oliticians, or
the wisdom of the arts, are coarse and vulgar. The unrighteous man, or
the sayer and doer of unholy things, had far better not be encouraged
in the illusion that his roguery is clever; for men glory in their
shame--they fancy that they hear others saying of them, 'These are not
mere good-for-nothing persons, mere burdens of the earth, but such as
men should be who mean to dwell safely in a state.' Let us tell them
that they are all the more truly what they do not think they are because
they do not know it; for they do not know the penalty of injustice,
which above all things they ought to know--not stripes and death, as
they suppose, which evil-doers often escape, but a penalty which cannot
be escaped.

THEODORUS: What is that?

SOCRATES: There are two patterns eternally set before them; the one
blessed and divine, the other godless and wretched: but they do not see
them, or perceive that in their utter folly and infatuation they are
growing like the one and unlike the other, by reason of their evil
deeds; and the penalty is, that they lead a life answering to the
pattern which they are growing like. And if we tell them, that unless
they depart from their cunning, the place of innocence will not receive
them after death; and that here on earth, they will live ever in the
likeness of their own evil selves, and with evil friends--when they hear
this they in their superior cunning will seem to be listening to the
talk of idiots.

THEODORUS: Very true, Socrates.

SOCRATES: Too true, my friend, as I well know; there is, however, one
peculiarity in their case: when they begin to reason in private about
their dislike of philosophy, if they have the courage to hear the
argument out, and do not run away, they grow at last strangely
discontented with themselves; their rhetoric fades away, and they become
helpless as children. These however are digressions from which we must
now desist, or they will overflow, and drown the original argument; to
which, if you please, we will now return.

THEODORUS: For my part, Socrates, I would rather have the digressions,
for at my age I find them easier to follow; but if you wish, let us go
back to the argument.

SOCRATES: Had we not reached the point at which the partisans of the
perpetual flux, who say that things are as they seem to each one, were
confidently maintaining that the ordinances which the state commanded
and thought just, were just to the state which imposed