And will not he who has been shown to be the wickedest, be also the most miserable ? and he who has tyrannized longest and most, most continually and truly miserable ; although this may not be the opinion of men in general ?
Yes, he said, inevitably.
And must not the tyrannical man be like the tyrannical State, and the democratical man like the democratical State ; and the same of the others ?
Certainly.
And as State is to State in virtue and happiness, so is man in relation to man ?
To be sure.
Then comparing our original city, which was under a king, and the city which is under a tyrant, how do they stand as to virtue ?
They are the opposite extremes, he said, for one is the very best and the other is the very worst.
There can be no mistake, I said, as to which is which, and therefore I will at once inquire whether you would arrive at a similar decision about their relative happiness and misery. And here we must not allow ourselves to be panic-stricken at the apparition of the tyrant, who is only a unit and may perhaps have a few retainers about him ; but let us go as we ought into every corner of the city and look all about, and then we will give our opinion.
A fair invitation, he replied ; and I see, as everyone must, that a tyranny is the wretchedest form of government, and the rule of a king the happiest.
And in estimating the men, too, may I not fairly make a like request, that I should have a judge whose mind can enter into and see through human nature ? he must not be like a child who looks at the outside and is dazzled at the pompous aspect which the tyrannical nature assumes to the beholder, but let him be one who has a clear insight. May I suppose that the judgment is given in the hearing of us all by one who is able to judge, and has dwelt in the same place with him, and been present at his daily life and known him in his family relations, where he may be seen stripped of his tragedy attire, and again in the hour of public danger — he shall tell us about the happiness and misery of the tyrant when compared with other men ?
That again, he said, is a very fair proposal.
Shall I assume that we ourselves are able and experienced judges and have before now met with such a person ? We shall then have someone who will answer our inquiries.
By all means.
Let me ask you not to forget the parallel of the individual and the State ; bearing this in mind, and glancing in turn from one to the other of them, will you tell me their respective conditions ?
What do you mean ? he asked.
Beginning with the State, I replied, would you say that a city which is governed by a tyrant is free or enslaved ?
No city, he said, can be more completely enslaved.
And yet, as you see, there are freemen as well as masters in such a State ?
Yes, he said, I see that there are — a few ; but the people, speaking generally, and the best of them are miserably degraded and enslaved.
Then if the man is like the State, I said, must not the same rule prevail ? His soul is full of meanness and vulgarity — the best elements in him are enslaved ; and there is a small ruling part, which is also the worst and maddest.
Inevitably.
And would you say that the soul of such a one is the soul of a freeman or of a slave ?
He has the soul of a slave, in my opinion.
And the State which is enslaved under a tyrant is utterly incapable of acting voluntarily ?
Utterly incapable.
And also the soul which is under a tyrant (I am speaking of the soul taken as a whole) is least capable of doing what she desires ; there is a gadfly which goads her, and she is full of trouble and remorse ?
Certainly.
And is the city which is under a tyrant rich or poor ?
Poor.
And the tyrannical soul must be always poor and insatiable ?
True.
And must not such a State and such a man be always full of fear ?
Yes, indeed.
Is there any State in which you will find more of lamentation and sorrow and groaning and pain ?
Certainly not.
And is there any man in whom you will find more of this sort of misery than in the tyrannical man, who is in a fury of passions and desires ?
Impossible.
Reflecting upon these and similar evils, you held the tyrannical State to be the most miserable of States ?
And I was right, he said.
Certainly, I said. And when you see the same evils in the tyrannical man, what do you say of him ?
I say that he is by far the most miserable of all men.
There, I said, I think that you are beginning to go wrong.
What do you mean ?
I do not think that he has as yet reached the utmost extreme of misery.
Then who is more miserable ?
One of whom I am about to speak.
Who is that ?
He who is of a tyrannical nature, and instead of leading a private life has been cursed with the further misfortune of being a public tyrant.
From what has been said, I gather that you are right.
Yes, I replied, but in this high argument you should be a little more certain, and should not conjecture only ; for of all questions, this respecting good and evil is the greatest.
Very true, he said.
Let me then offer you an illustration, which may, I think, throw a light upon this subject.
What is your illustration ?
The case of rich individuals in cities who possess many slaves : from them you may form an idea of the tyrant’s condition, for they both have slaves ; the only difference is that he has more slaves.
Yes, that is the difference.
You know that they live securely and have nothing to apprehend from their servants ?
What should they fear ?
Nothing. But do you observe the reason of this ?
Yes ; the reason is, that the whole city is leagued together for the protection of each individual.
Very true, I said. But imagine one of these owners, the master say of some fifty slaves, together with his family and property and slaves, carried off by a god into the wilderness, where there are no freemen to help him — will he not be in an agony of fear lest he and his wife and children should be put to death by his slaves ?
Yes, he said, he will be in the utmost fear.
The time has arrived when he will be compelled to flatter divers of his slaves, and make many promises to them of freedom and other things, much against his will — he will have to cajole his own servants.
Yes, he said, that will be the only way of saving himself.
And suppose the same god, who carried him away, to surround him with neighbors who will not suffer one man to be the master of another, and who, if they could catch the offender, would take his life ?
His case will be still worse, if you suppose him to be everywhere surrounded and watched by enemies.
And is not this the sort of prison in which the tyrant will be bound — he who being by nature such as we have described, is full of all sorts of fears and lusts ? His soul is dainty and greedy, and yet alone, of all men in the city, he is never allowed to go on a journey, or to see the things which other freemen desire to see, but he lives in his hole like a woman hidden in the house, and is jealous of any other citizen who goes into foreign parts and sees anything of interest.
Very true, he said.
And amid evils such as these will not he who is ill-governed in his own person — the tyrannical man, I mean — whom you just now decided to be the most miserable of all — will not he be yet more miserable when, instead of leading a private life, he is constrained by fortune to be a public tyrant ? He has to be master of others when he is not master of himself : he is like a diseased or paralytic man who is compelled to pass his life, not in retirement, but fighting and combating with other men.
Yes, he said, the similitude is most exact.
Is not his case utterly miserable ? and does not the actual tyrant lead a worse life than he whose life you determined to be the worst ?
Certainly.
He who is the real tyrant, whatever men may think, is the real slave, and is obliged to practise the greatest adulation and servility, and to be the flatterer of the vilest of mankind. He has desires which he is utterly unable to satisfy, and has more wants than anyone, and is truly poor, if you know how to inspect the whole soul of him : all his life long he is beset with fear and is full of convulsions and distractions, even as the State which he resembles : and surely the resemblance holds ?
Very true, he said.
Moreover, as we were saying before, he grows worse from having power : he becomes and is of necessity more jealous, more faithless, more unjust, more friendless, more impious, than he was at first ; he is the purveyor and cherisher of every sort of vice, and the consequence is that he is supremely miserable, and that he makes everybody else as miserable as himself.
No man of any sense will dispute your words. Come, then, I said, and as the general umpire in theatrical contests proclaims the result, do you also decide who in your opinion is first in the scale of happiness, and who second, and in what order the others follow : there are five of them in all — they are the royal, timocratical, oligarchical, democratical, tyrannical.
The decision will be easily given, he replied ; they shall be choruses coming on the stage, and I must judge them in the order in which they enter, by the criterion of virtue and vice, happiness and misery.
Need we hire a herald, or shall I announce that the son of Ariston (the best) has decided that the best and justest is also the happiest, and that this is he who is the most royal man and king over himself ; and that the worst and most unjust man is also the most miserable, and that this is he who being the greatest tyrant of himself is also the greatest tyrant of his State ?
Make the proclamation yourself, he said.
And shall I add, “whether seen or unseen by gods and men” ?
Let the words be added.
Then this, I said, will be our first proof ; and there is another, which may also have some weight.
What is that ?
The second proof is derived from the nature of the soul : seeing that the individual soul, like the State, has been divided by us into three principles, the division may, I think, furnish a new demonstration.
Of what nature ?
It seems to me that to these three principles three pleasures correspond ; also three desires and governing powers.
How do you mean ? he said.
There is one principle with which, as we were saying, a man learns, another with which he is angry ; the third, having many forms, has no special name, but is denoted by the general term appetitive, from the extraordinary strength and vehemence of the desires of eating and drinking and the other sensual appetites which are the main elements of it ; also money-loving, because such desires are generally satisfied by the help of money.
That is true, he said.
If we were to say that the loves and pleasures of this third part were concerned with gain, we should then be able to fall back on a single notion ; and might truly and intelligibly describe this part of the soul as loving gain or money.
I agree with you.
Again, is not the passionate element wholly set on ruling and conquering and getting fame ?
True.
Suppose we call it the contentious or ambitious — would the term be suitable ?
Extremely suitable.
On the other hand, everyone sees that the principle of knowledge is wholly directed to the truth, and cares less than either of the others for gain or fame.
Far less.
“Lover of wisdom,” “lover of knowledge,” are titles which we may fitly apply to that part of the soul ?
Certainly.
One principle prevails in the souls of one class of men, another in others, as may happen ?
Yes.
Then we may begin by assuming that there are three classes of men — lovers of wisdom, lovers of honor, lovers of gain ?
Exactly.
And there are three kinds of pleasure, which are their several objects ?
Very true.
Now, if you examine the three classes of men, and ask of them in turn which of their lives is pleasantest, each will be found praising his own and depreciating that of others : the money-maker will contrast the vanity of honor or of learning if they bring no money with the solid advantages of gold and silver ?
True, he said.
And the lover of honor — what will be his opinion ? Will he not think that the pleasure of riches is vulgar, while the pleasure of learning, if it brings no distinction, is all smoke and nonsense to him ?
Very true.
And are we to suppose, I said, that the philosopher sets any value on other pleasures in comparison with the pleasure of knowing the truth, and in that pursuit abiding, ever learning, not so far indeed from the heaven of pleasure ? Does he not call the other pleasures necessary, under the idea that if there were no necessity for them, he would rather not have them ?
There can be no doubt of that, he replied.
Since, then, the pleasures of each class and the life of each are in dispute, and the question is not which life is more or less honorable, or better or worse, but which is the more pleasant or painless — how shall we know who speaks truly ?
I cannot myself tell, he said.
Well, but what ought to be the criterion ? Is any better than experience, and wisdom, and reason ?
There cannot be a better, he said.
Then, I said, reflect. Of the three individuals, which has the greatest experience of all the pleasures which we enumerated ? Has the lover of gain, in learning the nature of essential truth, greater experience of the pleasure of knowledge than the philosopher has of the pleasure of gain ?
The philosopher, he replied, has greatly the advantage ; for he has of necessity always known the taste of the other pleasures from his childhood upward : but the lover of gain in all his experience has not of necessity tasted — or, I should rather say, even had he desired, could hardly have tasted — the sweetness of learning and knowing truth.
Then the lover of wisdom has a great advantage over the lover of gain, for he has a double experience ?
Yes, very great.
Again, has he greater experience of the pleasures of honor, or the lover of honor of the pleasures of wisdom ?
Nay, he said, all three are honored in proportion as they attain their object ; for the rich man and the brave man and the wise man alike have their crowd of admirers, and as they all receive honor they all have experience of the pleasures of honor ; but the delight which is to be found in the knowledge of true being is known to the philosopher only.
His experience, then, will enable him to judge better than anyone ?
Far better.
And he is the only one who has wisdom as well as experience ?
Certainly.
Further, the very faculty which is the instrument of judgment is not possessed by the covetous or ambitious man, but only by the philosopher ?
What faculty ?
Reason, with whom, as we were saying, the decision ought to rest.
Yes.
And reasoning is peculiarly his instrument ?
Certainly.
If wealth and gain were the criterion, then the praise or blame of the lover of gain would surely be the most trustworthy ?
Assuredly.
Or if honor, or victory, or courage, in that case the judgment of the ambitious or pugnacious would be the truest ?
Clearly.
But since experience and wisdom and reason are the judges —
The only inference possible, he replied, is that pleasures which are approved by the lover of wisdom and reason are the truest.
And so we arrive at the result, that the pleasure of the intelligent part of the soul is the pleasantest of the three, and that he of us in whom this is the ruling principle has the pleasantest life.
Unquestionably, he said, the wise man speaks with authority when he approves of his own life.
And what does the judge affirm to be the life which is next, and the pleasure which is next ?
Clearly that of the soldier and lover of honor ; who is nearer to himself than the money-maker.
Last comes the lover of gain ?
Very true, he said.
Twice in succession, then, has the just man overthrown the unjust in this conflict ; and now comes the third trial, which is dedicated to Olympian Zeus the saviour : a sage whispers in my ear that no pleasure except that of the wise is quite true and pure — all others are a shadow only ; and surely this will prove the greatest and most decisive of falls ?
Yes, the greatest ; but will you explain yourself ?
I will work out the subject and you shall answer my questions.
Proceed.
Say, then, is not pleasure opposed to pain ?
True.
And there is a neutral state which is neither pleasure nor pain ?
There is.
A state which is intermediate, and a sort of repose of the soul about either — that is what you mean ?
Yes.
You remember what people say when they are sick ?
What do they say ?
That after all nothing is pleasanter than health. But then they never knew this to be the greatest of pleasures until they were ill.
Yes, I know, he said.
And when persons are suffering from acute pain, you must have heard them say that there is nothing pleasanter than to get rid of their pain ?
I have.
And there are many other cases of suffering in which the mere rest and cessation of pain, and not any positive enjoyment, are extolled by them as the greatest pleasure ?
Yes, he said ; at the time they are pleased and well content to be at rest.
Again, when pleasure ceases, that sort of rest or cessation will be painful ?
Doubtless, he said.
Then the intermediate state of rest will be pleasure and will also be pain ?
So it would seem.
But can that which is neither become both ?
I should say not.
And both pleasure and pain are motions of the soul, are they not ?
Yes.
But that which is neither was just now shown to be rest and not motion, and in a mean between them ?
Yes.
How, then, can we be right in supposing that the absence of pain is pleasure, or that the absence of pleasure is pain ?
Impossible. This, then, is an appearance only, and not a reality ; that is to say, the rest is pleasure at the moment and in comparison of what is painful, and painful in comparison of what is pleasant ; but all these representations, when tried by the test of true pleasure, are not real, but a sort of imposition ?
That is the inference.
Look at the other class of pleasures which have no antecedent pains and you will no longer suppose, as you perhaps may at present, that pleasure is only the cessation of pain, or pain of pleasure.
What are they, he said, and where shall I find them ?
There are many of them : take as an example, the pleasures of smell, which are very great and have no antecedent pains ; they come in a moment, and when they depart leave no pain behind them.
Most true, he said.
Let us not, then, be induced to believe that pure pleasure is the cessation of pain, or pain of pleasure.
No.
Still, the more numerous and violent pleasures which reach the soul through the body are generally of this sort — they are reliefs of pain.
That is true.
And the anticipations of future pleasures and pains are of a like nature ?
Yes.
Shall I give you an illustration of them ?
Let me hear.
You would allow, I said, that there is in nature an upper and lower and middle region ?
I should.
And if a person were to go from the lower to the middle region, would he not imagine that he is going up ; and he who is standing in the middle and sees whence he has come, would imagine that he is already in the upper region, if he has never seen the true upper world ?
To be sure, he said ; how can he think otherwise ?
But if he were taken back again he would imagine, and truly imagine, that he was descending ?
No doubt.
All that would arise out of his ignorance of the true upper and middle and lower regions ?
Yes.
Then can you wonder that persons who are inexperienced in the truth, as they have wrong ideas about many other things, should also have wrong ideas about pleasure and pain and the intermediate state ; so that when they are only being drawn toward the painful they feel pain and think the pain which they experience to be real, and in like manner, when drawn away from pain to the neutral or intermediate state, they firmly believe that they have reached the goal of satiety and pleasure ; they, not knowing pleasure, err in contrasting pain with the absence of pain, which is like contrasting black with gray instead of white — can you wonder, I say, at this ?
No, indeed ; I should be much more disposed to wonder at the opposite.
Look at the matter thus : Hunger, thirst, and the like, are inanitions of the bodily state ?
Yes.
And ignorance and folly are inanitions of the soul ?
True.
And food and wisdom are the corresponding satisfactions of either ?
Certainly.
And is the satisfaction derived from that which has less or from that which has more existence the truer ?
Clearly, from that which has more.
What classes of things have a greater share of pure existence, in your judgment — those of which food and drink and condiments and all kinds of sustenance are examples, or the class which contains true opinion and knowledge and mind and all the different kinds of virtue ? Put the question in this way : Which has a more pure being — that which is concerned with the invariable, the immortal, and the true, and is of such a nature, and is found in such natures ; or that which is concerned with and found in the variable and mortal, and is itself variable and mortal ?
Far purer, he replied, is the being of that which is concerned with the invariable.
And does the essence of the invariable partake of knowledge in the same degree as of essence ?
Yes, of knowledge in the same degree.
And of truth in the same degree ?
Yes.
And, conversely, that which has less of truth will also have less of essence ?
Necessarily.
Then, in general, those kinds of things which are in the service of the body have less of truth and essence than those which are in the service of the soul ?
Far less.
And has not the body itself less of truth and essence than the soul ?
Yes.
What is filled with more real existence, and actually has a more real existence, is more really filled than that which is filled with less real existence and is less real ?
Of course.
And if there be a pleasure in being filled with that which is according to nature, that which is more really filled with more real being will more really and truly enjoy true pleasure ; whereas that which participates in less real being will be less truly and surely satisfied, and will participate in an illusory and less real pleasure ?
Unquestionably. Those, then, who know not wisdom and virtue, and are always busy with gluttony and sensuality, go down and up again as far as the mean ; and in this region they move at random throughout life, but they never pass into the true upper world ; thither they neither look, nor do they ever find their way, neither are they truly filled with true being, nor do they taste of pure and abiding pleasure. Like cattle, with their eyes always looking down and their heads stooping to the earth, that is, to the dining-table, they fatten and feed and breed, and, in their excessive love of these delights, they kick and butt at one another with horns and hoofs which are made of iron ; and they kill one another by reason of their insatiable lust. For they fill themselves with that which is not substantial, and the part of themselves which they fill is also unsubstantial and incontinent.
Verily, Socrates, said Glaucon, you describe the life of the many like an oracle.
Their pleasures are mixed with pains — how can they be otherwise ? For they are mere shadows and pictures of the true, and are colored by contrast, which exaggerates both light and shade, and so they implant in the minds of fools insane desires of themselves ; and they are fought about as Stesichorus says that the Greeks fought about the shadow of Helen at Troy, in ignorance of the truth.
Something of that sort must inevitably happen.
And must not the like happen with the spirited or passionate element of the soul ? Will not the passionate man who carries his passion into action, be in the like case, whether he is envious and ambitious, or violent and contentious, or angry and discontented, if he be seeking to attain honor and victory and the satisfaction of his anger without reason or sense ?
Yes, he said, the same will happen with the spirited element also.
Then may we not confidently assert that the lovers of money and honor, when they seek their pleasures under the guidance and in the company of reason and knowledge, and pursue after and win the pleasures which wisdom shows them, will also have the truest pleasures in the highest degree which is attainable to them, inasmuch as they follow truth ; and they will have the pleasures which are natural to them, if that which is best for each one is also most natural to him ?
Yes, certainly ; the best is the most natural.
And when the whole soul follows the philosophical principle, and there is no division, the several parts are just, and do each of them their own business, and enjoy severally the best and truest pleasures of which they are capable ?
Exactly.
But when either of the two other principles prevails, it fails in attaining its own pleasure, and compels the rest to pursue after a pleasure which is a shadow only and which is not their own ?
True.
And the greater the interval which separates them from philosophy and reason, the more strange and illusive will be the pleasure ?
Yes.
And is not that farthest from reason which is at the greatest distance from law and order ?
Clearly.
And the lustful and tyrannical desires are, as we saw, at the greatest distance ? Yes.
And the royal and orderly desires are nearest ?
Yes.
Then the tyrant will live at the greatest distance from true or natural pleasure, and the king at the least ?
Certainly.
But if so, the tyrant will live most unpleasantly, and the king most pleasantly ?
Inevitably.
Would you know the measure of the interval which separates them ?
Will you tell me ?
There appear to be three pleasures, one genuine and two spurious : now the transgression of the tyrant reaches a point beyond the spurious ; he has run away from the region of law and reason, and taken up his abode with certain slave pleasures which are his satellites, and the measure of his inferiority can only be expressed in a figure.
How do you mean ?
I assume, I said, that the tyrant is in the third place from the oligarch ; the democrat was in the middle ?
Yes.
And if there is truth in what has preceded, he will be wedded to an image of pleasure which is thrice removed as to truth from the pleasure of the oligarch ?
He will.
And the oligarch is third from the royal ; since we count as one royal and aristocratical ?
Yes, he is third.
Then the tyrant is removed from true pleasure by the space of a number which is three times three ?
Manifestly.
The shadow, then, of tyrannical pleasure determined by the number of length will be a plane figure.
Certainly.
And if you raise the power and make the plane a solid, there is no difficulty in seeing how vast is the interval by which the tyrant is parted from the king.
Yes ; the arithmetician will easily do the sum.
Or if some person begins at the other end and measures the interval by which the king is parted from the tyrant in truth of pleasure, he will find him, when the multiplication is completed, living 729 times more pleasantly, and the tyrant more painfully by this same interval.
What a wonderful calculation ! And how enormous is the distance which separates the just from the unjust in regard to pleasure and pain !
Yet a true calculation, I said, and a number which nearly concerns human life, if human beings are concerned with days and nights and months and years.
Yes, he said, human life is certainly concerned with them.
Then if the good and just man be thus superior in pleasure to the evil and unjust, his superiority will be infinitely greater in propriety of life and in beauty and virtue ?
Immeasurably greater.