temptations of power, and therefore he appointed demons
or demi-gods, who are of a superior race, to have dominion over man, as
man has dominion over the animals. They took care of us with great ease
and pleasure to themselves, and no less to us; and the tradition says
that only when God, and not man, is the ruler, can the human race cease
from ill. This was the manner of life which prevailed under Cronos, and
which we must strive to follow so far as the principle of immortality
still abides in us and we live according to law and the dictates of
right reason. But in an oligarchy or democracy, when the governing
principle is athirst for pleasure, the laws are trampled under foot, and
there is no possibility of salvation. Is it not often said that there
are as many forms of laws as there are governments, and that they
have no concern either with any one virtue or with all virtue, but are
relative to the will of the government? Which is as much as to say that
'might makes right.' 'What do you mean?' I mean that governments enact
their own laws, and that every government makes self-preservation its
principal aim. He who transgresses the laws is regarded as an evil-doer,
and punished accordingly. This was one of the unjust principles of
government which we mentioned when speaking of the different claims to
rule. We were agreed that parents should rule their children, the elder
the younger, the noble the ignoble. But there were also several other
principles, and among them Pindar's 'law of violence.' To whom then is
our state to be entrusted? For many a government is only a victorious
faction which has a monopoly of power, and refuses any share to the
conquered, lest when they get into office they should remember their
wrongs. Such governments are not polities, but parties; nor are any laws
good which are made in the interest of particular classes only, and not
of the whole. And in our state I mean to protest against making any
man a ruler because he is rich, or strong, or noble. But those who are
obedient to the laws, and who win the victory of obedience, shall be
promoted to the service of the Gods according to the degree of their
obedience. When I call the ruler the servant or minister of the law,
this is not a mere paradox, but I mean to say that upon a willingness to
obey the law the existence of the state depends. 'Truly, Stranger,
you have a keen vision.' Why, yes; every man when he is old has his
intellectual vision mos