hms. 'But is this the
practice elsewhere than in Crete and Lacedaemon? In other states, as far
as I know, dances and music are constantly changed at the pleasure of
the hearers.' I am afraid that I misled you; not liking to be always
finding fault with mankind as they are, I described them as they ought
to be. But let me understand: you say that such customs exist among
the Cretans and Lacedaemonians, and that the rest of the world would be
improved by adopting them? 'Much improved.' And you compel your poets to
declare that the righteous are happy, and that the wicked man, even if
he be as rich as Midas, is unhappy? Or, in the words of Tyrtaeus,
'I sing not, I care not about him' who is a great warrior not having
justice; if he be unjust, 'I would not have him look calmly upon death
or be swifter than the wind'; and may he be deprived of every good--that
is, of every true good. For even if he have the goods which men regard,
these are not really goods: first health; beauty next; thirdly wealth;
and there are others. A man may have every sense purged and improved; he
may be a tyrant, and do what he likes, and live for ever: but you and
I will maintain that all these things are goods to the just, but to the
unjust the greatest of evils, if life be immortal; not so great if he
live for a short time only. If a man had health and wealth, and power,
and was insolent and unjust, his life would still be miserable; he might
be fair and rich, and do what he liked, but he would live basely, and if
basely evilly, and if evilly painfully. 'There I cannot agree with you.'
Then may heaven give us the spirit of agreement, for I am as convinced
of the truth of what I say as that Crete is an island; and, if I were
a lawgiver, I would exercise a censorship over the poets, and I would
punish them if they said that the wicked are happy, or that injustice is
profitable. And these are not the only matters in which I should make
my citizens talk in a different way to the world in general. If I asked
Zeus and Apollo, the divine legislators of Crete and Sparta,--'Are
the just and pleasant life the same or not the same'?--and they
replied,--'Not the same'; and I asked again--'Which is the happier'? And
they said'--'The pleasant life,' this is an answer not fit for a God
to utter, and therefore I ought rather to put the same question to some
legislator. And if he replies 'The pleasant,' then I should say to
him, 'O my father, did you not tell me th