Platonismo

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===== JOWETT: LAWS IV 712A-718C — PRINCÍPIO E OS QUADROS DE UMA BOA LEGISLAÇÃO =====
Veja também: Coletânea de excertos da obra completa de Platão, na tradução de Jowett, indexados por termos relevantes

Cle. How do you mean ?

Ath. Let us try to amuse ourselves, old boys as we are, by moulding in words the laws which are suitable to your state.

Cle. Let us proceed without delay.

Ath. Then let us invoke God at the settlement of our state ; may he hear and be propitious to us, and come and set in order the State and the laws !

Cle. May he come !

Ath. But what form of polity are we going to give the city ?

Cle. Tell us what you mean a little more clearly. Do you mean some form of democracy, or oligarchy, or aristocracy, or monarchy ? For we cannot suppose that you would include tyranny.

Ath. Which of you will first tell me to which of these classes his own government is to be referred ?

Megillus. Ought I to answer first, since I am the elder ?

Cle. Perhaps you should.

Meg. And yet, Stranger, I perceive that I cannot say, without more thought, what I should call the government of Lacedaemon, for it seems to me to be like a tyranny — the power of our Ephors is marvellously tyrannical ; and sometimes it appears to me to be of all cities the most democratical ; and who can reasonably deny that it is an aristocracy ? We have also a monarchy which is held for life, and is said by all mankind, and not by ourselves only, to be the most ancient of all monarchies ; and, therefore, when asked on a sudden, I cannot precisely say which form of government the Spartan is.

Cle. I am in the same difficulty, Megillus ; for I do not feel confident that the polity of Cnosus is any of these.

Ath. The reason is, my excellent friends, that you really have polities, but the states of which we were just now speaking are merely aggregations of men dwelling in cities who are the subjects and servants of a part of their own state, and each of them is named after the dominant power ; they are not polities at all. But if states are to be named after their rulers, the true state ought to be called by the name of the God who rules over wise men.

Cle. And who is this God ?

Ath. May I still make use of fable to some extent, in the hope that I may be better able to answer your question : shall I ?

Cle. By all means.

Ath. In the primeval world, and a long while before the cities came into being whose settlements we have described, there is said to have been in the time of Cronos a blessed rule and life, of which the best-ordered of existing states is a copy.

Cle. It will be very necessary to hear about that.

Ath. I quite agree with you ; and therefore I have introduced the subject.

Cle. Most appropriately ; and since the tale is to the point, you will do well in giving us the whole story.

Ath. I will do as you suggest. There is a tradition of the happy life of mankind in days when all things were spontaneous and abundant. And of this the reason is said to have been as follows : — Cronos knew what we ourselves were declaring, that no human nature invested with supreme power is able to order human affairs and not overflow with insolence and wrong. Which reflection led him to appoint not men but demigods, who are of a higher and more divine race, to be the kings and rulers of our cities ; he did as we do with flocks of sheep and other tame animals. For we do not appoint oxen to be the lords of oxen, or goats of goats ; but we ourselves are a superior race, and rule over them. In like manner God, in his love of mankind, placed over us the demons, who are a superior race, and they with great case and pleasure to themselves, and no less to us, taking care us and giving us peace and reverence and order and justice never failing, made the tribes of men happy and united. And this tradition, which is true, declares that cities of which some mortal man and not God is the ruler, have no escape from evils and toils. Still we must do all that we can to imitate the life which is said to have existed in the days of Cronos, and, as far as the principle of immortality dwells in us, to that we must hearken, both in private and public life, and regulate our cities and houses according to law, meaning by the very term “law,” the distribution of mind. But if either a single person or an oligarchy or a democracy has a soul eager after pleasures and desires — wanting to be filled with them, yet retaining none of them, and perpetually afflicted with an endless and insatiable disorder ; and this evil spirit, having first trampled the laws under foot, becomes the master either of a state or of an individual — then, as I was saying, salvation is hopeless. And now, Cleinias, we have to consider whether you will or will not accept this tale of mine.

Cle. Certainly we will.

Ath. You are aware — are you not ? — that there are of said to be as many forms of laws as there are of governments, and of the latter we have already mentioned all those which are commonly recognized. Now you must regard this as a matter of first-rate importance. For what is to be the standard of just and unjust, is once more the point at issue. Men say that the law ought not to regard either military virtue, or virtue in general, but only the interests and power and preservation of the established form of government ; this is thought by them to be the best way of expressing the natural definition of justice.

Cle. How ?

Ath. Justice is said by them to be the interest of the stronger.

Cle. Speak plainer.

Ath. I will : — “Surely,” they say, “the governing power makes whatever laws have authority in any state ?”

Cle. True.

Ath. “Well,” they would add, “and do you suppose that tyranny or democracy, or any other conquering power, does not make the continuance of the power which is possessed by them the first or principal object of their laws ?”

Cle. How can they have any other ?

Ath. “And whoever transgresses these laws is punished as an evil-doer by the legislator, who calls the laws just ?”

Cle. Naturally.

Ath. “This, then, is always the mode and fashion in which justice exists.”

Cle. Certainly, if they are correct in their view.

Ath. Why, yes, this is one of those false principles of government to which we were referring.

Cle. Which do you mean ?

Ath. Those which we were examining when we spoke of who ought to govern whom. Did we not arrive at the conclusion that parents ought to govern their children, and the elder the younger, and the noble the ignoble ? And there were many other principles, if you remember, and they were not always consistent. One principle was this very principle of might, and we said that Pindar considered violence natural and justified it.

Cle. Yes ; I remember.

Ath. Consider, then, to whom our state is to be entrusted. For there is a thing which has occurred times without number in states —

Cle. What thing ?

Ath. That when there has been a contest for power, those who gain the upper hand so entirely monopolize the government, as to refuse all share to the defeated party and their descendants — they live watching one another, the ruling class being in perpetual fear that some one who has a recollection of former wrongs will come into power and rise up against them. Now, according to our view, such governments are not polities at all, nor are laws right which are passed for the good of particular classes and not for the good of the whole state. States which have such laws are not polities but parties, and their notions of justice are simply unmeaning. I say this, because I am going to assert that we must not entrust the government in your state to any one because he is rich, or because he possesses any other advantage, such as strength, or stature, or again birth : but he who is most obedient to the laws of the state, he shall win the palm ; and to him who is victorious in the first degree shall be given the highest office and chief ministry of the gods ; and the second to him who bears the second palm ; and on a similar principle shall all the other be assigned to those who come next in order. And when I call the rulers servants or ministers of the law, I give them this name not for the sake of novelty, but because I certainly believe that upon such service or ministry depends the well- or ill-being of the state. For that state in which the law is subject and has no authority, I perceive to be on the highway to ruin ; but I see that the state in which the law is above the rulers, and the rulers are the inferiors of the law, has salvation, and every blessing which the Gods can confer.

Cle. Truly, Stranger, you see with the keen vision of age.

Ath. Why, yes ; every man when he is young has that sort of vision dullest, and when he is old keenest.

Cle. Very true.

Ath. And now, what is to be the next step ? May we not suppose the colonists to have arrived, and proceed to make our speech to them ?

Cle. Certainly.

Ath. “Friends,” we say to them, — “God, as the old tradition declares, holding in his hand the beginning, middle, and end of all that is, travels according to his nature in a straight line towards the accomplishment of his end. Justice always accompanies him, and is the punisher of those who fall short of the divine law. To justice, he who would be happy holds fast, and follows in her company with all humility and order ; but he who is lifted up with pride, or elated by wealth or rank, or beauty, who is young and foolish, and has a soul hot with insolence, and thinks that he has no need of any guide or ruler, but is able himself to be the guide of others, he, I say, is left deserted of God ; and being thus deserted, he takes to him others who are like himself, and dances about, throwing all things into confusion, and many think that he is a great man, but in a short time he pays a penalty which justice cannot but approve, and is utterly destroyed, and his family and city with him. Wherefore, seeing that human things are thus ordered, what should a wise man do or think, or not do or think ?

Cle. Every man ought to make up his mind that he will be one of the followers of God ; there can be no doubt of that.

Ath. Then what life is agreeable to God, and becoming in his followers ? One only, expressed once for all in the old saying that “like agrees with like, with measure measure,” but things which have no measure agree neither with themselves nor with the things which have. Now God ought to be to us the measure of all things, and not man, as men commonly say (Protagoras) : the words are far more true of him. And he who would be dear to God must, as far as is possible, be like him and such as he is. Wherefore the temperate man is the friend of God, for he is like him ; and the intemperate man is unlike him, and different from him, and unjust. And the same applies to other things ; and this is the conclusion, which is also the noblest and truest of all sayings — that for the good man to offer sacrifice to the Gods, and hold converse with them by means of prayers and offerings and every kind of service, is the noblest and best of all things, and also the most conducive to a happy life, and very fit and meet. But with the bad man, the opposite of this is true : for the bad man has an impure soul, whereas the good is pure ; and from one who is polluted, neither good man nor God can without impropriety receive gifts. Wherefore the unholy do only waste their much service upon the Gods, but when offered by any holy man, such service is most acceptable to them. This is the mark at which we ought to aim. But what weapons shall we use, and how shall we direct them ? In the first place, we affirm that next after the Olympian Gods and the Gods of the State, honour should be given to the Gods below ; they should receive everything in even and of the second choice, and ill omen, while the odd numbers, and the first choice, and the things of lucky omen, are given to the Gods above, by him who would rightly hit the mark of piety. Next to these Gods, a wise man will do service to the demons or spirits, and then to the heroes, and after them will follow the private and ancestral Gods, who are worshipped as the law prescribes in the places which are sacred to them. Next comes the honour of living parents, to whom, as is meet, we have to pay the first and greatest and oldest of all debts, considering that all which a man has belongs to those who gave him birth and brought him up, and that he must do all that he can to minister to them, first, in his property, secondly, in his person, and thirdly, in his soul, in return for the endless care and travail which they bestowed upon him of old, in the days of his infancy, and which he is now to pay back to them when they are old and in the extremity of their need. And all his life long he ought never to utter, or to have uttered, an unbecoming word to them ; for of light and fleeting words the penalty is most severe ; Nemesis, the messenger of justice, is appointed to watch over all such matters. When they are angry and want to satisfy their feelings in word or deed, he should give way to them ; for a father who thinks that he has been wronged by his son may be reasonably expected to be very angry. At their death, the most moderate funeral is best, neither exceeding the customary expense, nor yet falling short of the honour which has been usually shown by the former generation to their parents. And let a man not forget to pay the yearly tribute of respect to the dead, honouring them chiefly by omitting nothing that conduces to a perpetual remembrance of them, and giving a reasonable portion of his fortune to the dead. Doing this, and living after this manner, we shall receive our reward from the Gods and those who are above us (i.e., the demons) ; and we shall spend our days for the most part in good hope. And how a man ought to order what relates to his descendants and his kindred and friends and fellow-citizens, and the rites of hospitality taught by Heaven, and the intercourse which arises out of all these duties, with a view to the embellishment and orderly regulation of his own life — these things, I say, the laws, as we proceed with them, will accomplish, partly persuading, and partly when natures do not yield to the persuasion of custom, chastising them by might and right, and will thus render our state, if the Gods co-operate with us, prosperous and happy. But of what has to be said, and must be said by the legislator who is of my way of thinking, and yet, if said in the form of law, would be out of place — of this I think that he may give a sample for the instruction of himself and of those for whom he is legislating ; and then when, as far as he is able, he has gone through all the preliminaries, he may proceed to the work of legislation. Now, what will be the form of such prefaces ? There may be a difficulty in including or describing them all under a single form, but I think that we may get some notion of them if we can guarantee one thing.

Cle. What is that ?

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