good as you allow, will such a one
have great power in a state?

POLUS: He will not.

SOCRATES: Then I was right in saying that a man may do what seems good
to him in a state, and not have great power, and not do what he wills?

POLUS: As though you, Socrates, would not like to have the power of
doing what seemed good to you in the state, rather than not; you would
not be jealous when you saw any one killing or despoiling or imprisoning
whom he pleased, Oh, no!

SOCRATES: Justly or unjustly, do you mean?

POLUS: In either case is he not equally to be envied?

SOCRATES: Forbear, Polus!

POLUS: Why 'forbear'?

SOCRATES: Because you ought not to envy wretches who are not to be
envied, but only to pity them.

POLUS: And are those of whom I spoke wretches?

SOCRATES: Yes, certainly they are.

POLUS: And so you think that he who slays any one whom he pleases, and
justly slays him, is pitiable and wretched?

SOCRATES: No, I do not say that of him: but neither do I think that he
is to be envied.

POLUS: Were you not saying just now that he is wretched?

SOCRATES: Yes, my friend, if he killed another unjustly, in which case
he is also to be pitied; and he is not to be envied if he killed him
justly.

POLUS: At any rate you will allow that he who is unjustly put to death
is wretched, and to be pitied?

SOCRATES: Not so much, Polus, as he who kills him, and not so much as he
who is justly killed.

POLUS: How can that be, Socrates?

SOCRATES: That may very well be, inasmuch as doing injustice is the
greatest of evils.

POLUS: But is it the greatest? Is not suffering injustice a greater
evil?

SOCRATES: Certainly not.

POLUS: Then would you rather suffer than do injustice?

SOCRATES: I should not like either, but if I must choose between them, I
would rather suffer than do.

POLUS: Then you would not wish to be a tyrant?

SOCRATES: Not if you mean by tyranny what I mean.

POLUS: I mean, as I said before, the power of doing whatever seems good
to you in a state, killing, banishing, doing in all things as you like.

SOCRATES: Well then, illustrious friend, when I have said my say, do you
reply to me. Suppose that I go into a crowded Agora, and take a dagger
under my arm. Polus, I say to you, I have just acquired rare power, and
become a tyrant; for if I think that any of these men whom you see ought
to be put to death, the man whom I have a mind to kill is as good as
dead; and if I am disposed to b