Plato
According to Plato’s Republic, the human soul has three different elements, one consisting of raw appetites, another consisting of drives (such as anger and ambition), and a third consisting of thought or intellect. In the virtuous or just person, each of these three elements fulfills its own unique function and does so under the governance of reason. Likewise, according to Plato, in the ideal or just state there are also three elements, each of which fulfills its unique function and does so in accordance with the dictates of reason.
The lowest element in the soul—the appetitive element—corresponds in the well-ordered state to the class of craftsmen. The soul’s drive element corresponds in the state to the class of police-soldiers, who are auxiliaries to the governing class. This last class, in the well-ordered state, corresponds to the intellectual, rational element of the soul.
The governing class, according to Plato, comprises a select few highly educated and profoundly rational individuals, including women so qualified. An individual becomes a member of a class by birth, but he or she will move to a higher or lower class according to aptitude.
In the healthy state, said Plato, as in the well-ordered soul, the rational element is in control. Thus, for Plato, the ideal state is a class-structured aristocracy ruled by philosopher-kings.
Unlike the craftsmen, the ruling elite and their auxiliaries, who jointly are the guardians of society, have neither private property nor even private families: property, wives, and children are all possessions held in common. Reproduction among the guardians is arranged always to improve the bloodline of their posterity in intelligence, courage, and other qualities apt for leadership. The guardians not only must be trained appropriately for soldiering but also must be given a rigorous intellectual education that, for the few whose unique abilities allow it, prepares them for advanced work in mathematics and dialectic (that is, the Socratic method). These few, at age fifty and after many years of public service, advance to membership in the ruling aristocracy and to leadership of the state. Such was Plato’s vision of the ideal political structure.
It is important to be aware that, from Plato’s perspective, the state, like the person, is a living organism whose well-being must be sought by its subjects. Although he assumed that the healthy state is best for the individuals in it, Plato also believed that the health or well-being of the state is desirable for its own sake. And just as a person’s health or well-being requires the proper functioning and coordination of the elements of the soul under the overarching rule of reason, the state’s health or well-being lies in the proper functioning and coordination of its elements under the rule of the reasoning elite. The ideal state, according to Plato, is well ordered in this way, and its being well ordered in this way is something that is intrinsically desirable.
In Book VIII of the Republic, Plato identified five forms of government. The preferred form, of course, is an aristocracy, governed by rational philosopher- kings. According to Plato, however, even if this ideal state could be achieved, it would in time degenerate into a timocracy, in which the ruling class is motivated by love of honor rather than by love for the common good. A timocracy in turn gives way to a plutocracy, which is rule by men who primarily desire riches. Under a plutocracy, society becomes divided between two classes, the rich and the poor, Plato thought. Nevertheless, this form of government, Plato said, is preferable to the next degeneration, democracy, which results because “a society cannot hold wealth in honor and at the same time establish self-control in its citizens.” (Perhaps we will eventually see whether Plato is correct that a society that honors wealth cannot maintain self-control.) With Plato’s democracy, people’s impulses are unrestrained, and the result is lack of order and direction. “Mobocracy” is what we would call Plato’s “democracy” today. Tyranny, the last form of government in Plato’s classification, results when the democratic mob submits itself to a strongman, each person selfishly figuring to gain from the tyrant’s rule and believing that the tyrant will end democracy’s evil. In fact, Plato thought, the tyrant will acquire absolute power and enslave his subjects. Further, he, the tyrant, will himself become a slave to his wretched craving for power and self-indulgence. Plato was not always an optimist.
Crito : Plato
[In this dialogue, Plato portrayed “Socrates” in
prison the day before his execution. Socrates’ friend Crito has come to help
Socrates escape, but Socrates refuses. In this excerpt, Socrates explains why
it is wrong for him to try to escape: because doing so would violate an
implicit agreement with the state.]
Socrates: Then consider the matter in
this way— imagine I am about to escape, and the Laws and the State come and
interrogate me: “Tell us, Socrates,” they say, “what are you doing? Are you
going to overturn us —the Laws and the State, as far as you are able? Do you
imagine that a State can continue and not be overthrown, in which the decisions
of Law have no power, but are set aside and overthrown by individuals?”
What will be our answer, Crito,
to these and similar words? Anyone, and especially a clever orator, will have a
good deal to say about the evil of setting aside the Law which requires a
sentence to be carried out. We might reply, “Yes, but the State has injured us
and given an unjust sentence.” Suppose I say that?
Crito: Very good,
Socrates.
S:
“And was that our agreement with you?” the Law would say, “Or were you to abide
by the sentence of the State?” And if I were surprised at their saying this,
the Law would probably add: “Answer, Socrates, instead of opening your eyes:
you are in the habit of asking and answering questions. Tell us what complaint
you have against us which justifies you in attempting to destroy us and the
State? In the first place did we not bring you into existence? Your father
married your mother by our aid and conceived you. Say whether you have any
objection against those of us who regulate marriage?” None, I should reply. “Or
against those of us who regulate the system of care and education of children
in which you were trained? Were not the Laws, who have the charge of this, right
in commanding your father to train you in the arts and exercise?” Yes, I should
reply.
“Well then, since you were
brought into the world, nurtured and educated by us, can you deny in the first
place that you are our child and slave, as your fathers were before you? And if
this is true you are not on equal terms with us. Nor can you think you have a
right to do to us what we are doing to you. Would you have any right to strike
or do any other evil to a father or to your master, if you had one, when you
have been struck or received some other evil at his hands? And because we think
it is right to destroy you, do you think that you have any right to destroy us
in return, and your country so far as you are able? And will you, O expounder
of virtue, say you are justified in this? Has a philosopher like you failed to
discover your country is more to be valued and higher and holier by far than
mother and father or any ancestor, and more regarded in the eyes of the gods
and of men of understanding? It should be soothed and gently and reverently
entreated when angry, even more than a father, and if not persuaded, it should
be obeyed. And when we are punished by the State, whether with imprisonment or
whipping, the punishment is to be endured in silence. If the State leads us to
wounds or death in battle, we follow as is right; no one can yield or leave his
rank, but whether in battle or in a court of law, or in any other place, he
must do what his city and his country order him. Or, he must change their view
of what is just. If he may do no violence to his father or mother, much less
may he do violence to his country,” What answer shall we make to this, Crito?
Do the Laws speak truly, or do they not?
C: I think that they do.
S:
Then the Laws will say: “Consider, Socrates, if this is true, that in your
present attempt you are going to do us wrong. For, after having brought you
into the world, nurtured and educated you, and given you and every other
citizen a share in every good we had to give, we further give the right to every
Athenian, if he does not like us when he has come of age and has seen the ways
of the city, he may go wherever else he pleases and take his goods with him.
None of us Laws will forbid or interfere with him. Any of you who does not like
us and the city, and who wants to go to a colony or to any other city, may go
where he likes, and take his possessions with him. But he who has experience of
the way we order justice and administer the State, and still remains, has
entered into an implied contract to do as we command him. He who disobeys us
is, as we maintain, triply wrong; first, because in disobeying us he is
disobeying his parents; second, because we are the authors of his education;
third, because he has made an agreement with us that he will duly obey our
commands. He neither obeys them nor convinces us our commands are wrong. We do
not rudely impose our commands but give each person the alternative of obeying
or convincing us. That is
what we offer and he does neither. These are the sort of
accusations to which, as we were saying, Socrates, you will be exposed if you
do as you were intending; you, above all other Athenians.”
Suppose I ask, why is this? They
will justly answer that I above all other men have acknowledged the agreement.
“There is clear proof,” they will
say, “Socrates, that we and the city were not displeasing to you. Of all
Athenians you have been the most constant resident in the city, which, as you
never leave, you appear to love. You never went out of the city either to see
the games, except once when you went to the Isthmus, or to any other place
unless you were on military service; nor did you travel as other men do. Nor
had you any curiosity to know other States or their Laws: Your affections did
not go beyond us and our State; we were your special favorites and you agreed
in our government of you. This is the State in which you conceived your
children, which is a proof of your satisfaction. Moreover, you might, if you
wished, have fixed the penalty at banishment in the course of the trial—the
State which refuses to let you go now would have let you go then. You pretended
you preferred death to exile and that you were not grieved at death. And now
you have forgotten these fine sentiments and pay no respect to us, the Laws,
whom you destroy. You are doing what only a miserable slave would do, running
away and turning your back upon the agreements which you made as a citizen.
First of all, answer this very question: Are we right in saying you agreed to
be governed according to us in deed, and not in word only? Is that true or
not?”
How shall we answer that, Crito?
Must we not agree?
C: We must, Socrates.
S:
Then will the Laws say: “You, Socrates, are breaking the agreements which you
made with us at your leisure, not in any haste or under any compulsion or
deception, but having had 70 years to think of them, during which time you were
at liberty to leave the city, if we were not to your liking or if our covenants
appeared to you to be unfair. You might have gone either to Lacedaemon or Crete,
which you often
praise for their good government, or to some other
Hellenic or foreign state. You, above all other Athenians, seemed to be so fond
of the State and of us, her Laws, that you never left her. The lame, the blind,
the maimed were not more stationary in the State than you were.
Now you run away and forsake your agreements. Not,
Socrates, if you will take our advice; do not make yourself ridiculous by
escaping out of the city.
“Just consider, if you do evil in
this way, what good will you do either yourself or your friends? That your
friends will be driven into exile and lose their citizenship, or will lose
their property, is reasonably certain. You yourself, if you fly to one of the
neighboring cities, like Thebes or Megara, both of which are well-governed
cities, will come to them as an enemy, Socrates. Their government will be
against you and all patriotic citizens will cast suspicious eye upon you as a
destroyer of the Laws. You will confirm in the minds of the judges the justice
of their own condemnation of you. For he who is a corruptor of the Laws is more
than likely to be corruptor of the young. Will you then flee from well-ordered
cities and virtuous men? Is existence worth having on these terms? Or will you
go to these cities without shame and talk to them, Socrates? And what will you
say to them? Will you say what you say here about virtue, justice,
institutions, and laws being the best things among men. Would that be decent of
you? Surely not.
“If you go away from
well-governed states to Crito’s friends in Thessaly, where there is a great
disorder and immorality, they will be charmed to have the tale of your escape
from prison, set off with ludicrous particulars of the manner in which you were
wrapped in a goatskin or some other disguise and metamorphosed as the fashion
of runaways is — that is very likely. But will there be no one to remind you in
your old age you violated the most sacred laws from a miserable desire of a
little more life? Perhaps not, if you keep them in a good temper. But if they
are angry you will hear many degrading things; you will live, but how? As the
flatterer of all men and the servant of all men. And doing what? Eating
and drinking in Thessaly, having gone abroad in order
that you may get a dinner. Where will your fine sentiments about justice and
virtue be then? Say that you wish to live for the sake of your children, that
you may bring them up and educate them—will you take them into Thessaly and
deprive them of Athenian citizenship? Is that the benefit which you would
confer upon them? Or are you under the impression that they will be better
cared for and educated here if you are still alive, although absent from them because
your friends will take care of them? Do you think if you are an inhabitant of
Thessaly they will take care of them, and if you are an inhabitant of the other
world they will not take care of them? No, if they who call themselves friends
are truly friends, they surely will.
“Listen, then, Socrates, to us
who have brought you up. Think not of life and children first, and of justice
afterwards, but of justice first, that you may be justified before the rulers
of the other world. For neither will you nor your children be happier or holier
in this life, or happier in another, if you do as Crito bids. Now you depart in
innocence, a sufferer and not a doer of evil; a victim, not of the Laws, but of
men. But if you escape, returning evil for evil and injury for injury, breaking
the agreements which you have made with us, and wronging those whom you ought
least to wrong, that is to say, yourself, your friends, your country, and us,
we shall be angry with you while you live. Our brethren, the Laws in the other world,
will receive you as an enemy because they will know you have done your best to
destroy us. Listen, then, to us and not to Crito.”
This is the voice which I seem to
hear murmuring in my ears, like the sound of a divine flute in the ears of the
mystic. That voice, I say, is humming in my ears and prevents me from hearing
any other. I know anything more which you may say will be useless. Yet speak,
if you have anything to say.
C: I have nothing to
say, Socrates.
S: Then let me follow what
seems to be the will of the god.
Republic : Plato
[Here Plato, through “Socrates” (who is the first
speaker), explained the relation between the male and the female guardians of
society, as well as other features of
the ideal state.]
Socrates: . . . It looks as though
our rulers will have to make considerable of falsehood and deception for the
benefit of those they rule. And we heared that all such falsehoods are useful
as a form of drug.
Glaucon: And we were right.
S: Well, it seems we
were right, especially where marriages and the producing of children are
concerned.
G: How so?
S: It follows from our
previous agreements, first, that the best men must have sex with the best women
as frequently as possible, while the opposite is true of the most inferior men
and women, and, second, that if our herd is to be of the highest possible
quality, the former’s offspring must be reared but not the latter’s. And this
must all be brought about without being noticed by anyone except the rulers, so
that our herd of guardians remains as free from dissension as possible.
G: That’s absolutely right.
S: Therefore certain
festivals and sacrifices will be established by law at which we’ll bring the
brides and grooms together, and we’ll direct our poets to compose appropriate
hymns for the marriages that take place. We’ll leave the number of marriages for
the rulers to decide, but their aim will be to keep the number of males as
stable as they can, taking into account war, disease, and similar factors, so
that the city will, as far as possible, become neither too big nor too small.
G: That’s right.
S: Then there’ll have to be
some sophisticated lotteries introduced, so that at each marriage the inferior
people we mentioned will blame luck rather than the rulers when they aren’t
chosen.
G: There will.
S: And among other prizes
and rewards the young men who are good in war or other things must be given
permission to have sex with the women more often, since this will also be a
good pretext for having them father as many of the children as possible.
G: That’s right.
S: And then, as the
children are born, they’ll be taken over by the officials appointed for the
purpose, who may be either men or women or both, since our offices are open to
both sexes.
G: Yes.
S: I think they’ll take
the children of good parents to the nurses in change of the rearing pen
situated in a separate part of the city, but the children of inferior parents,
or any child of the others that is born defective, they’ll hide in a secret and
unknown place, as is appropriate.
G: It is, if indeed the
guardian breed is to remain pure.
S: And won’t the nurses
also see to it that the mothers are brought to the rearing pen when their
breasts have milk, taking every precaution to insure that no mother knows her
own child and providing wet nurses if the mother’s milk is insufficient? And
won’t they take care that the mothers suckle the children for only a reasonable
amount of time and that the care of sleepless
children and all other such troublesome duties are
taken over by the wet nurses and other attendants?
G: You’re making it very
easy for the wives of the guardians to have children.
S: And that’s only proper.
So let’s take up the next thing we proposed. We said that the children’s
parents should be in their prime.
G: True.
S: Do you share the view
that a woman’s prime lasts about twenty years and a man’s about thirty?
G: Which years are
those?
S: A woman is to bear
children for the city from the age of twenty to the age of forty, a man from
the time that he passes his peak as a runner until he reaches fifty-five. . . .
S: However, I think that
when women and men have passed the age of having children, we’ll leave them
free to have sex with whomever they wish, with these exceptions: For a man—his
daughter, his mother, his daughter’s children, and his mother’s ancestors; for
a woman—her son and his descendants, her father and his ancestors. Having
received these instructions, they should be very careful not to let a single
fetus see the light of day, but if one is conceived and forces its way to the
light, they must deal with it in the knowledge that no nurture is available for
it.
G: That’s certainly
sensible. But how will they recognize their fathers and daughters and the
others you mentioned?
S: They have no way of
knowing. But a man will call all the children born in the tenth or seventh
month after he became a bridegroom his sons, if they’re male, and his
daughters, if they’re female, and they’ll call him father. He’ll call their
children his grandchildren, and they’ll call the group to which he belongs
grandfathers and grandmothers. And those who were born at the same time as
their mothers and fathers were having children they’ll call their brothers and
sisters. Thus, as we were saying, the relevant groups will avoid sexual
relations with each other. But the law will allow brothers and sisters to have
sex with one
another if the lottery works out that way and the
Pythia1 approves.
G: That’s absolutely
right.
S: This, then, Glaucon, is
how the guardians of your city have their wives and children in common. We must
now confirm that this arrangement is both consistent with the rest of the
constitution and by far the best. Or how else are we to proceed?
G: In just that way.
S: Then isn’t the first
step towards agreement to ask ourselves what we say is the greatest good in
designing the city—the good at which the legislator aims in making the laws
—and what is the greatest evil? And isn’t the next step to examine whether the system
we’ve just described fits into the tracks of the good and not into those of the
bad?
G: Absolutely.
S: Is there any greater
evil we can mention for a city than that which tears it apart and makes it many
instead of one? Or any greater good than that which binds it together and makes
it one?
G: There isn’t.
S: And when, as far as
possible, all the citizens rejoice and are pained by the same successes and
failures, doesn’t this sharing of pleasures and pains bind the city together?
G: It most certainly
does.
S: But when some suffer
greatly, while others rejoice greatly, at the same things happening to the city
or its people, doesn’t this privatization of pleasures and pains dissolve the
city?
G: Of course.
S: And isn’t that what
happens whenever such words as “mine” and “not mine” aren’t used in unison? And
similarly with “someone else’s”?
G: Precisely.
S: Then, is the
best-governed city the one in which most people say “mine” and “not mine” about
the same things in the same way?
1 The priestess of Apollo at Delphi.
G: It is indeed. . . .
S: Therefore, in our city
more than in any other, they’ll speak in unison the words we mentioned a moment
ago. When any one of them is doing well or badly, they’ll say that “mine” is
doing well or that “mine” is doing badly.
G: That’s absolutely
true.
S: Now, didn’t we say that
the having and expressing of this conviction is closely followed by the having
of pleasures and pains in common?
G: Yes, and we were
right.
S: Then won’t our citizens,
more than any others, have the same thing in common, the one they call “mine”?
And, having that in common, won’t they, more than any others, have common
pleasures and pains?
G: Of course.
S: And, in addition to
the other institutions, the cause of this is the having of wives and children
in common by the guardians?
G: That more than
anything else is the cause.
S: But we agreed that the
having of pains and pleasures in common is the greatest good for a city, and we
characterized a well-governed city in terms of the body’s reaction to pain or
pleasure in any one of its parts.
G: And we were right to
agree.
S: Then, the cause of
the greatest good for our city has been shown to be the having of wives and
children in common by the auxiliaries.
G: It has.
S: And, of course, this
is consistent with what we said before, for we said somewhere that, if they’re
going to be guardians, they mustn’t have private houses, property, or
possessions, but must receive their upkeep from the other citizens as a wage
for their guardianship and enjoy it in common.
G: That’s right.
S: Then isn’t it true, just
as I claimed, that what we are saying now, taken together with what we said
before, makes even better guardians out of them and prevents them from tearing
the city
apart by not calling the same thing “mine”? If
different people apply the term to different things, one would drag into his
own house whatever he could separate from the others, and another would drag
things into a different house to a different wife and children, and this would
make for private pleasures and pains at private things. But our people, on the
other hand, will think of the same things as their own, aim at the same goal,
and, as far as possible, feel pleasure and pain in unison.
G: Precisely.
S: And what about
lawsuits and mutual accusations? Won’t they pretty well disappear from among
them, because they have everything in common except their own bodies? Hence
they’ll be spared all the dissension that arises between people because of the
possession of money, children, and families.
G: They’ll necessarily
be spared it.
S: Nor could any
lawsuits for insult or injury justly occur among them, for we’ll declare that
it’s a fine and just thing for people to defend themselves against others of
the same age, since this will compel them to stay in good physical shape.
G: That’s right. . . .
S: Then, in all cases,
won’t the laws induce men to live at peace with one another?
G: Very much so.
S: And if there’s no
discord among the guardians, there’s no danger that the rest of the city will
break into civil war, either with them or among themselves.
G: Certainly not.
S: I hesitate to
mention, since they’re so unseemly, the pettiest of the evils, the guardians
would therefore escape: The poor man’s flattery of the rich, the perplexities
and sufferings involved in bringing up children and in making the money necessary
to feed the household, getting into debt, paying it off, and in some way or
other providing enough money to hand over to their wives and household slaves
to manage. All of the various troubles men endure in these matters are obvious,
ignoble, and not worth discussing.
G: They’re obvious even
to the blind.
S: They’ll be free of all
these, and they’ll live a life more blessedly happy than that of the victors in
the Olympian games.
G: How?
S: The Olympian victors are
considered happy on account of only a small part of what is available to our
guardians, for the guardians’ victory is even greater, and their upkeep from
public funds more complete. The victory they gain is the preservation of the
whole city, and the crown of victory that they and their children receive is
their upkeep and all the necessities of life. They receive rewards from their
own city while they live, and at their death they’re given a worthy burial.
G: Those are very good
things.
S: Do you remember that,
earlier in our discussion, someone—I forget who—shocked us by saying that we
hadn’t made our guardians happy, that it was possible for them to have
everything that belongs to the citizens, yet they had nothing? We said, I
think, that if this happened to come up at some point, we’d look into it then,
but that our concern at the time was to make our guardians true guardians and
the city the happiest we could, rather than looking to any one group within it
and molding it for happiness.
G: I remember.
S: Well, then, if the life
of our auxiliaries is apparently much finer and better than that of Olympian
victors, is there any need to compare it to the lives of cobblers, farmers, or
other craftsmen?
G: Not in my opinion.
S: Then it’s surely right
to repeat here what I said then: If a guardian seeks happiness in such a way
that he’s no longer a guardian and isn’t satisfied with a life that’s moderate,
stable, and—as we say—best, but a silly, adolescent idea of happiness seizes
him and incites him to use his power to take everything in the city for
himself, he’ll come to know the true wisdom of Hesiod’s2 saying
that somehow “the half is worth more than the whole.”
2 Hesiod was an early Greek poet who is thought
to have lived around 700 B.C.E.—Ed.
G: If he takes my
advice, he’ll keep to his own lifestyle. . . .
S: Then doesn’t it remain
for us to determine whether it’s possible to bring about this association among
human beings, as it is among animals, and to say just how it might be done?
G: You took the words
right out of my mouth.
S: As far as war is
concerned, I think it’s clear how they will wage it.
G: How so?
S: Men and women will
campaign together. They’ll take the sturdy children with them, so that, like
the children of other craftsmen, they can see what they’ll have to do when they
grow up. But in addition to observing, they can serve and assist in everything
to do with the war and help their mothers and fathers. Haven’t you noticed in
the other crafts how the children of potters, for example, assist and observe
for a long time before actually making any pots?
G: I have indeed.
S: And should these
craftsmen take more care in training their children by appropriate experience
and observation than the guardians?
G: Of course not; that
would be completely ridiculous.
S: Besides, every animal
fights better in the presence of its young.
G: That’s so. But,
Socrates, there’s a considerable danger that in a defeat—and such things are
likely to happen in a war—they’ll lose their children’s lives as well as their
own, making it impossible for the rest of the city to recover.
S: What you say is true.
But do you think that the first thing we should provide for is the avoidance of
all danger?
G: Not at all.
S: Well, then, if people
will probably have to face some danger, shouldn’t it be the sort that will make
them better if they come through it successfully?
G: Obviously.
S: And do you think that
whether or not men who are going to be warriors observe warfare when they’re
still boys makes such a small difference that it isn’t worth the danger of
having them do it?
G: No, it does make a
difference to what you’re talking about.
S: On the assumption, then,
that the children are to be observers of war, if we can contrive some way to
keep them secure, everything will be fine, won’t it?
G: Yes.
No comments:
Post a Comment