[444d]
and unjust injustice?”
“Of necessity.” “But to produce health is to
establish the elements in a body in the natural relation of dominating and
being dominated1 by one another, while to cause disease is to bring it
about that one rules or is ruled by the other contrary to nature.”
“Yes, that is so.” “And is it not likewise the
production of justice in the soul to establish its principles in the natural
relation of controlling and being controlled by one another, while injustice
is to cause the one to rule or be ruled by the other contrary to
nature?” “Exactly so,” he said.
“Virtue, then, as it seems, would be a kind of health2
1 Cf. the generalization of ἔρως to include medicine and music in Symposium 186-187, and Timaeus 82 A, Laws 906 C, Unity of Plato's Thought, n. 500.
2 The identification of virtue with spiritual health really, as Plato says (445 A), answers the main question of the Republic. It is not explicitly used as one of the three final arguments in the ninth book, but is implied in 591 B. It is found “already” in Crito 47 D-E. Cf. Gorgias 479 B
Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vols. 5 & 6 translated by Paul Shorey. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1969.
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