Greek Texts & Translations

You say well, Stranger; but explain to us yet more clearly the purport of your last observation.

O Clinias, many of the sayings of old time have been nobly uttered, and of these not the least, I may say, are the titles given to the Fates.

What titles, pray?

That the first of them is Lachesis, the second Clotho, and Atropos the savior-third ^note—she that bestows on the dooms ratified by Clotho the quality of irreversibility. 960dShe it is that must furnish also to the State and its citizens, not merely health and salvation for their bodies, but also right legality in their souls, or rather the salvation of the laws. And this, as it seems clear to me, is what our laws still lack—namely, a right mode of naturally implanting in them this irreversible quality.

The point you mention is a serious one, if it is really impossible to discover a means whereby everything may acquire some such quality. 960e

Nay, but it is possible, as I now perceive quite clearly.

Then let us by no means desist until we have secured this very quality for the laws we have stated; for it would be ridiculous for us to have wasted all this labor on an object, and then not base it on any firm foundation.

You are right in your exhortation, and you will find me as ready as yourself to proceed.

Very good. Then what is it you say will prove a means of salvation to our polity and its laws, and how will it do so? 961a

Did we not say ^note that we must have in our State a synod of the following kind:—The ten senior members, at the moment, of the body of Law-wardens shall form the synod, in company with all who have won the award of merit; and, moreover, those inspectors who have gone abroad ^note to discover if they could hear of anything pertinent to the safekeeping of laws, and who, in the belief that they have succeeded, have come safely home again, shall, after undergoing a searching test, be deemed worthy to take part in the synod? In addition to these, 961bevery member must bring with him one of the young men, not less than thirty years old, whom he has first selected as being both by nature and training a suitable person; after selecting him, he shall introduce him among the members, and if they also approve, he shall keep him as a colleague, but if they disapprove, the fact of his original selection must be concealed from all the rest, and especially from the person thus rejected. The synod must meet at an early hour, when everyone has his time most free from other business, private or public. Was it not some such organization as this that we described in 961cour previous discourse?

It was.

Resuming, then, the subject of this synod, I will say this:—If one were to lay this down as an anchor for the whole State, possessing all the requisite conditions,—then, I affirm, it would secure the salvation of all that we desire.

How so?

Now will be the time for us to display no lack of zeal in declaring truly what follows.

Excellently spoken! Proceed as you propose. 961d

One ought to observe, Clinias, in regard to every object, in each of its operations, what constitutes its appropriate savior—as, for example, in an animal, the soul and the head are eminently such by nature.

How do you mean?

Surely it is the goodness of those parts that provides salvation to every animal.

How?

By the existence of reason in the soul, in addition to all its other qualities, and by the existence of sight and hearing, in addition to all else, in the head; thus, to summarize the matter, it is the combination of reason with the finest senses, and their union in one, that would most justly be termed the salvation of each animal.

That is certainly probable. 961e

It is probable. But what kind of reason is it which, when combined with senses, will afford salvation to ships in stormy weather and calm? On shipboard is it not the pilot and the sailors who, by combining the senses with the pilot reason, secure salvation both for themselves and for all that belongs to the ship?

Of course.

There is no need of many examples to illustrate this. Consider, for instance, what would be the right mark for a general to set up to shoot at in the case of an army, or the medical profession in the case of a human body, if they were aiming