[556e]
one will
pass the word to another ‘our men are good for
nothing’?” “Nay, I know very well that they
do,” said he. “And just as an unhealthy body requires
but a slight impulse1 from outside to fall into sickness, and sometimes, even
without that, all the man is one internal war, in like manner does not the
corresponding type of state need only a slight occasion,2 the one party bringing in3 allies from an oligarchical state, or the other from a
democratic, to become diseased and wage war with itself, and sometimes even
1 Cf. Soph.O. T. 961σμικρὰ παλαῖα σώματ᾽ εὐνάζει ῥοπή” a slight impulse puts aged bodies to sleep,” Demosth.Olynth. ii. 9 and 21. Cf. 544 E.
2 Cf. Polyb. vi. 57. Montaigne, apudHöffding, i. 30 “Like every other being each illness has its appointed time of development and close—interference is futile,” with Tim. 89 B.
3 Cf. Thuc. i. 3, ii. 68, iv. 64, Herod. ii. 108.
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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