e knees of Necessity, and a Siren
stood hymning upon each circle, while Lachesis, Clotho, and Atropos, the
daughters of Necessity, sat on thrones at equal intervals, singing of
past, present, and future, responsive to the music of the Sirens; Clotho
from time to time guiding the outer circle with a touch of her right
hand; Atropos with her left hand touching and guiding the inner circles;
Lachesis in turn putting forth her hand from time to time to guide both
of them. On their arrival the pilgrims went to Lachesis, and there was
an interpreter who arranged them, and taking from her knees lots, and
samples of lives, got up into a pulpit and said: 'Mortal souls, hear
the words of Lachesis, the daughter of Necessity. A new period of
mortal life has begun, and you may choose what divinity you please;
the responsibility of choosing is with you--God is blameless.' After
speaking thus, he cast the lots among them and each one took up the
lot which fell near him. He then placed on the ground before them the
samples of lives, many more than the souls present; and there were all
sorts of lives, of men and of animals. There were tyrannies ending in
misery and exile, and lives of men and women famous for their different
qualities; and also mixed lives, made up of wealth and poverty,
sickness and health. Here, Glaucon, is the great risk of human life, and
therefore the whole of education should be directed to the acquisition
of such a knowledge as will teach a man to refuse the evil and choose
the good. He should know all the combinations which occur in life--of
beauty with poverty or with wealth,--of knowledge with external
goods,--and at last choose with reference to the nature of the soul,
regarding that only as the better life which makes men better, and
leaving the rest. And a man must take with him an iron sense of truth
and right into the world below, that there too he may remain undazzled
by wealth or the allurements of evil, and be determined to avoid the
extremes and choose the mean. For this, as the messenger reported the
interpreter to have said, is the true happiness of man; and any one, as
he proclaimed, may, if he choose with understanding, have a good lot,
even though he come last. 'Let not the first be careless in his choice,
nor the last despair.' He spoke; and when he had spoken, he who had
drawn the first lot chose a tyranny: he did not see that he was fated to
devour his own children--and when he discovered his mi