ng
all this part of instruction and education to the teachers of the lyre.

CLEINIAS: To what do you refer?

ATHENIAN: We were saying, if I remember rightly, that the sixty
years old choristers of Dionysus were to be specially quick in their
perceptions of rhythm and musical composition, that they might be able
to distinguish good and bad imitation, that is to say, the imitation of
the good or bad soul when under the influence of passion, rejecting the
one and displaying the other in hymns and songs, charming the souls
of youth, and inviting them to follow and attain virtue by the way of
imitation.

CLEINIAS: Very true.

ATHENIAN: And with this view the teacher and the learner ought to use
the sounds of the lyre, because its notes are pure, the player who
teaches and his pupil rendering note for note in unison; but complexity,
and variation of notes, when the strings give one sound and the poet or
composer of the melody gives another--also when they make concords and
harmonies in which lesser and greater intervals, slow and quick, or
high and low notes, are combined--or, again, when they make complex
variations of rhythms, which they adapt to the notes of the lyre--all
that sort of thing is not suited to those who have to acquire speedy and
useful knowledge of music in three years; for opposite principles are
confusing, and create a difficulty in learning, and our young men should
learn quickly, and their mere necessary acquirements are not few or
trifling, as will be shown in due course. Let the director of education
attend to the principles concerning music which we are laying down. As
to the songs and words themselves which the masters of choruses are to
teach and the character of them, they have been already described by us,
and are the same which, when consecrated and adapted to the different
festivals, we said were to benefit cities by affording them an innocent
amusement.

CLEINIAS: That, again, is true.

ATHENIAN: Then let him who has been elected a director of music receive
these rules from us as containing the very truth; and may he prosper in
his office! Let us now proceed to lay down other rules in addition to
the preceding about dancing and gymnastic exercise in general. Having
said what remained to be said about the teaching of music, let us speak
in like manner about gymnastic. For boys and girls ought to learn to
dance and practise gymnastic exercises--ought they not?

CLEINIAS: Yes.

ATHENIAN