ABSTRACT
The Republic, which was composed in the maturity of Plato’s life, somewhere about his fortieth year, and therefore, better than any other dialogue, represents the fulness of his thought, has come down to us with a double title – ‘the State’ (πολιτϵία, or, in Latin, respublica; whence the name by which it generally goes), ‘or concerning Justice’. In spite of these two titles, it must not be assumed that it is a treatise either on political science or on jurisprudence. It is both, and it is yet more than both. It is an attempt at a complete philosophy of man. Primarily, it is concerned with man in action, and it is therefore occupied with the problems of moral and political life. But man is a whole: his action cannot be understood apart from his thinking; and therefore the Republic is also a philosophy of man in thought and of the laws of his thinking. Viewed in this way, as a complete philosophy of man, the Republic forms a single and organic whole. Viewed in its divisions, it would almost seem to fall into a number of treatises, each occupied with its separate subject. There is a treatise on metaphysics, which exhibits the unity of all things in the Idea of the Good. There is a treatise on moral philosophy, which investigates the virtues of the human soul, and shows their union and perfection in justice. There is a treatise on education: ‘the Republic’, said Rousseau, ‘is not a work upon politics, but the finest treatise on education that ever was written.’ There is a treatise on political science, which sketches the polity, and the social institutions (especially in respect of property and marriage), which should regulate an ideal State. Lastly, there is a treatise as it were on the philosophy of history, which explains the process of historical change and the gradual decline of the ideal State into tyranny. But all these treatises are woven into one, because all these subjects as yet were one. There was no rigorous differentiation of knowledge into separate studies, such as Aristotle afterwards suggested, rather than himself made. 1 The philosophy of man stood as one subject, confronting as equal or superior the other subject of the philosophy of nature. The question which Plato set himself to answer was simply this: What is a good man, and how is a good man made? Such a question might seem to belong to moral philosophy, and to moral philosophy alone. But to the Greek it was obvious that a good man must be a member of a State, and could be made good only through membership of a State. Upon the first question, therefore, a second naturally followed: What is the good State, and how is the good State made? Moral philosophy thus ascends into political science; and the two, joined in one, must climb still further. To a follower of Socrates it was plain that a good man must be possessed of knowledge. A third question therefore arose: What is the ultimate knowledge of which a good man must be possessed in order to be good? It is for metaphysics to answer; and when metaphysics has given its answer, still a fourth question emerges. By what methods will the good State lead its citizens towards the ultimate knowledge which is the condition of virtue? To answer this question, a theory of education is necessary; and indeed, since a readjustment of social conditions seems necessary to Plato if his scheme of education is to work satisfactorily, a reconstruction of social life must also be attempted, and a new economics must reinforce the new pedagogics. 1
