The Republic
Asclepius did not practise our present system of medicine, which may be
said to educate diseases. But Herodicus, being a trainer, and himself
of a sickly constitution, by a combination of training and doctoring
found out a way of torturing first and chiefly himself, and secondly
the rest of the world.
How was that? he said.
By the invention of lingering death; for he had a mortal disease which
he perpetually tended, and as recovery was out of the question, he
passed his entire life as a valetudinarian; he could do nothing but
attend upon himself, and he was in constant torment whenever he
departed in anything from his usual regimen, and so dying hard, by the
help of science he struggled on to old age.
A rare reward of his skill!
Yes, I said; a reward which a man might fairly expect who never
understood that, if Asclepius did not instruct his descendants in
valetudinarian arts, the omission arose, not from ignorance or
inexperience of such a branch of medicine, but because he knew that in
all well-ordered states every individual has an occupation to which he
must attend, and has therefore no leisure to spend in continually being
ill. This we remark in the case of the artisan, but, ludicrously
enough, do not apply the same rule to people of the richer sort.
How do you mean? he said.
I mean this: When a carpenter is ill he asks the physician for a rough
and ready cure; an emetic or a purge or a cautery or the knife,—these
are his remedies. And if some one prescribes for him a course of
dietetics, and tells him that he must swathe and swaddle his head, and
all that sort of thing, he replies at once that he has no time to be
ill, and that he sees no good in a life which is spent in nursing his
disease to the neglect of his customary employment; and therefore
bidding good-bye to this sort of physician, he resumes his ordinary
habits, and either gets well and lives and does his business, or, if
his constitution fails, he dies and has no more trouble.
Yes, he said, and a man in his condition of life ought to use the art
of medicine thus far only.
Has he not, I said, an occupation; and what profit would there be in
his life if he were deprived of his occupation?
Quite true, he said.
But with the rich man this is otherwise; of him we do not say that he
has any specially appointed work which he must perform, if he would
live.
He is generally supposed to have nothing to do.
Then you never heard of the saying of Phocylides, that as soon as a man
has a livelihood he should practise virtue?
Nay, he said, I think that he had better begin somewhat sooner.
Let us not have a dispute with him about this, I said; but rather ask
ourselves: Is the practice of virtue obligatory on the rich man, or can
he live without it? And if obligatory on him, then let us raise a
further question, whether this dieting of disorders, which is an
impediment to the application of the mind in carpentering and the
mechanical arts, does not equally stand in the way of the sentiment of
Phocylides?
Of that, he replied, there can be no doubt; such excessive care of the
body, when carried beyond the rules of gymnastic, is most inimical to
the practice of virtue.
Yes, indeed, I replied, and equally incompatible with the management of
a house, an army, or an office of state; and, what is most important of
all, irreconcileable with any kind of study or thought or
self-reflection—there is a constant suspicion that headache and
giddiness are to be ascribed to philosophy, and hence all practising or
making trial of virtue in the higher sense is absolutely stopped; for a
man is always fancying that he is being made ill, and is in constant
anxiety about the state of his body.
Yes, likely enough.
And therefore our politic Asclepius may be supposed to have exhibited
the power of his art only to persons who, being generally of healthy
constitution and habits of life, had a definite ailment; such as these
he cured by purges and operations, and bade them live as usual, herein
consulting the interests of the State; but bodies which disease had
penetrated through and through he would not have attempted to cure by
gradual processes of evacuation and infusion: he did not want to
lengthen out good-for-nothing lives, or to have weak fathers begetting
weaker sons;—if a man was not able to live in the ordinary way he had
no business to cure him; for such a cure would have been of no use
either to himself, or to the State.
Then, he said, you regard Asclepius as a statesman.
Clearly; and his character is further illustrated by his sons. Note
that they were heroes in the days of old and practised the medicines of
which I am speaking at the siege of Troy: You will remember how, when
Pandarus wounded Menelaus, they
‘Sucked the blood out of the wound, and sprinkled soothing remedies,’
but they never prescribed what the patient was afterwards to eat or
drink in the case of Menelaus, any more than in the case of Eurypylus;
the remedies, as they conceived, were enough to heal any man who before
he was wounded was healthy and regular in his habits; and even though
he did happen to drink a posset of Pramnian wine, he might get well all
the same. But they would have nothing to do with unhealthy and
intemperate subjects, whose lives were of no use either to themselves
or others; the art of medicine was not designed for their good, and
though they were as rich as Midas, the sons of Asclepius would have
declined to attend them.
They were very acute persons, those sons of Asclepius.
Naturally so, I replied. Nevertheless, the tragedians and Pindar
disobeying our behests, although they acknowledge that Asclepius was
the son of Apollo, say also that he was bribed into healing a rich man
who was at the point of death, and for this reason he was struck by
lightning. But we, in accordance with the principle already affirmed by
us, will not believe them when they tell us both;—if he was the son of
a god, we maintain that he was not avaricious; or, if he was
avaricious, he was not the son of a god.
All that, Socrates, is excellent; but I should like to put a question
to you: Ought there not to be good physicians in a State, and are not
the best those who have treated the greatest number of constitutions
good and bad? and are not the best judges in like manner those who are
acquainted with all sorts of moral natures?
Yes, I said, I too would have good judges and good physicians. But do
you know whom I think good?
Will you tell me?
I will, if I can. Let me however note that in the same question you
join two things which are not the same.
How so? he asked.
Why, I said, you join physicians and judges. Now the most skilful
physicians are those who, from their youth upwards, have combined with
the knowledge of their art the greatest experience of disease; they had
better not be robust in health, and should have had all manner of
diseases in their own persons. For the body, as I conceive, is not the
instrument with which they cure the body; in that case we could not
allow them ever to be or to have been sickly; but they cure the body
with the mind, and the mind which has become and is sick can cure
nothing.
That is very true, he said.
But with the judge it is otherwise; since he governs mind by mind; he
ought not therefore to have been trained among vicious minds, and to
have associated with them from youth upwards, and to have gone through
the whole calendar of crime, only in order that he may quickly infer
the crimes of others as he might their bodily diseases from his own
self-consciousness; the honourable mind which is to form a healthy
judgment should have had no experience or contamination of evil habits
when young. And this is the reason why in youth good men often appear
to be simple, and are easily practised upon by the dishonest, because
they have no examples of what evil is in their own souls.
Yes, he said, they are far too apt to be deceived.
Therefore, I said, the judge should not be young; he should have
learned to know evil, not from his own soul, but from late and long
observation of the nature of evil in others: knowledge should be his
guide, not personal experience.
Yes, he said, that is the ideal of a judge.
Yes, I replied, and he will be a good man (which is my answer to your
question); for he is good who has a good soul. But the cunning and
suspicious nature of which we spoke,—he who has committed many crimes,
and fancies himself to be a master in wickedness, when he is amongst
his fellows, is wonderful in the precautions which he takes, because he
judges of them by himself: but when he gets into the company of men of
virtue, who have the experience of age, he appears to be a fool again,
owing to his unseasonable suspicions; he cannot recognise an honest
man, because he has no pattern of honesty in himself; at the same time,
as the bad are more numerous than the good, and he meets with them
oftener, he thinks himself, and is by others thought to be, rather wise
than foolish.
Most true, he said.
Then the good and wise judge whom we are seeking is not this man, but
the other; for vice cannot know virtue too, but a virtuous nature,
educated by time, will acquire a knowledge both of virtue and vice: the
virtuous, and not the vicious, man has wisdom—in my opinion.
And in mine also.
This is the sort of medicine, and this is the sort of law, which you
will sanction in your state. They will minister to better natures,
giving health both of soul and of body; but those who are diseased in
their bodies they will leave to die, and the corrupt and incurable
souls they will put an end to themselves.
That is clearly the best thing both for the patients and for the State.
And thus our youth, having been educated only in that simple music
which, as we said, inspires temperance, will be reluctant to go to law.
Clearly.
And the musician, who, keeping to the same track, is content to
practise the simple gymnastic, will have nothing to do with medicine
unless in some extreme case.
That I quite believe.
The very exercises and tolls which he undergoes are intended to
stimulate the spirited element of his nature, and not to increase his
strength; he will not, like common athletes, use exercise and regimen
to develope his muscles.
Very right, he said.
Neither are the two arts of music and gymnastic really designed, as is
often supposed, the one for the training of the soul, the other for the
training of the body.
What then is the real object of them?
I believe, I said, that the teachers of both have in view chiefly the
improvement of the soul.
How can that be? he asked.
Did you never observe, I said, the effect on the mind itself of
exclusive devotion to gymnastic, or the opposite effect of an exclusive
devotion to music?
In what way shown? he said.
The one producing a temper of hardness and ferocity, the other of
softness and effeminacy, I replied.
Yes, he said, I am quite aware that the mere athlete becomes too much
of a savage, and that the mere musician is melted and softened beyond
what is good for him.
Yet surely, I said, this ferocity only comes from spirit, which, if
rightly educated, would give courage, but, if too much intensified, is
liable to become hard and brutal.
That I quite think.
On the other hand the philosopher will have the quality of gentleness.
And this also, when too much indulged, will turn to softness, but, if
educated rightly, will be gentle and moderate.
True.
And in our opinion the guardians ought to have both these qualities?
Assuredly.
And both should be in harmony?
Beyond question.
And the harmonious soul is both temperate and courageous?
Yes.
And the inharmonious is cowardly and boorish?
Very true.