And the lawgiver reviewing his work,will appoint guardians to preside over these things-some who walk by intelligence,others by true opinion only,and then mind will bind together all his ordinances and show them to be in harmony with temperance and justice,and not with wealth or ambition.This is the spirit,Stranger,in which Iwas and am desirous that you should pursue the subject.And I want to know the nature of all these things,and how they are arranged in the laws of Zeus,as they are termed,and in those of the Pythian Apollo,which Minos and Lycurgus gave;and how the order of them is discovered to his eyes,who has experience in laws gained either by study or habit,although they are far from being self-evident to the rest of mankind like ourselves.
Cle.How shall we proceed,Stranger?
Ath.I think that we must begin again as before,and first consider the habit of courage;and then we will go on and discuss another and then another form of virtue,if you please.In this way we shall have a model of the whole;and with these and similar discourses we will beguile the way.And when we have gone through all the virtues,we will show,by the grace of God,that the institutions of which I was speaking look to virtue.
Meg.Very good;and suppose that you first criticize this praiser of Zeus and the laws of Crete.
Ath.I will try to criticize you and myself,as well as him,for the argument is a common concern.Tell me-were not first the syssitia,and secondly the gymnasia,invented by your legislator with a view to war?
Meg.Yes.
Ath.And what comes third,and what fourth?For that,I think,is the sort of enumeration which ought to be made of the remaining parts of virtue,no matter whether you call them parts or what their name is,provided the meaning is clear.
Meg.Then I,or any other Lacedaemonian,would reply that hunting is third in order.
Ath.Let us see if we can discover what comes fourth and fifth.
Meg.I think that I can get as far as the fouth head,which is the frequent endurance of pain,exhibited among us Spartans in certain hand-to-hand fights;also in stealing with the prospect of getting a good beating;there is,too,the so-called Crypteia,or secret service,in which wonderful endurance is shown-our people wander over the whole country by day and by night,and even in winter have not a shoe to their foot,and are without beds to lie upon,and have to attend upon themselves.Marvellous,too,is the endurance which our citizens show in their naked exercises,contending against the violent summer heat;and there are many similar practices,to speak of which in detail would be endless.
Ath.Excellent,O Lacedaemonian Stranger.But how ought we to define courage?Is it to be regarded only as a combat against fears and pains,or also against desires and pleasures,and against flatteries;which exercise such a tremendous power,that they make the hearts even of respectable citizens to melt like wax?
Meg.I should say the latter.
Ath.In what preceded,as you will remember,our Cnosian friend was speaking of a man or a city being inferior to themselves:-Were you not,Cleinias?
Cle.I was.
Ath.Now,which is in the truest sense inferior,the man who is overcome by pleasure or by pain?
Cle.I should say the man who is overcome by pleasure;for all men deem him to be inferior in a more disgraceful sense,than the other who is overcome by pain.
Ath.But surely the lawgivers of Crete and Lacedaemon have not legislated for a courage which is lame of one leg,able only to meet attacks which come from the left,but impotent against the insidious flatteries which come from the right?
Cle.Able to meet both,I should say.
Ath.Then let me once more ask,what institutions have you in either of your states which give a taste of pleasures,and do not avoid them any more than they avoid pains;but which set a person in the midst of them,and compel or induce him by the prospect of reward to get the better of them?Where is an ordinance about pleasure similar to that about pain to be found in your laws?Tell me what there is of this nature among you:-What is there which makes your citizen equally brave against pleasure and pain,conquering what they ought to conquer,and superior to the enemies who are most dangerous and nearest home?
Meg.I was able to tell you,Stranger,many laws which were directed against pain;but I do not know that I can point out any great or obvious examples of similar institutions which are concerned with pleasure;there are some lesser provisions,however,which I might mention.
Cle.Neither can I show anything of that sort which is at all equally prominent in the Cretan laws.
Ath.No wonder,my dear friends;and if,as is very likely,in our search after the true and good,one of us may have to censure the laws of the others,we must not be offended,but take kindly what another says.
Cle.You are quite right,Athenian Stranger,and we will do as you say.
Ath.At our time of life,Cleinias,there should be no feeling of irritation.
Cle.Certainly not.
Ath.I will not at present determine whether he who censures the Cretan or Lacedaemonian polities is right or wrong.But I believe that I can tell better than either of you what the many say about them.For assuming that you have reasonably good laws,one of the best of them will be the law forbidding any young men to enquire which of them are right or wrong;but with one mouth and one voice they must all agree that the laws are all good,for they came from God;and any one who says the contrary is not to be listened to.But an old man who remarks any defect in your laws may communicate his observation to a ruler or to an equal in years when no young man is present.
Cle.Exactly so,Stranger;and like a diviner,although not there at the time,you seem to me quite to have hit the meaning of the legislator,and to say what is most true.
Ath.As there are no young men present,and the legislator has given old men free licence,there will be no impropriety in our discussing these very matters now that we are alone.