Complete Works (213 page)

I suppose so.

And a law is correct if it prescribes what is to the rulers’ own advantage and incorrect if it prescribes what is to their disadvantage? Is that what you mean?

It is.

And whatever laws they make must be obeyed by their subjects, and this is justice?

Of course.

[d] Then, according to your account, it is just to do not only what is to the advantage of the stronger, but also the opposite, what is not to their advantage. What are you saying?

The same as you. But let’s examine it more fully. Haven’t we agreed that, in giving orders to their subjects, the rulers are sometimes in error as to what is best for themselves, and yet that it is just for their subjects to do whatever their rulers order? Haven’t we agreed to that much?

I think so.

[e] Then you must also think that you have agreed that it is just to do what is disadvantageous to the rulers and those who are stronger, whenever they unintentionally order what is bad for themselves. But you also say that it is just for the others to obey the orders they give. You’re terribly clever, Thrasymachus, but doesn’t it necessarily follow that it is just to do the opposite of what you said, since the weaker are then ordered to do what is disadvantageous to the stronger?

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By god, Socrates, said Polemarchus, that’s quite clear.

If you are to be his witness anyway, said Clitophon, interrupting.

Who needs a witness? Polemarchus replied. Thrasymachus himself agrees that the rulers sometimes order what is bad for themselves and that it is just for the others to do it.

That, Polemarchus, is because Thrasymachus maintained that it is just to obey the orders of the rulers.

He also maintained, Clitophon, that the advantage of the stronger is [b] just. And having maintained both principles he went on to agree that the stronger sometimes gives orders to those who are weaker than he is—in other words, to his subjects—that are disadvantageous to the stronger himself. From these agreements it follows that what is to the advantage of the stronger is no more just than what is not to his advantage.

But, Clitophon responded, he said that the advantage of the stronger is what the stronger believes to be his advantage. This is what the weaker must do, and this is what he maintained the just to be.

That isn’t what he said, Polemarchus replied.

It makes no difference, Polemarchus, I said. If Thrasymachus wants to put it that way now, let’s accept it. Tell me, Thrasymachus, is this what [c] you wanted to say the just is, namely, what the stronger believes to be to his advantage, whether it is in fact to his advantage or not? Is that what we are to say you mean?

Not at all. Do you think I’d call someone who is in error stronger at the very moment he errs?

I did think that was what you meant when you agreed that the rulers aren’t infallible but are liable to error.

That’s because you are a false witness in arguments, Socrates. When [d] someone makes an error in the treatment of patients, do you call him a doctor in regard to that very error? Or when someone makes an error in accounting, do you call him an accountant in regard to that very error in calculation? I think that we express ourselves in words that, taken literally, do say that a doctor is in error, or an accountant, or a grammarian. But each of these, insofar as he is what we call him, never errs, so that, according [e] to the precise account (and you are a stickler for precise accounts), no craftsman ever errs. It’s when his knowledge fails him that he makes an error, and in regard to that error he is no craftsman. No craftsman, expert, or ruler makes an error at the moment when he is ruling, even though everyone will say that a physician or a ruler makes errors. It’s in this loose way that you must also take the answer I gave earlier. But the most precise answer is this. A ruler, insofar as he is a ruler, never makes errors and
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unerringly decrees what is best for himself, and this his subject must do. Thus, as I said from the first, it is just to do what is to the advantage of the stronger.

All right, Thrasymachus, so you think I’m a false witness?

You certainly are.

And you think that I asked the questions I did in order to harm you in the argument?

I know it very well, but it won’t do you any good. You’ll never be able [b] to trick me, so you can’t harm me that way, and without trickery you’ll never be able to overpower me in argument.

I wouldn’t so much as try, Thrasymachus. But in order to prevent this sort of thing from happening again, define clearly whether it is the ruler and stronger in the ordinary sense or in the precise sense whose advantage you said it is just for the weaker to promote as the advantage of the stronger.

I mean the ruler in the most precise sense. Now practice your harm doing and false witnessing on that if you can—I ask no concessions from you—but you certainly won’t be able to.

[c] Do you think that I’m crazy enough to try to shave a lion or to bear false witness against Thrasymachus?

You certainly tried just now, though you were a loser at that too.

Enough of this. Tell me: Is a doctor in the precise sense, whom you mentioned before, a money-maker or someone who treats the sick? Tell me about the one who is really a doctor.

He’s the one who treats the sick.

What about a ship’s captain? Is a captain in the precise sense a ruler of sailors or a sailor?

A ruler of sailors.

We shouldn’t, I think, take into account the fact that he sails in a ship, [d] and he shouldn’t be called a sailor for that reason, for it isn’t because of his sailing that he is called a ship’s captain, but because of his craft and his rule over sailors?

That’s true.

And is there something advantageous to each of these, that is, to bodies and to sailors?

Certainly.

And aren’t the respective crafts by nature set over them to seek and provide what is to their advantage?

They are.

And is there any advantage for each of the crafts themselves except to be as complete or perfect as possible?

[e] What are you asking?

This: If you asked me whether our bodies are sufficient in themselves, or whether they need something else, I’d answer: “They certainly have needs. And because of this, because our bodies are deficient rather than self-sufficient, the craft of medicine has now been discovered. The craft of medicine was developed to provide what is advantageous for a body.” Do you think that I’m right in saying this or not?

You are right.

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Now, is medicine deficient? Does a craft need some further virtue, as the eyes are in need of sight, and the ears of hearing, so that another craft is needed to seek and provide what is advantageous to them? Does a craft itself have some similar deficiency, so that each craft needs another, to seek out what is to its advantage? And does the craft that does the seeking need still another, and so on without end? Or does each seek out what is [b] to its own advantage by itself? Or does it need neither itself nor another craft to seek out what is advantageous to it, because of its own deficiencies? Is it that there is no deficiency or error in any craft? That it isn’t appropriate for any craft to seek what is to the advantage of anything except that of which it is the craft? And that, since it is itself correct, it is without either fault or impurity, as long as it is wholly and precisely the craft that it is? Consider this with the preciseness of language you mentioned. Is it so or not?

It appears to be so.

Medicine doesn’t seek its own advantage, then, but that of the body? [c]

Yes.

And horse-breeding doesn’t seek its own advantage, but that of horses? Indeed, no other craft seeks its own advantage—for it has no further needs—but the advantage of that of which it is the craft?

Apparently so.

Now, surely, Thrasymachus, the crafts rule over and are stronger than the things of which they are the crafts?

Very reluctantly, he conceded this as well.

No kind of knowledge seeks or orders what is advantageous to itself, then, but what is advantageous to the weaker, which is subject to it. [d]

He tried to fight this conclusion, but he conceded it in the end. And after he had, I said: Surely, then, no doctor, insofar as he is a doctor, seeks or orders what is advantageous to himself, but what is advantageous to his patient? We agreed that a doctor in the precise sense is a ruler of bodies, not a money-maker. Wasn’t that agreed?

Yes.

So a ship’s captain in the precise sense is a ruler of sailors, not a sailor?

That’s what we agreed. [e]

Doesn’t it follow that a ship’s captain or ruler won’t seek and order what is advantageous to himself, but what is advantageous to a sailor, his subject?

He reluctantly agreed.

So, then, Thrasymachus, no one in any position of rule, insofar as he is a ruler, seeks or orders what is advantageous to himself, but what is advantageous to his subject, that on which he practices his craft. It is to his subject and what is advantageous and proper to it that he looks, and everything he says and does he says and does for it.

When we reached this point in the argument, and it was clear to all that his account of justice had turned into its opposite, instead of answering,
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Thrasymachus said: Tell me, Socrates, do you still have a wet nurse?

What’s this? Hadn’t you better answer
my
questions rather than asking
me
such things?

Because she’s letting you run around with a snotty nose, and doesn’t wipe it when she needs to! Why, for all she cares, you don’t even know about sheep and shepherds.

Just what is it I don’t know?

You think that shepherds and cowherds seek the good of their sheep [b] and cattle, and fatten them and take care of them, looking to something other than their master’s good and their own. Moreover, you believe that rulers in cities—true rulers, that is—think about their subjects differently than one does about sheep, and that night and day they think of something besides their own advantage. You are so far from understanding about [c] justice and what’s just, about injustice and what’s unjust, that you don’t realize that justice is really the good of another, the advantage of the stronger and the ruler, and harmful to the one who obeys and serves. Injustice is the opposite, it rules the truly simple and just, and those it rules do what is to the advantage of the other and stronger, and they make the one they serve happy, but themselves not at all. You must look at it [d] as follows, my most simple Socrates: A just man always gets less than an unjust one. First, in their contracts with one another, you’ll never find, when the partnership ends, that a just partner has got more than an unjust one, but less. Second, in matters relating to the city, when taxes are to be paid, a just man pays more on the same property, an unjust one less, but when the city is giving out refunds, a just man gets nothing, while an [e] unjust one makes a large profit. Finally, when each of them holds a ruling position in some public office, a just person, even if he isn’t penalized in other ways, finds that his private affairs deteriorate because he has to neglect them, that he gains no advantage from the public purse because of his justice, and that he’s hated by his relatives and acquaintances when he’s unwilling to do them an unjust favor. The opposite is true of an unjust man in every respect. Therefore, I repeat what I said before: A person of great power outdoes everyone else. Consider him if you want to figure
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great power outdoes everyone else. Consider him if you want to figure out how much more advantageous it is for the individual to be just rather than unjust. You’ll understand this most easily if you turn your thoughts to the most complete injustice, the one that makes the doer of injustice happiest and the sufferers of it, who are unwilling to do injustice, most wretched. This is tyranny, which through stealth or force appropriates the property of others, whether sacred or profane, public or private, not little by little, but all at once. If someone commits only one part of injustice and [b] is caught, he’s punished and greatly reproached—such partly unjust people are called temple-robbers,
¹¹
kidnappers, housebreakers, robbers, and thieves when they commit these crimes. But when someone, in addition to appropriating their possessions, kidnaps and enslaves the citizens as well, instead of these shameful names he is called happy and blessed, not [c] only by the citizens themselves, but by all who learn that he has done the whole of injustice. Those who reproach injustice do so because they are afraid not of doing it but of suffering it. So, Socrates, injustice, if it is on a large enough scale, is stronger, freer, and more masterly than justice. And, as I said from the first, justice is what is advantageous to the stronger, while injustice is to one’s own profit and advantage.

[d] Having emptied this great flood of words into our ears all at once like a bath attendant, Thrasymachus intended to leave. But those present didn’t let him and made him stay to give an account of what he had said. I too begged him to stay, and I said to him: After hurling such a speech at us, Thrasymachus, do you intend to leave before adequately instructing us [e] or finding out whether you are right or not? Or do you think it a small matter to determine which whole way of life would make living most worthwhile for each of us?

Is
that
what I seem to you to think? Thrasymachus said.

Either that, or else you care nothing for us and aren’t worried about whether we’ll live better or worse lives because of our ignorance of what you say you know. So show some willingness to teach it to us. It wouldn’t be a bad investment for you to be the benefactor of a group as large as ours. For my own part, I’ll tell you that I am not persuaded. I don’t believe
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that injustice is more profitable than justice, not even if you give it full scope and put no obstacles in its way. Suppose that there
is
an unjust person, and suppose he
does
have the power to do injustice, whether by trickery or open warfare; nonetheless, he doesn’t persuade me that injustice is more profitable than justice. Perhaps someone here, besides myself, feels [b] the same as I do. So come now, and persuade us that we are wrong to esteem justice more highly than injustice in planning our lives.