Chapter 17 Volume 9-2

Su: The righteous have defeated the unjust in two consecutive confrontations, and now it is the third confrontation.This time, according to the practice of the Olympia Games, the blessing of Zeus of Olympia was called upon.Please note, I seem to have heard a wise person say: Except for a wise person, the happiness of anyone else is not real and pure, but just a kind of image of happiness!If it fails this time, it will be the biggest and most decisive failure! G: That's right.But I have to ask you to explain. SOCRATES: If you will answer my questions while I am searching, I will explain.

G: Just ask. SOCRATES: Then tell me: don't we say that pain is the opposite of pleasure? G: Of course. SOCRATES: Isn't there a state in which one feels neither pleasure nor pain? Grid: Yes. SOCRATES: Isn't this a state in between, an intermediate state where both sides of the soul are at peace?Is this your understanding? G: That's right. SUE: Do you remember what people said when they were sick? G: What are you talking about? SOCRATES: They say that there is no greater happiness than health, though they did not feel that it was the greatest happiness before their illness.

G: I remember. SOCRATES: Have you ever heard it from someone in extreme pain?They will say that there is no greater joy than the cessation of pain.right? G: I heard it. SOCRATES: I think you must have noticed that, in many such cases, people, when suffering, extol the highest pleasure in being free from and being free from pain.This highest happiness is not meant to be enjoyed positively. Greg: Yes.Note that in this case peace may become happy or lovely. SOCRATES: Likewise, when one ceases to be happy, this peace of happiness can also be painful. G: Maybe. SOCRATES: Therefore, the peace we just said is an intermediate state between the two can sometimes be both painful and happy.

G: It seems so. SOCRATES: Can what is neither really be both? G: I don't think so. S: Pleasure and pain are both movements in the mind.right? Greg: Right. Su: Didn't we explain it just now?Being neither painful nor happy is a peace of mind, an intermediate state between the two.Yeah? Greg: Yes. SOCRATES: So how can it be true that the absence of pain is pleasure, and the absence of pleasure is pain? G: It can never be right. SOCRATES: Pleasure contrasted with pain and pain contrasted with pleasure are both peace, not real pleasure and pain, but only seeming pleasure or pain.These happy images have nothing to do with real happiness, they are just a deception.

G: Arguments can show it anyway. SOCRATES: So, please look at the kind of happiness that is not after pain, and you can really make a clean break with the following idea that still haunts you: In essence, pleasure is the cessation of pain, and pain is the cessation of pleasure. G: Where are you telling me to look, what kind of happiness are you talking about? SOCRATES: There are many such pleasures, especially those connected with the sense of smell, if you take pleasure in noticing them.Such pleasures, which are painless at first, appear suddenly and are intense at once; and they leave no pain after their cessation.

Grid: Exactly. SOCRATES: So let us not believe the saying that freedom from pain is real happiness, and that the absence of pleasure is real pain. G: Yeah, don't believe that. S: However, most of the so-called greatest pleasures that are conveyed to the mind through the body belong to this category, and are in a certain sense free from pain. ①For example, the pleasure of eating comes first with the pain of hunger. Greg: Yes. SOCRATES: Aren't the pleasures and pains that precede this kind of pain and pleasure also of the same kind because of the anticipation of them? G: This is the category.

SOCRATES: And do you know what they are like, and what do they resemble most? G: What? Su: Do you think that there are three levels of nature, upper, lower, and middle? Greg: Yes. Su: So when a person ascends from the bottom to the middle, wouldn't he think that he has already ascended to the top?When he stood in the middle and looked down where he came from, wouldn't he think he was already up because he had never seen the real up? G: I don't think he could have thought otherwise. Su: If he goes down again, he will think that he is going down. Isn't his thinking right?

G: Of course you are. S: Didn't all this happen to him because he had no real experience of the upper, middle, and lower? G: Obviously yes. SOCRATES: Then people who have not experienced reality should be incorrect about pleasure, pain, and states in between, just as they are about many other things.So when they encounter pain, they think they are in pain, that their pain is real.They will be convinced that transitioning from pain to an in-between state can bring fulfillment and happiness.In fact, since they have never experienced true pleasure, they mistakenly compare pain with no pain.As someone who has never seen white compares gray to black.Do you think this phenomenon is strange?

G: No, I don't think it's weird.If this were not the case, I would be rather surprised. SOCRATES: Let us consider the question again as follows.Isn't hunger, thirst, etc. a kind of vacancy in the normal state of the body? G: Of course it is. SOCRATES: Aren't ignorance and ignorance also a kind of vacancy in the normal state of mind? G: Exactly. Su: After eating and acquiring knowledge, wouldn’t the gaps in body and mind be filled? G: Of course it will be enriched. Su: Which of the two kinds of enrichment is the more real enrichment, the enrichment with the less real and the enrichment with the more real?

G: Obviously the latter. SOCRATES: A category of things such as rice, meat, drink, food in general.The other class of things is true opinion, knowledge, reason, and all that is virtuous.Which of these two kinds of things do you think has more pure reality?In other words, there is a close connection between an ever-changing and indestructible real, which itself has this nature and is produced in things that have this nature, and another thing, an ever-changing possibility. The annihilating itself has this nature and is a thing produced in a thing that has this nature—which of these two things do you think has more pure reality?

G: Something that never changes is much more real. SOCRATES: Is the reality of the eternal and unchanging things greater than their intelligibility? G: Absolutely not. Sue: What about authenticity? G: Neither. Su: Is being relatively unreal also being relatively unreal? G: Certainly. SOCRATES: So generally speaking, the kind of things that guarantee the needs of the body are not as real and substantial as those that guarantee the needs of the soul. G: Much worse! S: Then, do you think that the body itself is also less real and substantial than the mind itself? G: I think so. SOCRATES: Then, the more real the thing to be filled and the thing to be filled is, the greater the reality of the fullness will be, isn't it? G: Of course it is. SOCRATES: If, therefore, we are happy when we are filled with what is proper to nature, then the more real is the thing which is filled and with which it is filled, the more real is our happiness; and vice versa. , if we are relatively lacking in reality, we will be less able to obtain real and reliable fulfillment, and we will be less able to feel reliable and real happiness. G: There is no doubt about it. SOCRATES: Therefore, those who have no experience of wisdom and virtue, only know how to gather together to have fun, and spend their lives going back and forth between the middle and lower levels that we have compared, never climbing up again, seeing and reaching the real highest level. state, or be satisfied with any reality, or experience any reliable pure happiness.They looked down at the feast with their heads down, just like cattle bowing their heads to the pasture and only know how to eat grass, and the male and female mate.In vain do they try to satisfy that unreal, insatiable part of the soul with these unreal things.Unsatisfied, they killed each other with iron weapons, just as cattle kicked and bumped each other with horns and hooves. G: Socrates, your description of the lives of the people is exactly like an oracle. SOCRATES: Is not the happiness of such a man necessarily mixed with pain, and therefore only a shadow and a portrait of real happiness?Pleasure, by contrast, seems strong on the surface, and arouses mad desires in the hearts of fools, and drives them to struggle for it, as Stacyhorus says, the heroes at Troy for the phantom of Helen. And fighting is the same.All because of ignorance of the truth.Is that right? ① According to the legend of Stsihorus, the real Helen remained in Egypt, and only her phantom was brought to Troy. G: That must be the way it is. SUE: What do you think about the passion part?Isn't it necessarily the same? If a man pursues honor, victory, or pride without thought or reason, then his love of honor, victory, and satisfaction of pride can lead to jealousy, compulsion, and indignation.isn't it? G: The same thing inevitably happens on this occasion. SOCRATES: We can therefore safely conclude that if the desires of love of profit and love of victory follow the guidance of knowledge and reason, and choose and pursue only those pleasures to which wisdom points, they will obtain as much pleasure as they can and, being guided by truth, are their own inherent pleasures, if the best of anything may be said to be most of itself.Can we say that? G: Indeed, the most inherent in oneself. SOCRATES: If, therefore, the mind as a whole follows the guidance of its loving and intellectual parts, and has no dissension within it, each part will be just, enjoying its own peculiar pleasure while the others play their part, Enjoying the best and truest happiness within their respective spheres. G: Absolutely. SOCRATES: If it is guided by one of the other two parts, it will not be able to obtain its own inherent happiness, but will force the other two parts to pursue a false happiness that is not their own. Greg: Yes. SOCRATES: Wouldn't this effect be most pronounced in the part that is furthest from philosophy and reasoning? G: Exactly. SOCRATES: Isn't the furthest from theory the furthest from law and order? G: Obviously yes. SOCRATES: Haven't we seen that the furthest from law and order is the desire of love and the desire of tyrants? G: Exactly. SOCRATES: The orderly desire of kings is the closest, is it not? Greg: Yes. SOCRATES: Therefore, I think that tyrants are farthest from true inherent happiness, and kings are closest to it. G: Certainly. SOCRATES: So tyrants and tyrants live the most unhappy lives, and kings live the happiest lives. G: Absolutely. SOCRATES: Do you know, then, that the life of a tyrant is much less joyful than that of a king? G: You tell me, and I'll know. Su: It seems that there are three types of happiness, one is true and the other is false.The tyrant surpasses both classes of false pleasure in distance from law and reason, and is surrounded by the hired pleasure of a certain slavery.Its vileness is not easy to express, except perhaps... G: How? SOCRATES: The tyrant is a third level below the oligarchs, because there is a democrat in between. Greg: Yes. SOCRATES: If what we have said above is true, then the happiness he enjoys is but an illusion of happiness, and its reality is far below that illusion.isn't it? G: That's right. SOCRATES: Again, the oligarchs are still in the third rank below the kings, if we assume that the aristocrats and the kings are the same thing. G: It's the third level below. SOCRATES: So the distance between the tyrant and true happiness is three times three and nine, expressed in numbers. G: It's obvious. SOCRATES: Therefore the figure of the phantom of the tyrant's pleasure is a planar number as seen from its length. G: Absolutely. Su: However, once it is squared and then cubed, it is very clear how the difference becomes. G: That's pretty clear for a mathematician. Su: In other words, if someone wants to express the difference in true happiness between a king and a tyrant, he will find that the life of a king is 729 times happier than that of a tyrant after he has done the cubic calculation. The king's life is 729 times more painful. G: It's a magic algorithm that shows how big the gap between the just and the unjust is in terms of pleasure and pain. SOCRATES: Besides, this is a correct number for human life, since day, night, month and year are suitable for human life. ①The exact meaning of this statement is not clear.But the Pythagorean Philolaus argued that there are 364 (1/2) days in a year and probably the same number of nights; 364 (1/2) x 2 = 729.Fellowaus also believed in a "great year" of 729 months.Plato may not be entirely true, but this numerical formula has always had a certain fascination for him, as it did for many Greeks. G: Of course it is. SOCRATES: If the good and the just outnumber the evil and the unjust by so many in pleasure, must they not be innumerable in manners, in the beauty of life, and in virtue? G: Really, more than countless. Su: Very good.We have now reached this point in our argument.Let us return once again to the statement that provoked our discussion and carried us here.This statement is: "Injustice benefits a man who acts utterly unjustly and yet has the name of justice." Is that what it says? G: That's what I said. SOCRATES: Now that we have agreed on the respective effects of acts of justice and of acts of injustice, let us now discuss with the author of this statement. G: How to discuss it? SOCRATES: Let us create a statue of a person's mind in the discussion, so that the person who made this statement can clearly see the meaning of this statement. G: What kind of statue? SOCRATES: A statue born with multiple natures, as the ancient legends say, like Chimera or Scylla or Kerberos, or other monsters that are said to have many shapes growing together. ① Kemera XιμαC′ρα is a monster with the head of a lion, the body of a sheep, and the body of a snake, which can breathe fire.See Homer's epic "Iliad" vi179-182; Plato's "Phaedro" chapter 229D.Scylla EGH'AAη is a sea monster.See epic "Odyssey" xii85 below.Kerberos KD′ρβJρB, a dog that guards the underworld, with a snake tail, has three heads, and it is said that it has fifty heads.See Hesiod's Theogony 311-31── Ge: There is such a legend. SOCRATES: Imagine a very complex multi-headed beast.It has the head of a wild beast and the head of a tame beast.The head can also be changed at will and grow out at will. G: Making such a statue is something that only skilled craftsmen can do.But since speech is a more easily moldable material than wax, we shall suppose that the image of the monster is already so molded. Su: Then create a lion-shaped image and a human-shaped image, and make the first image the largest, and the lion image as the second to make the second largest. G: It's easier, just say a word. SOCRATES: And then combine the three images into one, as if growing together in some kind of monster. Greg: It's done. Su: And then make a human-shaped shell for this combination, so that other people's eyes cannot see anything inside, as if it is purely a person's image. G: It's also finished. SOCRATES: Let us then say to the man who asserts that it is to the advantage of the agent to act unjustly, and to the disadvantage of the agent to act justly: he is tantamount to arguing that the indulgence and strengthening of the hydra and the lion and all lions, But it is good for man to suffer hunger and thirst until he is so weak that the two can do to him as he pleases without scruple.In other words, he is tantamount to advocating that people should not try to mediate the disputes between two spirits so that they can live in harmony, but should allow them to annex and kill each other and die together. G: That's what it means to be in favor of injustice. Su: On the contrary, those who advocate the theory of justice and benefit believe that all our actions and speeches should be for the purpose of allowing our inner humanity to completely dominate the whole human being, manage that monster with many heads, like a farmer who cultivates and waters domesticated seedlings while hoeing Like weeds.He also needs to turn the lion nature into his ally, take care of everyone's interests without discrimination, and make the various components live in harmony, thereby promoting their growth.Is that right? G: Yes, that's exactly what the proponents of justice favor mean. Su: Therefore, no matter what angle you start from, the conclusion is that those who advocate justice is beneficial are right, and those who advocate injustice are wrong.For, whether pleasure, honor, or profit is considered, the argument of those who advocate justice is right, while those who oppose it have no reason, and have no real knowledge of what they oppose. G: I think exactly so. SOCRATES: Shall we then persuade our opponents with kindness?Because he didn't mean to make mistakes.We shall ask him in the following words: "My dear friend, shall we not say that what law and custom deem beautiful or ugly have been reckoned beautiful and ugly, also for the same reason: The so-called beautiful and honorable things are those which make the animal part of our nature subject to the human (or, rather, divine) part of our nature; The tame part enslaved to the wild part? "Are we going to ask him that? Will he agree? G: If he takes my advice, he can be persuaded. SOCRATES: What good does it do a man if he accepts money unjustly in this way, if he enslaves the best part of himself in the enslavement of the worst part?In other words, if a man sells his son or daughter as a slave to a severe and wicked master, no matter how much he gets, no one can say that it is to his advantage.Yeah?If a man has the heart to enslave the most holy part of himself to the most unholy and most abominable part, it is not a lamentable bribery, a consequence more terrible than the sale of his husband's life for a necklace. thing? ①The wife of Amphilaus accepted the bribe of Polynices and sent her husband to participate in the death-defying campaign of the seven generals against Thebes. G: If I could answer for him, I'd say it's pretty scary. S: Don't you think that indulgence is so often condemned because it gives too much freedom to the polymorph within us? G: Obviously yes. SOCRATES: Isn't stubbornness and irascibility condemned because it increases and strengthens to too great a degree the power of the lion or dragon within us? G: Definitely. SOCRATES: In the same way, luxury and weakness are condemned, because they lessen and weaken the lion until it becomes lazy and cowardly? G: Of course it is. SOCRATES: When a man subjects his lion nature, which is his passion, to the ferocity of a mob, and for the sake of money and uncontrollable animal desires, forces the lion to endure every kind of insult that he has learned from childhood, and grows up to be a monkey rather than a lion.At this time, don't people want to accuse this person of being flattering and despicable? Greg: Indeed. Su: Handicrafts are despised by others, why do you think this is?Shall we not reply that it is because the best part of a man is inherently weak, unable to manage and control the many beasts within, but to serve them and learn how to please them? G: It seems so. SOCRATES: We therefore say that such a man should be the slave of a best man (that is to say, a man who has a divine government within himself), not in order that he may have the same management as a best man. ?We say this not because we think that slaves ought (as Thrasymachus did to the governed) to be governed or governed injuriously to themselves, but because it is more desirable for all to be governed by a divinely wise man. kind.Of course, wisdom and control management had better come from within oneself, otherwise it had to be imposed from the outside.The purpose is to allow everyone to become friends and equals under the same guidance. right? G: Exactly. Su: It is also very clear that the purpose of enacting the law as an ally of all citizens of Chengbang is here.We discipline children and do not set them free until we have established in them what is called constitutional regulation.We do not let it be free until we have, with the help of the best in our own minds, brought up in their minds the best parts, and made them guardians and rulers of children's minds. — That's why we do this. G: Yes, that is very clear. SOCRATES: So, Glaucon, what method can we use to argue that to be an unjust self-indulgent person, or to make himself worse by doing anything despicable to gain more money and power, is What is beneficial? G: Can't prove it. SOCRATES: What good does it do a man to do evil without being found out and thus escape punishment?Didn't he get away with it and only get worse?If he was caught and punished, wouldn't his bestial part be subdued and domesticated?Isn't his human part set free?Has not his whole soul, in establishing the best part of its nature, acquired temperance and justice (together with wisdom), and thus attained a rare state?Although the human body can reach a valuable state when it has acquired strength and beauty (combined with health), this state of the mind is much more precious than that of the body, just as The mind is much more valuable than the body.Yeah? Grid: Exactly. SOCRATES: Therefore a reasonable man will make every effort to this end throughout his life; he will first of all value those studies which will cultivate this quality in his mind, and despise others.Yeah? G: Obviously yes. Su: Secondly, in terms of physical habits and exercise, not only will he not allow himself to covet irrational and barbaric pleasures, and put his life interest in this aspect, he will not even take physical health as his main goal, and seek The methods of strength, health, or beauty are placed first, unless these things are conducive to the spirit of self-control.He will be found to be attuning his body to the harmony of his mind at all times. G: If he's going to be a real musician, he must be. SOCRATES: In the pursuit of wealth, will he not be equally mindful of the principles of harmony and order? Will he be carried away by the flattery of the crowd and amass a wealth to his own detriment? G: I think he won't. SOCRATES: He will tend to look at the constitution in his mind, guarding it, and preventing any disturbance caused by excess or deficiency of wealth.Therefore, according to this principle, he will add or disperse a little bit of his own wealth as much as possible in order to maintain normality. G: Exactly. SOCRATES: In honors, he follows the same principle: whatever honors can make him better, he accepts them with joy.He shunned honor, both public and private, if it threatened to break his established habits. G: If that's what he's most concerned about, then he won't be willing to get involved in politics. SOCRATES: Seriously, in a desirable city-state he would certainly be willing to participate in politics. But in the city-state of his birth he would not, barring a miracle. G: I know that by the desired city-state you mean the city-state we have established in theory, the ideal city-state.But I think this kind of city-state cannot be found on earth. SOCRATES: Perhaps there is a prototype of it built in the sky, so that anyone who wishes to see it can see himself settled there.It doesn't matter whether it exists now or will exist in the future.In any case, he can participate in politics only in such a city-state, and not in any other country. G: It seems so.