[457a]
applied as we described will effect.”
“Surely.” “Then the institution we proposed is
not only possible but the best for the state.” “That is
so.” “The women of the guardians, then, must strip,
since they will be clothed with virtue as a garment,1 and must take their part with the men in war
and the other duties of civic guardianship and have no other occupation. But
in these very duties lighter tasks must be assigned to the women than to the
men
[457b]
because of their weakness as a
class. But the man who ridicules unclad women, exercising because it is best
that they should, ‘plucks the unripe2 fruit’ of laughter
and does not know, it appears, the end of his laughter nor what he would be
at. For the fairest thing that is said or ever will be said is this, that
the helpful is fair3 and the harmful foul.”
“Assuredly.”“In this matter, then, of the regulation of women, we may say
that we have surmounted one of the waves of our paradox
[457c]
and have not been quite swept4 away by
it in ordaining that our guardians and female guardians must have all
pursuits in common, but that in some sort the argument concurs with itself
in the assurance that what it proposes is both possible and
beneficial.” “It is no slight wave that you are thus
escaping.” “You will not think it a great5 one,” I said, “when you have seen the
one that follows.” “Say on then and show me,”
said he. “This,” said I, “and all that
precedes has for its sequel, in my opinion, the following law.”
“What? “That these women shall all be common6 to all the men,
[457d]
and that none shall cohabit with any
privately; and that the children shall be common, and that no parent shall
know its own offspring nor any child its parent.” “This
is a far bigger paradox than the other, and provokes more distrust as to its
possibility and its utility.7” “I presume,”
said I, “that there would be no debate about its utility, no
denial that the community of women and children would be the greatest good,
supposing it possible. But I take it that its possibility or the contrary
[457e]
would be the chief topic of
contention.” “Both,” he said, “would
be right sharply debated.” “You mean,” said I,
“that I have to meet a coalition of arguments. But I expected to
escape from one of them, and that if you agreed that the thing was
beneficial, it would remain for me to speak only of its
feasibility.” “You have not escaped
detection,” he said, “in your attempted flight, but you
must render an account of both.” “I must pay the
penalty,” I said, “yet do me this much grace:
1 Cf. Rousseau, Lettre à d'Alembert, “Couvertes de l'honnêteté publique.”
2 Cf. Pindar, fr. 209 Schroeder,ἀτελῆ σοφίας καρπὸν δρέπ（ειν). Plato varies the quotation to suit his purpose.
3 This is one of the chief texts for the alleged utilitarianism of Plato, a question too complicated to be settled by anything less than a comparative study of the Protagoras, Gorgias, Phaedo, Philebus, Republic(IX) and Laws.ὠφέλιμον suggests “benefit” rather than “utility.” Cf. Introduction to second volume of this translation, and on 339 A-B.
4 Cf. Aeschylus Septem, in fine.
5 For this form of exaggeration Cf. on 414 C, 339 B.
6 On the whole topic cf. Introduction p. xxxiv, Lucian, Fugitivi 18οὐκ εἰδότες ὅπως ὁ ἱερὸς ἐκεῖνος ἠξίου κοινὰς ἡγεῖσθαι τὰς γυναῖκας, Epictetus fr. 53, p. 21, Rousseau, Emile, v: “je ne parle point de cette prétendue communauté de femmes dont le reproche tant répété prouve que ceux qui le lui font ne l'ont jamais lu.” But Rousseau dissents violently from what he calls “cette promiscuité civile qui confond partout les deux sexes dans les mêmes emplois.” Cf. further the denunciations of the Christian fathers passim, who are outdone by De Quincey's “Otaheitian carnival of licentious appetite, connected with a contempt of human life which is excessive even for paganism.” Most of the obvious parallels between Plato and Aristophanes'Ecclesiazusae follow as a matter of course from the very notion of communal marriage and supply no evidfence for the dating of a supposed earlier edition of the whole or a part of the Republic. In any case the ideas of the Republic might have come to Aristophanes in conversation before publication; and the Greeks knew enough of the facts collected in such books as Westermarck's Marriage, not to be taken altogether by surprise by Plato's speculations. Cf. Herodotus iv. 104, and Aristotle Politics 1262 a 20. Cf. further Adam's exhaustive discussion in the appendix to this book, Grube, “The Marriage Laws in Plato's Republic,”Classical Quarterly, 1927, pp. 95 ff., Teichmüller, Literarische Fehden, i. p. 19 n., and the more recent literature collected in Praechter-Ueberweg, 12th ed. i. p. 207, Pöhlmann, Geschichte der Sozialenfrage und des Sozialsmus in der antiken Welt, ii. p. 578, Pohlenz, Aus Platon's Werdezeit, pp. 225-228, C. Robert, Hermes lvii. pp. 351 ff.
7 A distinct suggestion of the topics of the “useful” and the “possible” in Aristotle's Rhetoric.
Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vols. 5 & 6 translated by Paul Shorey. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1969.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
Purchase a copy of this text (not necessarily the same edition) from Amazon.com
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.