after killing him by design and plotting resides in the State, being responsible for the murder and not innocent or pure of heart in respect of it,—in his case the prosecutions on this charge shall proceed in the same way, except in the matter of bail. And the person convicted shall be allowed to have burial at home; but all else shall be carried out in his case in the same way as in the case last described. And these same regulations shall govern all cases where Strangers are at law with Strangers, or citizens and Strangers at law with each other, or slaves with slaves, in respect both of actual murder and of plotting to murder, except as regards bail; and as to this, just as it has been said that the actual murderers must be secured by guarantors, so these persons too must provide security to the person who proclaims the murder. If a slave willfully slay a free man, either by his own hand or by plotting, and be convicted at the trial, the public executioner of the State shall drag him in the direction of the tomb of the dead man to a spot from which he can see the tomb, and there scourge him with as many stripes as the prosecutor shall prescribe; and if the murderer be still alive after the beating, he shall put him to death. And if a man kill a slave when he is doing no wrong, actuated by fear lest the slave should expose his own foul and evil deeds, or for any other such reason, just as he would have been liable to a charge of murder for slaying a citizen, so likewise he shall be liable in the same way for the death of such a slave. Should cases occur of a kind for which it is a formidable and most unwelcome task to legislate, and yet impossible not to legislate,—such as murders of kinsfolk, either by a man’s own hand or by plotting, which are wholly willful and wicked,—crimes that occur for the most part in States with bad organization and nurture, but may occur at times even in a country where one would not expect them,—we must again recite the story we uttered[*](Plat. Laws 870d, Plat. Laws 870e.) a moment ago, if haply anyone, on hearing us, may become more strongly disposed in consequence voluntarily to abstain from murders of the most impious kind. The myth or story (or whatever one should call it) has been clearly stated, as derived from ancient priests, to the effect that Justice, the avenger of kindred blood, acting as overseer, employs the law just mentioned, and has ordained that the doer of such a deed must of necessity suffer the same as he has done: if ever a man has slain his father, he must endure to suffer the same violent fate at his own children’s hands in days to come; or if he has slain his mother, he must of necessity come to birth sharing in the female nature, and when thus born be removed from life by the hands of his offspring in afterdays;