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1 Cf. on 344 E. Justice is a species falling under the vague genus τὸ ἑαυτοῦ πράττειν, which Critias in the Charmides proposed as a definition of σωφροσύνη(Charmides 161 B), but failed to sustain owing to his inability to distinguish the various possible meanings of the phrase. In the Republic too we have hitherto failed to “learn from ourselves” its true meaning, till now when Socrates begins to perceive that if taken in the higher sense of spiritual division of labor in the soul and in the state, it is the long-sought justice. Cf. 433 B-D, 443 C-D.
2 This need not refer to any specific passage in the dialogues. Cf. Unity of Plato's Thought, n. 236. A Greek could at any time say that minding one's own business and not being a busybody is σῶφρον or δίκαιον or both.
3 τρόπον τινὰ γιγνόμενον: as in the translation, not “justice seems somehow to be proving to be this.” Cf. 432 E, 516 C, Lysis 217 E, Laws 910 B, 495 A, 596 D, Goodwin, Moods and Tenses, 830. Yet, Cf. Politicus 291 D.
4 καίτοι: cf. on 360 C and 376 B. Here it points out the significance of τὸ ὑπόλοιπον if true, while ἀλλὰ μέντοι introduces the considerations that prove it true.
5 γε argues from the very meaning of ἐνάμιλλον. Cf. 379 B.
6 So Phaedo 79 Eὅρα δὴ καὶ τῇδε. It introduces a further confirmation. The mere judicial and conventional conception of justice can be brought under the formula in a fashion (πῃ), for legal justice “est constans et perpetua voluntas ius suum cuique tribuens.” Cf. 331 E and Aristotle Rhet. 1366 b 9ἔστι δὲ δικαιοσύνη μὲν ἀρετὴ δι᾽ ἣν τὰ αὑτῶν ἕκαστα ἔχουσι, καὶ ὡς ὁ νόμος.
7 τἀλλότρια: the article is normal; Stallb. on Phaedrus 230 A. For the ambiguity of τἀλλότρια cf. 443 D. So οἰκείου is one's own in either literal or the ideal sense of the Stoics and Emerson, and ἑαυτοῦ is similarly ambiguous. Cf. on 443 D.
8 ἕξις is still fluid in Plato and has not yet taken the technical Aristotelian meaning of habit or state.
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