hildren has reference to the commonwealth and
not to individuals, except in so far as they are constituents of the
commonwealth. And since individuals for the most part bring forth
children wrongly and educate them wrongly, they consider that they
remove destruction from the state, and therefore, for this reason, with
most sacred fear, they commit the education of the children, who as it
were are the element of the republic, to the care of magistrates; for
the safety of the community is not that of a few. And thus they
distribute male and female breeders of the best natures according to
philosophical rules. Plato thinks that this distribution ought to be
made by lot, lest some men seeing that they are kept away from the
beautiful women, should rise up with anger and hatred against the
magistrates; and he thinks further that those who do not deserve
cohabitation with the more beautiful women, should be deceived whilst
the lots are being led out of the city by the magistrates, so that at
all times the women who are suitable should fall to their lot, not those
whom they desire. This shrewdness, however, is not necessary among the
inhabitants of the City of the Sun. For with them deformity is unknown.
When the women are exercised they get a clear complexion, and become
strong of limb, tall and agile, and with them beauty consists in
tallness and strength. Therefore, if any woman dyes her face, so that it
may become beautiful, or uses high-heeled boots so that she may appear
tall, or garments with trains to cover her wooden shoes, she is
condemned to capital punishment. But if the women should even desire
them, they have no facility for doing these things. For who indeed would
give them this facility? Further, they assert that among us abuses of
this kind arise from the leisure and sloth of women. By these means they
lose their colour and have pale complexions, and become feeble and
small. For this reason they are without proper complexions, use high
sandals, and become beautiful not from strength, but from slothful
tenderness. And thus they ruin their own tempers and natures, and
consequently those of their offspring. Furthermore, if at any time a man
is taken captive with ardent love for a certain woman, the two are
allowed to converse and joke together, and to give one another garlands
of flowers or leaves, and to make verses. But if the race is endangered,
by no means is further union between them permitted. Moreover, the