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[417a] the coin of the multitude, while that which dwells within them is unsullied. But for these only of all the dwellers in the city it is not lawful to handle gold and silver and to touch them nor yet to come under the same roof1 with them, nor to hang them as ornaments on their limbs nor to drink from silver and gold. So living they would save themselves and save their city.2 But whenever they shall acquire for themselves land of their own and houses and coin, they will be house-holders and farmers instead of guardians, and will be transformed

1 As if the accursed and tainted metal were a polluted murderer or temple-robber. Cf. my note on Horace, Odes iii. 2. 27 “sub isdem trabibus,” Antiphon v. 11.

2 Cf. 621 B-C, and Laws692 A.

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