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[416e] they must receive as an agreed1 stipend2 from the other citizens as the wages of their guardianship, so measured that there shall be neither superfluity at the end of the year nor any lack.3 And resorting to a common mess4 like soldiers on campaign they will live together. Gold and silver, we will tell them, they have of the divine quality from the gods always in their souls, and they have no need of the metal of men nor does holiness suffer them to mingle and contaminate that heavenly possession with the acquisition of mortal gold, since many impious deeds have been done about

1 Cf. 551 B, Meno 91 B, Thucydides i. 108, G.M.T. 837.

2 They are worthy of their hire. Cf. on 347 A. It is a strange misapprehension to speak of Plato as careless of the welfare of the masses. His aristocracy is one of social service, not of selfish enjoyment of wealth and power.

3 This is precisely Aristophanes' distinction between beggary and honorable poverty, Plutus 552-553.

4 As at Sparta. Cf. 458 C, Newman, Introduction to Aristotle's Politics, p. 334.

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