Laws
what has been said is enough for them, and that any other things their
Genius and God will suggest to them--he will tell them to whom, and
when, and to what Gods severally they are to sacrifice and perform
dances, and how they may propitiate the deities, and live according to
the appointment of nature; being for the most part puppets, but having
some little share of reality.
MEGILLUS: You have a low opinion of mankind, Stranger.
ATHENIAN: Nay, Megillus, be not amazed, but forgive me: I was comparing
them with the Gods; and under that feeling I spoke. Let us grant, if you
wish, that the human race is not to be despised, but is worthy of some
consideration.
Next follow the buildings for gymnasia and schools open to all; these
are to be in three places in the midst of the city; and outside the city
and in the surrounding country, also in three places, there shall be
schools for horse exercise, and large grounds arranged with a view to
archery and the throwing of missiles, at which young men may learn and
practise. Of these mention has already been made; and if the mention be
not sufficiently explicit, let us speak further of them and embody them
in laws. In these several schools let there be dwellings for teachers,
who shall be brought from foreign parts by pay, and let them teach those
who attend the schools the art of war and the art of music, and the
children shall come not only if their parents please, but if they do not
please; there shall be compulsory education, as the saying is, of all
and sundry, as far as this is possible; and the pupils shall be regarded
as belonging to the state rather than to their parents. My law would
apply to females as well as males; they shall both go through the same
exercises. I assert without fear of contradiction that gymnastic and
horsemanship are as suitable to women as to men. Of the truth of this
I am persuaded from ancient tradition, and at the present day there are
said to be countless myriads of women in the neighbourhood of the Black
Sea, called Sauromatides, who not only ride on horseback like men, but
have enjoined upon them the use of bows and other weapons equally
with the men. And I further affirm, that if these things are possible,
nothing can be more absurd than the practice which prevails in our own
country, of men and women not following the same pursuits with all
their strength and with one mind, for thus the state, instead of being
a whole, is reduced to a half, but has the same imposts to pay and
the same toils to undergo; and what can be a greater mistake for any
legislator to make than this?
CLEINIAS: Very true; yet much of what has been asserted by us, Stranger,
is contrary to the custom of states; still, in saying that the discourse
should be allowed to proceed, and that when the discussion is completed,
we should choose what seems best, you spoke very properly, and I now
feel compunction for what I have said. Tell me, then, what you would
next wish to say.
ATHENIAN: I should wish to say, Cleinias, as I said before, that if the
possibility of these things were not sufficiently proven in fact, then
there might be an objection to the argument, but the fact being as
I have said, he who rejects the law must find some other ground of
objection; and, failing this, our exhortation will still hold good,
nor will any one deny that women ought to share as far as possible in
education and in other ways with men. For consider; if women do not
share in their whole life with men, then they must have some other order
of life.
CLEINIAS: Certainly.
ATHENIAN: And what arrangement of life to be found anywhere is
preferable to this community which we are now assigning to them? Shall
we prefer that which is adopted by the Thracians and many other races
who use their women to till the ground and to be shepherds of their
herds and flocks, and to minister to them like slaves? Or shall we do
as we and people in our part of the world do--getting together, as the
phrase is, all our goods and chattels into one dwelling, we entrust them
to our women, who are the stewards of them, and who also preside over
the shuttles and the whole art of spinning? Or shall we take a middle
course, as in Lacedaemon, Megillus--letting the girls share in gymnastic
and music, while the grown-up women, no longer employed in spinning
wool, are hard at work weaving the web of life, which will be no cheap
or mean employment, and in the duty of serving and taking care of the
household and bringing up the children, in which they will observe a
sort of mean, not participating in the toils of war; and if there were
any necessity that they should fight for their city and families, unlike
the Amazons, they would be unable to take part in archery or any other
skilled use of missiles, nor could they, after the example of the
Goddess, carry shield or spear, or stand up nobly for their country when
it was being destroyed, and strike terror into their enemies, if only
because they were seen in regular order? Living as they do, they would
never dare at all to imitate the Sauromatides, who, when compared with
ordinary women, would appear to be like men. Let him who will, praise
your legislators, but I must say what I think. The legislator ought to
be whole and perfect, and not half a man only; he ought not to let the
female sex live softly and waste money and have no order of life, while
he takes the utmost care of the male sex, and leaves half of life only
blest with happiness, when he might have made the whole state happy.
MEGILLUS: What shall we do, Cleinias? Shall we allow a stranger to run
down Sparta in this fashion?
CLEINIAS: Yes; for as we have given him liberty of speech we must let
him go on until we have perfected the work of legislation.
MEGILLUS: Very true.
ATHENIAN: Then now I may proceed?
CLEINIAS: By all means.
ATHENIAN: What will be the manner of life among men who may be supposed
to have their food and clothing provided for them in moderation, and who
have entrusted the practice of the arts to others, and whose husbandry
committed to slaves paying a part of the produce, brings them a return
sufficient for men living temperately; who, moreover, have common tables
in which the men are placed apart, and near them are the common tables
of their families, of their daughters and mothers, which day by day,
the officers, male and female, are to inspect--they shall see to the
behaviour of the company, and so dismiss them; after which the presiding
magistrate and his attendants shall honour with libations those Gods to
whom that day and night are dedicated, and then go home? To men whose
lives are thus ordered, is there no work remaining to be done which is
necessary and fitting, but shall each one of them live fattening like a
beast? Such a life is neither just nor honourable, nor can he who lives
it fail of meeting his due; and the due reward of the idle fatted beast
is that he should be torn in pieces by some other valiant beast whose
fatness is worn down by brave deeds and toil. These regulations, if we
duly consider them, will never be exactly carried into execution under
present circumstances, nor as long as women and children and houses and
all other things are the private property of individuals; but if we can
attain the second-best form of polity, we shall be very well off. And
to men living under this second polity there remains a work to be
accomplished which is far from being small or insignificant, but is the
greatest of all works, and ordained by the appointment of righteous law.
For the life which may be truly said to be concerned with the virtue of
body and soul is twice, or more than twice, as full of toil and trouble
as the pursuit after Pythian and Olympic victories, which debars a
man from every employment of life. For there ought to be no bye-work
interfering with the greater work of providing the necessary exercise
and nourishment for the body, and instruction and education for the
soul. Night and day are not long enough for the accomplishment of their
perfection and consummation; and therefore to this end all freemen ought
to arrange the way in which they will spend their time during the whole
course of the day, from morning till evening and from evening till the
morning of the next sunrise. There may seem to be some impropriety
in the legislator determining minutely the numberless details of the
management of the house, including such particulars as the duty of
wakefulness in those who are to be perpetual watchmen of the whole city;
for that any citizen should continue during the whole of any night in
sleep, instead of being seen by all his servants, always the first to
awake and get up--this, whether the regulation is to be called a law or
only a practice, should be deemed base and unworthy of a freeman; also
that the mistress of the house should be awakened by her hand-maidens
instead of herself first awakening them, is what the slaves, male and
female, and the serving-boys, and, if that were possible, everybody and
everything in the house should regard as base. If they rise early, they
may all of them do much of their public and of their household business,
as magistrates in the city, and masters and mistresses in their private
houses, before the sun is up. Much sleep is not required by nature,
either for our souls or bodies, or for the actions which they perform.
For no one who is asleep is good for anything, any more than if he were
dead; but he of us who has the most regard for life and reason keeps
awake as long as he can, reserving only so much time for sleep as is
expedient for health; and much sleep is not required, if the habit of
moderation be once rightly formed. Magistrates in states who keep awake
at night are terrible to the bad, whether enemies or citizens, and are
honoured and reverenced by the just and temperate, and are useful to
themselves and to the whole state.
A night which is passed in such a manner, in addition to all the
above-mentioned advantages, infuses a sort of courage into the minds of
the citizens. When the day breaks, the time has arrived for youth to go
to their schoolmasters. Now neither sheep nor any other animals can live
without a shepherd, nor can children be left without tutors, or slaves
without masters. And of all animals the boy is the most unmanageable,
inasmuch as he has the fountain of reason in him not yet regulated;
he is the most insidious, sharp-witted, and insubordinate of animals.
Wherefore he must be bound with many bridles; in the first place, when
he gets away from mothers and nurses, he must be under the management
of tutors on account of his childishness and foolishness; then, again,
being a freeman, he must be controlled by teachers, no matter what they
teach, and by studies; but he is also a slave, and in that regard
any freeman who comes in his way may punish him and his tutor and his
instructor, if any of them does anything wrong; and he who comes across
him and does not inflict upon him the punishment which he deserves,
shall incur the greatest disgrace; and let the guardian of the law, who
is the director of education, see to him who coming in the way of the
offences which we have mentioned, does not chastise them when he ought,
or chastises them in a way which he ought not; let him keep a sharp
look-out, and take especial care of the training of our children,
directing their natures, and always turning them to good according to
the law.
But how can our law sufficiently train the director of education
himself; for as yet all has been imperfect, and nothing has been said
either clear or satisfactory? Now, as far as possible, the law ought
to leave nothing to him, but to explain everything, that he may be
an interpreter and tutor to others. About dances and music and choral