qual, always to honour
inferiors, and with them to form connexions;--this will be for the
benefit of the city and of the families which are united; for the
equable and symmetrical tends infinitely more to virtue than the
unmixed. And he who is conscious of being too headstrong, and carried
away more than is fitting in all his actions, ought to desire to become
the relation of orderly parents; and he who is of the opposite temper
ought to seek the opposite alliance. Let there be one word concerning
all marriages:--Every man shall follow, not after the marriage which is
most pleasing to himself, but after that which is most beneficial to the
state. For somehow every one is by nature prone to that which is likest
to himself, and in this way the whole city becomes unequal in property
and in disposition; and hence there arise in most states the very
results which we least desire to happen. Now, to add to the law an
express provision, not only that the rich man shall not marry into the
rich family, nor the powerful into the family of the powerful, but that
the slower natures shall be compelled to enter into marriage with the
quicker, and the quicker with the slower, may awaken anger as well as
laughter in the minds of many; for there is a difficulty in perceiving
that the city ought to be well mingled like a cup, in which the
maddening wine is hot and fiery, but when chastened by a soberer God,
receives a fair associate and becomes an excellent and temperate drink
(compare Statesman). Yet in marriage no one is able to see that the same
result occurs. Wherefore also the law must let alone such matters, but
we should try to charm the spirits of men into believing the equability
of their children's disposition to be of more importance than equality
in excessive fortune when they marry; and him who is too desirous of
making a rich marriage we should endeavour to turn aside by reproaches,
not, however, by any compulsion of written law.

Let this then be our exhortation concerning marriage, and let us
remember what was said before--that a man should cling to immortality,
and leave behind him children's children to be the servants of God in
his place for ever. All this and much more may be truly said by way of
prelude about the duty of marriage. But if a man will not listen, and
remains unsocial and alien among his fellow-citizens, and is still
unmarried at thirty-five years of age, let him pay a yearly fine;--he
who of the highest