Home > Authors Index > Plato > Laws > This page
Laws, a non-fiction book by Plato |
||
The Preamble - Book 2 |
||
| < Previous |
Table of content |
Next > |
|
________________________________________________
_ THE PREAMBLE - BOOK II And are there any other uses of well-ordered potations? There are; but in order to explain them, I must repeat what I mean by right education; which, if I am not mistaken, depends on the due regulation of convivial intercourse. 'A high assumption.' I believe that virtue and vice are originally present to the mind of children in the form of pleasure and pain; reason and fixed principles come later, and happy is he who acquires them even in declining years; for he who possesses them is the perfect man. When pleasure and pain, and love and hate, are rightly implanted in the yet unconscious soul, and after the attainment of reason are discovered to be in harmony with her, this harmony of the soul is virtue, and the preparatory stage, anticipating reason, I call education. But the finer sense of pleasure and pain is apt to be impaired in the course of life; and therefore the Gods, pitying the toils and sorrows of mortals, have allowed them to have holidays, and given them the Muses and Apollo and Dionysus for leaders and playfellows. All young creatures love motion and frolic, and utter sounds of delight; but man only is capable of taking pleasure in rhythmical and harmonious movements. With these education begins; and the uneducated is he who has never known the discipline of the chorus, and the educated is he who has. The chorus is partly dance and partly song, and therefore the well-educated must sing and dance well. But when we say, 'He sings and dances well,' we mean that he sings and dances what is good. And if he thinks that to be good which is really good, he will have a much higher music and harmony in him, and be a far greater master of imitation in sound and gesture than he who is not of this opinion. 'True.' Then, if we know what is good and bad in song and dance, we shall know what education is? 'Very true.' Let us now consider the beauty of figure, melody, song, and dance. Will the same figures or sounds be equally well adapted to the manly and the cowardly when they are in trouble? 'How can they be, when the very colours of their faces are different?' Figures and melodies have a rhythm and harmony which are adapted to the expression of different feelings (I may remark, by the way, that the term 'colour,' which is a favourite word of music-masters, is not really applicable to music). And one class of harmonies is akin to courage and all virtue, the other to cowardice and all vice. 'We agree.' And do all men equally like all dances? 'Far otherwise.' Do some figures, then, appear to be beautiful which are not? For no one will admit that the forms of vice are more beautiful than the forms of virtue, or that he prefers the first kind to the second. And yet most persons say that the merit of music is to give pleasure. But this is impiety. There is, however, a more plausible account of the matter given by others, who make their likes or dislikes the criterion of excellence. Sometimes nature crosses habit, or conversely, and then they say that such and such fashions or gestures are pleasant, but they do not like to exhibit them before men of sense, although they enjoy them in private. 'Very true.' And do vicious measures and strains do any harm, or good measures any good to the lovers of them? 'Probably.' Say, rather 'Certainly': for the gentle indulgence which we often show to vicious men inevitably makes us become like them. And what can be worse than this? 'Nothing.' Then in a well-administered city, the poet will not be allowed to make the songs of the people just as he pleases, or to train his choruses without regard to virtue and vice. 'Certainly not.' And yet he may do this anywhere except in Egypt; for there ages ago they discovered the great truth which I am now asserting, that the young should be educated in forms and strains of virtue. These they fixed and consecrated in their temples; and no artist or musician is allowed to deviate from them. They are literally the same which they were ten thousand years ago. And this practice of theirs suggests the reflection that legislation about music is not an impossible thing. But the particular enactments must be the work of God or of some God-inspired man, as in Egypt their ancient chants are said to be the composition of the goddess Isis. The melodies which have a natural truth and correctness should be embodied in a law, and then the desire of novelty is not strong enough to change the old fashions. Is not the origin of music as follows? We rejoice when we think that we prosper, and we think that we prosper when we rejoice, and at such times we cannot rest, but our young men dance dances and sing songs, and our old men, who have lost the elasticity of youth, regale themselves with the memory of the past, while they contemplate the life and activity of the young. 'Most true.' People say that he who gives us most pleasure at such festivals is to win the palm: are they right? 'Possibly.' Let us not be hasty in deciding, but first imagine a festival at which the lord of the festival, having assembled the citizens, makes a proclamation that he shall be crowned victor who gives the most pleasure, from whatever source derived. We will further suppose that there are exhibitions of rhapsodists and musicians, tragic and comic poets, and even marionette-players--which of the pleasure-makers will win? Shall I answer for you?--the marionette-players will please the children; youths will decide for comedy; young men, educated women, and people in general will prefer tragedy; we old men are lovers of Homer and Hesiod. Now which of them is right? If you and I are asked, we shall certainly say that the old men's way of thinking ought to prevail. 'Very true.' So far I agree with the many that the excellence of music is to be measured by pleasure; but then the pleasure must be that of the good and educated, or better still, of one supremely virtuous and educated man. The true judge must have both wisdom and courage. For he must lead the multitude and not be led by them, and must not weakly yield to the uproar of the theatre, nor give false judgment out of that mouth which has just appealed to the Gods. The ancient custom of Hellas, which still prevails in Italy and Sicily, left the judgment to the spectators, but this custom has been the ruin of the poets, who seek only to please their patrons, and has degraded the audience by the representation of inferior characters. What is the inference? The same which we have often drawn, that education is the training of the young idea in what the law affirms and the elders approve. And as the soul of a child is too young to be trained in earnest, a kind of education has been invented which tempts him with plays and songs, as the sick are tempted by pleasant meats and drinks. And the wise legislator will compel the poet to express in his poems noble thoughts in fitting words and rhythms. 'But is this the practice elsewhere than in Crete and Lacedaemon? In other states, as far as I know, dances and music are constantly changed at the pleasure of the hearers.' I am afraid that I misled you; not liking to be always finding fault with mankind as they are, I described them as they ought to be. But let me understand: you say that such customs exist among the Cretans and Lacedaemonians, and that the rest of the world would be improved by adopting them? 'Much improved.' And you compel your poets to declare that the righteous are happy, and that the wicked man, even if he be as rich as Midas, is unhappy? Or, in the words of Tyrtaeus, 'I sing not, I care not about him' who is a great warrior not having justice; if he be unjust, 'I would not have him look calmly upon death or be swifter than the wind'; and may he be deprived of every good--that is, of every true good. For even if he have the goods which men regard, these are not really goods: first health; beauty next; thirdly wealth; and there are others. A man may have every sense purged and improved; he may be a tyrant, and do what he likes, and live for ever: but you and I will maintain that all these things are goods to the just, but to the unjust the greatest of evils, if life be immortal; not so great if he live for a short time only. If a man had health and wealth, and power, and was insolent and unjust, his life would still be miserable; he might be fair and rich, and do what he liked, but he would live basely, and if basely evilly, and if evilly painfully. 'There I cannot agree with you.' Then may heaven give us the spirit of agreement, for I am as convinced of the truth of what I say as that Crete is an island; and, if I were a lawgiver, I would exercise a censorship over the poets, and I would punish them if they said that the wicked are happy, or that injustice is profitable. And these are not the only matters in which I should make my citizens talk in a different way to the world in general. If I asked Zeus and Apollo, the divine legislators of Crete and Sparta,--'Are the just and pleasant life the same or not the same'?--and they replied,--'Not the same'; and I asked again--'Which is the happier'? And they said'--'The pleasant life,' this is an answer not fit for a God to utter, and therefore I ought rather to put the same question to some legislator. And if he replies 'The pleasant,' then I should say to him, 'O my father, did you not tell me that I should live as justly as possible'? and if to be just is to be happy, what is that principle of happiness or good which is superior to pleasure? Is the approval of gods and men to be deemed good and honourable, but unpleasant, and their disapproval the reverse? Or is the neither doing nor suffering evil good and honourable, although not pleasant? But you cannot make men like what is not pleasant, and therefore you must make them believe that the just is pleasant. The business of the legislator is to clear up this confusion. He will show that the just and the unjust are identical with the pleasurable and the painful, from the point of view of the just man, of the unjust the reverse. And which is the truer judgment? Surely that of the better soul. For if not the truth, it is the best and most moral of fictions; and the legislator who desires to propagate this useful lie, may be encouraged by remarking that mankind have believed the story of Cadmus and the dragon's teeth, and therefore he may be assured that he can make them believe anything, and need only consider what fiction will do the greatest good. That the happiest is also the holiest, this shall be our strain, which shall be sung by all three choruses alike. First will enter the choir of children, who will lift up their voices on high; and after them the young men, who will pray the God Paean to be gracious to the youth, and to testify to the truth of their words; then will come the chorus of elder men, between thirty and sixty; and, lastly, there will be the old men, and they will tell stories enforcing the same virtues, as with the voice of an oracle. 'Whom do you mean by the third chorus?' You remember how I spoke at first of the restless nature of young creatures, who jumped about and called out in a disorderly manner, and I said that no other animal attained any perception of rhythm; but that to us the Gods gave Apollo and the Muses and Dionysus to be our playfellows. Of the two first choruses I have already spoken, and I have now to speak of the third, or Dionysian chorus, which is composed of those who are between thirty and sixty years old. 'Let us hear.' We are agreed (are we not?) that men, women, and children should be always charming themselves with strains of virtue, and that there should be a variety in the strains, that they may not weary of them? Now the fairest and most useful of strains will be uttered by the elder men, and therefore we cannot let them off. But how can we make them sing? For a discreet elderly man is ashamed to hear the sound of his own voice in private, and still more in public. The only way is to give them drink; this will mellow the sourness of age. No one should be allowed to taste wine until they are eighteen; from eighteen to thirty they may take a little; but when they have reached forty years, they may be initiated into the mystery of drinking. Thus they will become softer and more impressible; and when a man's heart is warm within him, he will be more ready to charm himself and others with song. And what songs shall he sing? 'At Crete and Lacedaemon we only know choral songs.' Yes; that is because your way of life is military. Your young men are like wild colts feeding in a herd together; no one takes the individual colt and trains him apart, and tries to give him the qualities of a statesman as well as of a soldier. He who was thus trained would be a greater warrior than those of whom Tyrtaeus speaks, for he would be courageous, and yet he would know that courage was only fourth in the scale of virtue. 'Once more, I must say, Stranger, that you run down our lawgivers.' Not intentionally, my good friend, but whither the argument leads I follow; and I am trying to find some style of poetry suitable for those who dislike the common sort. 'Very good.' In all things which have a charm, either this charm is their good, or they have some accompanying truth or advantage. For example, in eating and drinking there is pleasure and also profit, that is to say, health; and in learning there is a pleasure and also truth. There is a pleasure or charm, too, in the imitative arts, as well as a law of proportion or equality; but the pleasure which they afford, however innocent, is not the criterion of their truth. The test of pleasure cannot be applied except to that which has no other good or evil, no truth or falsehood. But that which has truth must be judged of by the standard of truth, and therefore imitation and proportion are to be judged of by their truth alone. 'Certainly.' And as music is imitative, it is not to be judged by the criterion of pleasure, and the Muse whom we seek is the muse not of pleasure but of truth, for imitation has a truth. 'Doubtless.' And if so, the judge must know what is being imitated before he decides on the quality of the imitation, and he who does not know what is true will not know what is good. 'He will not.' Will any one be able to imitate the human body, if he does not know the number, proportion, colour, or figure of the limbs? 'How can he?' But suppose we know some picture or figure to be an exact resemblance of a man, should we not also require to know whether the picture is beautiful or not? 'Quite right.' The judge of the imitation is required to know, therefore, first the original, secondly the truth, and thirdly the merit of the execution? 'True.' Then let us not weary in the attempt to bring music to the standard of the Muses and of truth. The Muses are not like human poets; they never spoil or mix rhythms or scales, or mingle instruments and human voices, or confuse the manners and strains of men and women, or of freemen and slaves, or of rational beings and brute animals. They do not practise the baser sorts of musical arts, such as the 'matured judgments,' of whom Orpheus speaks, would ridicule. But modern poets separate metre from music, and melody and rhythm from words, and use the instrument alone without the voice. The consequence is, that the meaning of the rhythm and of the time are not understood. I am endeavouring to show how our fifty-year-old choristers are to be trained, and what they are to avoid. The opinion of the multitude about these matters is worthless; they who are only made to step in time by sheer force cannot be critics of music. 'Impossible.' Then our newly-appointed minstrels must be trained in music sufficiently to understand the nature of rhythms and systems; and they should select such as are suitable to men of their age, and will enable them to give and receive innocent pleasure. This is a knowledge which goes beyond that either of the poets or of their auditors in general. For although the poet must understand rhythm and music, he need not necessarily know whether the imitation is good or not, which was the third point required in a judge; but our chorus of elders must know all three, if they are to be the instructors of youth. And now we will resume the original argument, which may be summed up as follows: A convivial meeting is apt to grow tumultuous as the drinking proceeds; every man becomes light-headed, and fancies that he can rule the whole world. 'Doubtless.' And did we not say that the souls of the drinkers, when subdued by wine, are made softer and more malleable at the hand of the legislator? the docility of childhood returns to them. At times however they become too valiant and disorderly, drinking out of their turn, and interrupting one another. And the business of the legislator is to infuse into them that divine fear, which we call shame, in opposition to this disorderly boldness. But in order to discipline them there must be guardians of the law of drinking, and sober generals who shall take charge of the private soldiers; they are as necessary in drinking as in fighting, and he who disobeys these Dionysiac commanders will be equally disgraced. 'Very good.' If a drinking festival were well regulated, men would go away, not as they now do, greater enemies, but better friends. Of the greatest gift of Dionysus I hardly like to speak, lest I should be misunderstood. 'What is that?' According to tradition Dionysus was driven mad by his stepmother Here, and in order to revenge himself he inspired mankind with Bacchic madness. But these are stories which I would rather not repeat. However I do acknowledge that all men are born in an imperfect state, and are at first restless, irrational creatures: this, as you will remember, has been already said by us. 'I remember.' And that Apollo and the Muses and Dionysus gave us harmony and rhythm? 'Very true.' The other story implies that wine was given to punish us and make us mad; but we contend that wine is a balm and a cure; a spring of modesty in the soul, and of health and strength in the body. Again, the work of the chorus is co-extensive with the work of education; rhythm and melody answer to the voice, and the motions of the body correspond to all three, and the sound enters in and educates the soul in virtue. 'Yes.' And the movement which, when pursued as an amusement, is termed dancing, when studied with a view to the improvement of the body, becomes gymnastic. Shall we now proceed to speak of this? 'What Cretan or Lacedaemonian would approve of your omitting gymnastic?' Your question implies assent; and you will easily understand a subject which is familiar to you. Gymnastic is based on the natural tendency of every animal to rapid motion; and man adds a sense of rhythm, which is awakened by music; music and dancing together form the choral art. But before proceeding I must add a crowning word about drinking. Like other pleasures, it has a lawful use; but if a state or an individual is inclined to drink at will, I cannot allow them. I would go further than Crete or Lacedaemon and have the law of the Carthaginians, that no slave of either sex should drink wine at all, and no soldier while he is on a campaign, and no magistrate or officer while he is on duty, and that no one should drink by daylight or on a bridal night. And there are so many other occasions on which wine ought to be prohibited, that there will not be many vines grown or vineyards required in the state. _ |
||