However Plato--while he tolerates no poetry except in so far as it

produces ethical correction or regulation of the emotions, and

blames as hurtful the poet who simply touches or kindles

emotion--is in a peculiar manner averse to dramatic poetry, with

its diversity of assumed characters and its obligation of giving

speech to different points of view. His aversion had been

exhibited before, both in the Republic and in the Gorgias:[126]

but it reappears here in the Treatise De Legibus, with this

aggravating feature--that the revolution in music and poetry is

represented as generating cause of a deteriorated character and an

ultra-democratical polity of Athens. This (as I have before

remarked) is a sentiment peculiar to Plato. For undoubtedly,

oligarchical politicians (such as Thucydides, Nikias, Kritias),

who agreed with him in disliking the democracy, would never have

thought of ascribing what they disliked to such a cause as

alteration in the Athenian music and poetry. They would much more

have agreed with Aristotle,[127] when he attributes the important

change both in the character and polity of the Athenian people

after the Persian invasion, to the events of that invasion

itself--to the heroic and universal efforts made by the citizens,

on shipboard as well as on land, against the invading host--and

to the necessity for continuing those efforts by organising the

confederacy of Delos. Hence arose a new spirit of self-reliance

and enterprise--or rather an intensification of what had already

begun after the expulsion of Hippias and the reform by

Kleisthenes--which rendered the previous constitutional forms too

narrow to give satisfaction.[128] The creation of new and grander

forms of poetry may fairly be looked upon as one symptom of this

energetic general outburst: but it is in no way a primary or

causal fact, as Plato wishes us to believe. Nor can Plato himself

have supposed it to be so, at the time when he composed his

Menexenus: wherein the events of the post-Xerxeian period are

presented in a light very different from that in which he viewed

them when he wrote his Leges--presented with glowing commendations

on his countrymen.

[Footnote 126: Plato, Republ. iii. pp. 395-396, x. p. 605 B;

Gorgias, p. 502 B; Legg. iv. p. 719 B.

Aristotle takes a view of tragedy quite opposed to that of Plato:

he considers it as calculated to purge or purify the emotions of

fear, compassion, &c. (Aristot. Poet. c. 13. Compare Politic.

viii. 7, 9). Unfortunately the Poetica exist only as a fragment,

so that his doctrine about [Greek: ka/tharsis] is only declared

and not fully developed.

Rousseau (in his Lettre à d'Alembert Sur les Spectacles, p. 33

seq.) impugns this doctrine of Aristotle, and condemns theatrical

representations, partly with arguments similar to those of Plato,

partly with others of his own.]

[Footnote 127: Aristotel. Politic. v. 4, p. 1304, a. 20; ii. 12,

p. 1274, a. 12; viii. 6, 1340, a. 30.]

[Footnote 128: Herodot. v. 78.]

[Side-note: Doctrines of Plato in this prefatory matter.]

The long ethical prefatory matter[129] which we have gone through,

includes these among other doctrines--1. That the life of justice,

and the life of pleasure, are essentially coincident. 2. That

Reason, as declared by the lawgiver, ought to controul all our

passions and emotions. 3. That intoxication, under certain

conditions, is an useful stimulus to elderly men. 4. That the

political constitution of society ought not to be founded upon one

single principle of authority, but upon a combination of several.

5. That the extreme of liberty, and the extreme of despotism, are

both bad.[130]

[Footnote 129: What Aristotle calls [Greek: toi=s e)/xôthen

lo/gois], in reference to the Republic of Plato (Aristotel.

Politic. ii. 36, p. 1264, b. 39).]

[Footnote 130: Compare on this point Plato's Epistol. viii. pp.

354-355, where this same view is enforced.]

[Side-note: Compared with those of the Republic and of the

Xenophontic Cyropædia.]

Of these five positions, the two first are coincident with the

doctrines of the Republic: the third is not coincident compared

with them, but indirectly in opposition to them: the fourth and

fifth put Plato on a standing point quite different from that of

the Republic, and different also from that of the Xenophontic

Cyropædia. In the Cyropædia, all government is strictly personal:

the subjects both obey willingly, and are rendered comfortable

because of the supreme and manifold excellence of one

person--their chief, Cyrus--in every department of practical

administration, civil as well as military. In the Platonic

Republic, the government is also personal: to this extent--that

Plato provides neither political checks, nor magistrates, nor

laws, nor judicature: but aims only at the perfect training of the

Guardians, and the still more elaborate and philosophical training

of those few chief or elder Guardians, who are to direct the rest.

He demands only a succession of these philosophers, corresponding

to the regal Artist sketched in the Politikus: and he leaves all

ulterior directions to them. Upon their perfect dispositions and

competence, all the weal or woe of the community depends. All is

personal government; but it is lodged in the hands of a few

philosophers, assumed to be super-excellent, like the one chief in

the Xenophontic Cyropædia. When however we come to the Leges, we

find that Plato ceases to presume upon such supreme personal

excellence. He drops it as something beyond the limit of human

attainment, and as fit only for the golden or Saturnian age.[131]

He declares that power, without adequate restraints, is a

privilege with which no man can be trusted.[132] Nevertheless the

magistrates must be vested with sufficient power: since excess of

liberty is equally dangerous. To steer between these two

rocks,[133] you want not only a good despot but a sagacious

lawgiver. It is he who must construct a constitutional system,

having regard to the various natural foundations of authority in

the minds of the citizens. He must provide fixed laws,

magistrates, and a competent judicature: moreover, both the

magistrates and the judicature must be servants of the law, and

nothing beyond.[134] The lawgiver must frame his laws with

single-minded view, not to the happiness of any separate section

of the city, but to that of the whole. He must look to the virtue

of the whole, in its most comprehensive sense, and to all good

things, ranked in their triple subordination and their comparative

value--that is, First, the good things belonging to the

mind--Secondly, Those belonging to the body--Thirdly, Wealth and

External acquisitions.[135]

[Footnote 131: Plato, Legg. iv. pp. 713-714.]

[Footnote 132: Plato, Legg. iii. p. 687 E--iv. p. 713 B, ix. p. 875

C.]]

[Footnote 133: Plato, Legg. iv. pp. 710-711.]

[Footnote 134: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 715 C-D. [Greek: tou\s d'

a)/rchontas legome/nous nu=n u(pêre/tas toi=s no/mois e)ka/lesa,

ou)= ti kainotomi/as o)noma/tôn e(/neka, a)ll'], &c. It

appears as if this phrase, calling "magistrates the servants or

ministers of the law," was likely to be regarded as a harsh and

novel metaphor.]

[Footnote 135: Plato, Legg. iv. pp. 707 B, 714 B; iii. p. 697 A.]

[Side-note: Constructive scheme--Plato's new point of view.]

We now enter upon this constructive effort of Plato's old age.

That a political constitution with fixed laws (he makes the

Athenian say) and with magistrates acting merely as servants of

the laws, is the only salvation for a city and its people--this is

a truth which every man sees most distinctly in his old age,

though when younger he was very dull in discerning it.[136]

Probably enough what we here read represents the change in Plato's

own mind: the acquisition of a new point of view, which was not

present to him when he composed his Republic and his Politikus.

[Footnote 136: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 715 E. [Greek: Ne/os me\n ga\r

ô)\n pa=s a)/nthrôpos ta\ toiau=ta a)mblu/tata au)to\s o(ra=|,

ge/rôn de\ o)xu/tata.]

Compare vii. pp. 819 D-821 D, for marks of Plato's old age and

newly acquired opinions.]

[Side-note: New Colony to be founded in Krete--its general

conditions.]

Here the exposition assumes a definite shape. The Kretan Kleinias

apprises his Athenian companion, that the Knossians with other

Kretans are about to establish a new colony on an unsettled point

in Krete; and that himself with nine others are named

commissioners for framing and applying the necessary regulations.

He invites the co-operation of the Athenian:[137] who accordingly

sets himself to the task of suggesting such laws and measures

as are best calculated to secure the march of the new Magnetic

settlement towards the great objects defined in the preceding

programme.

[Footnote 137: Plato, Legg. iii. p. 702 C.]

The new city is to be about nine English miles from the sea. The

land round it is rough, poor, and without any timber for

shipbuilding; but it is capable of producing all supplies

absolutely indispensable, so that little need will be felt of

importation from abroad. The Athenian wishes that the site were

farther from the sea. Yet he considers the general conditions to

be tolerably good; inasmuch as the city need not become commercial

and maritime, and cannot have the means of acquiring much gold and

silver--which is among the greatest evils that can befall a city,

since it corrupts justice and goodness in the citizens.[138] The

settlers are all Greeks, from various towns of Krete and

Peloponnesus. This (remarks the Athenian) is on the whole better

than if they came from one single city. Though it may introduce

some additional chance of discord, it will nevertheless render

them more open-minded and persuadable for the reception of new

institutions.[139]

[Footnote 138: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 705.]

[Footnote 139: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 708.]

[Side-note: The Athenian declares that he will not merely

promulgate peremptory laws, but will recommend them to the

citizens by prologues or hortatory discourses.]

The colonists being supposed to be assembled in their new domicile

and ready for settlement, Plato, or his Athenian spokesman,

addresses to them a solemn exhortation, inculcating piety towards

the Gods, celestial and subterranean, as well as to the Dæmons and

Heroes--and also reverence to parents.[140] He then intimates

that, though he does not intend to consult the settlers on the

acceptance or rejection of laws, but assumes to himself the power

of prescribing such laws as he thinks best for them--he

nevertheless will not content himself with promulgating his

mandates in a naked and peremptory way. He will preface each law

with a proëm or prologue (_i.e._ a string of preliminary

recommendations): in order to predispose their minds favourably,

and to obtain from them a willing obedience.[141] He will employ

not command only, but persuasion along with or antecedent to

command: as the physician treats his patients when they are

freemen, not as he sends his slaves to treat slave-patients,

with a simple compulsory order.[142] To begin with an introductory

proëm or prelude, prior to the announcement of the positive law,

is (he says) the natural course of proceeding. It is essential to

all artistic vocal performances: it is carefully studied and

practised both by the rhetor and the musician.[143] Yet in spite

of this analogy, no lawgiver has ever yet been found to prefix

proëms to his laws: every one has contented himself with issuing

peremptory commands.[144] Here then Plato undertakes to set the

example of prefixing such prefatory introductions. The nature of

the case would prescribe that every law, every speech, every song,

should have its suitable proëm: but such prolixity would be

impolitic. A discretion must be entrusted to the lawgiver, as it

is to the orator and the musician. Proëms or prologues must be

confined to the great and important laws.[145]

[Footnote 140: Plato, Legg. iv. pp. 716-718.]

[Footnote 141: Plato, Legg. iv. pp. 718-719-723.]

[Footnote 142: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 720. This is a curious

indication respecting the medical profession and practice at

Athens.]

[Footnote 143: Plato, Legg. iv. pp. 722 D-723 D. [Greek: tô=| te

r(ê/tori kai\ tô=| melô|dô=| kai\ tô=| nomothe/tê| to\ toiou=ton

e(ka/stote e)pitrepte/on.]]

[Footnote 144: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 722 B-E.

The [Greek: prooi/mia dêmêgorika/] of Demosthenes are well

known.]

[Footnote 145: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 723 C-D. About [Greek: ta\ tô=n

no/môn prooi/mia], compare what Plato says about his

communications with the younger Dionysius, shortly after his

(Plato's) second arrival at Syracuse, Plato, Epistol. iii. p. 316

A.]

[Side-note: General character of these prologues--didactic

or rhetorical homilies.]

Accordingly, from hence to the end of the Treatise De Legg., Plato

proceeds upon the principle here laid down. He either prefixes a

prologue to each of his laws--or blends the law with its proëm--or

gives what may be called a proëm without a law, that is a string

of hortatory or comminatory precepts. There are various points (he

says) on which the lawgiver cannot propose any distinct and

peremptory enactment, but must confine himself to emphatic

censure[146] and declaration of opinion, with threats of

displeasure on the part of the Gods: the rather as he cannot hope

to accomplish his public objects, without the largest interference

with private habits--nor without bringing his regulations to bear

upon individual life, where positive law can hardly reach.[147]

The Platonic prologues are sometimes expositions of the reasons of

the law--_i. e._ of the dangers which it is intended to

ward off, or the advantages to be secured by it. But far more

frequently, they are morsels of rhetoric--lectures, discourses, or

homilies--addressed to the emotions and not to the reason,

insisting on the ethical and religious point of view, and destined

to operate with persuasive or intimidating effect upon an

uninstructed multitude.[148]

[Footnote 146: Cicero (De Legg. ii. 6) professes to follow Plato

in this practice of prefixing proëms to his Laws. He calls the

proëm an encomium upon the law, which in most cases it is--"ut

priusquam ipsam legem recitem, de ejus legis laude dicam".]

[Footnote 147: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 780 A.]

[Footnote 148: Plato, Legg. iv. p. 722 B. [Greek: pro\s tou/tô|

de\ ou)dei\s e)/oike dianoêthê=nai pô/pote tô=n nomothetô=n, ô(s

e)xo\n duoi=n chrê=sthai pro\s ta\s nomothesi/as, peithoi= kai\

bi/a|, kath' o(/son oi(=o/n te e)pi\ to\n a)/peiron paidei/as

o)/chlon tô=| e(te/rô| chrô=ntai mo/non.]]

[Side-note: Great value set by Plato himself upon these

prologues. They are to serve as type for all poets. No one is

allowed to contradict them.]

It seems that Plato took credit to himself for what he thought a

beneficial innovation, in thus blending persuasive exhortation

with compulsory command. His assurance, that no Grecian lawgiver

had ever done so before, is doubtless trustworthy:[149] though we

may remark that the confusion of the two has been the general rule

with Oriental lawgivers--the Hindoos, the Jews, the Mahommedan

Arabs, &c. But with him the innovation serves a farther

purpose. He makes it the means of turning rhetoric to account; and

of enlisting in his service, as lawgiver, not only all the

rhetoric but all the poetry, in his community. His Athenian

speaker is so well satisfied with these prologues, that he

considers them to possess the charm of a poetical work, and

suspects them to have been dictated by inspiration from the

Gods.[150] He pronounces them the best and most suitable

compositions for the teaching of youth, and therefore prescribes

that teachers shall cause the youth to recite and learn them,

instead of the poetical and rhetorical works usually employed. He

farther enjoins that his prologues shall serve as type and canon

whereby all other poetical and rhetorical compositions shall be

tried. If there be any compositions in full harmony and analogy

with this type, the teachers shall be compelled to learn them by

heart, and teach them to pupils. Any teacher refusing to do so

shall be dismissed.[151] Nor shall any poet be allowed to

compose and publish works containing sentiments contradictory

to the declaration of the lawgiver.[152]

[Footnote 149: The testimony of Plato shows that the [Greek:

prooi/mia tê=s nomothesi/as] ascribed to Zaleukus and Charondas

(Diodor. xii. 12-20) are composed by authors later than his time,

and probably in imitation of his [Greek: prooi/mia]: which indeed

is probable enough on other grounds. See Heyne, Opuscula, vol.

ii., Prolus i. vi., De Zaleuci et Charondæ Legibus.

Cicero read the proëms ascribed to Zaleukus and Charondas as

genuine (Legg. ii. 6); so did Diodôrus, xii. 17-20; Stobæus, Serm.

xlii.]

[Footnote 150: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 811 C. [Greek: ou)k a)/neu

tino\s e)pipnoi/as theô=n, e)/doxan d' ou)=n moi panta/pasi

poiê/sei tini\ prosomoi/ôs ei)rê=sthai.]]

[Footnote 151: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 811 D-E.]

[Footnote 152: Plato, Legg. p. 811 E.]

[Side-note: Contrast of Leges with Gorgias and Phædrus.]

As a contrast to this view of Plato in his later years, it is

interesting to turn to that which he entertained in an earlier

part of his life, in the Gorgias and the Phædrus, respecting

rhetoric. In the former dialogue, Gorgias is recognised as a

master of the art of persuasion, especially as addressed to a

numerous audience, and respecting ethical questions, What is just,

and what is unjust? Sokrates, on the contrary, pointedly

distinguishes persuasion from teaching--discredits simple

persuasion, without teaching, as merely deceptive--and contends

that rhetorical discourse addressed to a multitude, upon such

topics, can never convey any teaching.[153] But in the Leges we

find that the art of persuasion has risen greatly in Plato's

estimation. Whether it be a true art, or a mere unartistic knack,

he now recognises its efficacy in modifying the dispositions of

the uninstructed multitude, and announces himself to be the first

lawgiver who will employ it systematically for that purpose. He

combines the seductions of the rhetor with the unpalatable

severities of the lawgiver: the two distinct functions of Gorgias

and his brother the physician Herodikus, when Gorgias accompanied

his brother to visit suffering patients, and succeeded by force of

rhetoric in overcoming their repugnance to the cutting and burning

indispensable for cure.[154] Again, in the Phædrus, Plato treats

the art of persuasion, when applied at once to a mixed assemblage

of persons, either by writing or discourse, as worthless and

unavailing.[155] He affirms that it makes no durable impression on

the internal mind of the individuals: the same discourse will

never suit all. Individuals differ materially in their cast of

mind; moreover, they differ in opinion upon ethical topics (just

and unjust) more than upon any other. Some men are open to

persuasion by topics which will have no effect on others.

Accordingly, you must go through a laborious discrimination:

first, you must discriminate generally the various classes of

minds and the various classes of discourse--next, you must

know to which classes of minds the individuals of the multitude

before you belong. You must then address to each mind the mode of

persuasion specially adapted to it. The dialectic philosopher is

the only one who possesses the true art of persuasion. Such was

Plato's point of view in the Phædrus. I need hardly point out how

completely it is dropped in his Leges: wherein he pours persuasion

into the ears of an indiscriminate multitude, through the common

channel of a rhetorical lecture, considering it of such impressive

efficacy as to justify the supposition of inspiration from the

Gods.[156]

[Footnote 153: Plato, Gorgias, pp. 454-456.]

[Footnote 154: Plato, Gorgias, p. 456 B.]

[Footnote 155: Plato, Phædrus, pp. 263 A, 271-272-273 E--275 E--276

A--277 C.]

[Footnote 156: Zeller, in his 'Platonische Studien' (pp. 66-72-88,

&c.), insists much on the rhetorical declamatory prolixity

visible throughout the Treatise De Legibus, as quite at variance

with the manner of Plato in his earlier and better dialogues, and

even as specimens of what Plato there notes as the rhetorical or

sophistical manner. He expresses his surprise that the Athenian

should be made to ascribe such discourses to the inspiration of

the Gods (p. 107). Zeller enumerates these and many other

dissimilarities in the Treatise De Legibus, as compared with other

Platonic dialogues, as premisses to sustain his conclusion that

the treatise is not by Plato. In my judgment they do not bear out

that conclusion (which indeed Zeller has since renounced in his

subsequent work); but they are not the less real and notable,

marking the change in Plato's own mind.

How poor an opinion had Plato of the efficacy of the [Greek:

nouthetêtiko\n ei)=dos lo/gôn] at the time when he composed the

Sophistês (p. 230 A)! What a superabundance of such discourse does

he deliver in the Treatise De Legibus, taking especial pride in

the peculiarity!]

[Side-note: Regulations for the new colony--About religious

worship, the oracles of Delphi and Dodona are to be consulted.]

After this unusual length of preliminaries, Plato enters on the

positive regulation of his colony. As to the worship of the Gods,

he directs little or nothing of his own authority. The colony must

follow the advice of the oracles of Delphi, Dodona, and

Ammon--together with any consecrated traditions, epiphanies, or

inspirations from the Gods belonging to the spot--as to the Gods

who shall be publicly worshipped, and the suitable temples and

rites. Only he directs that to each portion of the territory set

apart for civil purposes, some God, Dæmon, or Hero, shall be

specially assigned as Patron,[157] with a chapel and precinct

wherein all meetings of the citizens of the district shall be

held, whether for religious ceremonies, or for recreation, or for

political duties.

[Footnote 157: Plato, Legg. v. p. 738 C-D. [Greek: o(/pôs a)\n

xu/llogoi e(ka/stôn tô=n merô=n kata\ chro/nous gigno/menoi tou\s

prostachthe/ntas . . . meta\ thusiô=n.]

That such "ordained seasons" for meetings and sacrifices should be

punctually attended to--was a matter of great moment, on religious

no less than on civil grounds. It was with a view to that object

principally that each Grecian city arranged its calendar and its

system of intercalation. Plato himself states this (vii. p. 809

D).

Sir George Lewis, in his Historical Survey of the Astronomy of the

Ancients, adverts to the passage of Plato here cited, and gives a

very instructive picture of the state of the Hellenic world as to

Calendar and computation of time (see p. 19; also the greater part

of chapter i. of his valuable work). The object of all the cities

was to adjust lunar time with solar time by convenient

intercalations, but hardly any two cities agreed in the method of

doing so. Different schemes of intercalation and periods

(trietêric, octaetêric, enneadekaetêric) were either adopted by

civic authority or suggested by private astronomers, such as

Kleostratus and Meton. The practical dissonance and confusion was

great, and the theoretical dissatisfaction also.

Now in this dialogue De Legibus, Plato recognises both the

importance of the object and the problem to be solved, yet he

suggests no means of his own for solving it. He makes no

arrangement for the calendar of his new Magnêtic city. I confess

that this is to me a matter of some surprise. To combine an

exertion of authority with an effort of arithmetical calculation,

is in his vein; and the exactness of observances as respects the

Gods, in harmony with the religious tone of the treatise, depended

on some tolerable solution of the problem.

We may perhaps presume that Plato refused to deal with the problem

because he considered it as mathematically insoluble. Days,

months, and years are not exactly commensurable with each other.

In the Timæus (p. 36 C) Plato declares that the rotation of the

Circle of the Same, or the outermost sidereal sphere, upon which

the succession of day and night depends, is according to the side

of a parallelogram ([Greek: kata\ pleura/n])--while the rotations

of the Moon and Sun (two of the seven branches composing the

Circle of the Different) are according to the diagonal thereof

([Greek: kata\ dia/metron]): now the side and the diagonal

represented the type of incommensurable magnitudes among the

ancient reasoners. It would appear also that he considers the

rotations of the Moon and Sun to be incommensurable with each

other, both of them being members included in the Circle of the

Different.

Since an exact mathematical solution was thus unattainable, Plato

may probably have despised a merely approximative solution,

sufficient for practical convenience--to which last object he

generally pays little attention. He might also fancy that even the

attempt to meddle with the problem betokened that confusion of the

incommensurable with the commensurable, which he denounces in this

very treatise (vii. pp. 819-820).]

[Side-note: Perpetuity of number of citizens, and of lots of

land, one to each, inalienable and indivisible.]

Plato requires for his community a fixed and peremptory total of

5040 citizens, never to be increased, and never to be diminished:

a total sufficient, in his judgment, to defend the territory

against invaders, and to lend aid on occasion to an oppressed

neighbour. He distributes the whole territory into 5040 lots of

land, each of equal value, assigning one lot to each citizen. Each

lot is assumed to be sufficient for the maintenance of a family of

sober habits, and no more. The total number (5040) is selected

because of the great variety of divisors by which it may be

divided without remainder.[158]

[Footnote 158: Plato, Legg. v. pp. 737-738, vi. p. 771 C.

Aristotle declares this total of 5040 to be extravagantly great,

inasmuch as it would require an amount of territory beyond the

scale which can be reckoned upon for a Grecian city, to maintain

so many unproductive persons, including not merely the 5040 adult

citizens, but also their wives, children, and personal attendants,

none of whom would take part in any productive industry (Politic.

ii. 6, p. 1265, b. 16).

The remark here cited indicates the small numerical scale upon

which the calculations of a Greek politician were framed. But we

can hardly be surprised at it, seeing that the new city is

intended for the Island of Krete, where none even of the existing

cities were considerable. Moreover Aristotle had probably present

to his mind the analogy of Sparta. The Spartan citizens were in a

situation more analogous to the 5040 than any other Grecian

residents. But the Spartan citizens could not have been near so

numerous as 5040 at that time; not even one-fifth of it--Aristotle

tells us, Politic. ii. 9, 1270, a. 31. Aristotle goes on to remark

on the definition given by Plato of the size and value of each lot

of land sufficient for the citizen and his family to live [Greek:

sôphro/nôs]: it ought to be (says Aristotle) [Greek: sôphro/nôs

kai\ e)leutheri/ôs]. These are the two modes of excellence, and

the only two, which a man can display in the use of his property

(1265, a. 35). But this change would only aggravate the difficulty

as to the total area of land required for the 5040. Compare the

remark of Aristotle on the scheme of Hippodamus, Politic. ii. 8,

1268, a. 42.]

[Side-note: Plato reasserts his adherence to the

principle of the Republic, though the repugnance of others hinders

him from realising it.]

We thus see that Plato, in laying down his fundamental principle

([Greek: u(po/thesin]), recognises separate individual property

and separate family among his citizens: both of which had been

strenuously condemned and strictly excluded, in respect to the

Guardians of his Republic. But he admits the principle only with

the proviso that there shall be a peremptory limit to number of

citizens, to individual wealth, and to individual poverty:

moreover, even with this proviso, he admits it only as a

second-best, because mankind will not accept, and are not

sufficiently exalted to work out, what is in itself the best. He

reasserts the principle of the Republic, that separate property

and separate family are both essentially mischievous: that all

individuality, either of interest or sympathy or sentiment, ought

to be extinguished as far as possible.[159] Though constrained

against his will to renounce this object, he will still approximate

to it as near as he can in his second-best. Moreover, he may

possibly, at some future time (D.V.), propose a third-best. When

once departure from the genuine standard is allowed, the departure

may be made in many different ways.

[Footnote 159: Plato, Legg. v. pp. 739-740; vii. p. 807 B.]

This declaration deserves notice as attesting the undiminished

adhesion of Plato to the main doctrines of his Republic. The point

here noted is one main difference of principle between the

Treatise De Legibus and the Republic: the enactment of written

fundamental laws with prologues serving as homilies to be preached

to the citizens, is another. Both of them are differences of

principle: each gives rise to many subordinate differences or

corollaries.[160]

[Footnote 160: Plato, Legg. v. p. 739 E. [Greek: ê(\n de\ nu=n

ê(mei=s e)pikecheirê/kamen, ei)/ê te a)\n genome/nê pôs

a)thanasi/as e)ggu/tata kai\ ê( mi/a deute/rôs; tri/tên de\ meta\

tau=ta, e)a\n theo\s e)the/lê|, diaperanou/metha.] Upon this

passage K. F. Hermann observes: "Hæc enim est quam ordine tertiam

appellat Plato, quæ Aristoteli [Politic. iv. 1, 2] [Greek: e)x

u(pothe/seôs politei/a] dicitur: quod tamen nolim ita accipi, ut à

nonnullis factum est, ut hanc quoque olim singulari scripto

persecuturum fuisse philosophum credamus, quasi tribus exemplis

absolvi rerum publicarum formas censuisset; innumeræ enim pro

singularum nationum et urbium fortuna esse possunt," &c. (De

Vestigiis Instit. Vet. imprimis Attic. per Plat. de Legg. libros

indag., p. 16).

That Plato _did_ intend to compose a _third_ work upon

an analogous subject appears to me clear from the words,--but it

does not at all follow that he thought that three varieties would

exhaust all possibility. Upon this point I dissent from Hermann,

and also upon his interpretation of Aristotle's phrase [Greek: ê(

e)x u(pothe/seôs politei/a]. Aristotle distinguishes three

distinct varieties of end which the political constructor may

propose to himself:--1. [Greek: tê\n politei/an tê\n a(plô=s

a)ri/stên, tê\n ma/lista kat' eu)chê/n]. 2. [Greek: Tê\n e)k tô=n

u(pokeime/nôn a)ri/stên]. 3. [Greek: Tê\n e)x u(pothe/seôs

a)ri/stên]. Now K. F. Hermann here maintains, and Boeckh had

already maintained before him (ad Platonis Minoem et de Legibus,

pp. 66-67), that the city sketched in Plato's treatise De Legibus

coincides with No. 2 in Aristotle's enumeration, and that the

projected [Greek: tri/tê] in Plato coincides with No. 3--[Greek:

tê\n e)x u(pothe/seôs]. I differ from them here. There is no

ground for presuming that what Plato puts _third_ must also

be put by Aristotle _third_. I think that the Platonic city

De Legibus corresponds to No. 3 in Aristotle and not to No. 2. It

is a city [Greek: e)x u(pothe/seôs], not [Greek: e)k tô=n

u(pokeime/nôn a)ri/stên]. Plato borrows little or nothing from

[Greek: ta\ u(pokei/mena], and almost everything from his own

[Greek: u(po/thesis] or assumed principle, which in this case is

the fixed number of the citizens as well as of the lots of land,

the imposition of a limit on each man's proprietary acquisitions,

and the recognition of separate family establishments subject to

these limits. This is the [Greek: u(po/thesis] of Plato's second

city, to which all his regulations of detail are accommodated: it

is substituted by him (unwillingly, because of the repugnance of

others) in place of the [Greek: u(po/thesis] of his first city or

the Republic, which [Greek: u(po/thesis] is perfect communism

among the [Greek: phu/lakes], without either separate property or

separate family. This last is Plato's [Greek: a(plôs a)ri/stê].]

[Side-note: Regulations about land, successions,

marriages, &c. The number of citizens must not be allowed to

increase.]

Each citizen proprietor shall hold his lot of land, not as his

own, but as part and parcel of the entire territory, which, taken

as a whole, is Goddess and Mistress--conjointly with all the local

Gods and Heroes--of the body of citizens generally. No citizen

shall either sell or otherwise alienate his lot, nor divide it,

nor trench upon its integrity. The total number of lots, the

integrity of each lot, and the total number of citizens, shall all

remain consecrated in perpetuity, without increase or diminution.

Each citizen in dying shall leave one son as successor to his lot:

if he has more than one, he may choose which of them he will

prefer. The successor so chosen shall maintain the perpetuity of

worship of the Gods, reverential rites to the family and deceased

ancestors, and obligations towards the city.[161] If the citizen

has other sons, they will be adopted into the families of other

citizens who happen to be childless: if he has daughters, he will

give them out in marriage, but without any dowry. Such family

relations will be watched over by a special board of magistrates:

with this peremptory condition, that they shall on no account

permit either the number of citizen proprietors, or the number of

separate lots, to depart from the consecrated 5040.[162] Each

citizen's name, and each lot of land, will be registered on

tablets of cypress wood. These registers will be preserved in the

temples, in order that the magistrates may be able to prevent

fraud.[163]

[Footnote 161: Plato, Legg. v. p. 740 A-B.]

[Footnote 162: Plato, Legg. v. pp. 740 D-742 C. Aristotle remarks

that in order to attain the object which Plato here proclaims,

restriction ought to be imposed on [Greek: teknopoii+/a]. No

citizen ought to be allowed to beget more than a certain number of

children. He observes that this last-mentioned restriction, if

imposed alone and without any others, would do more than all the

rest to maintain the permanent 5040 lots, and that without this no

other restrictions could be efficacious (Politic. ii. 6, 1265, a.

37, 1266, b. 9).

Plato concurs in this opinion, though he trusts to prudence and

the admonition of elders for bringing about this indispensable

limitation of births in a family, without legal prohibition. I

have already touched upon this matter in my review of Plato's

Republic. See above--chap. xxxvii. p. 198 seq.

The [Greek: no/moi thetikoi\] of Philolaus at Thebes, regulating

[Greek: tê\n paidopoii+/an] with a view to keep the lots of land

unchanged, are only known by the brief allusion of Aristotle,

Polit. ii. 12, 1274, b. 4.]

[Footnote 163: Plato, Legg. v. p. 741 C. [Greek: kuparitti/nas

mnê/mas], &c.]

[Side-note: Position of the city and akropolis--Distribution

of the territory and citizens into twelve equal sections or

tribes.]

The city, with its appropriate accessories, shall be placed as

nearly as possible in the middle of the territory. The akropolis,

sacred to Hestia and Athênê, will be taken as a centre from whence

twelve radiating lines will be drawn to the extremity of the

territory, so as to distribute the whole area into twelve

sections, not all equal in magnitude, but equalised in value by

diminishing the area in proportion to superior goodness of land.

The total number of citizens will be distributed also in twelve

sections, of 420 each (5040/12), among whom the lots of land

contained in each twelfth will be apportioned. This duodecimal

division, the fundamental canon of Plato's municipal arrangements,

is a sanctified present from the Gods, in harmony with the months

and with the kosmical revolutions.[164] Each twelfth, land and

citizens together, will be constituted a Tribe, and will be

consecrated to some God (determined by lot) whose name it will

bear, and at whose altar two monthly festivals will be celebrated:

one for the tribe, the other for the entire city. The tribes are

peremptorily equal in respect to number of citizens; but care

shall also be taken to make them as nearly equal as possible in

respect to registered property: that is, in respect to property

other than land, which each citizen brings with him to the

settlement, and which will all be recorded (as well as the land)

in the public registers.[165] The lot of land assigned to each

citizen will include a portion near the centre, and a portion near

the circumference: the most central portion being coupled with the

most outlying, and so on in order. Each citizen will thus have two

separate residences:[166] one nearer to the city, the other more

distant from it.

[Footnote 164: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 771 B. Plato here reckons the

different numerical divisions adopted in different cities as being

all both natural and consecrated, but he considers his own as the

most fortunate and right. He insists much upon the importance of

symmetrical distribution, with definite numerical ratio, in all

the departments of life: in the various civil subdivisions of the

Tribe, such as Phratries, Dêmes, Villages--in the arrangements of

the citizens for military service, [Greek: ta/xeis kai\

a)gôga/s]--in the coins, weights and measures--in the modulations

of the voice, and in the direction of movements either rectilinear

or rotatory. (Whoever looks at Aristophanes, Aves, 1010 seq., will

see all such regularity and symmetry derided in the person of

Meton.) Nay, he enjoins that all the vessels made for common use

shall be exact fractions or exact multiples of each other. This

will make it necessary for all the citizens to learn elementary

arithmetic, which Plato considers to be of essential value, not

only for practical use but as a stimulus to the dormant

intelligence. On this point he notes the Egyptians and Phenicians

as standing higher than the Greeks (vii. p. 818), but as applying

their superior arithmetical knowledge only to a mean and

disgraceful thirst for wealth. Against this last defect Plato

reckons upon guarding his citizens by other precautions, while he

encourages in them the learning of arithmetic (Legg. v. p. 747).

Plato here speaks of the Egyptians and Phenicians, much as the

Jews have been spoken of in later times. And it is curious that he

seems to consider their peculiarities of character as referable to

their local domicile. He maintains that one place is intrinsically

different from another in respect to producing good and bad

characters; some places are even privileged by [Greek: thei/a

e)pi/pnoia kai\ daimo/nôn lê/xeis] &c.]

[Footnote 165: Plato, Legg. v. p. 745.]

[Footnote 166: Plato, Legg. v. p. 745, vi. p. 771 D.]

[Side-note: Movable property--Inequality therein reluctantly

allowed, as far as four to one, but no farther.]

Plato would be glad if he were able to establish among all the

citizens, equality not merely of landed property, but property of

all other property besides. This, however, he recognises his

inability to exact. The colonists will bring with them movable

property--some more, some less: and inequality must be tolerated

up to a certain limit. Each citizen is allowed to possess movable

property as far as four times the value of his lot of land, but no

more. The maximum of wealth possessed by any citizen will thus be

equal to five times the value of his lot of land: the minimum of

the poorest citizen will be the lot of land itself, which cannot,

under the worst circumstances, be alienated or diminished. If any

citizen shall in any way acquire property above the maximum here

named, he is directed to make it over to the city and to the

Gods. In case of disobedience, he may be indicted before the

Nomophylakes; and if found guilty, shall be disgraced, excluded

from his share of public distributions, and condemned to pay twice

as much--half being assigned as recompense to the prosecutor.[167]

The public register kept by the magistrates, in which is

enrolled all the property of every kind belonging to each citizen,

will enable them to enforce this regulation, and will be farther

useful in all individual suits respecting money.

[Footnote 167: Plato, Legg. v. pp. 744-745, vi. p. 754 E.]

[Side-note: Census of the citizens--four classes, with

graduated scale of property. No citizen to possess gold or silver.

No loans or interest. No debts enforced by law.]

In the public census of the city, the citizens will be distributed

into four classes, according to their different scales of

property. The richest will be four minæ: the other three minæ,

two, and one mina, respectively. Direct taxation will be assessed

upon them according to the difference of wealth: to which also a

certain reference will be had in the apportionment of

magistracies, and in the regulation of the voting privilege.[168]

[Footnote 168: Plato, Legg. v. p. 744 B, vi. p. 754 E.]

By this determination of a maximum and minimum, coupled with a

certain admitted preference to wealth in the assignment of

political power, Plato considers that he has guarded against the

intestine dissensions and other evils likely to arise from

inequality of property. He accounts great poverty to be a serious

cause of evil; yet he is very far from looking upon wealth as a

cause of good. On the contrary, he proclaims that great wealth is

absolutely incompatible either with great virtue or great

happiness.[169] Accordingly, while he aims at preserving every

individual citizen from poverty, he at the same time disclaims all

purpose of making his community either richer or more

powerful.[170] He forbids every private citizen to possess gold

and silver. The magistrates must hold a certain stock of it in

reserve, in case of public dealing with foreign cities: but they

will provide for the daily wants of the community by a special

cheap currency, having no value beyond the limits of the

territory.[171] Moreover, Plato prohibits all loans on interest.

He refuses to enforce by law the restoration even of a

deposit. He interdicts all dowry or marriage portion with

daughters.[172]

[Footnote 169: Plato, Legg. v. pp. 742 E, 743 A, 744 E.]

[Footnote 170: Plato, Legg. v. p. 742 D.]

[Footnote 171: Plato, Legg. v. p. 742 A.]

[Footnote 172: Plato, Legg. v. p. 742 C.]

[Side-note: Board of thirty-seven Nomophylakes--general

supervisors of the laws and their execution--how elected.]

How is the Platonic colony to be first set on its march, and by

whom are its first magistrates to be named? By the inhabitants of

Knôssus, its mother city--replies Plato. The Knossians will

appoint a provisional Board of two hundred: half from their own

citizens, half from the elders and most respected men among the

colonists themselves.[173] This Board will choose the first

Nomophylakes, consisting of thirty-seven persons, half Knossians,

half colonists. These Nomophylakes are intended as a Council of

State, and will be elected by the citizens in the following way,

when the colony is once in full march:--All the citizens who

perform or have performed military service, either as hoplites or

cavalry, will be electors. They will vote by tablets laid upon the

altar, and inscribed with the name both of the voter himself and

of the person whom he prefers. First, three hundred persons will

be chosen by the majority of votes according to this process.

Next, out of these three hundred, one hundred will be chosen by a

second process of the same kind. Lastly, out of these one hundred,

thirty-seven will be chosen by a third similar process, but with

increased solemnity: these thirty-seven will constitute the Board

of Nomophylakes, or Guardians of the Laws.[174] No person shall be

eligible for Guardian until he has attained the age of fifty. When

elected, he shall continue to serve until he is seventy, and no

longer: so that if elected at sixty, he will have ten years of

service.[175] The duties of this Board will be to see that all the

laws are faithfully executed: in which function they will have

superintendence over all special magistrates and officers.

[Footnote 173: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 752 D, 754 C.]

[Footnote 174: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 753 C-D.]

[Footnote 175: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 755 A.]

[Side-note: Military commanders--General council of

360--complicated mode of election.]

For the office of General and Minister of War, three persons shall

be chosen by show of hands of the military citizens. It shall be

the duty of the Nomophylakes to propose three names for this

office: but other citizens may also propose different names, and

the show of hands will decide. The three Generals, when chosen,

shall propose twelve names as Taxiarchs, one for each tribe:

other names may also be proposed, and the show of hands of each

tribe will determine.[176]

[Footnote 176: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 755 E.]

A Council shall be annually chosen, consisting of 360 members,

ninety from each of the four proprietary scales in the Census. The

mode of electing this Council is highly complicated. First, Plato

provides that 360 Councillors shall be chosen out of the first (or

richest) class, and as many out of the second class, by universal

suffrage, every citizen being compelled to give his vote: then

that 360 Councillors shall be chosen out of the third class, by

universal suffrage, but under this condition, that the three

richest classes are compelled to vote, while the fourth class may

abstain from voting, if they please: next, that 360 Councillors

shall be chosen out of the fourth class, still by universal

suffrage, but with liberty to the third and fourth classes to

abstain from voting, while the first and second classes are

compelled to vote. Out of the four batches, of 360 names from each

class, 180 names from each class are to be chosen by universal

suffrage compulsory on all. This last list of 180 names is to be

reduced, by drawing lots, to 90 from each class, or 360 in all:

who constitute the Council for the year.[177]

[Footnote 177: Plato, Legg vi. p. 756. Compare Aristot. Politic.

ii. 6, p. 1266, a. 14.

The passage of Plato is not perspicuous. It appears to me to have

been misunderstood by some commentators, who suppose that only 90

[Greek: bouleutai\] are to be chosen out of each census in the

original voting (see Schneider's Comment. on the passage of

Aristotle above alluded to, p. 99). The number originally chosen

from each class must be 360, because it is directed, in the final

process, to be reduced first (by election) to 180 from each class,

and next (by sortition) to 90 from each class.]

[Side-note: Character of the electoral scheme--Plato's views

about wealth--he caters partly for the oligarchical sentiment,

partly for the democratical.]

Here the evident purpose of Plato is to obtain in the last result

a greater number of votes from the rich than from the poor,

without absolutely disfranchising the poor. Where the persons to

be voted for are all of the richer classes, there the poor are

compelled to come and vote as well as the rich: where the persons

to be voted for are all of the poorer class, there the rich are

compelled to vote, while the poor are allowed to stay away. He

seems to look on the vote, not as a privilege which citizens will

wish to exercise, but as a duty which they must be compelled by

fine to discharge. This is (as Aristotle calls it) an oligarchical

provision. It exhibits Plato's mode of attaining the end

stated by Livy as proposed in the Servian constitution at Rome,

and the end contemplated (without being announced) by the framers

of most other political constitutions recorded in

history--"_Gradus facti, ut neque exclusus quisquam suffragio

videretur, et vis omnis penes primores civitatis esset_".[178]

Plato defends it by distinguishing two sorts of equality: one complete

and undistinguishing, in which all the citizens are put upon a

level: the other in which the good and able citizen is

distinguished from the bad and incapable citizen, so that he

acquires power and honour in proportion to his superior

merit.[179] This second sort of equality Plato approves,

pronouncing it to be political justice. But such defence tacitly

assumes that superiority in wealth, as between the four classes of

his census, is to count as evidence of, or as an equivalent for,

superior merit: an assumption doubtless received by many Grecian

politicians, and admitted in the general opinion of Greece--but

altogether at variance with the declared judgment of Plato himself

as to the effect of wealth upon the character of the wealthy man.

The poorest citizen in the Platonic community must have his lot of

land, which Plato considers sufficient for a sober-minded family:

the richest citizen can possess** only five times as much: and all

receive the same public instruction. Here, therefore, there can be

no presumption of superior merit in the richer citizen as compared

with the poorer, whatever might be said about the case as it stood

in actual Grecian communities. We see that Plato in this case

forgets his own peculiar mode of thought, and accommodates himself

to received distinctions, without reflecting that the principles

of _his_ own political system rendered such distinctions

inapplicable. He bows to the oligarchical sentiment of his

contemporaries, by his preferential encouragement to the votes of

the rich: he bows to the democratical sentiment, when he consents

to employ to a small extent the principle of the lot.[180]

[Footnote 178: Livy i. 43.

Aristotle characterises these regulations of the Platonic

community as oligarchical, and remarks that this is in

contradiction to the principle with which Plato set out--that it

ought to be a compound of monarchy and democracy. Aristotle

understands this last principle somewhat differently from what

Plato seems to have intended (Politic. ii. 6, 1266, a. 10).]

[Footnote 179: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 757 A-B.

Compare a like distinction drawn between two sorts of [Greek:

i)so/tês] in Isokrates, Areiopagitic. Orat. vii. s. 23-24; also

Aristotel. Politic.]

[Footnote 180: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 757 E. [Greek: dio\ tô=| tou=

klê/rou i)/sô| a)na/gkê proschrê/sasthai, duskoli/as tô=n pollô=n

e(/neka], &c.]

[Side-note: Meetings of council--other

magistrates--Agoranomi--Astynomi, &c.]

Of the annually-chosen Council, one twelfth part only (or thirty

Councillors) will be in constant session in the city: each of

their sessions lasting for one month, and the total thus covering

the year. The remaining eleven twelfths will be attending to their

private affairs, except when special necessities arise. The

Council will have the general superintendence of the city, and

controul over all meetings of the citizens.[181] Provision is made

for three magistrates called Astynomi, to regulate the streets,

roads, public buildings, water-courses, &c.: and for five

Agoranomi, to watch over the public market with its appertaining

temples and fountains, and to take cognisance of disputes or

offences occurring therein. None but citizens of the two richest

classes of the census are eligible as Astynomi or Agoranomi:

first, twice the number required are chosen by public show of

hands--next, half of the number so chosen are drawn off by lot. In

regard to the show of hands, Plato again decrees, that all

citizens of the two richer classes shall be compelled to take part

in it, under fine: all citizens of the two poorer classes may take

part if they choose, but are not compelled.[182] By this

provision, as before, Plato baits for the oligarchical sentiment:

by the partial use of the lot, for the democratical.

[Footnote 181: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 758 C-D.]

[Footnote 182: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 763-764.]

[Side-note: Defence of the territory--rural

police--Agronomi, &c.]

The defence of the territory is entrusted to the Agronomi, five

persons selected from each of the twelve tribes, making sixty in

all; and assisted by sixty other junior subordinates, selected by

the five Agronomi (those of each tribe choosing twelve) from their

respective tribes. Each of these companies of seventeen will be

charged with the care of one of the twelve territorial districts,

as may be determined by lot. Each will then pass by monthly change

from one district to another, so as to make the entire circuit of

the twelve districts in one year, going round in an easterly

direction or to the right: each will then make the same circuit

backward, during a second year, in a westerly direction or to the

left.[183] Their term of service will be two years in all,

during which all of them will have become familiarly acquainted

with every portion of the territory. A public mess will be

provided for these companies, and each man among them will be held

to strict continuity of service. Their duties will be, not merely

to keep each district in a condition of defence against a foreign

enemy, but also to improve its internal condition: to facilitate

the outflow of water where there is too much, and to retard it

where there is too little: to maintain, in the precincts sacred to

the Gods, reservoirs of spring-water, partly as ornament, partly

also as warm baths (for the heating of which large stocks of dry

wood must be collected)--to benefit the old, the sick, and the

overworked husbandman.[184] Farthermore, these Agronomi will

adjudicate upon disputes and offences among the rural population,

both slave and free. If they abuse their trust, they will be

accountable, first to the assembled citizens of the district, next

to the public tribunals in the city.

[Footnote 183: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 760 D. [Greek: tou\s tê=s

chô/ras to/pous metalla/ttontas a)ei\ tô=n e(xê=s to/pôn e(ka/stou

mêno\s ê(gei=sthai tou\s phroura/rchous e)pi\ dexia\ ku/klô|; to\

d' e)pide/xia gigne/sthô to\ pro\s e(/ô.]

In reference to omens and auguries the Greek spectator looked

towards the north, so that he had the east on his right hand.]

[Footnote 184: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 761 A-D.

Agreeable and refreshing combinations of springs with shady trees

near the precincts of the Gods were frequent. See Xenophon,

Hellen. v. 3, 19.

The thermal waters were also generally connected with some

precinct of Hêraklês or Asklêpius.

In some temples it was forbidden to use this adjoining water

except for sacred rites, Thucyd. iv. 97.]

[Side-note: Comparison with the Lacedæmonian Kryptia.]

Plato considers that these Agronomi will go through hard work

during their two years of service, inasmuch as they will have no

slaves, and will have to do everything for themselves: though in

the performance of any public work they are empowered to put in

requisition both men and cattle from the neighbourhood.[185] He

pronounces it to be a salutary discipline for the young men, whom

he admonishes that an apprenticeship in obedience is indispensable

to qualify them for command, and that exact obedience to the laws

and magistrates will be their best title to posts of authority

when older.[186] Moreover, he insists on the necessity that all

citizens should become minutely acquainted with the whole

territory: towards which purpose he encourages young men in the

exercise of hunting. He compares (indirectly) his movable guard of

Agronomi to the Lacedæmonian Krypti, who maintained the police of

Laconia, and kept watch over the Helots:[187] though they are

also the parallel of the youthful Peripoli at Athens, who were

employed as Guards for two years round various parts of Attica.

[Footnote 185: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 760 E-763 A.]

[Footnote 186: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 762 E.]

[Footnote 187: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 763 A-B. [Greek: ei)/te tis

kruptou\s ei)/te a)grono/mous ei)/th' o(/, ti kalô=n chai/rei],

&c. He notes the hardships endured by these [Greek: Kruptoi\]

in their [Greek: Kruptei/a], i. p. 633 C.

The phrase seems however to indicate that Plato did not much like

to call his Agronomi by the name of [Greek: Kruptoi/]. The duties

performed by the Lacedæmonian [Greek: Kruptoi\] against the Helots

were of the harshest character. See chap. vi. p. 509 of my

'History of Greece'. Schömann, Antiq. Juris Publ. Græc. iv. 1-4,

p. 111, v. 1, 21, p. 199.]

[Side-note: Priests--Exêgêtæ--Property belonging to

temples.]

Besides Astynomi and Agoranomi, Plato provides priests for the

care of the sacred buildings in the city, and for the service of

the Gods. In choosing these priests, as in choosing the other

magistrates, election and sortition are to be combined: to satisfy

at once the oligarchical and the democratical sentiment. The lot

will be peculiarly suitable in a case where priests are to be

chosen--because the God may be expected to guide it in a manner

agreeable to himself.[188] Plato himself however is not confident

on this point, for he enjoins additional precautions: the person

chosen must be sixty years old at least, free from all bodily

defect, of legitimate birth, and of a family untainted by previous

crime. Plato prescribes farther, that laws or canons respecting

matters of divine concern shall be obtained from the Delphian

oracle: and that certain Exêgêtæ shall be named as authorised

interpreters of these canons, as long as they live.[189]

Treasurers or stewards shall also be chosen, out of the two richer

classes of the census, to administer the landed property and

produce belonging to the various temples.[190]

[Footnote 188: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 749 D.]

[Footnote 189: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 759 E.]

[Footnote 190: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 760 A.]

In the execution of the duties imposed upon them, the Agoranomi

and Astynomi are empowered to fine an offender to the extent of

one mina (one hundred drachmæ), each of them separately--and when

both sit together, to the extent of two minæ.[191]

[Footnote 191: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 764 B.

Here, as in other provisions, Plato copies the practice at Athens,

where each individual magistrate was empowered to impose a fine of

definite amount ([Greek: e)pibolê\n e)piba/llein]), though we do

not know what that amount was. The Proedri could impose a fine as

high as one mina, the Senate as high as five minæ (Meier und

Schömann, Der Attische Prozess, p. 34).]

[Side-note: Superintendence of Music and Gymnastic.

Educational function.]

_Music and Gymnastic._--For each of these, two magisterial

functions must be constituted: one to superintend the

teaching and training--the other, to preside over the matches and

distribution of prizes. In regard to the musical matches, one

President must be appointed for the monôdic single-headed

exhibitions, another for the choric exhibitions. The President of

the former must be not less than thirty years of age. The

President of the latter must be not less than forty years of age.

In order to appoint a fit person, the Nomophylakes shall constrain

all the citizens whom they believe to be conversant with monôdic

or choric matters, to assemble and agree on a preliminary list of

ten candidates, who shall undergo a Dokimasy or examination, upon

the single point of skill and competency, and no other. If they

all pass, recourse shall be had to lot, and the one who draws the

first lot shall be President for the year. In regard to the

gymnastic matches, of men as well as of horses, the citizens of

the three richest classes shall be constrained to come together

(those of the fourth class may come, or stay away, as they

please), and to fix upon twenty suitable persons; who shall

undergo the Dokimasy, and out of whom three shall be selected by

lot as Presidents of gymnastic contests for the year.[192]

[Footnote 192: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 764-765.]

[Side-note: Grave duties of the Minister of

Education--precautions in electing him.]

We observe that in the nomination of Presidents for the musical

and gymnastic contests, Plato adopts the same double-faced

machinery as before--To please the oligarchical sentiment by

treating the votes of the rich as indispensable, the votes of the

poor as indifferent--To please the democratical sentiment by a

partial application of the lot. But in regard to the President of

musical and gymnastic education or training, he prescribes a very

different manner of choice. He declares this to be the most

important function in the city. Upon the way in which the Minister

of Education discharges his functions, the ultimate character of

the citizens will mainly turn. Accordingly, this magistrate must

be a man of fifty years of age, father of legitimate

children--and, if possible, of daughters as well as sons. He must

also be one of the thirty-seven Nomophylakes. He will be selected,

not by the votes of the citizens generally, but by the votes of all

the magistrates (except the annual Councillors and the Prytanes):

such votes being deposited secretly in the temple of Apollo. The

person who obtains the most of these secret votes will be

submitted to a farther Dokimasy by all the voting magistrates

(except the Nomophylakes themselves), and will, if approved, be

constituted President of musical and gymnastic education for five

years.[193]

[Footnote 193: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 765-766.]

[Side-note: Judicial duties.]

From the magisterial authority in his city, Plato now passes to

the judicial or dikastic. He remarks that no peremptory line of

separation can be drawn between the two. Every magistrate

exercises judicial functions on some matters: every dikast, on the

days when he sits, decides magisterially.[194] He then proceeds to

distinguish (as the Attic forum did) between two sorts of

causes:--Private, disputes between man and man, where the persons

complaining of being wronged are one or a few individuals--Public,

where the party wronged or alleged to be wronged is the

state.[195]

[Footnote 194: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 767 A.]

[Footnote 195: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 767 B.

This was the main distinction adopted in the Attic law. 1.

Complaint, founded upon injury alleged to be done to the interest

of some individual--[Greek: a)gô\n i)/dios, di/kê i)di/a, di/kê]

in the narrow sense. 2. Complaint, founded upon injury alleged to

be done towards some interest not strictly individual--[Greek:

a)gô\n dêmo/sios, di/kê dêmosi/a, graphê/] (Meier und Schömann,

der Attische Prozess, p. 162).]

[Side-note: Private Causes--how tried.]

In regard to the private causes, he institutes Tribe-Dikasteries,

taken by lot out of the citizens of each tribe, and applied

without notice to each particular cause as it comes on, so that no

one can know beforehand in what cause he is to adjudicate, nor can

any one be solicited or bribed.[196] He institutes farthermore a

superior court of appeal, formed every year by the various Boards

of Magistrates, each choosing out of its own body the most

esteemed member, subject to approval by an ensuing Dokimasy.[197]

When one citizen believes himself to be wronged by another, he

must first submit the complaint to arbitration by neighbours and

common friends. If this arbitration fails to prove satisfactory,

he must next bring the complaint before the Tribe-Dikastery.

Should their decision prove unsatisfactory, the case may be

brought (seemingly by either of the parties) before the

superior court of appeal, whose decision will be final. Plato

directs that this superior Court shall hold its sittings publicly,

in presence of all the Magistrates and all the Councillors, as

well as of any other citizen who may choose to attend. The members

of the Court are to give their votes openly.[198] Should they be

suspected of injustice or corruption, they may be impeached before

the Nomophylakes; who, if convinced of their guilt, shall compel

them to make good the wrong done, and shall impose penalties

besides, if the case requires.[199]

[Footnote 196: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 768 B.]

[Footnote 197: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 767-C-D. [Greek: gigne/sthô

koino\n a(/pasi toi=s to\ tri/ton a)mphisbêtou=sin i)diô/tais

pro\s a)llê/lous.]]

[Footnote 198: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 767 A-D, 768 B. Compare xii.

p. 956.]

[Footnote 199: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 767 E.]

[Side-note: Public Causes must be tried directly by the

citizens--strong feeling among Greeks about this.]

In regard to Public Causes, Plato makes unusual concession to a

feeling much prevalent in Greece, and especially potent at Athens.

Where the wrong done is to the public, he recognises that the

citizens generally will not submit to be excluded from the

personal cognizance of it: the citizen excluded from that

privilege feels as if he had no share in the city.[200] If one

citizen accuses another of treason, or peculation, or other wrong

towards the public, the accusation shall be originated at first,

and decided at last, before the general body of citizens. But

after having been originated before this general assembly, the

charge must be submitted to an intermediate stage of examination,

before three of the principal Boards of Magistrates; who shall

sift the allegations of the accuser, as well as the defence of the

accused. These commissioners (we must presume) will make a report

on the case, which report will be brought before the general

assembly; who will then adjudicate upon it finally, and condemn or

acquit as they think right.[201]

[Footnote 200: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 768 B. [Greek: o( ga\r

a)koinô/nêtos ô)\n e)xousi/as tou= sundika/zein, ê(gei=tai to\

para/pan tê=s po/leôs ou) me/tochos ei)=nai.] This is a remarkable

indication about the tone of Grecian feeling from a very adverse

witness.]

[Footnote 201: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 768 A. [Greek: tê\n de\

ba/sanon e)n tai=s megi/stais a)rchai=s trisi/n], &c.

Here the word [Greek: ba/sanos] is used in a much more extended

sense than usual, so as to include the whole process of judicial

enquiry.]

[Side-note: Plato's way of meeting this

feeling--intermediate inquiry and report by a special Commissioner.]

This proposition deserves notice. Plato proclaims his

disapprobation of the numerous Dikasteries in Athens, wherein the

Dikasts sat, heard, and voted--perhaps with applause or murmurs,

but with no searching questions of their own--leaving the

whole speech to the parties and their witnesses. To decide justly

(he says), the judicial authority must not remain silent, but must

speak more than the parties, and must undertake the substantial

conduct of the inquiry. No numerous assembly--nor even any few,

unless they be intelligent--are competent to such a duty: nor even

an intelligent few, without much time and patience.[202] To secure

such an inquiry on these public causes--as far as is possible

consistent with the necessity of leaving the final decision to the

general assembly--is the object of Plato's last-mentioned

proposition. It is one of the most judicious propositions in his

whole scheme.

[Footnote 202: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 766 E.]

* * * * *

[Side-note: What laws the magistrates are to enforce--Many

details must be left to the Nomophylakes.]

Plato has now constituted the magistrates and the judicial

machinery. It is time to specify the laws which they are to obey

and to enforce.[203]

[Footnote 203: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 768 E.]

Plato considers the Nomophylakes (together with another board

called the Nocturnal Council, to be hereafter described) as the

permanent representatives of himself: destined to ensure that the

grand ethical purpose of the lawgiver shall be constantly kept in

view, and to supply what may have been left wanting in the

original programme.[204] Especially at the first beginning,

provision will be found wanting in many details, which the

Nomophylakes will take care to supply. In respect to the choric

festivals, which are of so much importance for the training and

intercourse of young men and maidens, the lawgiver must trust to

the Choric Superintendents and the Nomophylakes for regulating, by

their experience, much which he cannot foresee. But an experience

of ten years will enable them to make all the modifications and

additions required; and after that period they shall fix and

consecrate in perpetuity the ceremonies as they then stand,

forbidding all farther change. Neither in that nor in any other

arrangement shall any subsequent change be allowed, except on

the unanimous requisition of all the magistrates, all the people,

and all the oracles of the Gods.[205]

[Footnote 204: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 770 C-E.]

[Footnote 205: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 772 C-D.]

[Side-note: Marriage-Laws--Rich husbands to choose poor

wives--No dowries--costly marriage festivals are forbidden.]

The choric festivals, in which the youths and maidens will take

part, both of them naked as far as a sober modesty will allow,

present occasions for mutual acquaintance between them, which

serves as foundation for marriage.[206] At the age of twenty-five

a young man is permitted to marry; and before the age of

thirty-five he is required to marry, under penalty of fine and

disgrace, if he does not.[207] Plato introduces here a discourse,

in the form of a prologue to his marriage law, wherein he impresses

on young men the general principles according to which they ought

to choose their wives. The received sentiment, which disposes a rich

youth to choose his wife from a rich family, is (in Plato's view)

altogether wrong. Rich husbands ought to assort themselves with

poor wives; and in general the characters of husband and wife

ought to be opposite rather than similar, in order that the

offspring may not inherit the defects of either.[208] The

religious ceremonies antecedent to marriage are to be regulated by

the Exêgêtæ. A costly marriage feast--and, above all, drunkenness

at that feast--are emphatically forbidden. Any offspring begotten

when the parent is in this disorderly and insane condition,[209]

will probably be vitiated from the beginning. Out of the two

residences which every citizen's lot will comprise, one must be

allotted to the son when the son marries.[210]

[Footnote 206: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 772 A. [Greek: gumnou\s kai\

gumna\s me/chri per ai)dou=s sô/phronos e(ka/stôn], &c.]

[Footnote 207: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 772 E, 774 A.]

[Footnote 208: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 773 C-D.

Compare the Politikus, pp. 310-311, where the necessity is

insisted on of coupling in marriage two persons of opposite

dispositions--[Greek: to\ a)ndrei=on ê)=thos] with [Greek: to\

ko/smion ê)=thos]. There is a natural inclination (Plato says) for

the [Greek: a)ndrei=oi] to intermarry with each other, and for the

[Greek: ko/smioi] to do the like: but the lawgiver must contend

against this. If this be permitted, each of the breeds will

degenerate through excess of its own peculiarity.]

[Footnote 209: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 775.]

[Footnote 210: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 776 A.]

[Side-note: Laws about slavery. Slaves to be well fed, and

never treated with cruelty or insolence. The master must not

converse with them.]

Plato now enters upon his laws respecting property; and first of

all upon the most critical variety of property; that in human

beings, or slavery. This he declares to be a subject full of

difficulty. There is much difference of opinion on the subject.

Some speak of slaves as deserving trust and good treatment,

in proof of which various anecdotes of exemplary fidelity on their

part are cited: others again regard them as incorrigibly debased,

fit for nothing better than the whip and spur, like cattle. Then

moreover the modified form of slavery, such as that of the Helots

in Laconia, and the Penestæ in Thessaly, has been found full of

danger and embarrassment, though the Spartans themselves are well

satisfied with it.[211] (It will be recollected that the Helots

and Penestæ were not slaves bought and imported from abroad, as

the slaves in Attica were, but conquered Hellenic communities who

had been degraded from freedom into slavery, and from the

condition of independent proprietorship into that of tributary

tenants or serfs; but with the right to remain permanently on

their lands, without ever being sold for exportation.) This form

of slavery (where the slaves are of the same race and language,

with reciprocal bonds of sympathy towards each other) Plato

denounces as especially dangerous. Care must be taken that there

shall be among the slaves as little fellowship of language and

feelings as possible; but they must be well fed: moreover

everything like cruelty and insolence in dealing with them must be

avoided, even more carefully than in dealing with freemen. This he

prescribes partly for the protection of the slave himself, but

still more for the interest of the master: whose intrinsic virtue,

or want of virtue, will be best tested by his behaviour as a

master. The slaves must be punished judicially, when they deserve

it. But the master must never exhort or admonish them, as he would

address himself to a freeman: he must never say a word to them,

except to give an order: above all, he must abstain from all

banter and joking, either with male or female slaves.[212] Many

foolish masters indulge in such behaviour, which emboldens

the slaves to give themselves airs, and renders the task of

governing them almost impracticable.[213]

[Footnote 211: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 777. He alludes also to the

enslavement of the indigenous population called the Mariandyni, by

the Grecian colonists of Herakleia on the southern coast of the

Euxine; and to the disturbances and disorders which had occurred

through movements of the slaves in Southern Italy. Probably this

last may be connected with that revolt whereby the Bruttians

became enfranchised; but we can make out nothing definite from

Plato's language.]

[Footnote 212: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 777 D-E. [Greek: kola/zein ge

mê\n e)n di/kê dou/lous a)ei\, kai\ mê\ nouthetou=ntas ô(s

e)leuthe/rous thru/ptesthai poiei=n. Tê\n de\ oi)ketou= pro/srêsin

chrê\ schedo\n e)pi/taxin pa=san gi/gnesthai, mê\ prospai/zontas

mêdamê=| mêdamô=s oi)ketai=s, mê/t' ou)=n thêlei/ais mê/t'

a)/r)r(esin.]]

[Footnote 213: Aristotle (Polit. vii. p. 1330, a. 27; Oeconom.

i. p. 1344, b. 18) agrees with Plato as to the danger of having

slaves who speak the same language and are of the same tribes,

with common lineage and sympathies. He disapproves of anything

which tends to impart spirit and independence to the slave's

character; and he takes occasion from hence to deduce some

objections against various arrangements of the Platonic Republic

(Politic. ii. p. 1264, a. 35). These are precautions--[Greek:

pro\s to\ mêde\n neôteri/zein]. But Aristotle dissents from Plato

on another point--where Plato enjoins that the master shall not

exhort or admonish his slave, but shall address to him no word

except the word of command (Aristot. Politic. i. p. 1260, b. 5).

Aristotle says that there is a certain special and inferior kind

of [Greek: a)retê\] which the slave can possess and ought to

possess; that this ought to be communicated to him by the

admonition and exhortation of the master; and that the master

ought to admonish his slaves even more than he admonishes his

children. The slave requires a certain [Greek: ê)thikê\n

a)retê/n], so that he may not be hindered from his duty by [Greek:

a)kolasi/a] or [Greek: deili/a]: but it is an [Greek: a)retê\

mikra/]: the courage required for the slave is [Greek:

u(pêretikê/], that for the master [Greek: a)rchikê/] (ib. p. 1260,

a. 22-35). This measure of virtue the master must impart to the

slave by exhortation, over and above the orders which he gives as

to the performance of work. It would appear, however, that in

Aristotle's time there were various persons who denied that there

was any [Greek: a)retê\] belonging to a slave--[Greek: para\ ta\s

o)rganika\s kai\ diakonika/s] (p. 1259, b. 23). Upon this last

theory is founded the injunction of Plato which Aristotle here

controverts.

What Aristotle says about slaves in the fifth chapter of the first

book of his Oeconomica, is superior to what he says in the

Politica, and superior to anything which we read in the Platonic

Treatise De Legibus.]

[Side-note: Circular form for the city--Temples in the

centre--No walls round it.]

As to the construction of the city, Plato prescribes that its

external contour shall be of circular form, encircling the summit

of an eminence, with the agora near the centre. The temples of the

Gods shall be planted around the agora, and the buildings for

gymnasia and schooling, for theatrical representation, for

magistrative, administrative, and judicial business, near at hand.

Plato follows the example of Sparta in prohibiting any special

outer wall for the fortification of the city, which he treats as

an indication of weakness and timidity: nevertheless he suggests

that the houses constituting the city may be erected on such a

plan, and in such connection, as to be equivalent to a

fortification.[214] When once the city is erected, the Astynomi or

Ædiles are to be charged with the duty of maintaining its

integrity and cleanliness.

[Footnote 214: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 778-779.]

[Side-note: Mode of life prescribed to new-married couples

They are to take the best care about good procreation for the

city.]

Plato next proceeds to regulate the mode of life proper for all

his new-married couples. He proclaims broadly that large

interference with private and individual life is unavoidable; and

that no great public reform can be accomplished without it.[215]

He points out that this principle was nowhere sufficiently

admitted: not even at Sparta, where it was carried farther than

anywhere else. Even the Spartans and Kretans adopted the public

mess-table only for males, and not for females.[216] In Plato's

view, it is essential for both. He would greatly prefer (as

announced already in his Republic) that it should be one and the

same for both--males and females taking their meals together.

[Footnote 215: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 780 A, vii. p. 790 A.]

[Footnote 216: Plato. Legg. vi. p. 781 A.]

[Side-note: Board of superintending matrons.]

The newly-married couples are enjoined to bestow their best

attention upon the production of handsome and well-constituted

children: this being their primary duty to the city for ten years

after their marriage. Their conduct will be watched by a Board of

Matrons, chosen for the purpose by the Nomophylakes, and

assembling every day in the temple of Eileithuia. In case of any

dispute, or unfaithful or unseemly conduct, these Matrons will

visit them to admonish or threaten, if they see reason. Should

such interference fail of effect, the Matrons will apprise the

Nomophylakes, who will on their parts admonish and censure, and

will at last denounce the delinquents, if still refractory, to the

public authority. The delinquents will then be disgraced, and

debarred from the public ceremonies, unless they can clear

themselves by indicting and convicting their accusers before the

public tribunal.[217]

[Footnote 217: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 784.]

[Side-note: Age fixed for marriage. During the first ten

years the couple are under obligation to procreate for the

city--Restrictions during these ten years.]

The age of marriage is fixed at from thirty to thirty-five for

males, from sixteen to twenty for females. The first ten years

after marriage are considered as appropriated to the production of

children _for the city_, and are subject to the strict

supervision above mentioned. If any couple have no offspring for

ten years, the marriage shall be dissolved by authority. After ten

years the supervision is suspended, and the couple are left to

themselves. If either of them shall commit an infidelity with

another person still under the decennial restriction, the party so

offending is liable to the same penalty as if he were still

himself also under it.[218] But if the person with whom infidelity

is committed be not under that restriction, no penalty will be

incurred beyond a certain general discredit, as compared with

others whose conduct is blameless, and who will receive greater

honour. However, Plato advises that nothing shall be said in the

law respecting the conduct of married couples after the period of

decennial restriction has elapsed, unless there be some grave

scandal to call attention to the subject.[219]

[Footnote 218: Plato, Legg. vi. pp. 784-785.]

[Footnote 219: Plato, Legg. vi. p. 785 A. [Greek: kai\

metriazo/ntôn me\n peri\ ta\ toiau=ta tô=n pleio/nôn

a)nomothe/têta sigê=| kei/sthô, a)kosmou/ntôn de\ nomothetêthe/nta

tau/tê| pratte/sthô], &c.]

[Side-note: How infants are to be brought

up--Nurses--Perpetual regulated movements--useful for toning

down violent emotions.]

Plato now proceeds to treat about the children just born. The

principle of separate family being admitted in the Treatise De

Legibus, he refrains from promulgating any peremptory laws on this

subject, because it is impossible for the lawgiver or the

magistrate to enter into each private house, and to enforce

obedience on such minute and numerous details: while it would be

discreditable for him to command what he could not enforce, and it

would moreover accustom citizens to disobey the law with impunity.

Still, however, Plato[220] thinks it useful to deliver some

general advice, which he hopes that fathers and mothers will

spontaneously follow. He begins with the infant as soon as born,

and even before birth. The mother during pregnancy is admonished

to take regular exercise; the infant when born must be carried

about constantly in the nurse's arms. The invigorating effects of

such gestation are illustrated by the practice of Athenian

cock-fighters, who cause the cocks while under training to be carried

about under the arms of attendants in long walks.[221] Besides

that the nurses (slaves) must be strong women, there must also be

more than one to each infant, in order that he may be sufficiently

carried about. He must be kept in swaddling-clothes for the first

two years, and must not be allowed to walk until he is three years

of age.[222] The perpetual movement and dandling, in the arms of

the nurse, produces a good effect not only on the health and

bodily force of the infant, but also upon his emotions.[223] The

infant ought to be kept (if it were possible) in movement as

constant and unceasing as if he were on shipboard. Nurses know

this by experience, when they lull to sleep an insomnious child,

not by holding him still, but by swinging him about in their arms,

and by singing a ditty. So likewise the insane and furious

emotions inspired by Dionysus (also by Zeus, by the mother of the

Gods, &c.) are appeased by the regulated movement, dance and

music, solemnly performed at the ceremonial worship of the God who

excited the emotions. These are different varieties of fear and

perturbation: they are morbid internal movements, which we

overpower and heal by muscular and rhythmical movements impressed

from without, with appropriate music and religious

solemnities.[224]

[Footnote 220: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 788-790 A.]

[Footnote 221: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 789.]

[Footnote 222: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 789 E, 790 A.]

[Footnote 223: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 790 C-D. [Greek: la/bômen

toi/nun tou=to oi(=on stoichei=on e)p' a)mpho/tera sô/mato/s te

kai\ psuchê=s tô=n pa/nu ne/ôn, tê\n tithê/nêsin kai\ ki/nêsin,

gignome/nên o(/ti ma/lista dia\ pa/sês nukto/s te kai\ ê(me/ras,

ô(s e)/sti xu/mphoros a(/pasi me/n, ou)ch ê(/kista de\ toi=s o(/,

ti neôta/toisi, kai\ oi)kei=n, ei) dunato\n ê)=n, oi(=on a)ei\

ple/ontas; nu=n d' ô(s e)ggu/tata tou/tou poiei=n dei= peri\ ta\

neogenê= pai/dôn thre/mmata.]]

[Footnote 224: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 790 E-791 A. [Greek:

deimai/nein e)sti/ pou tau=t' a)mpho/tera ta\ pa/thê, kai\ e)/sti

dei/mata di' e(/xin phau/lên tê=s psuchê=s tina/. o(/tan ou)=n

e)/xôthe/n tis prosphe/rê toi=s toiou/tois pa/thesi seismo/n, ê(

tô=n e)/xôthen kratei= ki/nêsis prospherome/nê tê\n e)nto\s

phobera\n ou)=san kai\ manikê\n ki/nêsin, kratê/sasa de\ galê/nên

ê(suchi/an tê=s peri\ ta\ tê=s kardi/as chalepê=s genome/nês

e(ka/stôn pêdê/seôs.]

About the effect of the movement, bustle, noise, and solemn

exhibitions, &c., of a Grecian festival, in appeasing the

over-wrought internal excitement of those who took part in it, see

Lobeck, Aglaophamus, p. 689.

Compare Euripid. Hippolyt. 141, where the Chorus addresses the

love-sick Phædra:--

[Greek: su\ ta)/r' e)/ntheos, ô)= kou/ra,

ei)/t' e)k Pano\s ei)/th' E(ka/tas,

ê)\ semnô=n Koruba/ntôn,

ê)\ matro\s o)rei/as phoita=|s.]

Also Eurip. Medea, 1172 about [Greek: Pano\s o)rga/s].]

To guard the child, during the first three years of his life,

against disturbing fears, or at least to teach him to conquer them

when they may spring up, is to lay the best foundation of a

fearless character for the future.[225] By extreme indulgence he

would be rendered wayward: by extreme harshness his spirit would

be broken.[226] A middle course ought to be pursued, guarding him

against pains as far as may be, yet at the same time keeping

pleasures out of his reach, especially the stronger pleasures:

thus shall we form in him a gentle and propitious disposition,

such as that which we ascribe to the Gods.[227]

[Footnote 225: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 791 C.]

[Footnote 226: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 791 D.]

[Footnote 227: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 792 C-D.]

[Side-note: Choric and orchestic movements, their effect in

discharging strong emotions.]

The comparison made here by Plato between the effect produced by

these various religious ceremonies upon the mind of the votary,

and that produced by the dandling of the nurse upon the perturbed

child in her arms, is remarkable. In both, the evil is the

same--unfounded and irrational fear--an emotional disturbance within:

in both, the remedy is the same--regulated muscular movement and

excitement from without: more gentle in the case of the infant,

more violent in the case of the adult. Emotion is a complex fact,

physical as well as mental; and the physical aspect and basis of

it (known to Aristotle[228] as well as to Plato) is here brought

to view. To speak the language of modern science (with which their

views here harmonise, in spite of their imperfect acquaintance

with human anatomy), if the energies of the nervous system are

overwrought within, they may be diverted into a new channel by

bodily movements at once strenuous and measured, and may thus be

discharged in a way tranquillising to the emotions. This is

Plato's theory about the healing effects of the choric and

orchestic religious ceremonies of his day. The God was believed

first to produce the distressing excitement within--then to

suggest and enjoin (even to share in) the ceremonial movements for

the purpose of relieving it. The votary is brought back from the

condition of comparative madness to that of sober reason.[229]

Strong emotion of any kind is, in Plato's view, a state of

distemper. The observances here prescribed respecting wise

regulation of the emotions, especially in young children, are

considered by Plato as not being laws in the proper and positive

sense, but as the unwritten customs, habits, rules, discipline,

&c., upon which all positive laws repose and depend. Though

they appear to go into excessive and petty details, yet unless

they be well understood and efficaciously realised, the laws

enacted will fail to attain their purpose.[230]

[Footnote 228: Aristot. De Animâ, i. 1.]

[Footnote 229: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 791 B. [Greek: kateirga/sato

a)nti\ manikô=n ê(mi=n diathe/seôn e(/xeis e)/mphronas e)/chein.]

Servius observes (Not. ad Virgil. Bucol. v. 73):--"Sane, ut in

religionibus saltaretur, hæc ratio est, quod nullam majores nostri

partem corporis esse voluerunt, quæ non sentiret religionem. Nam

cantus ad animam, saltatio ad mobilitatem pertinet corporis."]

[Footnote 230: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 793 C-D.]

[Side-note: Training of boys and girls.]

Pursuant to this view of the essential dependence of _leges_

upon _mores_, Plato continues his directions about the

training of children. From the age of three to six, the child must

be supplied with amusements, under a gentle but sufficient

controul. The children of both sexes will meet daily at the

various temples near at hand, with discreet matrons to preside

over them, and will find amusement for each other. At six years of

age the boys and girls will be separated, and will be consigned to

different male and female tutors. The boys shall learn

riding, military exercise, and the use of the various weapons of

war. The girls shall learn these very same things also, if it be

possible. Plato is most anxious that they should learn, but he

fears that the feelings of the community will not tolerate the

practice.[231] All the teaching will be conducted under the

superintendence of teachers, female as well as male: competent

individuals, of both sexes, being appointed to the functions of

command without distinction.[232] The children will be taught to

use their left hands as effectively as their right.[233] Wrestling

shall be taught up to a certain point, to improve the strength and

flexibility of the limbs; but elaborate wrestling and pugilism is

disapproved. Imitative dancing, choric movements, and procession,

shall also be taught, but always in arms, to familiarise the youth

with military details.[234]

[Footnote 231: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 794 B-D.]

[Footnote 232: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 795 D. [Greek: a)rchou/sais te

kai\ a)/rchousi]. Also p. 806 E.]

[Footnote 233: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 794-795, 804 D.]

[Footnote 234: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 796 C-D.]

[Side-note: Musical and literary teaching for youth--Poetry,

songs, music, dances, must all be fixed by authority, and never

changed--Mischief done by poets aiming to please.]

Plato now enters upon the musical and literary teaching proper for

the youthful portion of his community. Poetry, music, and dancing,

as connected with the service and propitiation of the Gods, are in

the first instance recreative and amusing; but they also involve

serious consequences.[235] It is most important to the community

that these exercises should not only be well arranged, but that

when arranged they should be fixed by authority, so as to prevent

all innovations or deviations by individual taste. Plato here

repeats, with emphasis, his commendation of the Egyptian practice

to consecrate all the songs, dances, and festive ceremonies, and

to tolerate no others whatever.[236] Change is in itself a most

serious evil, and change in one department provokes an appetite

for change in all. Plato forbids all innovation, even in matters

of detail, such as the shape of vessels or articles of

furniture.[237] He allows no poet to circulate any ode except such

as is in full harmony with the declaration of the lawgiver

respecting good and evil. All the old poems must be sifted and

weeded. All new hymns and prayers to the Gods, even before they

are shown to a single individual, must be examined by Censors

above fifty years of age, in order that it may be seen whether the

poet knows what he ought to praise or blame, and what he ought to

pray for. In general, the poets do not know what is good and what

is evil. By mistaken prayers--especially for wealth, which the

lawgiver discountenances as prejudicial--they may bring down great

mischief upon the city.[238] Different songs must be composed for

the two sexes: songs of a bold and martial character for males--of

a sober and quiet character for females.[239] But the poet must on

no account cultivate "the sweet Muse," or make it his direct aim

to produce emotions delightful to the audience. The sound and

useful music will always in the end become agreeable, provided the

pupils hear it from their earliest childhood, and hear nothing

else.[240] Plato censures the tragic representations exhibited in

the Grecian cities (at Athens, more than anywhere else) as being

unseemly, and even impious, because, close to the altar where

sacrifice was offered to the Gods, choric and dramatic

performances of the most touching and pathetic character were

exhibited. The poet who gained the prize was he who touched most

deeply the tender emotions of the audience, and caused the

greatest flow of tears among them. Now, in the opinion of Plato,

the exhibition of so much human misery, and the communication of

so much sorrowful sympathy, was most unsuitable to the festival

day, and offensive to the Gods. It was tolerable only on the

inauspicious days of the year, and when exhibited by hired Karian

mourners, such as those who wailed loudly at funerals. The music

at the festivals ought to have no emotional character, except that

of gentle, kindly, auspicious cheerfulness.[241]

[Footnote 235: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 803 C-E.]

[Footnote 236: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 799.]

[Footnote 237: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 797.]

[Footnote 238: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 800 A, 801 B, 802 B.]

[Footnote 239: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 802 D-E.]

[Footnote 240: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 802 C. [Greek: kai\ mê\

paratitheme/nês tê=s glukei/as Mou/sês.]]

[Footnote 241: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 800 B-E. 801 A: [Greek:

eu)phêmi/a, kai\ dê\ kai\ to\ tê=s ô)|dê=s ge/nos eu)/phêmon

ê(mi=n pa/ntê| pa/ntôs u(parche/tô.]

This is a remarkable declaration of Plato, condemning the tragic

representations at Athens. Compare Gorgias, p. 501; Republic, x.

p. 605; also about the effect on the spectators, Ion, p. 535 E.

The idea of [Greek: eu)phêmi/a] is more negative than positive; it

is often shown by silence. The [Greek: dusphê/miai] (Soph. Phil.

10), or [Greek: blasphêmi/a], as Plato calls it, are the positive

act or ill-omened manifestation. Plato, Phædon, p. 117: [Greek:

e)n eu)phêmi/a| chrê\ teleuta=|n.]]

[Side-note: Boys and girls to learn letters and the lyre,

from ten to thirteen years of age. Masters will teach the laws and

homilies of the lawgiver, and licensed extracts from the poets.]

At ten years old, the boys and girls (who have hitherto been

exercised in recitation, singing, dancing, &c.) are to learn

their letters, or reading and writing. They will continue

this process until thirteen years old. They will learn the use of

the lyre, for three years. The same period and duration is fixed

for all of them, not depending at all upon the judgment or

preference of the parents.[242] It is sufficient if they learn to

read and and write tolerably, without aiming to do it either

quickly or very well. The boys will be marched to school at

daybreak every morning, under the care of a tutor, who is chosen

by the magistrate for the purpose of keeping them under constant

supervision and discipline.[243] The masters for teaching will be

special persons paid for the duty, usually foreigners.[244] They

will be allowed to teach nothing except the laws and homilies of

the lawgiver, together with any selections from existing poets

which may be in full harmony with these.[245] Plato here proclaims

how highly he is himself delighted with his own string of

homilies: which are not merely exhortations useful to be heard,

but also have the charm of poetry, and have been aided by

inspirations from the Gods.[246] As for the poets themselves,

whether serious or comic, whose works were commonly employed in

teaching, being committed wholly or partially to memory--Plato

repudiates them as embodying a large proportion of mischievous

doctrine which his pupils ought never to hear. Much reading, or

much learning, he discountenances as dangerous to youths.[247]

[Footnote 242: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 810 A.]

[Footnote 243: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 808 C, 809 B.]

[Footnote 244: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 804 D, 813 E.]

[Footnote 245: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 811 E. Any new poet who wishes

to exhibit must submit his compositions to the Censors. P. 817

C-D.]

[Footnote 246: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 811 C-D. [Greek: ou)k a)/neu

tino\s e)pipnoi/as theô=n . . . ma/la ê(sthê=nai.] Stallbaum in

his note (p. 337) treats this as said in jest (_faceté_

dicit). To me it seems sober earnest, and quite in character with

the didactic solemnity of the whole treatise. Plato himself would

have been astonished (I think) at the note of his commentator.]

[Footnote 247: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 810-811. [Greek: ki/nduno/n

phêmi ei)=nai phe/rousan toi=s paisi\ tê\n polumathi/an] (811 B).

Compare p. 819 A.]

[Side-note: The teaching is to be simple, and common to both

sexes.]

The teaching of the harp and of music (occupying the three years

from thirteen to sixteen, after the three preceding years of

teaching letters) will not be suffered to extend to any elaborate

or complicated combinations. The melody will be simple: the

measure grave and dignified. The imitative movement or dancing

will exhibit only the gestures and demeanour suitable to the

virtuous man in the various situations of life, whether

warlike or pacific:[248] the subject-matter of the songs or hymns

will be regulated (as above described) by censorial authority. The

practice will be consecrated and unchangeable, under the

supervision of a magistrate for education.[249]

[Footnote 248: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 812 C-D. Still Plato allows

the exhibition, under certain conditions, of low, comic, ludicrous

dances; yet not by any freemen or citizens, but by slaves and

hired persons of mean character. He even considers it necessary

that the citizens should see such low exhibitions occasionally, in

order to appreciate by contrast the excellence of their own

dignified exhibitions. Of two opposites you cannot know the one

unless you also learn to know the other--[Greek: a)/neu ga\r

geloi/ôn ta\ spoudai=a kai\ pa/ntôn tô=n e)nanti/ôn ta\ e)nanti/a

mathei=n me\n ou) dunato/n, ei) me/llei tis phro/nimos e)/sesthai,

poiei=n de\ ou)k a)\n dunato\n a)mpho/tera], &c. (p. 816 E).]

[Footnote 249: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 813 A.]

All this teaching is imparted to the youth of both sexes: to boys,

by male teachers--to girls, by female teachers, both of them paid.

The training in gymnastic and military exercises and in arms, is

also common to girls and boys.[250] Plato deems it disgraceful

that the females shall be brought up timorous and helpless--unable

to aid in defending the city when it is menaced, and even

unmanning the male citizens by demonstrations of terror.[251]

[Footnote 250: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 813 C-E, 814-815. [Greek:

polemikê\ o)/rchêsis--ei)rênikê/] or [Greek: a)po/lemos

o)/rchêsis.]]

[Footnote 251: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 814 B. See Æschylus, Sept.

adv. Thebas, 172-220.]

[Side-note: Rudiments of arithmetic and geometry to be

taught.]

We next come to arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy. Plato directs

that all his citizens shall learn the rudiments of these

sciences--not for the reason urged by most persons, because of the

necessities of practical life (which reason he discards as

extravagantly silly, though his master Sokrates was among those

who urged it)--but because these are endowments belonging to the

divine nature, and because without them no man can become a God,

Dæmon, or Hero, capable of watching over mankind.[252] In Egypt

elementary arithmetic and geometry were extensively taught to

boys--but very little in Greece:[253] though he intimates that

both in Egypt, and in the Phenician towns, they were turned

only to purposes of traffic, and were joined with sordid

dispositions which a good lawgiver ought to correct by other

provisions. In the Platonic city, both arithmetic and geometry

will be taught, so far as to guard the youth against absurd

blunders about measurement, and against confusion of

incommensurable lines and spaces with commensurable. Such blunders

are now often made by Greeks.[254] By a good method, the teaching

of these sciences may be made attractive and interesting; so that

no force will be required to compel youth to learn.[255]

[Footnote 252: Plato. Legg. vii. p. 812 B-C. [Greek: ou(=tos

pa/ntôs tô=n lo/gôn eu)êthe/stato/s e)sti makrô=|.] In

interpreting this curious passage we must remember that

regularity, symmetry, exact numerical proportion, &c., are the

primary characteristics of the divine agents in Plato's view: of

Uranus and the Stars, as the first of them, compare Æschyl.

Prometh. 460.]

[Footnote 253: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 818 E, 819 B-D. [Greek:

ê)|schu/nthên . . . u(pe\r a(pa/ntôn tô=n E(llê/nôn.] Compare

Legg. v. p. 747 C, and Republic, iv. p. 436 A.

Respecting the distinction between [Greek: theoi/, dai/mones,

ê(/rôes], see Nägelsbach, Nach-Homerische Theologie, pp.

104-115.]

[Footnote 254: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 819 E, 820 A-C.]

[Footnote 255: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 820 D. [Greek: meta\ paidia=s

a(/ma manthano/mena ô)phelê/sei.]

I transcribe here the curious passage which we read a little

before.

Plat. Legg. vii. p. 819 A-C. [Greek: Tosa/de toi/nun e(/kasta

chrê\ pha/nai mantha/nein dei=n tou\s e)leuthe/rous, _o(/sa kai\

pa/mpolus_ e)n Ai)gu/ptô| _pai/dôn o)/chlos a(/ma gra/mmasi

mantha/nei_. Prô=ton me\n ga\r peri\ logismou\s a)technô=s

paisi\n e)xeurême/na mathê/mata, meta\ paidia=s te kai\ ê(donê=s

mantha/nein; _ mê/lôn te/ tinô=n dianomai\ kai\ stepha/nôn_

plei/osin a(/ma kai\ e)la/ttosin, a(rmotto/ntôn a)rithmô=n tô=n

au)tô=n . . . kai\ dê\ kai\ pai/zontes, phia/las a(/ma chrusou=

kai\ chalkou= kai\ a)rgu/rou kai\ toiou/tôn tinô=n a)/llôn

kerannu/ntes, oi( de\ kai\ o(/las pôs diadido/ntes, o(/per

ei)=pon, ei)s _paidia\n e)narmo/ttontes ta\s tô=n a)nagkai/ôn

a)rithmô=n chrê/seis, ô)phelou=si tou\s mantha/nontas ei)s_ te

ta\s tô=n stratope/dôn ta/xeis kai\ a)gôga\s kai\ stratei/as kai\

ei)s oi)konomi/as au)=; kai\ pa/ntôs _chrêsimôte/rous au)tou\s

au)toi=s kai\ e)grêgoro/tas ma=llon tou\s a)nthrô/pous_

a)perga/zontai.]

The information here given is valuable respecting the extensive

teaching of elementary arithmetic as well as of letters among

Egyptian boys, far more extensive than among Hellenic boys. The

priests especially, in Egypt a numerous order, taught these

matters to their own sons (Diodor. i. 81), probably to other boys

also. The information is valuable too in another point of view, as

respects the _method_ of teaching arithmetic to boys; not by

abstract numbers, nor by simple effort of memory in the repetition

of a multiplication-table, but by concrete examples and

illustrations exhibited to sense in familiar objects. The

importance of this concrete method, both in facilitating

comprehension and in interesting the youthful learner, are

strongly insisted on by Plato, as they have been also by some of

the ablest modern teachers of elementary arithmetic: see Professor

Leslie's Philosophy of Arithmetic, and Mr. Horace Grant's

Arithmetic for Young Children and Second Stage of Arithmetic. The

following passage from a work of Sir John Herschel (Review of

Whewell's History of Inductive Sciences, in the Quarterly Review,

June, 1841) bears a striking and curious analogy to the sentences

above transcribed from Plato:--"_Number_ we cannot help

regarding as an abstraction, and consequently its general

properties or its axioms to be of necessity inductively concluded

from the consideration of particular cases. And surely this is the

way in which children do acquire their knowledge of number, and in

which they learn its axioms. The apples and the marbles are put in

requisition ([Greek: mê/lôn dianomai\ kai\ stepha/nôn],

_Plato_), and through the multitude of gingerbread nuts their

ideas acquire clearness, precision, and generality."

I borrow the above references from Mr. John Stuart Mill, System of

Logic, Book ii. ch. vi. p. 335, ed. 1. They are annexed as a note

to the valuable chapters of his work on Demonstration and

Necessary Truths, in which he shows that the truth so-called, both

in Geometry and Arithmetic, rest upon inductive evidence.

"The fundamental truths of the Science of Number all rest upon the

evidence of sense: they are proved by showing to our eyes and to

our fingers that any given number of objects, ten balls for

example, may by separation and re-arrangement exhibit to our

senses all the different sets of numbers, the sum of which is

equal to ten. All the improved methods of teaching arithmetic to

children proceed upon a knowledge of this fact. All who wish to

carry the child's _mind_ along with them in learning

arithmetic--all who (as Dr. Biber in his remarkable Letters on

Education expresses it) wish to teach numbers and not mere

ciphers--now teach it through the evidence of the senses, in the

manner we have described" (p. 335).]

[Side-note: Astronomy must be taught, in order that the

citizens may not assert libellous falsehoods respecting the

heavenly bodies.]

Astronomy must also be taught up to a certain point, in order that

the youth may imbibe correct belief respecting those great

Divinities--Hêlios, Selênê, and the Planets--or may at any rate be

protected from the danger of unconsciously advancing false

affirmations about them, discreditable to their dignity. The

general public consider it impious to study the Kosmos and the

celestial bodies, with a view to detect the causes of what

occurs:[256] while at the same time they assert that the movements

of Hêlios and Selênê are irregular, and they call the planets

Wanderers. Regular action is (in Plato's view) the characteristic

mark of what is good and perfect: irregularity is the foremost of

all defects, and cannot without blasphemy be imputed to any of the

celestial bodies. Moreover, many persons also assert untruly, that

among the celestial bodies the one which is really the slowest

mover, moves the fastest--and that the one which is really the

fastest mover, moves the slowest. How foolish would it appear

(continues Plato) if they made the like mistake about the Olympic

runners, and if they selected the defeated competitor, instead of

the victor, to be crowned and celebrated in panegyrical odes! How

offensive is such falsehood, when applied to the great Gods in the

heavens! Each of them has in reality one uniform circular

movement, though they appear to have many and variable movements.

Our youth must be taught enough of astronomy to guard against such

heresies. The study of astronomy up to this point, far from being

impious, is indispensable as a safeguard against impiety.[257]

Plato intimates that these astronomical truths were of recent

acquisition, even to himself.[258]

[Footnote 256: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 821 A. We must observe that

the Athenian (who here represents Plato himself) does not give

this repugnance to astronomical study as his own feeling, but, on

the contrary, as a prejudice from which he dissents. There is no

ground, therefore, so far as this passage is concerned, for the

charge of contradiction advanced by Velleius against Plato in

Cicero De Nat. Deor. i. 12, 30.]

[Footnote 257: Plat. Legg. vii. pp. 821 B-822 C. [Greek:

katapseudo/metha nu=n, ô(s e)/pos ei)pei=n, E(/llênes pa/ntes

mega/lôn theô=n, Ê(li/ou te a(/ma kai\ Selê/nês] (821 B) . . .

[Greek: peri\ theô=n tô=n kat' ou)/ranon tou/s ge ê(mete/rous

poli/tas te kai\ tou\s ne/ous to\ me/chri tosou/tou mathei=n peri\

a(pa/ntôn tou/tôn, me/chri tou= mê\ blasphêmei=n peri\ au)ta/,

eu)phêmei=n de\ a)ei\ thu/ontas te kai\ e)n eu)chai=s

eu)chome/nous eu)sebôs] (821C-D). The five Planets were

distinguished and named, and their periods to a certain extent

understood, by Plato; but by many persons in his day the word

Planet was understood more generally as comprehending all the

celestial bodies, sun and moon among them--(except fixed stars)

therefore comets also--[Greek: ta\ mê\ e)n tê=| au)tê=|

periphora=| o)/nta], Xenoph. Memor. iv. 7, 5, where an opinion is

ascribed to Sokrates quite opposed to that which Plato here

expresses. See Schaubach, Geschichte der Astronomie, pp.

212-477.]

[Footnote 258: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 819 D, 821 E.

This portion of the Leges is obscure, and would be hardly

intelligible if it were not illustrated by a passage in the Timæus

(p. 38). Even with such help it is difficult, and has been

understood differently by different interpreters. Proklus (in

Timæum, pp. 262-263) and Martin (Études sur le Timée, ii. note 36,

p. 84) interpret it as alluding to the spiral line ([Greek:

e(/lika]) described by each planet (Sun and Moon are each counted

as planets) round the Earth, arising from the combination of the

force of the revolving sidereal sphere or Aplanês, carrying all

the planets round along with it from East to West, with the

counter-movement (contrary, but obliquely contrary) inherent in

each planet. The spiral movement of each planet, resulting from

combination of these two distinct forces, is a regular movement

governed by law; though to an observer who does not understand the

law, the movements appear irregular. Compare Derkyllides ap. Theon

Smyrn. c. 41, f. 27, p. 330, ed. Martin.

The point here discussed forms one of the items of controversy

between Gruppe and Boeckh, in the recent discussion about Plato's

astronomical views. _Gruppe_, Die Kosmischen Systeme der

Griechen, pp. 157-168: _Boeckh_, Untersuchungen über das

Kosmische System des Platon, pp. 45-57.

Gruppe has an ingenious argument to show that the novelty ([Greek:

para/doxon]) which Plato had in his mind, but was afraid to

declare openly because of existing prejudices, was the

heliocentric or Copernican system, which he believes to have been

Plato's discovery. Boeckh refutes Gruppe's reasoning; and refutes

it, in my judgment, completely. He sustains the interpretation

given by Proklus and Martin.

Boeckh also illustrates (pp. 35-38-49-54), in a manner more

satisfactory than Gruppe, the dicta of Plato about the comparative

velocity of the Planets (Sun and Moon counted among them).

Plato declares the Moon to be the quickest mover among the

planets, and Saturn to be the slowest. On the contrary Demokritus

pronounced the Moon to be the slowest mover of all; slower than

the Sun, because the Sun was farther from the Earth and nearer to

the outermost or sidereal sphere. It was the rotation of this

last-mentioned sphere (according to Demokritus) which carried

round along with it the Sun, the Moon, and all the planets: the

bodies near to it were more forcibly acted upon by its rotation,

and carried round more rapidly, than the bodies distant from

it--hence the Moon was the least rapid mover of all (Lucretius, v.

615-635. See Sir George Lewis's Historical Survey of the Astronomy

of the Ancients, ch. ii. pp. 139-140).

It appears to me probable that Plato, in the severe remarks which

he makes on persons who falsely affirmed the quickest mover in the

heavens to be the slowest, had in view these doctrines of

Demokritus. Plato never once mentions Demokritus by name (see

Mullach, Fragment. Demokrit. p. 25); but he is very sparing in

mentioning by name _any_ contemporaries. It illustrates the

difference between the manner of Aristotle and Plato, that

Aristotle frequently names Demokritus--seventy-eight times

according to Mullach (p. 107)--even in the works which we

possess.]

[Side-note: Hunting--how far permitted or advised.]

In regard to hunting, Plato thinks that it is a subject on which

positive laws are unsuitable or insufficient, and he therefore

gives certain general directions which partake of the nature both

of advice and of law. The good citizen (he says) is one who not

only obeys the positive laws prescribed by the lawgiver, but

who also conforms his conduct to the general cast of the

lawgiver's opinions: practising what is commended therein,

abstaining from what is blamed.[259] Plato commends one mode of

hunting--the chase after quadrupeds: yet only with horses, dogs,

javelins, &c., wherein both courage and bodily strength are

improved--but not with nets or snares, where no such result is

produced. He blames other modes--such as fishing and bird-snaring

(especially by night). He blames still more emphatically theft and

piracy, which he regards also as various modes of hunting.[260]

[Footnote 259: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 822 E.]

[Footnote 260: Plato, Legg. vii. pp. 823-824.]

[Side-note: Large general sense which Plato gives to the

word hunting.]

What principally deserves notice here is, the large general idea

which Plato conceives to himself under the term Hunting, and the

number of diverse particulars comprehended therein. 1. Hunting of

quadrupeds; either with dogs and javelins openly, or with snares,

by stratagem. 2. Hunting of birds, in the air. 3. Hunting of

fishes, in the water. 4. Hunting after the property of other men,

in the city or country. 5. Hunting after men as slaves, or after

other valuables, by means of piratical vessels. 6. Hunting of

public enemies, by one army against an opposite one. 7. Hunting of

men to conciliate their friendship or affection, sometimes by fair

means, sometimes by foul.[261]

[Footnote 261: Plato, Legg. vii. p. 823. [Greek: thê/ra ga\r

pampolu/ ti pra=gma/ e)sti, perieilêmme/non o)no/mati schedo\n

e(ni\ . . . pollê\ de\ ê( kata\ phili/an thêreu/ousa] (823 B) . . .

[Greek: a)/gras a)nthrô/pôn kata\ tha/lattan . . . klôpei/as e)n

chô/ra| kai\ po/lei] (823 E). Compare the Epinomis, p. 975 C.

So also in the Sophistês (pp. 221-222) Plato analyses and

distributes the general idea of [Greek: thêreutikê/]: including

under it, as one variety, the hunting after men by violent means

([Greek: tê\n bi/aion thê/ran, tê\n lê|stikê/n, a)ndrapodistikê\n,

turannikê/n, kai\ xu/mpasan tê\n polemikê/n])--and as another

variety, the hunting after men by persuasive or seductive means

([Greek: tê\n pithanourgikê/n, e)rôtikê/n, kolakikê/n]). In the

Memorabilia of Xenophon also (ii. 6, 29-33), Sokrates expands this

same idea--[Greek: tê\n thê/ran a)nthrô/pôn--ta\ tô=n phi/lôn

thêratika/], &c. Compare also the conversation between

Sokrates and Theodotê (iii. 11, 8-15)--[Greek: thêrô/menos], ib.

i. 2, 24--and Plato Protag. init.]

That all these processes--which Plato here includes as so many

varieties of hunting--present to the mind, when they are compared,

a common point of analogy, is not to be denied. The number of

different comparisons which the mind can make between phenomena,

is almost unlimited. Analogies may be followed from one to

another, until at last, after successive steps, the analogy

between the first and the last becomes faint or

imperceptible. Yet the same word, transferred successively

from the first to the last, conceals this faintness of analogy and

keeps them all before the mind as one. To us, this extension of

the word _hunting_ to particular cases dissimilar in so many

respects, appears more as poetical metaphor: to intelligent Greeks

of the Sokratic school, it seemed a serious comparison: and to

Plato, with his theory of Ideas, it ought to have presented a Real

Idea or permanent One, which alone remained constant amidst an

indefinite multitude of fugitive, shadowy, and deceptive,

particulars. But though this is the consistent corollary, from

Plato's theory of Ideas, he does not so state it in the Treatise

De Legibus, and probably he did not so conceive it. Critics have

already observed that in this Treatise scarce any mention is made

of the theory of Ideas. Plato had passed into other points of

view: yet he neither formally renounces the points of view which

we find in anterior dialogues, nor takes the trouble of

reconciling them with the thoughts of the later dialogues. Whether

there exists any Real, Abstract, Idea of Hunting, apart from the

particular acts and varieties of hunting--is a question which he

does not touch upon. Yet this is the main feature of the Platonic

philosophy, and the main doctrine most frequently impugned by

Aristotle as Platonic.

[Side-note: Number of religious sacrifices to be determined

by lawgiver.]

Although, in regard to the religious worship of his community, the

oracle of Delphi is asked to prescribe what sacrifices are to be

offered, and to what Gods--yet the religious lawgiver will

determine the number of such sacrifices and festivals, as well as

the times and seasons.[262] Each day in the year, sacrifice will

be offered by one of the magistrates to some God or Dæmon. Once in

every month, there will be a solemn sacrifice and festival, with

matches of music and gymnastics, offered by each tribe to its

eponymous God. The offerings to the celestial Gods will be kept

distinct from the offerings to the subterranean Gods. Among these

last, Pluto will be especially worshipped during the twelfth month

of the year. The festivals will be adjusted to the seasons, and

there will on proper occasions be festivals for women separately

and exclusively.[263]

[Footnote 262: Plato, Legg. viii. p. 828.]

[Footnote 263: Plato, Legg. viii. p. 828.]

[Side-note: Military muster of the whole citizen

population once in each month--men, women, and children.]

Once a month certainly--and more than once, if the magistrates

command--on occasion of one of these festivals, all the citizen

population are ordered to attend in military muster--men, women

and children. They will be brought together in such divisions and

detachments as the magistrate shall direct. They will here go

through gymnastic and military exercises. They will also have

fights, with warlike weapons not likely to inflict mortal wounds,

yet involving sufficient danger to test their bravery and

endurance: one against one, two against two, ten against ten.[264]

The victors will receive honorary wreaths, and public encomium in

appropriate songs. Both men and women will take part alike in

these exercises and contests, and in the composition of the odes

to celebrate the victors.[265]

[Footnote 264: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 833 E.]

[Footnote 265: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 829 B-E. [Greek: Ta\ au)ta\

de\ le/gô stratei/as te peri\ kai\ tê=s e)n poiê/sesi par)r(êsi/as

gunaixi/ te kai\ a)ndra/sin o(moi/ôs gi/gnesthai dei=n.] 830 E:

[Greek: chrôme/nous u(pokindu/nois be/lesin.]]

Such monthly musters, over and above the constant daily gymnastics

of the youthful population, are indispensable as preliminary

training; without which the citizens cannot fight with efficiency

and success, in the event of a real foreign enemy invading the

territory.[266] No athlete ever feels himself qualified to contend

at the public games without the most laborious special training

beforehand. Yet Plato expresses apprehension that his proposal of

regular musters for warlike exercises with sham-battles, will

appear ridiculous. He states that nothing of the kind existed in

any Grecian city, by reason of two great corruptions:--First, the

general love of riches and money-getting: Secondly, the bad

governments everywhere existing, whether democracy, oligarchy, or

despotism--each of which was in reality a faction or

party-government, _i.e._, government by one part over another

unwilling part.[267]

[Footnote 266: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 830.]

[Footnote 267: Plat. Legg. viii. pp. 831-832.

I read with surprise the declaration of Plato, that no such

military training exercises existed _anywhere_ in Greece. How

is this to be reconciled with the statements of Xenophon in his

Treatise on the Republic of the Lacedæmonians, wherein he

expressly calls the Spartans [Greek: techni/tas tô=n

polemikô=n]--or even with statement of Plato himself about Sparta

in the first book of this Treatise De Legibus? Compare Thucyd. v. 69.]

[Side-note: Gymnastic training must have reference to war,

not to athletic prizes.]

Plato prescribes that the gymnastic training in his community

shall be such as to have a constant reference to war; and that

elaborate bodily excellence, for the purpose simply of

obtaining prizes at the public games, shall be discouraged. There

will be foot-races, for men, for boys, and for young women up to

twenty years of age--the men always running in full panoply.[268]

Horse-racing is permitted, but chariot-racing is

discountenanced.[269] There will also be practice with the bow and

with other weapons of light warfare, in which the young women are

encouraged to take part--yet not constrained, in deference to

prevalent sentiment.[270]

[Footnote 268: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 833 B-C.]

[Footnote 269: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 834 B.]

[Footnote 270: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 834 C-D.]

[Side-note: Regulation of sexual intercourse. Syssitia or

public mess.]

In regard to sexual intercourse, Plato recognises that the

difficulty of regulating it according to the wisdom of the

lawgiver is greater in his city than** in any actual city, because

of the more free and public life of the women. Neither Krete nor

Sparta furnish a good example to follow on this point.[271] He

thinks however that by causing one doctrine on the subject to be

continually preached, and by preventing any other from being even

mentioned, the lawgiver may be able so to consecrate this doctrine

as to procure for it pretty universal obedience. The lawgiver may

thus be able to suppress pæderasty altogether, and to restrict

generally the sexual intercourse to that of persons legally

married--or to enforce at least the restriction, that the

exceptional cases of sexual intercourse departing from these

conditions shall be covered with the veil of secrecy.[272] The

constant bodily exercises prescribed in the Platonic community

will tend to diminish the influence of such appetites in the

citizens: while the example of the distinguished prize combatants

at the Olympic games, in whose long-continued training strict

continence was practised, shows that even more than what Plato

anticipates can be obtained, under the stimulus of sufficient

motive.[273]

[Footnote 271: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 836 B.]

[Footnote 272: Plato, Legg. viii. p. 841.]

[Footnote 273: Plato, Legg. viii. pp. 840 A, 841 A.

Compare the remarks which I have made above in this volume (p.

197) respecting the small probable influence of Aphroditê in the

Platonic Republic. A like remark may be made, though not so

emphatically, respecting the Platonic community in the Leges.]

What is here proposed respecting the sexual appetite finds no

approbation from Kleinias, since the customs in Krete were

altogether different. But the Syssitia, or public mess-table for

the citizens, are welcomed readily both by the Kretan and the

Spartan. The Syssitia existed both in Krete and at Sparta; but

were regulated on very different principles in one and in the

other. Plato declines to discuss this difference, pronouncing it

to be unimportant. But Aristotle informs us what it was; and shows

that material consequences turned upon it, in reference to the

citizenship at Sparta.[274]

[Footnote 274: Plato, Legg. viii. p. 842 B; Aristot. Politic. ii.

9-10, p. 1271, a. 26, 1272, a. 12. The statement of Aristotle,

about the manner in which the cost of the Kretan Syssitia was

provided, while substantially agreeing with Ephorus (ap. Strabo.

x. p. 480), does not exactly coincide with the account given by

Dosiadas of the Kretans in Lyktus (ap. Athenæum, iv. p. 143).

Compare Hoeckh, Kreta, vol. iii. pp. 134-138.]

[Side-note: Regulations about landed

property--Boundaries--Limited power of fining by magistrates.]

Plato enters now upon the economical and proprietary rules proper

for his community. As there will be neither gold and silver nor

foreign commerce, he is dispensed from the necessity of making

laws about shipments, retailing, interest, mine-digging,

collectors of taxes, &c. The persons under his charge will be

husbandmen, shepherds, bee-keepers, &c., with those who work

under them, and with the artisans who supply implements to

them.[275] The first and most important of all regulations is, the

law of Zeus Horius or Terminalis--Not to disturb or transgress the

boundary marks between different properties. Upon this depends the

maintenance of those unalterable _fundi_ or lots, which is

the cardinal principle of the Platonic community. Severe

penalties, religious as well as civil, are prescribed for

offenders against this rule.[276] Each proprietor is directed to

have proper regard to the convenience of neighbours, and above all

to abstain from annoying or damaging them, especially in regard to

the transit, or retention, or distribution, of water. To intercept

the supply, or corrupt the quality of water, is a high crime.[277]

Regulations are made about the carrying of the harvest, both of

grain and fruit. Disputes arising upon these points are to be

decided by the magistrates, up to the sum of three minæ: above

that sum, by the public Dikasteries. Many rules of detail will

require to be made by the magistrates themselves with a view to

fulfil the purposes of the lawgiver. So soon as the magistrates

think that enough of these regulations have been introduced, they

will consecrate the system as it stands, rendering it perpetual

and unalterable.[278]

[Footnote 275: Plato, Legg. viii. pp. 842 D, 846 D.]

[Footnote 276: Plato, Legg. viii. pp. 842-843.]

[Footnote 277: Plat. Legg. viii. pp. 844 A, 845 E.]

[Footnote 278: Plat. Legg. viii. p. 846 A-D.]

[Side-note: Regulations about artisans--Distribution of

the annual landed produce.]

Next, Plato passes to the Demiurgi or Artisans. These are all

non-citizens or metics: for it is a peremptory law, that no citizen

shall be an artisan in any branch. Nor is any artisan permitted to

carry on two crafts trades at once.[279] If any article be

imperatively required from abroad, either for implements of war or

for religious purposes, the magistrates shall cause it to be

imported. But there shall be no retailing, nor reselling with

profit, of any article.[280]

[Footnote 279: Plato, Legg. viii. p. 846 D-E.]

[Footnote 280: Plato, Legg. viii. p. 847.]