Laws
by Plato
translated by Benjamin Jowett
Book VI
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE:
An ATHENIAN STRANGER;
CLEINIAS, a Cretan;
MEGILLUS, a Lacedaemonian
[Athenian Stranger] And now having made an end of the
preliminaries we will proceed to the appointment of magistracies.
[Cleinias] Very good.
[Ath.] In the ordering of a state there are two parts: first,
the number of the magistracies, and the mode of establishing
them; and, secondly, when they have been established, laws again
will have to be provided for each of them, suitable in nature and
number. But before electing the magistrates let us stop a little
and say a word in season about the election of them.
[Cle.] What have you got to say?
[Ath.] This is what I have to say; every one can see, that
although the work of legislation is a most important matter, yet
if a well-ordered city superadd to good laws unsuitable offices,
not only will there be no use in having the good laws-not only
will they be ridiculous and useless, but the greatest political
injury and evil will accrue from them.
[Cle.] Of course.
[Ath.] Then now, my friend, let us observe what will happen in
the constitution of out intended state. In the first place, you
will acknowledge that those who are duly appointed to magisterial
power, and their families, should severally have given
satisfactory proof of what they are, from youth upward until the
time of election; in the next place, those who are to elect
should have been trained in habits of law, and be well educated,
that they may have a right judgment, and may be able to select or
reject men whom they approve or disapprove, as they are worthy of
either. But how can we imagine that those who are brought
together for the first time, and are strangers to one another,
and also uneducated, will avoid making mistakes in the choice of
magistrates?
[Cle.] Impossible.
[Ath.] The matter is serious, and excuses will not serve the
turn. I will tell you, then, what you and I will have to do,
since you, as you tell me, with nine others, have offered to
settle the new state on behalf of the people of Crete, and I am
to help you by the invention of the present romance. I certainly
should not like to leave the tale wandering all over the world
without a head;-a headless monster is such a hideous thing.
[Cle.] Excellent, Stranger.
[Ath.] Yes; and I will be as good as my word.
[Cle.] Let us by all means do as you propose.
[Ath.] That we will, by the grace of God, if old age will only
permit us.
[Cle.] But God will be gracious.
[Ath.] Yes; and under his guidance let us consider further
point.
[Cle.] What is it?
[Ath.] Let us remember what a courageously mad and daring
creation this our city is.
[Cle.] What had you in your mind when you said that?
[Ath.] I had in my mind the free and easy manner in which we
are ordaining that the inexperienced colonists shall receive our
laws. Now a man need not be very wise, Cleinias, in order to see
that no one can easily receive laws at their first imposition.
But if we could anyhow wait until those who have been imbued with
them from childhood, and have been nurtured in them, and become
habituated to them, take their part in the public elections of
the state; I say, if this could be accomplished, and rightly
accomplished by any way or contrivance-then, I think that there
would be very little danger, at the end of the time, of a state
thus trained not being permanent.
[Cle.] A reasonable supposition.
[Ath.] Then let us consider if we can find any way out of the
difficulty; for I maintain, Cleinias, that the Cnosians, above
all the other Cretans, should not be satisfied with barely
discharging their duty to the colony, but they ought to take the
utmost pains to establish the offices which are first created by
them in the best and surest manner. Above all, this applies to
the selection of the guardians of the law, who must be chosen
first of all, and with the greatest care; the others are of less
importance.
[Cle.] What method can we devise of electing them?
[Ath.] This will be the method:-Sons of the Cretans, I shall
say to them, inasmuch as the Cnosians have precedence over the
other states, they should, in common with those who join this
settlement, choose a body of thirty-seven in all, nineteen of
them being taken from the settlers, and the remainder from the
citizens of Cnosus. Of those latter the Cnosians shall make a
present to your colony, and you yourself shall be one of the
eighteen, and shall become a citizen of the new state; and if you
and they cannot be persuaded to go, the Cnosians may fairly use a
little violence in order to make you.
[Cle.] But why, Stranger, do not you and Megillus take a part
in our new city?
[Ath.] O, Cleinias, Athens is proud, and Sparta too; and they
are both a long way off. But you and likewise the other colonists
are conveniently situated as you describe. I have been speaking
of the way in which the new citizens may be best managed under
present circumstances; but in after-ages, if the city continues
to exist, let the election be on this wise. All who are horse or
foot soldiers, or have seen military service at the proper ages
when they were severally fitted for it, shall share in the
election of magistrates; and the election shall be held in
whatever temple the state deems most venerable, and every one
shall carry his vote to the altar of the God, writing down on a
tablet the name of the person for whom he votes, and his father's
name, and his tribe, and ward; and at the side he shall write his
own name in like manner. Any one who pleases may take away any
tablet which he does not think properly filled up, and exhibit it
in the Agara for a period of not less than thirty days. The
tablets which are judged to be first, to the number of 300, shall
be shown by the magistrates to the whole city, and the citizens
shall in like manner select from these the candidates whom they
prefer; and this second selection, to the number of 100, shall be
again exhibited to the citizens; in the third, let any one who
pleases select whom pleases out of the 100, walking through the
parts of victims, and let them choose for magistrates and
proclaim the seven and thirty who have the greatest number of
votes. But who, Cleinias and Megillus, will order for us in the
colony all this matter of the magistrates, and the scrutinies of
them? If we reflect, we shall see that cities which are in
process of construction like ours must have some such persons,
who cannot possibly be elected before there are any magistrates;
and yet they must be elected in some way, and they are not to be
inferior men, but the best possible. For as the proverb says,
"a good beginning is half the business"; and "to
have begun well" is praised by all, and in my opinion is a
great deal more than half the business, and has never been
praised by any one enough.
[Cle.] That is very true.
[Ath.] Then let us recognize the difficulty, and make clear to
our own minds how the beginning is to be accomplished. There is
only one proposal which I have to offer, and that is one which,
under our circumstances, is both necessary and expedient.
[Cle.] What is it?
[Ath.] I maintain that this colony of ours has a father and
mother, who are no other than the colonizing state. Well I know
that many colonies have been, and will be, at enmity with their
parents. But in early days the child, as in a family, loves and
is beloved; even if there come a time later when the tie is
broken, still, while he is in want of education, he naturally
loves his parents and is beloved by them, and flies to his
relatives for protection, and finds in them his only natural
allies in time of need; and this parental feeling already exists
in the Cnosians, as is shown by their care of the new city; and
there is a similar feeling on the part of the young city towards
Cnosus. And I repeat what I was saying-for there is no harm in
repeating a good thing-that the Cnosians should take a common
interest in all these matters, and choose, as far as they can,
the eldest and best of the colonists, to the number of not less
than a hundred; and let there be another hundred of the Cnosians
themselves. These, I say, on their arrival, should have a joint
care that the magistrates should be appointed according to law,
and that when they are appointed they should undergo a scrutiny.
When this has been effected, the Cnosians shall return home, and
the new city do the best she can for her own preservation and
happiness. I would have the seven-and-thirty now, and in all
future time, chosen to fulfil the following duties:-Let them, in
the first place, be the guardians of the law; and, secondly, of
the registers in which each one registers before the magistrate
the amount of his property, excepting four minae which are
allowed to citizens of the first class, three allowed to the
second, two to the third, and a single mina to the fourth. And if
any one, despising the laws for the sake of gain, be found to
possess anything more which has not been registered, let all that
he has in excess be confiscated, and let him be liable to a suit
which shall be the reverse of honourable or fortunate. And let
any one who will, indict him on the charge of loving base gains,
and proceed against him before the guardians of the law. And if
he be cast, let him lose his share of the public possessions, and
when there is any public distribution, let him have nothing but
his original lot; and let him be written down a condemned man as
long as he lives, in some place in which any one who pleases can
read about his onces. The guardian of the law shall not hold
office longer than twenty years, and shall not be less than fifty
years of age when he is elected; or if he is elected when he is
sixty years of age, he shall hold office for ten years only; and
upon the same principle, he must not imagine that he will be
permitted to hold such an important office as that of guardian of
the laws after he is seventy years of age, if he live so long.
These are the three first ordinances about the guardians of
the law; as the work of legislation progresses, each law in turn
will assign to them their further duties. And now we may proceed
in order to speak of the election of other officers; for generals
have to be elected, and these again must have their ministers,
commanders, and colonels of horse, and commanders of brigades of
foot, who would be more rightly called by their popular name of
brigadiers. The guardians of the law shall propose as generals
men who are natives of the city, and a selection from the
candidates proposed shall be made by those who are or have been
of the age for military service. And if one who is not proposed
is thought by somebody to be better than one who is, let him name
whom he prefers in the place of whom, and make oath that he is
better, and propose him; and whichever of them is approved by
vote shall be admitted to the final selection; and the three who
have the greatest number of votes shall be appointed generals,
and superintendents of military affairs, after previously
undergoing a scrutiny, like the guardians of the law. And let the
generals thus elected propose twelve brigadiers, one for each
tribe; and there shall be a right of counterproposal as in the
case of the generals, and the voting and decision shall take
place in the same way. Until the prytanes and council are
elected, the guardians of the law shall convene the assembly in
some holy spot which is suitable to the purpose, placing the
hoplites by themselves, and the cavalry by themselves, and in a
third division all the rest of the army. All are to vote for the
generals [and for the colonels of horse], but the brigadiers are
to be voted for only by those who carry shields [i.e. the
hoplites]. Let the body of cavalry choose phylarchs for the
generals; but captains of light troops, or archers, or any other
division of the army, shall be appointed by the generals for
themselves. There only remains the appointment of officers of
cavalry: these shall be proposed by the same persons who proposed
the generals, and the election and the counter-proposal of other
candidates shall be arranged in the same way as in the case of
the generals, and let the cavalry vote and the infantry look on
at the election; the two who have the greatest number of votes
shall be the leaders of all the horse. Disputes about the voting
may be raised once or twice; but if the dispute be raised a third
time, the officers who preside at the several elections shall
decide.
The council shall consist of 30 x 12 members-360 will be a
convenient number for sub-division. If we divide the whole number
into four parts of ninety each, we get ninety counsellors for
each class. First, all the citizens shall select candidates from
the first class; they shall be compelled to vote, and, if they do
not, shall be duly fined. When the candidates have been selected,
some one shall mark them down; this shall be the business of the
first day. And on the following day, candidates shall be selected
from the second class in the same manner and under the same
conditions as on the previous day; and on the third day a
selection shall be made from the third class, at which every one
may, if he likes, vote, and the three first classes shall be
compelled to vote; but the fourth and lowest class shall be under
no compulsion, and any member of this class who does not vote
shall not be punished. On the fourth day candidates shall be
selected from the fourth and smallest class; they shall be
selected by all, but he who is of the fourth class shall suffer
no penalty, nor he who is of the third, if he be not willing to
vote; but he who is of the first or second class, if he does not
vote shall be punished;-he who is of the second class shall pay a
fine of triple the amount which was exacted at first, and he who
is of the first class quadruple. On the fifth day the rulers
shall bring out the names noted down, for all the citizens to
see, and every man shall choose out of them, under pain, if he do
not, of suffering the first penalty; and when they have chosen
out of each of the classes, they shall choose one-half of them by
lot, who shall undergo a scrutiny:-These are to form the council
for the year.
The mode of election which has been described is in a mean
between monarchy and democracy, and such a mean the state ought
always to observe; for servants and masters never can be friends,
nor good and bad, merely because they are declared to have equal
privileges. For to unequals equals become unequal, if they are
not harmonized by measure; and both by reason of equality, and by
reason of inequality, cities are filled with seditions. The old
saying, that "equality makes friendship," is happy and
also true; but there is obscurity and confusion as to what sort
of equality is meant. For there are two equalities which are
called by the same name, but are in reality in many ways almost
the opposite of one another; one of them may be introduced
without difficulty, by any state or any legislator in the
distribution of honours: this is the rule of measure, weight, and
number, which regulates and apportions them. But there is another
equality, of a better and higher kind, which is not so easily
recognized. This is the judgment of Zeus; among men it avails but
little; that little, however, is the source of the greatest good
to individuals and states. For it gives to the greater more, and
to the inferior less and in proportion to the nature of each;
and, above all, greater honour always to the greater virtue, and
to the less less; and to either in proportion to their respective
measure of virtue and education. And this is justice, and is ever
the true principle of states, at which we ought to aim, and
according to this rule order the new city which is now being
founded, and any other city which may be hereafter founded. To
this the legislator should look-not to the interests of tyrants
one or more, or to the power of the people, but to justice
always; which, as I was saying, the distribution of natural
equality among unequals in each case. But there are times at
which every state is compelled to use the words, "just,"
"equal," in a secondary sense, in the hope of escaping
in some degree from factions. For equity and indulgence are
infractions of the perfect and strict rule of justice. And this
is the reason why we are obliged to use the equality of the lot,
in order to avoid the discontent of the people; and so we invoke
God and fortune in our prayers, and beg that they themselves will
direct the lot with a view to supreme justice. And therefore,
although we are compelled to use both equalities, we should use
that into which the element of chance enters as seldom as
possible.
Thus, O my friends, and for the reasons given, should a state
act which would endure and be saved. But as a ship sailing on the
sea has to be watched night and day, in like manner a city also
is sailing on a sea of politics, and is liable to all sorts of
insidious assaults; and therefore from morning to night, and from
night to morning, rulers must join hands with rulers, and
watchers with watchers, receiving and giving up their trust in a
perpetual succession. Now a multitude can never fulfil a duty of
this sort with anything like energy. Moreover, the greater number
of the senators will have to be left during the greater part of
the year to order their concerns at their own homes. They will
therefore have to be arranged in twelve portions, answering to
the twelve months, and furnish guardians of the state, each
portion for a single month. Their business is to be at hand and
receive any foreigner or citizen who comes to them, whether to
give information, or to put one of those questions, to which,
when asked by other cities, a city should give an answer, and to
which, if she ask them herself, she should receive an answer; or
again, when there is a likelihood of internal commotions, which
are always liable to happen in some form or other, they will, if
they can, prevent their occurring; or if they have already
occurred, will lose time in making them known to the city, and
healing the evil. Wherefore, also, this which is the presiding
body of the state ought always to have the control of their
assemblies, and of the dissolutions of them, ordinary as well as
extraordinary. All this is to be ordered by the twelfth part of
the council, which is always to keep watch together with the
other officers of the state during one portion of the year, and
to rest during the remaining eleven portions.
Thus will the city be fairly ordered. And now, who is to have,
the superintendence of the country, and what shall be the
arrangement? Seeing that the whole city and the entire country
have been both of them divided into twelve portions, ought there
not to be appointed superintendents of the streets of the city,
and of the houses, and buildings, and harbours, and the agora,
and fountains, and sacred domains, and temples, and the like?
[Cle.] To be sure there ought.
[Ath.] Let us assume, then, that there ought to be servants of
the temples, and priests and priestesses. There must also be
superintendents of roads and buddings, who will have a care of
men, that they may do no harm, and also of beasts, both within
the enclosure and in the suburbs. Three kinds of officers will
thus have to be appointed, in order that the city may be suitably
provided according to her needs. Those who have the care of the
city shall be called wardens of the city; and those who have the
care of the agora shall be called wardens of the agora; and those
who have the care of the temples shall be called priests. Those
who hold hereditary offices as priests or priestesses, shall not
be disturbed; but if there be few or none such, as is probable at
the foundation of a new city, priests and priestesses shall be
appointed to be servants of the Gods who have no servants. Some
of our officers shall be elected, and others appointed by lot,
those who are of the people and those who are not of the people
mingling in a friendly manner in every place and city, that the
state may be as far as possible of one mind. The officers of the
temples shall be appointed by lot; in this way their election
will be committed to God, that he may do what is agreeable to him.
And he who obtains a lot shall undergo a scrutiny, first, as to
whether he is sound of body and of legitimate birth; and in the
second place, in order to show that he is of a perfectly pure
family, not stained with homicide or any similar impiety in his
own person, and also that his father and mother have led a
similar unstained life. Now the laws about all divine things
should be brought from Delphi, and interpreters appointed, under
whose direction they should be used. The tenure of the priesthood
should always be for a year and no longer; and he who will duly
execute the sacred office, according to the laws of religion,
must be not less than sixty years of age-the laws shall be the
same about priestesses. As for the interpreters, they shall be
appointed thus:-Let the twelve tribes be distributed into groups
of four, and let each group select four, one out of each tribe
within the group, three times; and let the three who have the
greatest number of votes [out of the twelve appointed by each
group], after undergoing a scrutiny, nine in all, be sent to
Delphi, in order that the God may return one out of each triad;
their age shall be the same as that of the priests, and the
scrutiny of them shall be conducted in the same manner; let them
be interpreters for life, and when any one dies let the four
tribes select another from the tribe of the deceased. Moreover,
besides priests and interpreters, there must be treasurers, who
will take charge of the property of the several temples, and of
the sacred domains, and shall have authority over the produce and
the letting of them; and three of them shall be chosen from the
highest classes for the greater temples, and two for the lesser,
and one for the least of all; the manner of their election and
the scrutiny of them shall be the same as that of the generals.
This shall be the order of the temples.
Let everything have a guard as far as possible. Let the
defence of the city be commited to the generals, and taxiarchs,
and hipparchs, and phylarchs, and prytanes, and the wardens of
the city, and of the agora, when the election of them has been
completed. The defence of the country shall be provided for as
follows:-The entire land has been already distributed into twelve
as nearly as possible equal parts, and let the tribe allotted to
a division provide annually for it five wardens of the country
and commanders of the watch; and let each body of five have the
power of selecting twelve others out of the youth of their own
tribe-these shall be not less than twenty-five years of age, and
not more than thirty. And let there be allotted to them severally
every month the various districts, in order that they may all
acquire knowledge and experience of the whole country. The term
of service for commanders and for watchers shall continue during
two years. After having had their stations allotted to them, they
will go from place to place in regular order, making their round
from left to right as their commanders direct them; (when I speak
of going to the right, I mean that they are to go to the east).
And at the commencement of the second year, in order that as many
as possible of the guards may not only get a knowledge of the
country at any one season of the year, but may also have
experience of the manner in which different places are affected
at different seasons of the year, their then commanders shall
lead them again towards the left, from place to place in
succession, until they have completed the second year. In the
third year other wardens of the country shall be chosen and
commanders of the watch, five for each division, who are to be
the superintendents of the bands of twelve. While on service at
each station, their attention shall be directed to the following
points:-In the first place, they shall see that the country is
well protected against enemies; they shall trench and dig
wherever this is required, and, as far as they can, they shall by
fortifications keep off the evil-disposed, in order to prevent
them from doing any harm to the country or the property; they
shall use the beasts of burden and the labourers whom they find
on the spot: these will be their instruments whom they will
superintend, taking them, as far as possible, at the times when
they are not engaged in their regular business. They shall make
every part of the country inaccessible to enemies, and as
accessible as possible to friends; there shall be ways for man
and beasts of burden and for cattle, and they shall take care to
have them always as smooth as they can; and shall provide against
the rains doing harm instead of good to the land, when they come
down from the mountains into the hollow dells; and shall keep in
the overflow by the help of works and ditches, in order that the
valleys, receiving and drinking up the rain from heaven, and
providing fountains and streams in the fields and regions which
lie underneath, may furnish even to the dry places plenty of good
water. The fountains of water, whether of rivers or of springs,
shall be ornamented with plantations and buildings for beauty;
and let them bring together the streams in subterraneous
channels, and make all things plenteous; and if there be a sacred
grove or dedicated precinct in the neighbourhood, they shall
conduct the water to the actual temples of the Gods, and so
beautify them at all seasons of the year. Everywhere in such
places the youth shall make gymnasia for themselves, and warm
baths for the aged, placing by them abundance of dry wood, for
the benefit of those labouring under disease-there the weary
frame of the rustic, worn with toil, will receive a kindly
welcome, far better than he would at the hands of a not over-wise
doctor.
The building of these and the like works will be useful and
ornamental; they will provide a pleasing amusement, but they will
be a serious employment too; for the sixty wardens will have to
guard their several divisions, not only with a view to enemies,
but also with an eye to professing friends. When a quarrel arises
among neighbours or citizens, and any one, whether slave or
freeman wrongs another, let the five wardens decide small matters
on their own authority; but where the charge against another
relates to greater matters, the seventeen composed of the fives
and twelves, shall determine any charges which one man brings
against another, not involving more than three minae. Every judge
and magistrate shall be liable to give an account of his conduct
in office, except those who, like kings, have the final decision.
Moreover, as regards the aforesaid wardens of the country, if
they do any wrong to those of whom they have the care, whether by
imposing upon them unequal tasks, or by taking the produce of the
soil or implements of husbandry without their consent; also if
they receive anything in the way of a bribe, or decide suits
unjustly, or if they yield to the influences of flattery, let
them be publicly dishonoured; and in regard to any other wrong
which they do to the inhabitants of the country, if the question
be of a mina, let them submit to the decision of the villagers in
the neighbourhood; but in suits of greater amount, or in case of
lesser, if they refuse to submit, trusting that their monthly
removal into another part of the country will enable them to
escape-in such cases the injured party may bring his suit in the
common court, and if he obtain a verdict he may exact from the
defendant, who refused to submit, a double penalty.
The wardens and the overseers of the country, while on their
two years service, shall have common meals at their several
stations, and shall all live together; and he who is absent from
the common meal, or sleeps out, if only for one day or night,
unless by order of his commanders, or by reason of absolute
necessity, if the five denounce him and inscribe his name the
agora as not having kept his guard, let him be deemed to have
betrayed the city, as far as lay in his power, and let him be
disgraced and beaten with impunity by any one who meets him and
is willing to punish him. If any of the commanders is guilty of
such an irregularity, the whole company of sixty shall see to it,
and he who is cognizant of the offence, and does not bring the
offender to trial, shall be amenable to the same laws as the
younger offender himself, and shall pay a heavier fine, and be
incapable of ever commanding the young. The guardians of the law
are to be careful inspectors of these matters, and shall either
prevent or punish offenders. Every man should remember the
universal rule, that he who is not a good servant will not be a
good master; a man should pride himself more upon serving well
than upon commanding well: first upon serving the laws, which is
also the service of the Gods; in the second place, upon having.
served ancient and honourable men in the days of his youth.
Furthermore, during the two years in which any one is a warden of
the country, his daily food ought to be of a simple and humble
kind. When the twelve have been chosen, let them and the five
meet together, and determine that they will be their own
servants, and, like servants, will not have other slaves and
servants for their own use, neither will they use those of the
villagers and husbandmen for their private advantage, but for the
public service only; and in general they should make up their
minds to live independently by themselves, servants of each other
and of themselves. Further, at all seasons of the year, summer
and winter alike, let them be under arms and survey minutely the
whole country; thus they will at once keep guard, and at the same
time acquire a perfect knowledge of every locality. There can be
no more important kind of information than the exact knowledge of
a man's own country; and for this as well as for more general
reasons of pleasure and advantage, hunting with dogs and other
kinds of sports should be pursued by the young. The service to
whom this is committed may be called the secret police, or
wardens of the country; the name does not much signify, but every
one who has the safety of the state at heart will use his utmost
diligence in this service.
After the wardens of the country, we have to speak of the
election of wardens of the agora and of the city. The wardens of
the country were sixty in number, and the wardens of the city
will be three, and will divide the twelve parts of the city into
three; like the former, they shall have care of the ways, and of
the different high roads which lead out of the country into the
city, and of the buildings, that they may be all made according
to law;-also of the waters, which the guardians of the supply
preserve and convey to them, care being taken that they may reach
the fountains pure and abundant, and be both an ornament and a
benefit to the city. These also should be men of influence, and
at leisure to take care of the public interest. Let every man
propose as warden of the city any one whom he likes out of the
highest class, and when the vote has been given on them, and the
number is reduced to the six who have the greatest number of
votes, let the electing officers choose by lot three out of the
six, and when they have undergone a scrutiny let them hold office
according to the laws laid down for them. Next, let the wardens
of the agora be elected in like manner, out of the first and
second class, five in number: ten are to be first elected, and
out of the ten five are to be chosen by lot, as in the election
of the wardens of the city:-these when they have undergone a
scrutiny are to be declared magistrates. Every one shall vote for
every one, and he who will not vote, if he be informed against
before the magistrates, shall be fined fifty drachmae, and shall
also be deemed a bad citizen. Let any one who likes go to the
assembly and to the general council; it shall be compulsory to go
on citizens of the first and second class, and they shall pay a
fine of ten drachmae if they be found not answering to their
names at the assembly. the third and fourth class shall be under
no compulsion, and shall be let off without a fine, unless the
magistrates have commanded all to be present, in consequence of
some urgent necessity. The wardens of the agora shall observe the
order appointed by law for the agora, and shall have the charge
of the temples and fountains which are in the agora; and they
shall see that no one injures anything, and punish him who does,
with stripes and bonds, if he be a slave or stranger; but if he
be a citizen who misbehaves in this way, they shall have the
power themselves of inflicting a fine upon him to the amount of a
hundred drachmae, or with the consent of the wardens of the city
up to double that amount. And let the wardens of the city have a
similar power of imposing punishments and fines in their own
department; and let them impose fines by their own department;
and let them impose fines by their own authority, up to a mina,
or up to two minae with the consent of the wardens of the agora.
In the next place, it will be proper to appoint directors of
music and gymnastic, two kinds of each-of the one kind the
business will be education, of the other, the superintendence of
contests. In speaking of education, the law means to speak of
those who have the care of order and instruction in gymnasia and
schools, and of the going to school, and of school buildings for
boys and girls; and in speaking of contests, the law refers to
the judges of gymnastics and of music; these again are divided
into two classes, the one having to do with music, the other with
gymnastics; and the same who judge of the gymnastic contests of
men, shall judge of horses; but in music there shall be one set
of judges of solo singing, and of imitation-I mean of
rhapsodists, players on the harp, the flute and the like, and
another who shall judge of choral song. First of all, we must
choose directors for the choruses of boys, and men, and maidens,
whom they shall follow in the amusement of the dance, and for our
other musical arrangements; -one director will be enough for the
choruses, and he should be not less than forty years of age. One
director will also be enough to introduce the solo singers, and
to give judgment on the competitors, and he ought not to be less
than thirty years of age. The director and manager of the
choruses shall be elected after the following manner:-Let any
persons who commonly take an interest in such matters go to the
meeting, and be fined if they do not go (the guardians of the law
shall judge of their fault), but those who have no interest shall
not be compelled. The elector shall propose as director some one
who understands music, and he in the scrutiny may be challenged
on the one part by those who say he has no skill, and defended on
the other hand by those who say that he has. Ten are to be
elected by vote, and he of the ten who is chosen by lot shall
undergo a scrutiny, and lead the choruses for a year according to
law. And in like manner the competitor who wins the lot shall be
leader of the solo and concert music for that year; and he who is
thus elected shall deliver the award to the judges. In the next
place, we have to choose judges in the contests of horses and of
men; these shall be selected from the third and also from the
second class of citizens, and three first classes shall be
compelled to go to the election, but the lowest may stay away
with impunity; and let there be three elected by lot out of the
twenty who have been chosen previously, and they must also have
the vote and approval of the examiners. But if any one is
rejected in the scrutiny at any ballot or decision, others shall
be chosen in the same manner, and undergo a similar scrutiny.
There remains the minister of the education of youth, male and
female; he too will rule according to law; one such minister will
be sufficient, and he must be fifty years old, and have children
lawfully begotten, both boys and girls by preference, at any
rate, one or the other. He who is elected, and he who is the
elector, should consider that of all the great offices of state,
this is the greatest; for the first shoot of any plant, if it
makes a good start towards the attainment of its natural
excellence, has the greatest effect on its maturity; and this is
not only true of plants, but of animals wild and tame, and also
of men. Man, as we say, is a tame or civilized animal;
nevertheless, he requires proper instruction and a fortunate
nature, and then of all animals he becomes the most divine and
most civilized; but if he be insufficiently or ill educated he is
the most savage of earthly creatures. Wherefore the legislator
ought not to allow the education of children to become a
secondary or accidental matter. In the first place, he who would
be rightly provident about them, should begin by taking care that
he is elected, who of all the citizens is in every way best; him
the legislator shall do his utmost to appoint guardian and
superintendent. To this end all the magistrates, with the
exception of the council and prytanes, shall go to the temple of
Apollo, and elect by ballot him of the guardians of the law whom
they severally think will be the best superintendent of education.
And he who has the greatest number of votes, after he has
undergone a scrutiny at the hands of all the magistrates who have
been his electors, with the exception of the guardians of the law-shall
hold office for five years; and in the sixth year let another be
chosen in like manner to fill his office.
If any one dies while he is holding a public office, and more
than thirty days before his term of office expires, let those
whose business it is elect another to the office in the same
manner as before. And if any one who is entrusted with orphans
dies, let the relations both on the father's and mother's side,
who are residing at home, including cousins, appoint another
guardian within ten days, or be fined a drachma a day for neglect
to do so.
A city which has no regular courts of law ceases to be a city;
and again, if a judge is silent and says no more in preliminary
proceedings than the litigants, as is the case in arbitrations,
he will never be able to decide justly; wherefore a multitude of
judges will not easily judge well, nor a few if they are bad. The
point in dispute between the parties should be made clear; and
time, and deliberation, and repeated examination, greatly tend to
clear up doubts. For this reason, he who goes to law with another
should go first of all to his neighbours and friends who know
best the questions at issue. And if he be unable to obtain from
them a satisfactory decision, let him have recourse to another
court; and if the two courts cannot settle the matter, let a
third put an end to the suit.
Now the establishment of courts of justice may be regarded as
a choice of magistrates, for every magistrate must also be a
judge of some things; and the judge, though he be not a
magistrate, yet in certain respects is a very important
magistrate on the day on which he is determining a suit.
Regarding then the judges also as magistrates, let us say who are
fit to be judges, and of what they are to be judges, and how many
of them are to judge in each suit. Let that be the supreme
tribunal which the litigants appoint in common for themselves,
choosing certain persons by agreement. And let there be two other
tribunals: one for private causes, when a citizen accuses another
of wronging him and wishes to get a decision; the other for
public causes, in which some citizen is of opinion that the
public has been wronged by an individual, and is willing to
vindicate the common interests. And we must not forget to mention
how the judges are to be qualified, and who they are to be. In
the first place, let there be a tribunal open to all private
persons who are trying causes one against another for the third
time, and let this be composed as follows:-All the officers of
state, as well annual as those holding office for a longer
period, when the new year is about to commence, in the month
following after the summer solstice, on the last day but one of
the year, shall meet in some temple, and calling God to witness,
shall dedicate one judge from every magistracy to be their first-fruits,
choosing in each office him who seems to them to be the best, and
whom they deem likely to decide the causes of his fellow-citizens
during the ensuing year in the best and holiest manner. And when
the election is completed, a scrutiny shall be held in the
presence of the electors themselves, and if any one be rejected
another shall be chosen in the same manner. Those who have
undergone the scrutiny shall judge the causes of those who have
declined the inferior courts, and shall give their vote openly.
The councillors and other magistrates who have elected them shall
be required to be hearers and spectators of the causes; and any
one else may be present who pleases. If one man charges another
with having intentionally decided wrong, let him go to the
guardians of the law and lay his accusation before them, and he
who is found guilty in such a case shall pay damages to the
injured party equal to half the injury; but if he shall appear to
deserve a greater penalty, the judges shall determine what
additional punishment he shall suffer, and how much more he ought
to pay to the public treasury, and to the party who brought the
suit.
In the judgment of offences against the state, the people
ought to participate, for when any one wrongs the state all are
wronged, and may reasonably complain if they are not allowed to
share in the decision. Such causes ought to originate with the
people, and the ought also to have the final decision of them,
but the trial of them shall take place before three of the
highest magistrates, upon whom the plaintiff and the defendant
shall agree; and if they are not able to come to an agreement
themselves, the council shall choose one of the two proposed. And
in private suits, too, as far as is possible, all should have a
share; for he who has no share in the administration of justice,
is apt to imagine that he has no share in the state at all. And
for this reason there shall be a court of law in every tribe, and
the judges shall be chosen by lot;-they shall give their
decisions at once, and shall be inaccessible to entreaties. The
final judgment shall rest with that court which, as we maintain,
has been established in the most incorruptible form of which
human things admit: this shall be the court established for those
who are unable to get rid of their suits either in the courts of
neighbours or of the tribes.
Thus much of the courts of law, which, as I was saying, cannot
be precisely defined either as being or not being offices; a
superficial sketch has been given of them, in which some things
have been told and others omitted. For the right place of an
exact statement of the laws respecting suits, under their several
heads, will be at the end of the body of legislation;-let us then
expect them at the end. Hitherto our legislation has been chiefly
occupied with the appointment of offices. Perfect unity and
exactness, extending to the whole and every particular of
political administration, cannot be attained to the full, until
the discussion shall have a beginning, middle, and end, and is
complete in every part. At present we have reached the election
of magistrates, and this may be regarded as a sufficient
termination of what preceded. And now there need no longer be any
delay or hesitation in beginning the work of legislation.
[Cle.] I like what you have said, Stranger-and I particularly
like your manner of tacking on the beginning of your new
discourse to the end of the former one.
[Ath.] Thus far, then, the old men's rational pastime has gone
off well.
[Cle.] You mean, I suppose, their serious and noble pursuit?
[Ath.] Perhaps; but I should like to know whether you and I
are agreed about a certain thing.
[Cle.] About what thing?
[Ath.] You know. the endless labour which painters expend upon
their pictures-they are always putting in or taking out colours,
or whatever be the term which artists employ; they seem as if
they would never cease touching up their works, which are always
being made brighter and more beautiful.
[Cle.] I know something of these matters from report, although
I have never had any great acquaintance with the art.
[Ath.] No matter; we may make use of the illustration
notwithstanding:-Suppose that some one had a mind to paint a
figure in the most beautiful manner, in the hope that his work
instead of losing would always improve as time went on-do you not
see that being a mortal, unless he leaves some one to succeed him
who will correct the flaws which time may introduce, and be able
to add what is left imperfect through the defect of the artist,
and who will further brighten up and improve the picture, all his
great labour will last but a short time?
[Cle.] True.
[Ath.] And is not the aim of the legislator similar? First, he
desires that his laws should be written down with all possible
exactness; in the second place, as time goes on and he has made
an actual trial of his decrees, will he not find omissions? Do
you imagine that there ever was a legislator so foolish as not to
know that many things are necessarily omitted, which some one
coming after him must correct, if the constitution and the order
of government is not to deteriorate, but to improve in the state
which he has established?
[Cle.] Assuredly, that is the sort of thing which every one
would desire.
[Ath.] And if any one possesses any means of accomplishing
this by word or deed, or has any way great or small by which he
can teach a person to understand how he can maintain and amend
the laws, he should finish what he has to say, and not leave the
work incomplete.
[Cle.] By all means.
[Ath.] And is not this what you and I have to do at the
present moment?
[Cle.] What have we to do?
[Ath.] As we are about to legislate and have chosen our
guardians of the law, and are ourselves in the evening of life,
and they as compared with us are young men, we ought not only to
legislate for them, but to endeavour to make them not only
guardians of the law but legislators themselves, as far as this
is possible.
[Cle.] Certainly; if we can.
[Ath.] At any rate, we must do our best.
[Cle.] Of course.
[Ath.] We will say to them-O friends and saviours of our laws,
in laying down any law, there are many particulars which we shall
omit, and this cannot be helped; at the same time, we will do our
utmost to describe what is important, and will give an outline
which you shall fill up. And I will explain on what principle you
are to act. Megillus and Cleinias and I have often spoken to one
another touching these matters, and we are of opinion that we
have spoken well. And we hope that you will be of the same mind
with us, and become our disciples, and keep in view the things
which in our united opinion the legislator and guardian of the
law ought to keep in view. There was one main point about which
we were agreed-that a man's whole energies throughout life should
be devoted to the acquisition of the virtue proper to a man,
whether this was to be gained by study, or habit, or some mode of
acquisition, or desire, or opinion, or knowledge-and this applies
equally to men and women, old and young-the aim of all should
always be such as I have described; anything which may be an
impediment, the good man ought to show that he utterly disregards.
And if at last necessity plainly compels him to be an outlaw from
his native land, rather than bow his neck to the yoke of slavery
and be ruled by inferiors, and he has to fly, an exile he must be
and endure all such trials, rather than accept another form of
government, which is likely to make men worse. These are our
original principles; and do you now, fixing your eyes upon the
standard of what a man and a citizen ought or ought not to be,
praise and blame the laws-blame those which have not this power
of making the citizen better, but embrace those which have; and
with gladness receive and live in them; bidding a long farewell
to other institutions which aim at goods, as they are termed, of
a different kind.
Let us proceed to another class of laws, beginning with their
foundation in religion. And we must first return to the number
5040-the entire number had, and has, a great many convenient
divisions, and the number of the tribes which was a twelfth part
of the whole, being correctly formed by 21 X 20 [5040/(21 X 20),
i.e., 5040/420=12], also has them. And not only is the whole
number divisible by twelve, but also the number of each tribe is
divisible by twelve. Now every portion should be regarded by us
as a sacred gift of Heaven, corresponding to the months and to
the revolution of the universe. Every city has a guiding and
sacred principle given by nature, but in some the division or
distribution has been more right than in others, and has been
more sacred and fortunate. In our opinion, nothing can be more
right than the selection of the number 5040, which may be divided
by all numbers from one to twelve with the single exception of
eleven, and that admits of a very easy correction; for if,
turning to the dividend (5040), we deduct two families, the
defect in the division is cured. And the truth of this may be
easily proved when we have leisure. But for the present, trusting
to the mere assertion of this principle, let us divide the state;
and assigning to each portion some God or son of a God, let us
give them altars and sacred rites, and at the altars let us hold
assemblies for sacrifice twice in the month-twelve assemblies for
the tribes, and twelve for the city, according to their
divisions; the first in honour of the Gods and divine things, and
the second to promote friendship and "better acquaintance,"
as the phrase is, and every sort of good fellowship with one
another. For people must be acquainted with those into whose
families and whom they marry and with those to whom they give in
marriage; in such matters, as far as possible, a man should deem
it all important to avoid a mistake, and with this serious
purpose let games be instituted in which youths and maidens shall
dance together, seeing one another and being seen naked, at a
proper age, and on a suitable occasion, not transgressing the
rules of modesty.
The directors of choruses will be the superintendents and
regulators of these games, and they, together with the guardians
of the law, will legislate in any matters which we have omitted;
for, as we said, where there are numerous and minute details, the
legislator must leave out something. And the annual officers who
have experience, and know what is wanted, must make arrangements
and improvements year by year, until such enactments and
provisions are sufficiently determined. A ten years experience of
sacrifices and dances, if extending to all particulars, will be
quite sufficient; and if the legislator be alive they shall
communicate with him, but if he be dead then the several officers
shall refer the omissions which come under their notice to the
guardians of the law, and correct them, until all is perfect; and
from that time there shall be no more change, and they shall
establish and use the new laws with the others which the
legislator originally gave them, and of which they are never, if
they can help, to change aught; or, if some necessity overtakes
them, the magistrates must be called into counsel, and the whole
people, and they must go to all the oracles of the Gods; and if
they are all agreed, in that case they may make the change, but
if they are not agreed, by no manner of means, and any one who
dissents shall prevail, as the law ordains.
Whenever any one over twenty-five years of age, having seen
and been seen by others, believes himself to have found a
marriage connection which is to his mind, and suitable for the
procreation of children, let him marry if he be still under the
age of five-and-thirty years; but let him first hear how he ought
to seek after what is suitable and appropriate. For, as Cleinias
says, every law should have a suitable prelude.
[Cle.] You recollect at the right moment, Stranger, and do not
miss the opportunity which the argument affords of saying a word
in season.
[Ath.] I thank you. We will say to him who is born of good
parents-O my son, you ought to make such a marriage as wise men
would approve. Now they would advise you neither to avoid a poor
marriage, nor specially to desire a rich one; but if other things
are equal, always to honour inferiors, and with them to form
connections;-this will be for the benefit of the city and of the
families which are united; for the equable and symmetrical tends
infinitely more to virtue than the unmixed. And he who is
conscious of being too headstrong, and carried away more than is
fitting in all his actions, ought to desire to become the
relation of orderly parents; and he who is of the opposite temper
ought to seek the opposite alliance. Let there be one word
concerning all marriages:-Every man shall follow, not after the
marriage which is most pleasing to himself, but after that which
is most beneficial to the state. For somehow every one is by
nature prone to that which is likest to himself, and in this way
the whole city becomes unequal in property and in disposition;
and hence there arise in most states the very results which we
least desire to happen. Now, to add to the law an express
provision, not only that the rich man shall not marry into the
rich family, nor the powerful into the family of the powerful,
but that the slower natures shall be compelled to enter into
marriage with the quicker, and the quicker with the slower, may
awaken anger as well as laughter in the minds of many; for there
is a difficulty in perceiving that the city ought to be well
mingled like a cup, in which the maddening wine is hot and fiery,
but when chastened by a soberer God, receives a fair associate
and becomes an excellent and temperate drink. Yet in marriage no
one is able to see that the same result occurs. Wherefore also
the law must let alone such matters, but we should try to charm
the spirits of men into believing the equability of their
children's disposition to be of more importance than equality in
excessive fortune when they marry; and him who is too desirous of
making a rich marriage we should endeavour to turn aside by
reproaches, not, however, by any compulsion of written law.
Let this then be our exhortation concerning marriage, and let
us remember what was said before-that a man should cling to
immortality, and leave behind him children's children to be the
servants of God in his place for ever. All this and much more may
be truly said by way of prelude about the duty of marriage. But
if a man will not listen and remains unsocial and alien among his
fellow-citizens, and is still unmarried at thirty-five years of
age, let him pay a yearly fine;-he who of the highest class shall
pay a fine of a hundred drachmae, and he who is of the second
dass a fine of seventy drachmae; the third class shall pay sixty
drachmae, and the fourth thirty drachmae, and let the money be
sacred to Here; he who does not pay the fine annually shall owe
ten times the sum, which the treasurer of the goddess shall
exact; and if he fails in doing so, let him be answerable and
give an account of the. money at his audit. He who refuses to
marry shall be thus punished in money, and also be deprived of
all honour which the younger show to the elder; let no young man
voluntarily obey him, and if he attempt to punish any one, let
every one come to the rescue and defend the injured person, and
he who is present and does not come to the rescue, shall be
pronounced by the law to be a coward and a bad citizen. Of the
marriage portion I have already spoken; and again I say for the
instruction of poor men that he who neither gives nor receives a
dowry on account of poverty, has a compensation; for the citizens
of our state are provided with the necessaries of life, and wives
will be less likely to be insolent, and husbands to be mean and
subservient to them on account of property. And he who obeys this
law will do a noble action; but he who will not obey, and gives
or receives more than fifty drachmae as the price of the marriage
garments if he be of the lowest, or more than a mina, or a mina
and-a-half, if he be of the third or second classes, or two minae
if he be of the highest class, shall owe to the public treasury a
similar sum, and that which is given or received shall be sacred
to Here and Zeus; and let the treasurers of these Gods exact the
money, as was said before about the unmarried-that the treasurers
of Here were to exact the money, or pay the fine themselves.
The betrothal by a father shall be valid in the first degree,
that by a grandfather in the second degree, and in the third
degree, betrothal by brothers who have the same father; but if
there are none of these alive, the betrothal by a mother shall be
valid in like manner; in cases of unexampled fatality, the next
of kin and the guardians shall have authority. What are to be the
rites before marriages, or any other sacred acts, relating either
to future, present, or past marriages, shall be referred to the
interpreters; and he who follows their advice may be satisfied.
Touching the marriage festival, they shall assemble not more than
five male and five female friends of both families; and a like
number of members of the family of either sex, and no man shall
spend more than his means will allow; he who is of the richest
class may spend a mina-he who is of the second, half a mina, and
in the same proportion as the census of each decreases: all men
shall praise him who is obedient to the law; but he who is
disobedient shall be punished by the guardians of the law as a
man wanting in true taste, and uninstructed in the laws of bridal
song. Drunkenness is always improper, except at the festivals of
the God who gave wine; and peculiarly dangerous, when a man is
engaged in the business of marriage; at such a crisis of their
lives a bride and bridegroom ought to have all their wits about
them-they ought to take care that their offspring may be born of
reasonable beings; for on what day or night Heaven will give them
increase, who can say? Moreover, they ought not to begetting
children when their bodies are dissipated by intoxication, but
their offspring should be compact and solid, quiet and compounded
properly; whereas the drunkard is all abroad in all his actions,
and beside himself both in body and soul. Wherefore, also, the
drunken man is bad and unsteady in sowing the seed of increase,
and is likely to beget offspring who will be unstable and
untrustworthy, and cannot be expected to walk straight either in
body or mind. Hence during the whole year and all his life long,
and especially while he is begetting children, ought to take care
and not intentionally do what is injurious to health, or what
involves insolence and wrong; for he cannot help leaving the
impression of himself on the souls and bodies of his offspring,
and he begets children in every way inferior. And especially on
the day and night of marriage should a man abstain from such
things. For the beginning, which is also a God dwelling in man,
preserves all things, if it meet with proper respect from each
individual. He who marries is further to consider that one of the
two houses in the lot is the nest and nursery of his young, and
there he is to marry and make a home for himself and bring up his
children, going away from his father and mother. For in
friendships there must be some degree of desire, in order to
cement and bind together diversities of character; but excessive
intercourse not having the desire which is created by time,
insensibly dissolves friendships from a feeling of satiety;
wherefore a man and his wife shall leave to his and her father
and mother their own dwelling-places, and themselves go as to a
colony and dwell there, and visit and be visited by their
parents; and they shall beget and bring up children, handing on
the torch of life from one generation to another, and worshipping
the Gods according to law for ever.
In the next place, we have to consider what sort of property
will be most convenient. There is no difficulty either in
understanding or acquiring most kinds of property, but there is
great difficulty in what relates to slaves. And the reason is
that we speak about them in a way which is right and which is not
right; for what we say about our slaves is consistent and also
inconsistent with our practice about them.
Megillus. I do not understand, Stranger, what you mean.
[Ath.] I am not surprised, Megillus, for the state of the
Helots among the Lacedaemonians is of all Hellenic forms of
slavery the most controverted and disputed about, some approving
and some condemning it; there is less dispute about the slavery
which exists among the Heracleots, who have subjugated the
Mariandynians, and about the Thessalian Penestae. Looking at
these and the like examples, what ought we to do concerning
property in slaves? I made a remark, in passing, which naturally
elicited a question about my meaning from you. It was this:-We
know that all would agree that we should have the best and most
attached slaves whom we can get. For many a man has found his
slaves better in every way than brethren or sons, and many times
they have saved the lives and property of their masters and their
whole house-such tales are well known.
[Meg.] To be sure.
[Ath.] But may we not also say that the soul of the slave is
utterly corrupt, and that no man of sense ought to trust them?
And the wisest of our poets, speaking of Zeus, says: Far-seeing
Zeus takes away half the understanding of men whom the day of
slavery subdues. Different persons have got these two different
notions of slaves in their minds-some of them utterly distrust
their servants, and, as if they were wild beasts, chastise them
with goads and whips, and make their souls three times, or rather
many times, as slavish as they were before;-and others do just
the opposite.
[Meg.] True.
[Cle.] Then what are we to do in our own country, Stranger,
seeing that there are, such differences in the treatment of
slaves by their owners?
[Ath.] Well, Cleinias, there can be no doubt that man is a
troublesome animal, and therefore he is not very manageable, nor
likely to become so, when you attempt to introduce the necessary
division, slave, and freeman, and master.
[Cle.] That is obvious.
[Ath.] He is a troublesome piece of goods, as has been often
shown by the frequent revolts of the Messenians, and the great
mischiefs which happen in states having many slaves who speak the
same language, and the numerous robberies and lawless life of the
Italian banditti, as they are called. A man who considers all
this is fairly at a loss. Two remedies alone remain to us-not to
have the slaves of the same country, nor if possible, speaking
the same language; in this way they will more easily be held in
subjection: secondly, we should tend them carefully, not only out
of regard to them, but yet more out of respect to ourselves. And
the right treatment of slaves is to behave properly to them, and
to do to them, if possible, even more justice than to those who
are our equals; for he who naturally and genuinely reverences
justice, and hates injustice, is discovered in his dealings with
any class of men to whom he can easily be unjust. And he who in
regard to the natures and actions of his slaves is undefiled by
impiety and injustice, will best sow the seeds of virtue in them;
and this may be truly said of every master, and tyrant, and of
every other having authority in relation to his inferiors. Slaves
ought to be punished as they deserve, and not admonished as if
they were freemen, which will only make them conceited. The
language used to a servant ought always to be that of a command,
and we ought not to jest with them, whether they are males or
females-this is a foolish way which many people have of setting
up their slaves, and making the life of servitude more
disagreeable both for them and for their masters.
[Cle.] True.
[Ath.] Now that each of the citizens is provided, as far as
possible, with a sufficient number of suitable slaves who can
help him in what he has to do, we may next proceed to describe
their dwellings.
[Cle.] Very good.
[Ath.] The city being new and hitherto uninhabited, care ought
to be taken of all the buildings, and the manner of building each
of them, and also of the temples and walls. These, Cleinias, were
matters which properly came before the marriages; but, as we are
only talking, there is no objection to changing the order. If,
however, our plan of legislation is ever to take effect, then the
house shall precede the marriage if God so will, and afterwards
we will come to the regulations about marriage; but at present we
are only describing these matters in a general outline.
[Cle.] Quite true.
[Ath.] The temples are to be placed all round the agora, and
the whole city built on the heights in a circle, for the sake of
defence and for the sake of purity. Near the temples are to be
placed buildings for the magistrates and the courts of law; in
these plaintiff and defendant will receive their due, and the
places will be regarded as most holy, partly because they have to
do with the holy things: and partly because they are the dwelling-places
of holy Gods: and in them will be held the courts in which cases
of homicide and other trials of capital offenses may fitly take
place. As to the walls, Megillus, I agree with Sparta in thinking
that they should be allowed to sleep in the earth, and that we
should not attempt to disinter them; there is a poetical saying,
which is finely expressed, that "walls ought to be of steel
and iron, and not of earth; besides, how ridiculous of us to be
sending out our young men annually into the country to dig and to
trench, and to keep off the enemy by fortifications, under the
idea that they are not to be allowed to set foot in our
territory, and then, that we should surround ourselves with a
wall, which, in the first place, is by no means conducive to the
health of cities, and is also apt to produce a certain effeminacy
in the minds of the inhabitants, inviting men to run thither
instead of repelling their enemies, and leading them to imagine
that their safety is due not to their keeping guard day and
night, but that when they are protected by walls and gates, then
they may sleep in safety; as if they were not meant to labour,
and did not know that true repose comes from labour, and that
disgraceful indolence and a careless temper of mind is only the
renewal of trouble. But if men must have walls, the private
houses ought to be so arranged from the first that the whole city
may be one wall, having all the houses capable of defence by
reason of their uniformity and equality towards the streets. The
form of the city being that of a single dwelling will have an
agreeable aspect, and being easily guarded will be infinitely
better for security. Until the original building is completed,
these should be the principal objects of the inhabitants; and the
wardens of the city should superintend the work, and should
impose a fine on him who is negligent; and in all that relates to
the city they should have a care of cleanliness, and not allow a
private person to encroach upon any public property either by
buildings or excavations. Further, they ought to take care that
the rains from heaven flow off easily, and of any other matters
which may have to be administered either within or without the
city. The guardians of the law shall pass any further enactments
which their experience may show to be necessary, and supply any
other points in which the law may be deficient. And now that
these matters, and the buildings about the agora, and the
gymnasia, and places of instruction, and theatres, are all ready
and waiting for scholars and spectators, let us proceed to the
subjects which follow marriage in the order of legislation.
[Cle.] By all means.
[Ath.] Assuming that marriages exist already, Cleinias, the
mode of life during the year after marriage, before children are
born, will follow next in order. In what way bride and bridegroom
ought to live in a city which is to be superior to other cities,
is a matter not at all easy for us to determine. There have been
many difficulties already, but this will be the greatest of them,
and the most disagreeable to the many. Still I cannot but say
what appears to me to be right and true, Cleinias.
[Cle.] Certainly.
[Ath.] He who imagines that he can give laws for the public
conduct of states, while he leaves the private life of citizens
wholly to take care of itself; who thinks that individuals may
pass the day as they please, and that there is no necessity of
order in all things; he, I say, who gives up the control of their
private lives, and supposes that they will conform to law in
their common and public life, is making a great mistake. Why have
I made this remark? Why, because I am going to enact that the
bridegrooms should live at the common tables, just as they did
before marriage. This was a singularity when first enacted by the
legislator in your parts of the world, Megillus and Cleinias, as
I should suppose, on the occasion of some war or other similar
danger, which caused the passing of the law, and which would be
likely to occur in thinly-peopled places, and in times of
pressure. But when men had once tried and been accustomed to a
common table, experience showed that the institution greatly
conduced to security; and in some such manner the custom of
having common tables arose among you.
[Cle.] Likely enough.
[Ath.] I said that there may have been singularity and danger
in imposing such a custom at first, but that now there is not the
same difficulty. There is, however, another institution which is
the natural sequel to this, and would be excellent, if it existed
anywhere, but at present it does not. The institution of which I
am about to speak is not easily described or executed; and would
be like the legislator "combing wool into the fire," as
people say, or performing any other impossible and useless feat.
[Cle.] What is the cause, Stranger, of this extreme
hesitation?
[Ath.] You shall hear without any fruitless loss of time. That
which has law and order in a state is the cause of every good,
but that which is disordered or ill-ordered is often the ruin of
that which is well-ordered; and at this point the argument is now
waiting. For with you, Cleinias and Megillus, the common tables
of men are, as I said, a heaven-born and admirable institution,
but you are mistaken in leaving the women unregulated by law.
They have no similar institution of public tables in the light of
day, and just that part of the human race which is by nature
prone to secrecy and stealth on account of their weakness-I mean
the female sex-has been left without regulation by the
legislator, which is a great mistake. And, in consequence of this
neglect, many things have grown lax among you, which might have
been far better, if they had been only regulated by law; for the
neglect of regulations about women may not only be regarded as a
neglect of half the entire matter, but in proportion as woman's
nature is inferior to that of men in capacity for virtue, in that
degree the consequence of such neglect is more than twice as
important. The careful consideration of this matter, and the
arranging and ordering on a common principle of all our
institutions relating both to men and women, greatly conduces to
the happiness of the state. But at present, such is the
unfortunate condition of mankind, that no man of sense will even
venture to speak of common tables in places and cities in which
they have never been established at all; and how can any one
avoid being utterly ridiculous, who attempts to compel women to
show in public how much they eat and drink? There is nothing at
which the sex is more likely to take offence. For women are
accustomed to creep into dark places, and when dragged out into
the light they will exert their utmost powers of resistance, and
be far too much for the legislator. And therefore, as I said
before, in most places they will not endure to have the truth
spoken without raising a tremendous outcry, but in this state
perhaps they may. And if we may assume that our whole discussion
about the state has not been mere idle talk, I should like to
prove to you, if you will consent to listen, that this
institution is good and proper; but if you had rather not, I will
refrain.
[Cle.] There is nothing which we should both of us like
better, Stranger, than to hear what you have to say.
[Ath.] Very good; and you must not be surprised if I go back a
little, for we have plenty of leisure, and there is nothing to
prevent us from considering in every point of view the subject of
law.
[Cle.] True.
[Ath.] Then let us return once more to what we were saying at
first. Every man should understand that the human race either had
no beginning at all, and will never have an end, but always will
be and has been; or that it began an immense while ago.
[Cle.] Certainly.
[Ath.] Well, and have there not been constitutions and
destructions of states, and all sorts of pursuits both orderly
and disorderly, and diverse desires of meats and drinks always,
and in all the world, and all sorts of changes of the seasons in
which animals may be expected to have undergone innumerable
transformations of themselves?
[Cle.] No doubt.
[Ath.] And may we not suppose that vines appeared, which had
previously no existence, and also olives, and the gifts of
Demeter and her daughter, of which one Triptolemus was the
minister, and that, before these existed, animals took to
devouring each other as they do still?
[Cle.] True.
[Ath.] Again, the practice of men sacrificing one another
still exists among many nations; while, on the other hand, we
hear of other human beings who did not even venture to taste the
flesh of a cow and had no animal sacrifices, but only cakes and
fruits dipped in honey, and similar pure offerings, but no flesh
of animals; from these they abstained under the idea that they
ought not to eat them, and might not stain the altars of the Gods
with blood. For in those days men are said to have lived a sort
of Orphic life, having the use of all lifeless things, but
abstaining from all living things.
[Cle.] Such has been the constant tradition, and is very
likely true.
[Ath.] Some one might say to us, What is the drift of all
this?
[Cle.] A very pertinent question, Stranger.
[Ath.] And therefore I will endeavour, Cleinias, if I can, to
draw the natural inference.
[Cle.] Proceed.
[Ath.] I see that among men all things depend upon three wants
and desires, of which the end is virtue, if they are rightly led
by them, or the opposite if wrongly. Now these are eating and
drinking, which begin at birth-every animal has a natural desire
for them, and is violently excited, and rebels against him who
says that he must not satisfy all his pleasures and appetites,
and get rid of all the corresponding pains-and the third and
greatest and sharpest want and desire breaks out last, and is the
fire of sexual lust, which kindles in men every species of
wantonness and madness. And these three disorders we must
endeavour to master by the three great principles of fear and law
and right reason; turning them away from that which is called
pleasantest to the best, using the Muses and the Gods who preside
over contests to extinguish their increase and influx.
But to return:-After marriage let us speak of the birth of
children, and after their birth of their nurture and education.
In the course of discussion the several laws will be perfected,
and we shall at last arrive at the common tables. Whether such
associations are to be confined to men, or extended to women
also, we shall see better when we approach and take a nearer view
of them; and we may then determine what previous institutions are
required and will have to precede them. As I said before we shall
see them more in detail, and shall be better able to lay down the
laws which are proper or suited to them.
[Cle.] Very true.
[Ath.] Let us keep in mind the words which have now been
spoken; for hereafter there may be need of them.
[Cle.] What do you bid us keep in mind?
[Ath.] That which we comprehended under the three words-first,
eating, secondly, drinking, thirdly, the excitement of love.
[Cle.] We shall be sure to remember, Stranger.
[Ath.] Very good. Then let us now proceed to marriage, and
teach persons in what way they shall beget children, threatening
them, if they disobey, with the terrors of the law.
[Cle.] What do you mean?
[Ath.] The bride and bridegroom should consider that they are
to produce for the state the best and fairest specimens of
children which they can. Now all men who are associated any
action always succeed when they attend and give their mind to
what they are doing, but when they do not give their mind or have
no mind, they fail; wherefore let the bridegroom give his mind to
the bride and to the begetting of children, and the bride in like
manner give her mind to the bridegroom, and particularly at the
time when their children are not yet born. And let the women whom
we have chosen be the overseers of such matters, and let them in
whatever number, large or small, and at whatever time the
magistrates may command, assemble every day in the temple of
Eileithyia during a third part of the day, and being there
assembled, let them inform one another of any one whom they see,
whether man or woman, of those who are begetting children,
disregarding the ordinances given at the time when the nuptial
sacrifices and ceremonies were performed. Let the begetting of
children and the supervision of those who are begetting them
continue ten years and no longer, during the time when marriage
is fruitful. But if any continue without children up to this
time, let them take counsel with their kindred and with the women
holding the office of overseer and be divorced for their mutual
benefit. If, however, any dispute arises about what is proper and
for the interest of either party, they shall choose ten of the
guardians of the law and abide by their permission and
appointment. The women who preside over these matters shall enter
into the houses of the young, and partly by admonitions and
partly by threats make them give over their folly and error: if
they persist, let the women go and tell the guardians of the law,
and the guardians shall prevent them. But if they too cannot
prevent them, they shall bring the matter before the people; and
let them write up their names and make oath that they cannot
reform such and such an one; and let him who is thus written up,
if he cannot in a court of law convict those who have inscribed
his name, be deprived of the privileges of a citizen in the
following respects:-let him not go to weddings nor to the
thanksgivings after the birth of children; and if he go, let any
one who pleases strike him with impunity; and let the same
regulations hold about women: let not a woman be allowed to
appear abroad, or receive honour, or go to nuptial and birthday
festivals, if she in like manner be written up as acting
disorderly and cannot obtain a verdict. And if, when they
themselves have done begetting children according to the law, a
man or woman have connection with another man or woman who are
still begetting children, let the same penalties be inflicted
upon them as upon those who are still having a family; and when
the time for procreation has passed let the man or woman who
refrains in such matters be held in esteem, and let those who do
not refrain be held in the contrary of esteem-that is to say,
disesteem. Now, if the greater part of mankind behave modestly,
the enactments of law may be left to slumber; but, if they are
disorderly, the enactments having been passed, let them be
carried into execution. To every man the first year is the
beginning of life, and the time of birth ought to be written down
in the temples of their fathers as the beginning of existence to
every child, whether boy or girl. Let every phratria have
inscribed on a whited wall the names of the successive archons by
whom the years are reckoned. And near to them let the living
members of the phratria be inscribed, and when they depart life
let them be erased. The limit of marriageable ages for a woman
shall be from sixteen to twenty years at the longest-for a man,
from thirty to thirty-five years; and let a woman hold office at
forty, and a man at thirty years. Let a man go out to war from
twenty to sixty years, and for a woman, if there appear any need
to make use of her in military service, let the time of service
be after she shall have brought forth children up to fifty years
of age; and let regard be had to what is possible and suitable to
each.
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