are good."]

[Footnote 4: A euphemism for "a world-wide tyranny."]

7
"When I consider it I can find no means by which we, who hold in such
high honour, or, to speak more correctly, who idolise boundless riches,
can close the door of our souls against those evil spirits which grow up
with them. For Wealth unmeasured and unbridled is dogged by
Extravagance: she sticks close to him, and treads in his footsteps: and
as soon as he opens the gates of cities or of houses she enters with him
and makes her abode with him. And after a time they build their nests
(to use a wise man's words[5]) in that corner of life, and speedily set
about breeding, and beget Boastfulness, and Vanity, and Wantonness, no
base-born children, but their very own. And if these also, the offspring
of Wealth, be allowed to come to their prime, quickly they engender in
the soul those pitiless tyrants, Violence, and Lawlessness, and
Shamelessness.

[Footnote 5: Plato, _Rep._ ix. 573, E.]

8
"Whenever a man takes to worshipping what is mortal and irrational[6] in
him, and neglects to cherish what is immortal, these are the inevitable
results. He never looks up again; he has lost all care for good report;
by slow degrees the ruin of his life goes on, until it is consummated
all round; all that is great in his soul fades, withers away, and is
despised.

[Footnote 6: Reading +kanoeta+.]

9
"If a judge who passes sentence for a bribe can never more give a free
and sound decision on a point of justice or honour (for to him who takes
a bribe honour and justice must be measured by his own interests), how
can we of to-day expect, when the whole life of each one of us is
controlled by bribery, while we lie in wait for other men's death and
plan how to get a place in their wills, when we buy gain, from whatever
source, each one of us, with our very souls in our slavish greed, how, I
say, can we expect, in the midst of such a moral pestilence, that there
is still left even one liberal and impartial critic, whose verdict will
not be biassed by avarice in judging of those great works which live on
through all time?

10
"Alas! I fear that for such men as we are it is better to serve than to
be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether against our
neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and bring a deluge
of calamity on the whole civilised world."

11
I ended by remarking generally that the genius of the present age is
wasted