are to be alike common
to all, where will be the difference between them and the military, or
what would they get by submitting to their government? and upon what
principles would they do it, unless they should establish the wise
practice of the Cretans? for they, allowing everything else to their
slaves, forbid them only gymnastic exercises and the use of arms. And if
they are not, but these should be in the same situation with respect to
their property which they are in other cities, what sort of a community
will there be? in one city there must of necessity be two, and those
contrary to each other; for he makes the military the guardians of the
state, and the husbandman, artisans, and others, citizens; and all those
quarrels, accusations, and things of the like sort, which he says are
the bane of other cities, will be found in his also: notwithstanding
Socrates says they will not want many laws in consequence of their
education, but such only as may be necessary for regulating the streets,
the markets, and the like, while at the same time it is the education of
the military only that he has taken any care of. Besides, he makes the
husbandmen masters of property upon paying a tribute; but this would
be likely to make them far more troublesome and high-spirited than the
Helots, the Penestise, or the slaves which others employ; nor has he
ever determined whether it is necessary to give any attention to them
in these particulars, nor thought of what is connected therewith,
their polity, their education, their laws; besides, it is of no little
consequence, nor is it easy to determine, how these should be framed so
as to preserve the community of the military.

Besides, if he makes the wives common, while the property [1264b]
continues separate, who shall manage the domestic concerns with the same
care which the man bestows upon his fields? nor will the inconvenience
be remedied by making property as well as wives common; and it is absurd
to draw a comparison from the brute creation, and say, that the same
principle should regulate the connection of a man and a woman which
regulates theirs amongst whom there is no family association.

It is also very hazardous to settle the magistracy as Socrates has
done; for he would have persons of the same rank always in office, which
becomes the cause of sedition even amongst those who are of no account,
but more particularly amongst those who are of a courageous and warlike
disposi