To say of Plato's Republic that it is the idea of a perfect commonwealth, is not to give, by any means, an adequate or even a just description of it. It is, in one sense, to be sure, a dream of social and political perfection, and so far its common title is not altogether inapplicable to it; but it bears hardly any resemblance to the things that generally pass under that name-to the figments, for example, of Harrington and Sir Thomas More. Compared with it, Telemachus, though a mere epic in prose, is didactic and practical-the Cyropædia deserves to be regarded as the manual of soldiers and statesmen, and as the best scheme of discipline for forming them. Plato's is a mere vision, and that vision is altogether characteristic of his genius as his contemporaries conceived of it. It is something between prose and poetry in the style*-it is something made up both of poetry and philosophy in the plan and design. But a very small part of it is given to any topics that can pretend to the character of political. Indeed, Socrates expressly says, that the institution of a commonwealth is but a subordinate object with him. His principal aim is to unfold the sublime mystery of perfect justice. The title of the work is Πολιτειων η περί Δικαι8. The latter is unquestionably the more appropriate designation. If it were possible to have any doubts after reading the work, the repeated and emphatic declarations of the philosopher himself would remove them. It is in the second book that he first alludes to the Commonwealth, and then the purpose for which he professes to treat of it, is unequivocally explained. He compares himself to one who, not having very good eyes, is required to read a text at some distance from him, written in distressingly small letters, and who prepares himself for his task by conning over the very same text which he happens to find set forth somewhere else in larger characters. The justice-the high and perfect justice-whose nature he is endeavouring to penetrate and unfold, exists not only in individuals but, on a grander scale, in the more conspicuous and palpable image of that artificial being, a body politic. This idea is perpetually recurring. Thus it runs

* Aristotle apud Diog. Laert. in Platon.

+ Lib. ii. p. 368. d. Tiedeman, a German professor, who, at the instance of Heyne wrote "Argumenta Exposita" of Plato's dialogues, i. e. abstracts or summaries of them with critical observations, published in the Bipont edition of 1786, quarrels, outright with Socrates about this passage. His remarks are worth inserting here for the benefit of scholars who may not have the edition. Quæ si, prout verbis sunt exposita, accipiamus; totam de republicâ disputationem justitiæ tantum declarandæ causa institui, facile nobis persuadeamus ; id quod secus tamen revera sese habet, cum absurdum sit, tam longum ordiri sermonem, adeoque prolixe de republica ordinanda disserere, aperienda justitiæ, quæ bievioribus potest exponi, causa. Quod

through the whole eighth book, which, it may be remarked by the way, is a dissertation of incomparable excellence, and decidedly the most practical part of the work. In this book he treats of injustice. He again resorts to the larger type-to the capital letters. He illustrates the effects of that vice, or rather of that vicious and diseased state of the soul, by corresponding distempers and mutations of the body-politic. We are told that the form of government is an image of the character of the citizen-that whatever may be said of the democracy or the oligarchy, applies as strictly to the democrat and the oligarchist that there are as many shapes or species of polity, as there are types or varieties of the human soul t-that as the most perfect commonwealth is only public virtue embodied in the institutions of a country, so every vice generates some abuse or corruption in the state-some pernicious disorder-some lawless power, incompatible with rational liberty.

In running this parallel between the individual and the corporate existence, he unfolds his idea of the rò dixalov, not in a prologue as Tiedeman affirms, but throughout the whole body of his work. He begins by shewing that there can be no happiness without it here; and ends by a revelation of other worlds and a state of beatific perfection, which it fits the soul to enter upon hereafter. We must take care, however, not to confound this sublime justice with the vulgar attribute commonly known by that name. Plato's justice is that so magnificently described by Hooker-in a passage which has been hackneyed by legal writers as if it had been the text of a code, but of which no familiarity can diminish or impair the truly Platonic grandeur—“ that law whose seat is the bosom of God, and whose voice, the harmony of the worldto which all things in heaven and earth do homage-which angels, and men, and creatures of every condition, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent, admire as the mother of their peace and joy." In this noble passage, the author of the Ecclesiastical Polity, whose mind was rapt and glowing with the visions of his Athenian prototype, touches upon the great leading idea, the true theme and sense of his Republic. The whole dialogue is a Pythagorean

igitur quæritur de justitia, prologi tantum locum tenet; nec recte Plato quid sibi vellet his libris occuluit aut legentium saltem oculis subtraxit; cum scriptoris, præsertim philosophici, longam ingredientis orationem, sit, quem sibi proposuerit finem ante exponere, ut quo tendant singula lector intelligens, etc. This is excellent, truly. It is as if Proclus or any other dreamer of the Alexandrian school should insist on making Homer a mystic in spite of himself.

* See about p. 550.

+ Lib. iv. Sub. Calc. cf. ib.id 256-372.

mystery. It is the work of one formed in the Socratic school of Milton

"There thou shalt hear and learn the secret power

Of harmony in tones and numbers hit

By voice or hand, and various measured verse,
Eolian charms or Dorian lyric odes."

Plato finds the key of the whole universe in the doctrine of number and proportion. He sees them pervading all nature, moral and physical-holding together its most distant parts, and most heterogeneous materials, and harmonizing them into order and beauty and rythm. Socrates declares his assent to the Pythagorean tenet, that astronomy is to the eye, what music is to the ear. The spheres, with the Syrens that preside over them, and the sweet melodies of that eternal diapason-the four elements combined in the formation of the world-the beautiful vicissitudes of the seasons-light and darkness, height and depth, all existences and their negations, all antecedents and consequences, all cause and effect, reveal the same mystery to the adept. Man is, in like manner, subject throughout his whole nature, to this universal law. Of the four cardinal virtues, take temperance for an example. What is it but a perfect discipline of the passions, by which they are all equally controlled-or rather a perfect concord or symphony in which each sounds its proper note and no other-in which no desire is either too high or too low-in which the enjoyment of the present moment is never allowed to hurt that of the future, nor passion to rebel against reason, nor one passion to invade the province, or to usurp the rights of another. The o dixalov goes somewhat further. It is that state of the soul wherein the three parts of which it is composed, the intellectual, the irascible, and the sensual, exercise each its proper function and influence-in which the four cardinal virtues are blended together in such just proportion, in such symphonious unison-in which all the faculties of the mind, while they are fully developed, are so well disciplined and disposed-that nothing jarring or discordant, nothing uneven or irregular, is ever perceived in them. And so in the larger type-a perfect polity is that in which the same proportion and fitness are observed-in which the different orders of society move in their own sphere, and do only

For the mystical creation of the human soul' according to number and proportion, see the Timæus. The same dialogue applies to the rest of our remarks. § ὥςε ορθότατ' ἂν φαῖμεν ταύτην τὴν ὁμόνοιαν, σωφροσύνην εἶναι, χείρονός τε και ἀμείνονος κατὰ φύσιν συμφωνίαν, &c. 1. iv. 432.

their appointed work-in which intellect governs, and strength and passion submit, that is, counsellors advise, soldiers make war, and the labouring classes employ themselves in their humble, but necessary and productive calling. On the other hand, the most fearfully depraved condition of society is that which Polybius calls an ochlocracy-an anarchy of jacobins and sansculottes-where every passion breaks loose in wild disorder, and no law is obeyed, no right respected, no decorum observedwhere young men despise their seniors, and old men affect the manners of youth, and children are disobedient to their parents, wives to their husbands, slaves to their masters-in short, where the very cattle that are within their gates, the ox and the ass, wander about as they list, without any dread of being treated as a public nuisance by the police, or even of being distrained damage feasant by the injured. The justice of which he speaks, is not, therefore, the single cardinal virtue known by that name. It is not commutative justice, nor retributive justice, nor (except, perhaps, in a qualified sense) distributive justice. It does not consist in mere outward conformity or specific acts—in the execution of a contract of do ut facias or facio ut des. Its seat is in "the inmost mind"-its influence is the music of the soul-it makes the whole nature of the true philosopher, a concert of disciplined affections-a choir of virtues attuned to the most perfect accord among themselves, and falling in with all the mysterious and everlasting harmonies of heaven and earth.‡

This general idea is still further illustrated by the scheme of education in Plato's Republic. It is extremely simple-for young men it consists only of music and gymnastics-for adepts of an advanced age, it is the study of truth, pure truth, the good, the ro ov, the divine monad, the one eternal, unchangeable. It is in the third book that he orders the former division of the scheme. It is necessary to cultivate with equal care both the parts of which it is composed-and to allow of no excess or imperfection in either. They who are addicted exclusively to music, become effeminate and slothful; they, on the other hand, who only discipline their nature by the exercises of the gymnasium, become rude and savage.§. God gave us these great cor

* Lib. iv. 443. Be it remembered by political economists, that the division of labour is a fundamental principle of Plato's legislation, and is enforced by very severe penalties. He considers it as in the highest degree absurd-as out of all reason and proportion-that one man should pretend to be good at many things.

t Lib. viii. p. 557.

† καὶ δὴ τὸν ἄλλον τῆς φιλοσόφου φύσεως χορὸν, &c. I. vi. p. 490. The parts in this choir are filled by ανδρια, μεγαλοπρέπεια, εὐμάθεια, μνήμη. Ct. l. iv. 442.

Lib. iii. p. 410. c. d. This music, as Tiedeman observes, is mystic and mathe matical. Pythagoras and Plato thought every thing musical of divine origin. 1. ii.

rectives of the soul and of the body, not for the sake of either separately, but that all their powers, and functions and impulses should be fully brought out into action; and above all, be har monized into mutual assistance and perfect unison.* Plato's whole method and discipline is directed to this end. He banishes from his ideal territory, the Lydian and Ionic measures as "softly sweet" and wanton-while he retains for certain purposes, the grave Dorian mood and the spirit-stirring Phrygian. So in like manner, he expels all the poets, (except the didactic) with Homer at their head. The tragic poets were, in reference to moral education, especially offensive to him.t In conformity with the same principle, he proscribes all manner of deliciousness and excess-Sicilian feasts, and Corinthian girls and Attic dessert and dainties-as leading to corruption of manners and to the necessity of laws and penalties, of the judge and the executioner. No innovation whatever is to be tolerated in this system of discipline-especially in what regards music and gymnastics; the slightest change in which Plato affirms to produce decided, however secret and insidious, effects upon the character and manners of a whole people. When his citizens divided into four orders, to correspond with the cardinal virtues, have gone through their preparatory discipline, and discharged in their day and generation the duties which were respectively allotted to them, they (at least the better sort of them) must, in the calm of declining life, turn to the study of the true philosophy. Not such as is taught by mercenary sophists-mere shallow fallacies, mountebank tricks to impose upon ignorance, vile arts to ingratiate one's self with that SAVAGE BEAST (a favourite image with the ancient writers) the wayward and tyrannical Demus. Nor such a philosophy as bestows its thoughts upon the depraved manners of men, or the fluctuating and perishable objects around us; but that deep wisdom, that rapturous and holy contemplation which abstracts itself from the senses and the

* ἀλλ' ἐπ' ἐκεῖνο ὅπως ἂν ἀλλήλων συναρμοσθῆτον, επιτείνομένω και ανειμένω μέχρι τοῦ προσήκοντος. Ib. 411 e. cf. 413 e. Sub. Calc.

In the Minos, Socrates pronounces some story about the old Cretan of that name, an Attic and Tragic fable."

† He traces the progress thus, ηρέμα υποῤῥει πρὸς τὰ ἤθη τε καὶ ἐπιτηδεύματα, ἐκ δὲ τούτων εἰς τὰ πρὸς ἀλλήλους ξυμβόλαια μείζων ἐκβαίνει, εκ δὲ δὴ τῶν ξυμβόλαιων ἔρχεται ἐπὶ τοὺς νόμους καὶ πολιτείας σὺν πολλῇ, ὦ Σώκρατες, doɛλyɛía, 1. 4. 424. We ought, perhaps, to apologize for quoting so much Greek; but the ipsissima verba are important in such discussions, and every scholar may not have Plato at hand.

VOL. IV. NO. 7.

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