[554]
Let us see.
Would he not, in the first place, resemble it in prizing wealth above everything? Inevitably. And also by being thrifty and laborious, satisfying only his own necessary 1 appetites and desires and not providing for expenditure on other things, but subduing his other appetites as vain and unprofitable? By all means. He would be a squalid 2 fellow, said I, looking for a surplus of profit 3 in everything, 554b and a hoarder, the type the multitude approves. 4 Would not this be the character of the man who corresponds to such a polity? I certainly think so, he said. Property, at any rate, is the thing most esteemed by that state and that kind of man. That, I take it, said I, is because he has never turned his thoughts to true culture. I think not, he said, else he would not have made the blind 5 one leader of his choir and first in honor. 6 Well said, I replied. But consider this. Shall we not say that owing to this lack of culture the appetites of the drone spring up in him, 554c some the beggarly, others the rascally, but that they are forcibly restrained by his general self-surveillance and self- control 7 ? We shall indeed, he said. Do you know, then, said I, to what you must look to discern the rascalities of such men? To what? he said. To guardianships of orphans, 8 and any such opportunities of doing injustice with impunity. True. And is it not apparent by this that in other dealings, where he enjoys the repute of a seeming just man, he by some better 9 element in himself 554d forcibly keeps down other evil desires dwelling within, 10 not persuading them that it is better not 11 nor taming them by reason, but by compulsion and fear, trembling for his possessions generally. Quite so, he said. Yes, by Zeus, said I, my friend. In most of them, when there is occasion to spend the money of others, you will discover the existence of drone-like appetites. Most emphatically. Such a man, then, would not be free from internal dissension. 12 He would not be really one, but in some sort a double 13 man. Yet for the most part, 554e his better desires would have the upper hand over the worse. It is so. And for this reason, I presume, such a man would be more seemly, more respectable, than many others; but the true virtue of a soul in unison and harmony 14 with itself would escape him and dwell afar. I think so.
Would he not, in the first place, resemble it in prizing wealth above everything? Inevitably. And also by being thrifty and laborious, satisfying only his own necessary 1 appetites and desires and not providing for expenditure on other things, but subduing his other appetites as vain and unprofitable? By all means. He would be a squalid 2 fellow, said I, looking for a surplus of profit 3 in everything, 554b and a hoarder, the type the multitude approves. 4 Would not this be the character of the man who corresponds to such a polity? I certainly think so, he said. Property, at any rate, is the thing most esteemed by that state and that kind of man. That, I take it, said I, is because he has never turned his thoughts to true culture. I think not, he said, else he would not have made the blind 5 one leader of his choir and first in honor. 6 Well said, I replied. But consider this. Shall we not say that owing to this lack of culture the appetites of the drone spring up in him, 554c some the beggarly, others the rascally, but that they are forcibly restrained by his general self-surveillance and self- control 7 ? We shall indeed, he said. Do you know, then, said I, to what you must look to discern the rascalities of such men? To what? he said. To guardianships of orphans, 8 and any such opportunities of doing injustice with impunity. True. And is it not apparent by this that in other dealings, where he enjoys the repute of a seeming just man, he by some better 9 element in himself 554d forcibly keeps down other evil desires dwelling within, 10 not persuading them that it is better not 11 nor taming them by reason, but by compulsion and fear, trembling for his possessions generally. Quite so, he said. Yes, by Zeus, said I, my friend. In most of them, when there is occasion to spend the money of others, you will discover the existence of drone-like appetites. Most emphatically. Such a man, then, would not be free from internal dissension. 12 He would not be really one, but in some sort a double 13 man. Yet for the most part, 554e his better desires would have the upper hand over the worse. It is so. And for this reason, I presume, such a man would be more seemly, more respectable, than many others; but the true virtue of a soul in unison and harmony 14 with itself would escape him and dwell afar. I think so.
Republic. Plato. Paul Shorey (Translator). Cambridge, MA. 1935-37.
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