| Plato, Laws (English) (XML Header) [genre: prose] [word count] [lemma count] [Pl. Leg.]. | ||
| <<Pl. Leg. 757e | Pl. Leg. 760a (Greek) | >>Pl. Leg. 762b |
759bshould not be disturbed; but if,—as is likely to be the case in such matters with a people who are being organized for the first time,—few or none have them already established, then we must establish priests and priestesses to be temple-keepers for the gods. In establishing all these offices, we must make the appointments partly by election and partly by lot, note mingling democratic with non-democratic methods, to secure mutual friendliness, in every rural and urban district, so that all may be as unanimous as possible. note As to the priests,
759cwe shall entrust it to the god himself to ensure his own good pleasure, by committing their appointment to the divine chance of the lot; but each person who gains the lot we shall test, first, as to whether he is sound and true-born, and secondly, as to whether he comes from houses that are as pure as possible, being himself clean from murder and all such offences against religion, and of parents that have lived by the same rule. They ought to bring from Delphi laws about all matters of religion, and appoint interpreters note thereof, and make use of those laws.
759dEach priestly office should last for one year and no longer; and the person who is to officiate in sacred matters efficiently according to the laws of religion should be not less than sixty years old: and the same rules shall hold good also for priestesses. For the interpreters the tribes shall vote four at a time, by three votings, for four men, one from each tribe; note and when the three men for whom most votes are cast have been tested, they shall send the other nine to Delphi for the oracle to select one from each triad;
759eand the rules as to their age and testing shall be the same as for the priests. These men shall hold office for life as interpreters; and when one falls out, the four tribes note shall elect a substitute from the tribe he belonged to. As treasurers to control the sacred funds in each of the temples, and the sacred glebes, with their produce
760aand their rents, we must choose from the highest property-classes three men for the largest temples, two for the smaller, and one for the least extensive; and the method of selecting and testing these shall be the same as that adopted in the case of the commanders. Such shall be the regulations concerning matters of religion. Nothing, so far as possible, shall be left unguarded. As regards the city, the task of guarding shall be in charge of the commanders, taxiarchs, hipparchs, phylarchs and prytaneis, and also
760bof the city-stewards and market-stewards, wherever we have such officials properly selected and appointed. All the rest of the country must be guarded in the following manner: we have marked out the whole country as nearly as possible into twelve equal portions: to each portion one tribe shall be assigned by lot, and it shall provide five men to act as land-stewards and phrourarchs (“watch-captains”); it shall be the duty of each of the Five to select twelve
760cyoung men from his own tribe of an age neither under 25 nor over 30. To these groups of twelve the twelve portions of the country shall be assigned, one to each in rotation for a month at a time, so that all of them may gain experience and knowledge of all parts of the country. The period of office and of service for guards and officers shall be two years. From the portion in which they are stationed first by the lot they shall pass on month by month to the next district, under the leadership of the phrourarchs, in a direction from left to right,—
760dand that will be from west to east. When the first year is completed, in order that as many as possible of the guards may not only become familiar with the country in one season of the year, but may also learn about what occurs in each several district at different seasons, their leaders shall lead them back again in the reverse direction, constantly
760echanging their district, until they have completed their second year of service. For the third year they must elect other land-stewards and phrourarchs. During their periods of residence in each district their duties shall be as follows: first, in order to ensure that the country shall be fenced as well as possible against enemies, they shall make channels wherever needed, and dig moats and build crosswalls, so as to keep out to the best of their power those who attempt in any way to damage the country
761aand its wealth; and for these purposes they shall make use of the beasts of burden and the servants in each district, employing the former and supervising the latter, and choosing always, so far as possible, the times when these people are free from their own business. In all respects they must make movement as difficult as possible for enemies, but for friends—whether men, mules or cattle—as easy as possible, by attending to the roads, that they all may become as level as possible, and to the rain-waters, that they may benefit instead of injuring the country, as they flow down from the heights into all the
761bhollow valleys in the mountains: they shall dam the outflows of their flooded dales by means of walls and channels, so that by storing up or absorbing the rains from heaven, and by forming pools or springs in all the low-lying fields and districts, they may cause even the driest spots to be abundantly supplied with good water. As to spring-waters, be they streams or fountains, they shall beautify and embellish them by means of plantations and buildings,
| Plato, Laws (English) (XML Header) [genre: prose] [word count] [lemma count] [Pl. Leg.]. | ||
| <<Pl. Leg. 757e | Pl. Leg. 760a (Greek) | >>Pl. Leg. 762b |
