[586b]
grazing and copulating, ever greedy for
more of these delights; and in their greed1 kicking and butting one another with
horns and hooves of iron they slay one another in sateless avidity, because
they are vainly striving to satisfy with things that are not real the unreal
and incontinent part2 of their souls.”
“You describe in quite oracular style,3
Socrates,” said Glaucon, “the life of the
multitude.” “And are not the pleasures with which they
dwell inevitably commingled with pains, phantoms of true pleasure, illusions
of scene-painting, so colored by contrary juxtaposition4
1 Cf. 373 E, Phaedo 66 C ff., Berkeley, Siris 330 “For these things men fight, cheat, and scramble.”
2 τὸ στέγον: Cf. Gorg. 493 B, Laws 714 A.
3 Plato laughs at himself. Cf. 509 C and 540 B-C. The picturesque, allegorical style of oracles was proverbial. For χρησμῳδεῖν Cf. Crat. 396 D, Apol. 39 C, Laws 712 A.
4 Cf. on 584 A, p. 384, note a.
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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