The Republic
estimation in which she is held by gods and men and which we
acknowledge to be her due should now be restored to her by us; since
she has been shown to confer reality, and not to deceive those who
truly possess her, let what has been taken from her be given back, that
so she may win that palm of appearance which is hers also, and which
she gives to her own.
The demand, he said, is just.
In the first place, I said—and this is the first thing which you will
have to give back—the nature both of the just and unjust is truly known
to the gods.
Granted.
And if they are both known to them, one must be the friend and the
other the enemy of the gods, as we admitted from the beginning?
True.
And the friend of the gods may be supposed to receive from them all
things at their best, excepting only such evil as is the necessary
consequence of former sins?
Certainly.
Then this must be our notion of the just man, that even when he is in
poverty or sickness, or any other seeming misfortune, all things will
in the end work together for good to him in life and death: for the
gods have a care of any one whose desire is to become just and to be
like God, as far as man can attain the divine likeness, by the pursuit
of virtue?
Yes, he said; if he is like God he will surely not be neglected by him.
And of the unjust may not the opposite be supposed?
Certainly.
Such, then, are the palms of victory which the gods give the just?
That is my conviction.
And what do they receive of men? Look at things as they really are, and
you will see that the clever unjust are in the case of runners, who run
well from the starting-place to the goal but not back again from the
goal: they go off at a great pace, but in the end only look foolish,
slinking away with their ears draggling on their shoulders, and without
a crown; but the true runner comes to the finish and receives the prize
and is crowned. And this is the way with the just; he who endures to
the end of every action and occasion of his entire life has a good
report and carries off the prize which men have to bestow.
True.
And now you must allow me to repeat of the just the blessings which you
were attributing to the fortunate unjust. I shall say of them, what you
were saying of the others, that as they grow older, they become rulers
in their own city if they care to be; they marry whom they like and
give in marriage to whom they will; all that you said of the others I
now say of these. And, on the other hand, of the unjust I say that the
greater number, even though they escape in their youth, are found out
at last and look foolish at the end of their course, and when they come
to be old and miserable are flouted alike by stranger and citizen; they
are beaten and then come those things unfit for ears polite, as you
truly term them; they will be racked and have their eyes burned out, as
you were saying. And you may suppose that I have repeated the remainder
of your tale of horrors. But will you let me assume, without reciting
them, that these things are true?
Certainly, he said, what you say is true.
These, then, are the prizes and rewards and gifts which are bestowed
upon the just by gods and men in this present life, in addition to the
other good things which justice of herself provides.
Yes, he said; and they are fair and lasting.
And yet, I said, all these are as nothing either in number or greatness
in comparison with those other recompenses which await both just and
unjust after death. And you ought to hear them, and then both just and
unjust will have received from us a full payment of the debt which the
argument owes to them.
Speak, he said; there are few things which I would more gladly hear.
Well, I said, I will tell you a tale; not one of the tales which
Odysseus tells to the hero Alcinous, yet this too is a tale of a hero,
Er the son of Armenius, a Pamphylian by birth. He was slain in battle,
and ten days afterwards, when the bodies of the dead were taken up
already in a state of corruption, his body was found unaffected by
decay, and carried away home to be buried. And on the twelfth day, as
he was lying on the funeral pile, he returned to life and told them
what he had seen in the other world. He said that when his soul left
the body he went on a journey with a great company, and that they came
to a mysterious place at which there were two openings in the earth;
they were near together, and over against them were two other openings
in the heaven above. In the intermediate space there were judges
seated, who commanded the just, after they had given judgment on them
and had bound their sentences in front of them, to ascend by the
heavenly way on the right hand; and in like manner the unjust were
bidden by them to descend by the lower way on the left hand; these also
bore the symbols of their deeds, but fastened on their backs. He drew
near, and they told him that he was to be the messenger who would carry
the report of the other world to men, and they bade him hear and see
all that was to be heard and seen in that place. Then he beheld and saw
on one side the souls departing at either opening of heaven and earth
when sentence had been given on them; and at the two other openings
other souls, some ascending out of the earth dusty and worn with
travel, some descending out of heaven clean and bright. And arriving
ever and anon they seemed to have come from a long journey, and they
went forth with gladness into the meadow, where they encamped as at a
festival; and those who knew one another embraced and conversed, the
souls which came from earth curiously enquiring about the things above,
and the souls which came from heaven about the things beneath. And they
told one another of what had happened by the way, those from below
weeping and sorrowing at the remembrance of the things which they had
endured and seen in their journey beneath the earth (now the journey
lasted a thousand years), while those from above were describing
heavenly delights and visions of inconceivable beauty. The story,
Glaucon, would take too long to tell; but the sum was this:—He said
that for every wrong which they had done to any one they suffered
tenfold; or once in a hundred years—such being reckoned to be the
length of man’s life, and the penalty being thus paid ten times in a
thousand years. If, for example, there were any who had been the cause
of many deaths, or had betrayed or enslaved cities or armies, or been
guilty of any other evil behaviour, for each and all of their offences
they received punishment ten times over, and the rewards of beneficence
and justice and holiness were in the same proportion. I need hardly
repeat what he said concerning young children dying almost as soon as
they were born. Of piety and impiety to gods and parents, and of
murderers, there were retributions other and greater far which he
described. He mentioned that he was present when one of the spirits
asked another, ‘Where is Ardiaeus the Great?’ (Now this Ardiaeus lived
a thousand years before the time of Er: he had been the tyrant of some
city of Pamphylia, and had murdered his aged father and his elder
brother, and was said to have committed many other abominable crimes.)
The answer of the other spirit was: ‘He comes not hither and will never
come. And this,’ said he, ‘was one of the dreadful sights which we
ourselves witnessed. We were at the mouth of the cavern, and, having
completed all our experiences, were about to reascend, when of a sudden
Ardiaeus appeared and several others, most of whom were tyrants; and
there were also besides the tyrants private individuals who had been
great criminals: they were just, as they fancied, about to return into
the upper world, but the mouth, instead of admitting them, gave a roar,
whenever any of these incurable sinners or some one who had not been
sufficiently punished tried to ascend; and then wild men of fiery
aspect, who were standing by and heard the sound, seized and carried
them off; and Ardiaeus and others they bound head and foot and hand,
and threw them down and flayed them with scourges, and dragged them
along the road at the side, carding them on thorns like wool, and
declaring to the passers-by what were their crimes, and that they were
being taken away to be cast into hell.’ And of all the many terrors
which they had endured, he said that there was none like the terror
which each of them felt at that moment, lest they should hear the
voice; and when there was silence, one by one they ascended with
exceeding joy. These, said Er, were the penalties and retributions, and
there were blessings as great.
Now when the spirits which were in the meadow had tarried seven days,
on the eighth they were obliged to proceed on their journey, and, on
the fourth day after, he said that they came to a place where they
could see from above a line of light, straight as a column, extending
right through the whole heaven and through the earth, in colour
resembling the rainbow, only brighter and purer; another day’s journey
brought them to the place, and there, in the midst of the light, they
saw the ends of the chains of heaven let down from above: for this
light is the belt of heaven, and holds together the circle of the
universe, like the under-girders of a trireme. From these ends is
extended the spindle of Necessity, on which all the revolutions turn.
The shaft and hook of this spindle are made of steel, and the whorl is
made partly of steel and also partly of other materials. Now the whorl
is in form like the whorl used on earth; and the description of it
implied that there is one large hollow whorl which is quite scooped
out, and into this is fitted another lesser one, and another, and
another, and four others, making eight in all, like vessels which fit
into one another; the whorls show their edges on the upper side, and on
their lower side all together form one continuous whorl. This is
pierced by the spindle, which is driven home through the centre of the
eighth. The first and outermost whorl has the rim broadest, and the
seven inner whorls are narrower, in the following proportions—the sixth
is next to the first in size, the fourth next to the sixth; then comes
the eighth; the seventh is fifth, the fifth is sixth, the third is
seventh, last and eighth comes the second. The largest (or fixed stars)
is spangled, and the seventh (or sun) is brightest; the eighth (or
moon) coloured by the reflected light of the seventh; the second and
fifth (Saturn and Mercury) are in colour like one another, and yellower
than the preceding; the third (Venus) has the whitest light; the fourth
(Mars) is reddish; the sixth (Jupiter) is in whiteness second. Now the
whole spindle has the same motion; but, as the whole revolves in one
direction, the seven inner circles move slowly in the other, and of
these the swiftest is the eighth; next in swiftness are the seventh,
sixth, and fifth, which move together; third in swiftness appeared to
move according to the law of this reversed motion the fourth; the third
appeared fourth and the second fifth. The spindle turns on the knees of
Necessity; and on the upper surface of each circle is a siren, who goes
round with them, hymning a single tone or note. The eight together form
one harmony; and round about, at equal intervals, there is another
band, three in number, each sitting upon her throne: these are the
Fates, daughters of Necessity, who are clothed in white robes and have
chaplets upon their heads, Lachesis and Clotho and Atropos, who
accompany with their voices the harmony of the sirens—Lachesis singing
of the past, Clotho of the present, Atropos of the future; Clotho from
time to time assisting with a touch of her right hand the revolution of