ut the other virtues in the soul, is worth
anything or nothing? 'I cannot tell.' You have answered well. It would
be absurd to speak of temperance as belonging to the class of honourable
or of dishonourable qualities, because all other virtues in their
various classes require temperance to be added to them; having the
addition, they are honoured not in proportion to that, but to their own
excellence. And ought not the legislator to determine these classes?
'Certainly.' Suppose then that, without going into details, we make
three great classes of them. Most honourable are the goods of the soul,
always assuming temperance as a condition of them; secondly, those of
the body; thirdly, external possessions. The legislator who puts them in
another order is doing an unholy and unpatriotic thing.

These remarks were suggested by the history of the Persian kings; and to
them I will now return. The ruin of their empire was caused by the
loss of freedom and the growth of despotism; all community of feeling
disappeared. Hatred and spoliation took the place of friendship; the
people no longer fought heartily for their masters; the rulers, finding
their myriads useless on the field of battle, resorted to mercenaries as
their only salvation, and were thus compelled by their circumstances
to proclaim the stupidest of falsehoods--that virtue is a trifle in
comparison of money.

But enough of the Persians: a different lesson is taught by the
Athenians, whose example shows that a limited freedom is far better than
an unlimited. Ancient Athens, at the time of the Persian invasion,
had such a limited freedom. The people were divided into four classes,
according to the amount of their property, and the universal love of
order, as well as the fear of the approaching host, made them obedient
and willing citizens. For Darius had sent Datis and Artaphernes,
commanding them under pain of death to subjugate the Eretrians and
Athenians. A report, whether true or not, came to Athens that all the
Eretrians had been 'netted'; and the Athenians in terror sent all
over Hellas for assistance. None came to their relief except the
Lacedaemonians, and they arrived a day too late, when the battle of
Marathon had been already fought. In process of time Xerxes came to
the throne, and the Athenians heard of nothing but the bridge over the
Hellespont, and the canal of Athos, and the innumerable host and fleet.
They knew that these were intended to avenge the de