e prime object of the truly good citizen, I do
not see that in these respects they were a whit superior to our present
statesmen, although I do admit that they were more clever at providing
ships and walls and docks, and all that. You and I have a ridiculous
way, for during the whole time that we are arguing, we are always going
round and round to the same point, and constantly misunderstanding one
another. If I am not mistaken, you have admitted and acknowledged more
than once, that there are two kinds of operations which have to do with
the body, and two which have to do with the soul: one of the two is
ministerial, and if our bodies are hungry provides food for them, and
if they are thirsty gives them drink, or if they are cold supplies them
with garments, blankets, shoes, and all that they crave. I use the same
images as before intentionally, in order that you may understand me the
better. The purveyor of the articles may provide them either wholesale
or retail, or he may be the maker of any of them,--the baker, or the
cook, or the weaver, or the shoemaker, or the currier; and in so doing,
being such as he is, he is naturally supposed by himself and every one
to minister to the body. For none of them know that there is another
art--an art of gymnastic and medicine which is the true minister of the
body, and ought to be the mistress of all the rest, and to use their
results according to the knowledge which she has and they have not, of
the real good or bad effects of meats and drinks on the body. All
other arts which have to do with the body are servile and menial and
illiberal; and gymnastic and medicine are, as they ought to be, their
mistresses. Now, when I say that all this is equally true of the soul,
you seem at first to know and understand and assent to my words, and
then a little while afterwards you come repeating, Has not the State
had good and noble citizens? and when I ask you who they are, you reply,
seemingly quite in earnest, as if I had asked, Who are or have been
good trainers?--and you had replied, Thearion, the baker, Mithoecus,
who wrote the Sicilian cookery-book, Sarambus, the vintner: these are
ministers of the body, first-rate in their art; for the first makes
admirable loaves, the second excellent dishes, and the third capital
wine;--to me these appear to be the exact parallel of the statesmen whom
you mention. Now you would not be altogether pleased if I said to
you, My friend, you know nothing