The Republic
grow, and could not imagine, any more than we can, the state of man
which preceded them. They were puzzled and awestricken by the Egyptian
monuments, of which the forms, as Plato says, not in a figure, but
literally, were ten thousand years old (Laws), and they contrasted the
antiquity of Egypt with their own short memories.
The early legends of Hellas have no real connection with the later
history: they are at a distance, and the intermediate region is
concealed from view; there is no road or path which leads from one to
the other. At the beginning of Greek history, in the vestibule of the
temple, is seen standing first of all the figure of the legislator,
himself the interpreter and servant of the God. The fundamental laws
which he gives are not supposed to change with time and circumstances.
The salvation of the state is held rather to depend on the inviolable
maintenance of them. They were sanctioned by the authority of heaven,
and it was deemed impiety to alter them. The desire to maintain them
unaltered seems to be the origin of what at first sight is very
surprising to us—the intolerant zeal of Plato against innovators in
religion or politics (Laws); although with a happy inconsistency he is
also willing that the laws of other countries should be studied and
improvements in legislation privately communicated to the Nocturnal
Council (Laws). The additions which were made to them in later ages in
order to meet the increasing complexity of affairs were still ascribed
by a fiction to the original legislator; and the words of such
enactments at Athens were disputed over as if they had been the words
of Solon himself. Plato hopes to preserve in a later generation the
mind of the legislator; he would have his citizens remain within the
lines which he has laid down for them. He would not harass them with
minute regulations, he would have allowed some changes in the laws: but
not changes which would affect the fundamental institutions of the
state, such for example as would convert an aristocracy into a
timocracy, or a timocracy into a popular form of government.
Passing from speculations to facts, we observe that progress has been
the exception rather than the law of human history. And therefore we
are not surprised to find that the idea of progress is of modern rather
than of ancient date; and, like the idea of a philosophy of history, is
not more than a century or two old. It seems to have arisen out of the
impression left on the human mind by the growth of the Roman Empire and
of the Christian Church, and to be due to the political and social
improvements which they introduced into the world; and still more in
our own century to the idealism of the first French Revolution and the
triumph of American Independence; and in a yet greater degree to the
vast material prosperity and growth of population in England and her
colonies and in America. It is also to be ascribed in a measure to the
greater study of the philosophy of history. The optimist temperament of
some great writers has assisted the creation of it, while the opposite
character has led a few to regard the future of the world as dark. The
‘spectator of all time and of all existence’ sees more of ‘the
increasing purpose which through the ages ran’ than formerly: but to
the inhabitant of a small state of Hellas the vision was necessarily
limited like the valley in which he dwelt. There was no remote past on
which his eye could rest, nor any future from which the veil was partly
lifted up by the analogy of history. The narrowness of view, which to
ourselves appears so singular, was to him natural, if not unavoidable.
5. For the relation of the Republic to the Statesman and the Laws, and
the two other works of Plato which directly treat of politics, see the
Introductions to the two latter; a few general points of comparison may
be touched upon in this place.
And first of the Laws.
(1) The Republic, though probably written at intervals, yet speaking
generally and judging by the indications of thought and style, may be
reasonably ascribed to the middle period of Plato’s life: the Laws are
certainly the work of his declining years, and some portions of them at
any rate seem to have been written in extreme old age.
(2) The Republic is full of hope and aspiration: the Laws bear the
stamp of failure and disappointment. The one is a finished work which
received the last touches of the author: the other is imperfectly
executed, and apparently unfinished. The one has the grace and beauty
of youth: the other has lost the poetical form, but has more of the
severity and knowledge of life which is characteristic of old age.
(3) The most conspicuous defect of the Laws is the failure of dramatic
power, whereas the Republic is full of striking contrasts of ideas and
oppositions of character.
(4) The Laws may be said to have more the nature of a sermon, the
Republic of a poem; the one is more religious, the other more
intellectual.
(5) Many theories of Plato, such as the doctrine of ideas, the
government of the world by philosophers, are not found in the Laws; the
immortality of the soul is first mentioned in xii; the person of
Socrates has altogether disappeared. The community of women and
children is renounced; the institution of common or public meals for
women (Laws) is for the first time introduced (Ar. Pol.).
(6) There remains in the Laws the old enmity to the poets, who are
ironically saluted in high-flown terms, and, at the same time, are
peremptorily ordered out of the city, if they are not willing to submit
their poems to the censorship of the magistrates (Rep.).
(7) Though the work is in most respects inferior, there are a few
passages in the Laws, such as the honour due to the soul, the evils of
licentious or unnatural love, the whole of Book x. (religion), the
dishonesty of retail trade, and bequests, which come more home to us,
and contain more of what may be termed the modern element in Plato than
almost anything in the Republic.
The relation of the two works to one another is very well given:
(1) by Aristotle in the Politics from the side of the Laws:—
‘The same, or nearly the same, objections apply to Plato’s later work,
the Laws, and therefore we had better examine briefly the constitution
which is therein described. In the Republic, Socrates has definitely
settled in all a few questions only; such as the community of women and
children, the community of property, and the constitution of the state.
The population is divided into two classes—one of husbandmen, and the
other of warriors; from this latter is taken a third class of
counsellors and rulers of the state. But Socrates has not determined
whether the husbandmen and artists are to have a share in the
government, and whether they too are to carry arms and share in
military service or not. He certainly thinks that the women ought to
share in the education of the guardians, and to fight by their side.
The remainder of the work is filled up with digressions foreign to the
main subject, and with discussions about the education of the
guardians. In the Laws there is hardly anything but laws; not much is
said about the constitution. This, which he had intended to make more
of the ordinary type, he gradually brings round to the other or ideal
form. For with the exception of the community of women and property, he
supposes everything to be the same in both states; there is to be the
same education; the citizens of both are to live free from servile
occupations, and there are to be common meals in both. The only
difference is that in the Laws the common meals are extended to women,
and the warriors number about 5000, but in the Republic only 1000.’
(2) by Plato in the Laws (Book v.), from the side of the Republic:—
‘The first and highest form of the state and of the government and of
the law is that in which there prevails most widely the ancient saying
that “Friends have all things in common.” Whether there is now, or ever
will be, this communion of women and children and of property, in which
the private and individual is altogether banished from life, and things
which are by nature private, such as eyes and ears and hands, have
become common, and all men express praise and blame, and feel joy and
sorrow, on the same occasions, and the laws unite the city to the
utmost,—whether all this is possible or not, I say that no man, acting
upon any other principle, will ever constitute a state more exalted in
virtue, or truer or better than this. Such a state, whether inhabited
by Gods or sons of Gods, will make them blessed who dwell therein; and
therefore to this we are to look for the pattern of the state, and to
cling to this, and, as far as possible, to seek for one which is like
this. The state which we have now in hand, when created, will be
nearest to immortality and unity in the next degree; and after that, by
the grace of God, we will complete the third one. And we will begin by
speaking of the nature and origin of the second.’
The comparatively short work called the Statesman or Politicus in its
style and manner is more akin to the Laws, while in its idealism it
rather resembles the Republic. As far as we can judge by various
indications of language and thought, it must be later than the one and
of course earlier than the other. In both the Republic and Statesman a
close connection is maintained between Politics and Dialectic. In the
Statesman, enquiries into the principles of Method are interspersed
with discussions about Politics. The comparative advantages of the rule
of law and of a person are considered, and the decision given in favour
of a person (Arist. Pol.). But much may be said on the other side, nor
is the opposition necessary; for a person may rule by law, and law may
be so applied as to be the living voice of the legislator. As in the
Republic, there is a myth, describing, however, not a future, but a
former existence of mankind. The question is asked, ‘Whether the state
of innocence which is described in the myth, or a state like our own
which possesses art and science and distinguishes good from evil, is
the preferable condition of man.’ To this question of the comparative
happiness of civilized and primitive life, which was so often discussed
in the last century and in our own, no answer is given. The Statesman,
though less perfect in style than the Republic and of far less range,
may justly be regarded as one of the greatest of Plato’s dialogues.
6. Others as well as Plato have chosen an ideal Republic to be the
vehicle of thoughts which they could not definitely express, or which
went beyond their own age. The classical writing which approaches most
nearly to the Republic of Plato is the ‘De Republica’ of Cicero; but
neither in this nor in any other of his dialogues does he rival the art
of Plato. The manners are clumsy and inferior; the hand of the
rhetorician is apparent at every turn. Yet noble sentiments are
constantly recurring: the true note of Roman patriotism—‘We Romans are
a great people’—resounds through the whole work. Like Socrates, Cicero
turns away from the phenomena of the heavens to civil and political
life. He would rather not discuss the ‘two Suns’ of which all Rome was
talking, when he can converse about ‘the two nations in one’ which had
divided Rome ever since the days of the Gracchi. Like Socrates again,
speaking in the person of Scipio, he is afraid lest he should assume
too much the character of a teacher, rather than of an equal who is
discussing among friends the two sides of a question. He would confine
the terms King or State to the rule of reason and justice, and he will
not concede that title either to a democracy or to a monarchy. But
under the rule of reason and justice he is willing to include the