He says indeed that, having
so good an education, the citizens will not need many laws, for
example laws about the city or about the markets; but then he confines
his education to the guardians. Again, he makes the husbandmen
owners of the property upon condition of their paying a tribute. But
in that case they are likely to be much more unmanageable and
conceited than the Helots, or Penestae, or slaves in general. And
whether community of wives and property be necessary for the lower
equally with the higher class or not, and the questions akin to
this, what will be the education, form of government, laws of the
lower class, Socrates has nowhere determined: neither is it easy to
discover this, nor is their character of small importance if the
common life of the guardians is to be maintained.
Again, if Socrates makes the women common, and retains private
property, the men will see to the fields, but who will see to the
house? And who will do so if the agricultural class have both their
property and their wives in common? Once more: it is absurd to
argue, from the analogy of the animals, that men and women should
follow the same pursuits, for animals have not to manage a
household. The government, too, as constituted by Socrates, contains
elements of danger; for he makes the same persons always rule.
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