Readings in Ancient Greek Philosophy by S. Marc Cohen

Author:S. Marc Cohen
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781624665943
Publisher: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.
Published: 2016-07-14T16:00:00+00:00

{369} BOOK VIII

THE description of the ideal city and of the man whose character resembles it—the philosopher-king—is now complete, and Socrates returns to the argument interrupted at the beginning of Book V. He describes four individual character types and the four types of constitutions that result when people who possess them rule in a city (544d–545d). He presents these as four stages in the increasing corruption or decline of the ideal city, and he explains why the ideal city will decline by appeal to a mathematical myth (546a–b). However, embedded in the myth is the serious philosophical suggestion that the ideal city will decline because the philosopher-kings have to rely on sense-perception in putting their eugenics policy into practice (546b–c).

The first of the bad cities Socrates describes is a timocracy. It is ruled by people whose souls are themselves ruled by the spirited part of their soul, in which the desire for honor, victories, and good reputation are located (550b). It is the second-best city to the ideal. The third-best city is an oligarchy. It is ruled by people whose souls are ruled by their necessary appetites (544a). The fourth-best city is a democracy. It is ruled by people whose souls are ruled by unnecessary appetites (561a–b). The worst city of all is a tyranny. It is ruled by someone whose soul is ruled by its lawless unnecessary appetites (571a).

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