ders the state will desire what is
possible, and will not indulge in vain wishes or attempts to accomplish
that which is impossible. The citizen must indeed be happy and good, and
the legislator will seek to make him so; but very rich and very good
at the same time he cannot be, not, at least, in the sense in which the
many speak of riches. For they mean by 'the rich' the few who have the
most valuable possessions, although the owner of them may quite well be
a rogue. And if this is true, I can never assent to the doctrine that
the rich man will be happy--he must be good as well as rich. And good in
a high degree, and rich in a high degree at the same time, he cannot be.
Some one will ask, why not? And we shall answer--Because acquisitions
which come from sources which are just and unjust indifferently, are
more than double those which come from just sources only; and the sums
which are expended neither honourably nor disgracefully, are only
half as great as those which are expended honourably and on honourable
purposes. Thus, if the one acquires double and spends half, the other
who is in the opposite case and is a good man cannot possibly be
wealthier than he. The first--I am speaking of the saver and not of the
spender--is not always bad; he may indeed in some cases be utterly bad,
but, as I was saying, a good man he never is. For he who receives money
unjustly as well as justly, and spends neither nor unjustly, will be a
rich man if he be also thrifty. On the other hand, the utterly bad is
in general profligate, and therefore very poor; while he who spends on
noble objects, and acquires wealth by just means only, can hardly be
remarkable for riches, any more than he can be very poor. Our statement,
then, is true, that the very rich are not good, and, if they are not
good, they are not happy. But the intention of our laws was, that the
citizens should be as happy as may be, and as friendly as possible to
one another. And men who are always at law with one another, and amongst
whom there are many wrongs done, can never be friends to one another,
but only those among whom crimes and lawsuits are few and slight.
Therefore we say that gold and silver ought not to be allowed in the
city, nor much of the vulgar sort of trade which is carried on by
lending money, or rearing the meaner kinds of live stock; but only the
produce of agriculture, and only so much of this as will not compel us
in pursuing it to neglect that for the