The Republic by Desmond Lee

Author:Desmond Lee
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group USA, Inc.

PART VII

THE PHILOSOPHER

RULER

1. The Ideal and the Actual

Socrates is again reminded of his promise to demonstrate the practicability of his State. He starts by distinguishing the ideal from the approximations to it which are the best that can be achieved in practice, and maintaining that even if the ideal he has sketched cannot be realized in every detail, it has still been worth describing as a standard to aim at. He then goes on to assert that the only hope of realizing it, even imperfectly, is for political power to be put in the hands of ‘philosophers’.

‘But it seems to me, Socrates, that if we let you go on like this [471] you will forget that you still have to show that the state we have described is a practical possibility, and if so how; all you’ve just been saying has merely been putting the question off. I’ll admit that your state would be ideal if it existed, and I’ll fill in the gaps in your description myself. I know that the mutual loyalty the citizens would feel because they know they can call each other brothers, fathers, and sons, would make them most formidable (d) enemies; and that the presence of their women on campaign, whether they fought with them or acted as a reserve, would make them altogether invincible, because of the panic it would cause in their enemies and the support it would give in case of need. I can see also how many domestic advantages they would 471 (e) have that you have left unmentioned. I grant all this, and a thousand other things too, if our state existed, and I don’t want to hear any more details. Let us forget them and concentrate now on the job of proving to ourselves that it can exist and how it can exist.’

472 (a) ‘This is a very sudden attack,’ I countered, ‘and you’ve no mercy on my delays. I’ve just escaped two waves; but the third, which you are trying to bring on me now, is the biggest and the most difficult of the three, though you may not know it. When you have seen and heard it, you will forgive me and see how reasonable was the hesitation which made me afraid to put forward and examine such a paradoxical theory.’

‘The more of these excuses we hear,’ he replied, ‘the less likely (b) we are to let you off explaining how this social system can be realized. Get on, and don’t waste time.’

‘Well,’ I said, ‘perhaps I ought to remind you first of all that we started our discussion by trying to find out what justice and injustice are.’

‘Yes – what of it?’ he asked.

‘I was only going to ask whether, when we find out what justice is, we shall require the just man to answer the description precisely, and be an exact counterpart of what justice is. Or (c) shall we be content if he approximates to it very closely and has a bigger share1 of it than other men?’

‘That will content us.

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