the hour of public danger --he shall tell us about the happiness and misery of the tyrant when compared with other men? That again, he said, is a very fair proposal. Shall I assume that we ourselves are able and experienced judges and have before now met with such a person? We shall then have some one who will answer our enquiries. By all means. Let me ask you not to forget the parallel of the individual and the State; bearing this in mind, and glancing in turn from one to the other of them, will you tell me their respective conditions? What do you mean? he asked. Beginning with the State, I replied, would you say that a city which is governed by a tyrant is free or enslaved? No city, he said, can be more completely enslaved. And yet, as you see, there are freemen as well as masters in such a State? Yes, he said, I see that there are --a few; but the people, speaking generally, and the best of them, are miserably degraded and enslaved. Then if the man is like the
Michael kors handbags State, I said, must not the same rule prevail? his soul is full of meanness and vulgarity --the best elements in him are enslaved; and there is a small ruling part, which is also the worst and maddest. Inevitably. And would you say that the soul of such an one is the soul of a freeman, or of a slave? He has the soul of a slave, in my opinion. And the State which is enslaved under a tyrant is utterly incapable of acting voluntarily? Utterly incapable. And also the soul which is under a tyrant (I am speaking of the soul taken as a whole) is least capable of doing what she desires; there is a gadfly which goads her, and she is full of trouble and remorse? Certainly. And is the city which is under a tyrant rich or poor? Poor. And the tyrannical soul must be always poor and insatiable? True. And must not such a State and such a man be always full of fear? Yes, indeed.
cheap Michael kors handbags Is there any State in which you will find more of lamentation and sorrow and groaning and pain? Certainly not. And is there any man in whom you will find more of this sort of misery than in the tyrannical man, who is in a fury of passions and desires? Impossible. Reflecting upon these and similar evils, you held the tyrannical State to be the most miserable of States? And I was right, he said. Certainly, I said. And when you see the same evils in the tyrannical man, what do you say of him? I say that he is by far the most miserable of all men. There, I said, I think that you are beginning to go wrong. What do you mean? I do not think that he has as yet reached the utmost extreme of misery. Then who is more miserable? One of whom I am about to speak. Who is that? He who is of a tyrannical nature, and instead of leading a private life has been cursed with the further misfortune of being a public tyrant. From what has been said, I gather that you are right. Yes, I replied, but in this high argument you should be a little more certain, and should not conjecture only; for of all questions, this respecting good and evil is the greatest. Very
cheap jordans true, he said. Let me then offer you an illustration, which may, I think, throw a light upon this subject. What is your illustration? The case of rich individuals in cities who possess many slaves: from them you may form an idea of the tyrant's condition, for they both have slaves; the only difference is that he has more slaves. Yes, that is the difference. You know that they live securely and have nothing to apprehend from their servants? What should they fear? Nothing. But do you observe the reason of this? Yes; the reason is, that the whole city is leagued together for the protection of each individual. Very true, I said. But imagine one of these owners, the master say of some fifty slaves, together with his family and property and slaves, carried off by a god into the wilderness, where there are no freemen to help him --will he not be in an agony of fear lest he and his wife and children should be put to death by his slaves? Yes, he said, he will be in the utmost fear. The time has arrived when he will be compelled to flatter divers of his slaves, and make many promises to them of freedom and other things, much against his will --he will have to cajole his own servants. Yes, he said, that will be the only way of saving himself. And suppose the same god, who carried him away, to surround him with neighbours who will not suffer one man to be the master of another, and who, if they could catch the offender, would take his life? His case will be still worse, if you suppose him to be everywhere surrounded and watched by enemies. And is not this the sort of
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