Athenian Stranger.Enough of this.And what,then,is to be regarded as the origin of government?Will not a man be able to judge of it best from a point of view in which he may behold the progress of states and their transitions to good or evil?
Cleinias.What do you mean?
Ath.I mean that he might watch them from the point of view of time,and observe the changes which take place in them during infinite ages.
Cle.How so?
Ath.Why,do you think that you can reckon the time which has elapsed since cities first existed and men were citizens of them?
Cle.Hardly.
Ath.But are sure that it must be vast and incalculable?
Cle.Certainly.
Ath.And have not thousands and thousands of cities come into being during this period and as many perished?And has not each of them had every form of government many times over,now growing larger,now smaller,and again improving or declining?
Cle.To be sure.
Ath.Let us endeavour to ascertain the cause of these changes;for that will probably explain the first origin and development of forms of government.
Cle.Very good.You shall endeavour to impart your thoughts to us,and we will make an effort to understand you.
Ath.Do you believe that there is any truth in ancient traditions?
Cle.What traditions?
Ath.The traditions about the many destructions of mankind which have been occasioned by deluges and pestilences,and in many other ways,and of the survival of a remnant?
Cle.Every one is disposed to believe them.
Ath.Let us consider one of them,that which was caused by the famous deluge.
Cle.What are we to observe about it?
Ath.I mean to say that those who then escaped would only be hill shepherds-small sparks of the human race preserved on the tops of mountains.
Cle.Clearly.
Ath.Such survivors would necessarily be unacquainted with the arts and the various devices which are suggested to the dwellers in cities by interest or ambition,and with all the wrongs which they contrive against one another.
Cle.Very true.
Ath.Let us suppose,then,that the cities in the plain and on the sea-coast were utterly destroyed at that time.
Cle.Very good.
Ath.Would not all implements have then perished and every other excellent invention of political or any other sort of wisdom have utterly disappeared?
Cle.Why,yes,my friend;and if things had always continued as they are at present ordered,how could any discovery have ever been made even in the least particular?For it is evident that the arts were unknown during ten thousand times ten thousand years.And no more than a thousand or two thousand years have elapsed since the discoveries of Daedalus,Orpheus and Palamedes-since Marsyas and Olympus invented music,and Amphion the lyre-not to speak of numberless other inventions which are but of yesterday.
Ath.Have you forgotten,Cleinias,the name of a friend who is really of yesterday?
Cle.I suppose that you mean Epimenides.
Ath.The same,my friend;he does indeed far overleap the heads of all mankind by his invention;for he carried out in practice,as you declare,what of old Hesiod only preached.
Cle.Yes,according to our tradition.
Ath.After the great destruction,may we not suppose that the state of man was something of this sort:-In the beginning of things there was a fearful illimitable desert and a vast expanse of land;a herd or two of oxen would be the only survivors of the animal world;and there might be a few goats,these too hardly enough to maintain the shepherds who tended them?
Cle.True.
Ath.And of cities or governments or legislation,about which we are now talking,do you suppose that they could have any recollection at all?
Cle.None whatever.
Ath.And out of this state of things has there not sprung all that we now are and have:cities and governments,and arts and laws,and a great deal of vice and a great deal of virtue?
Cle.What do you mean?
Ath.Why,my good friend,how can we possibly suppose that those who knew nothing of all the good and evil of cities could have attained their full development,whether of virtue or of vice?
Cle.I understand your meaning,and you are quite right.
Ath.But,as time advanced and the race multiplied,the world came to be what the world is.
Cle.Very true.
Ath.Doubtless the change was not made all in a moment,but little by little,during a very long period of time.
Cle.A highly probable supposition.
Ath.At first,they would have a natural fear ringing in their ears which would prevent their descending from the heights into the plain.
Cle.Of course.
Ath.The fewness of the survivors at that time would have made them all the more desirous of seeing one another;but then the means of travelling either by land or sea had been almost entirely lost,as I may say,with the loss of the arts,and there was great difficulty in getting at one another;for iron and brass and all metals were jumbled together and had disappeared in the chaos;nor was there any possibility of extracting ore from them;and they had scarcely any means of felling timber.Even if you suppose that some implements might have been preserved in the mountains,they must quickly have worn out and vanished,and there would be no more of them until the art of metallurgy had again revived.
Cle.There could not have been.
Ath.In how many generations would this be attained?
Cle.Clearly,not for many generations.
Ath.During this period,and for some time afterwards,all the arts which require iron and brass and the like would disappear.
Cle.Certainly.
Ath.Faction and war would also have died out in those days,and for many reasons.
Cle.How would that be?