The Republic
house, or steals the garments of some nightly wayfarer; next he
proceeds to clear a temple. Meanwhile the old opinions which he had
when a child, and which gave judgment about good and evil, are
overthrown by those others which have just been emancipated, and are
now the body-guard of love and share his empire. These in his
democratic days, when he was still subject to the laws and to his
father, were only let loose in the dreams of sleep. But now that he is
under the dominion of love, he becomes always and in waking reality
what he was then very rarely and in a dream only; he will commit the
foulest murder, or eat forbidden food, or be guilty of any other horrid
act. Love is his tyrant, and lives lordly in him and lawlessly, and
being himself a king, leads him on, as a tyrant leads a State, to the
performance of any reckless deed by which he can maintain himself and
the rabble of his associates, whether those whom evil communications
have brought in from without, or those whom he himself has allowed to
break loose within him by reason of a similar evil nature in himself.
Have we not here a picture of his way of life?
Yes, indeed, he said.
And if there are only a few of them in the State, and the rest of the
people are well disposed, they go away and become the body-guard or
mercenary soldiers of some other tyrant who may probably want them for
a war; and if there is no war, they stay at home and do many little
pieces of mischief in the city.
What sort of mischief?
For example, they are the thieves, burglars, cut-purses, foot-pads,
robbers of temples, man-stealers of the community; or if they are able
to speak they turn informers, and bear false witness, and take bribes.
A small catalogue of evils, even if the perpetrators of them are few in
number.
Yes, I said; but small and great are comparative terms, and all these
things, in the misery and evil which they inflict upon a State, do not
come within a thousand miles of the tyrant; when this noxious class and
their followers grow numerous and become conscious of their strength,
assisted by the infatuation of the people, they choose from among
themselves the one who has most of the tyrant in his own soul, and him
they create their tyrant.
Yes, he said, and he will be the most fit to be a tyrant.
If the people yield, well and good; but if they resist him, as he began
by beating his own father and mother, so now, if he has the power, he
beats them, and will keep his dear old fatherland or motherland, as the
Cretans say, in subjection to his young retainers whom he has
introduced to be their rulers and masters. This is the end of his
passions and desires.
Exactly.
When such men are only private individuals and before they get power,
this is their character; they associate entirely with their own
flatterers or ready tools; or if they want anything from anybody, they
in their turn are equally ready to bow down before them: they profess
every sort of affection for them; but when they have gained their point
they know them no more.
Yes, truly.
They are always either the masters or servants and never the friends of
anybody; the tyrant never tastes of true freedom or friendship.
Certainly not.
And may we not rightly call such men treacherous?
No question.
Also they are utterly unjust, if we were right in our notion of
justice?
Yes, he said, and we were perfectly right.
Let us then sum up in a word, I said, the character of the worst man:
he is the waking reality of what we dreamed.
Most true.
And this is he who being by nature most of a tyrant bears rule, and the
longer he lives the more of a tyrant he becomes.
That is certain, said Glaucon, taking his turn to answer.
And will not he who has been shown to be the wickedest, be also the
most miserable? and he who has tyrannized longest and most, most
continually and truly miserable; although this may not be the opinion
of men in general?
Yes, he said, inevitably.
And must not the tyrannical man be like the tyrannical State, and the
democratical man like the democratical State; and the same of the
others?
Certainly.
And as State is to State in virtue and happiness, so is man in relation
to man?
To be sure.
Then comparing our original city, which was under a king, and the city
which is under a tyrant, how do they stand as to virtue?
They are the opposite extremes, he said, for one is the very best and
the other is the very worst.
There can be no mistake, I said, as to which is which, and therefore I
will at once enquire whether you would arrive at a similar decision
about their relative happiness and misery. And here we must not allow
ourselves to be panic-stricken at the apparition of the tyrant, who is
only a unit and may perhaps have a few retainers about him; but let us
go as we ought into every corner of the city and look all about, and
then we will give our opinion.
A fair invitation, he replied; and I see, as every one must, that a
tyranny is the wretchedest form of government, and the rule of a king
the happiest.
And in estimating the men too, may I not fairly make a like request,
that I should have a judge whose mind can enter into and see through
human nature? he must not be like a child who looks at the outside and
is dazzled at the pompous aspect which the tyrannical nature assumes to
the beholder, but let him be one who has a clear insight. May I suppose
that the judgment is given in the hearing of us all by one who is able
to judge, and has dwelt in the same place with him, and been present at
his dally life and known him in his family relations, where he may be
seen stripped of his tragedy attire, and again in the hour of public
danger—he shall tell us about the happiness and misery of the tyrant
when compared with other men?
That again, he said, is a very fair proposal.
Shall I assume that we ourselves are able and experienced judges and
have before now met with such a person? We shall then have some one who
will answer our enquiries.
By all means.
Let me ask you not to forget the parallel of the individual and the
State; bearing this in mind, and glancing in turn from one to the other
of them, will you tell me their respective conditions?
What do you mean? he asked.
Beginning with the State, I replied, would you say that a city which is
governed by a tyrant is free or enslaved?
No city, he said, can be more completely enslaved.
And yet, as you see, there are freemen as well as masters in such a
State?
Yes, he said, I see that there are—a few; but the people, speaking
generally, and the best of them are miserably degraded and enslaved.
Then if the man is like the State, I said, must not the same rule
prevail? his soul is full of meanness and vulgarity—the best elements
in him are enslaved; and there is a small ruling part, which is also
the worst and maddest.
Inevitably.
And would you say that the soul of such an one is the soul of a
freeman, or of a slave?
He has the soul of a slave, in my opinion.
And the State which is enslaved under a tyrant is utterly incapable of
acting voluntarily?
Utterly incapable.
And also the soul which is under a tyrant (I am speaking of the soul
taken as a whole) is least capable of doing what she desires; there is
a gadfly which goads her, and she is full of trouble and remorse?
Certainly.
And is the city which is under a tyrant rich or poor?
Poor.
And the tyrannical soul must be always poor and insatiable?
True.
And must not such a State and such a man be always full of fear?
Yes, indeed.
Is there any State in which you will find more of lamentation and
sorrow and groaning and pain?
Certainly not.
And is there any man in whom you will find more of this sort of misery
than in the tyrannical man, who is in a fury of passions and desires?
Impossible.
Reflecting upon these and similar evils, you held the tyrannical State
to be the most miserable of States?
And I was right, he said.
Certainly, I said. And when you see the same evils in the tyrannical
man, what do you say of him?
I say that he is by far the most miserable of all men.
There, I said, I think that you are beginning to go wrong.
What do you mean?
I do not think that he has as yet reached the utmost extreme of misery.
Then who is more miserable?
One of whom I am about to speak.
Who is that?
He who is of a tyrannical nature, and instead of leading a private life
has been cursed with the further misfortune of being a public tyrant.
From what has been said, I gather that you are right.
Yes, I replied, but in this high argument you should be a little more
certain, and should not conjecture only; for of all questions, this
respecting good and evil is the greatest.
Very true, he said.
Let me then offer you an illustration, which may, I think, throw a
light upon this subject.
What is your illustration?
The case of rich individuals in cities who possess many slaves: from
them you may form an idea of the tyrant’s condition, for they both have
slaves; the only difference is that he has more slaves.
Yes, that is the difference.
You know that they live securely and have nothing to apprehend from
their servants?
What should they fear?
Nothing. But do you observe the reason of this?
Yes; the reason is, that the whole city is leagued together for the
protection of each individual.
Very true, I said. But imagine one of these owners, the master say of
some fifty slaves, together with his family and property and slaves,
carried off by a god into the wilderness, where there are no freemen to
help him—will he not be in an agony of fear lest he and his wife and
children should be put to death by his slaves?
Yes, he said, he will be in the utmost fear.
The time has arrived when he will be compelled to flatter divers of his
slaves, and make many promises to them of freedom and other things,
much against his will—he will have to cajole his own servants.
Yes, he said, that will be the only way of saving himself.
And suppose the same god, who carried him away, to surround him with
neighbours who will not suffer one man to be the master of another, and
who, if they could catch the offender, would take his life?
His case will be still worse, if you suppose him to be everywhere
surrounded and watched by enemies.
And is not this the sort of prison in which the tyrant will be bound—he
who being by nature such as we have described, is full of all sorts of
fears and lusts? His soul is dainty and greedy, and yet alone, of all
men in the city, he is never allowed to go on a journey, or to see the
things which other freemen desire to see, but he lives in his hole like
a woman hidden in the house, and is jealous of any other citizen who
goes into foreign parts and sees anything of interest.
Very true, he said.
And amid evils such as these will not he who is ill-governed in his own
person—the tyrannical man, I mean—whom you just now decided to be the
most miserable of all—will not he be yet more miserable when, instead
of leading a private life, he is constrained by fortune to be a public
tyrant? He has to be master of others when he is not master of himself:
he is like a diseased or paralytic man who is compelled to pass his
life, not in retirement, but fighting and combating with other men.
Yes, he said, the similitude is most exact.
Is not his case utterly miserable? and does not the actual tyrant lead
a worse life than he whose life you determined to be the worst?
Certainly.
He who is the real tyrant, whatever men may think, is the real slave,
and is obliged to practise the greatest adulation and servility, and to
be the flatterer of the vilest of mankind. He has desires which he is