Just so, he said.
And their dwellings must be such as will shield them against
the cold of winter and the heat of summer.
I suppose that you mean houses, he replied.
Yes, I said; but they must be the houses of soldiers, and not
of shopkeepers.
What is the difference? he said.
That I will endeavor to explain, I replied. To keep watch-
dogs, who, from want of discipline or hunger, or some evil
habit or other, would turn upon the sheep and worry them, and
behave not like dogs, but wolves, would be a foul and mon-
strous thing in a shepherd?
Truly monstrous, he said.
And therefore every care must be taken that our auxiliaries,
being stronger than our citizens, may not grow to be too much
for them and become savage tyrants instead of friends and
allies?
Yes, great care should be taken.
And would not a really good education furnish the best safe-
guard?
But they are well-educated already, he replied.
I cannot be so confident, my dear Glaucon, I said; I am much
more certain that they ought to be, and that true education,
whatever that may be, will have the greatest tendency to civilize
and humanize them in their relations to one another, and to
those who are under their protection.
Very true, he replied.
And not only their education, but their habitations, and all
that belongs to them, should be such as will neither impair
their virtue as guardians, nor tempt them to prey upon the other
citizens. Any man of sense must acknowledge that.
He must.
Then now let us consider what will be their way of life, if
they are to realize our idea of them. In the first place, none
of them should have any property of his own beyond what is
absolutely necessary; neither should they have a private house
or store closed against anyone who has a mind to enter; their
provisions should be only such as are required by trained war-
riors, who are men of temperance and courage; they should
agree to receive from the citizens a fixed rate of pay, enough to
meet the expenses of the year and no more; and they will go
to mess and live together like soldiers in a camp. Gold and
silver we will tell them that they have from God; the diviner
metal is within them, and they have therefore no need of the
dross which is current among men, and ought not to pollute
the divine by any such earthly admixture; for that commoner
metal has been the source of many unholy deeds, but their own
is undefiled. And they alone of all the citizens may not touch or
handle silver or gold, or be under the same roof with them, or
wear them, or drink from them. And this will be their salva-
tion, and they will be the saviours of the State. But should
they ever acquire homes or lands or moneys of their own, they
will become good housekeepers and husbandmen instead of
guardians, enemies and tyrants instead of allies of the other
citizens; hating and being hated, plotting and being plotted
against, they will pass their whole life in much greater ter-
ror of internal than of external enemies, and the hour of ruin,
both to themselves and to the rest of the State, will be at
hand. For all which reasons may we not say that thus shall
our State be ordered, and that these shall be the regulations
appointed by us for our guardians concerning their houses
and all other matters?
Yes, said Glaucon.
BOOK IV
WEALTH, POVERTY, AND VIRTUE
(ADEIMANTUS, SOCRATES.)
HERE Adeimantus interposed a question: How would
you answer, Socrates, said he, if a person were to
say that you are making these people miserable, and
that they are the cause of their own unhappiness; the city
in fact belongs to them, but they are none the better for it;
whereas other men acquire lands, and build large and hand-
some houses, and have everything handsome about them, offer-
ing sacrifices to the gods on their own account, and practis-
ing hospitality; moreover, as you were saying just now, they
have gold and silver, and all that is usual among the favorites
of fortune; but our poor citizens are no better than merce-
naries who are quartered in the city and are always mounting
guard?
Yes, I said; and you may add that they are only fed, and
not paid in addition to their food, like other men; and there-
fore they cannot, if they would, take a journey of pleasure;
they have no money to spend on a mistress or any other luxu-
rious fancy, which, as the world goes, is thought to be happi-
ness; and many other accusations of the same nature might
be added.
But, said he, let us suppose all this to be included in the
charge.
You mean to ask, I said, what will be our answer?
Yes.
If we proceed along the old path, my belief, I said, is that
we shall find the answer. And our answer will be that, even
as they are, our guardians may very likely be the happiest
of men; but that our aim in founding the State was not the
disproportionate happiness of any one class, but the greatest
happiness of the whole; we thought that in a State which
is ordered with a view to the good of the whole we should
be most likely to find justice, and in the ill-ordered State in-
justice: and, having found them, we might then decide which
of the two is the happier. At present, I take it, we are fash-
ioning the happy State, not piecemeal, or with a view of mak-
ing a few happy citizens, but as a whole; and by and by we
will proceed to view the opposite kind of State. Suppose that
we were painting a statue, and someone came up to us and
said: Why do you not put the most beautiful colors on the
most beautiful parts of the body--the eyes ought to be pur-
ple, but you have made them black--to him we might fairly
answer: Sir, you would not surely have us beautify the eyes
to such a degree that they are no longer eyes; consider rather
whether, by giving this and the other features their due pro-
portion, we make the whole beautiful. And so I say to you,
do not compel us to assign to the guardians a sort of happi-
ness which will make them anything but guardians; for we
too can clothe our husbandmen in royal apparel, and set
crowns of gold on their heads, and bid them till the ground
as much as they like, and no more. Our potters also might
be allowed to repose on couches, and feast by the fireside,
passing round the wine-cup, while their wheel is conveniently
at hand, and working at pottery only as much as they like;
in this way we might make every class happy--and then, as
you imagine, the whole State would be happy. But do not
put this idea into our heads; for, if we listen to you, the