moral. Nothing short of a radical turn-around of our mental and moral nature is
needed. Enlightenment is a slow and painful process that is naturally and powerfully
resisted by the ignorant and blind. Each stage of the upward journey into light is
painful and difficult. But enlightenment is possible; eventually the released prisoner
can behold the sun, although he is reluctant and has to be compelled at every stage.
When in the beginning, after he has turned his head, he is told that all he has
previously seen is illusory and he is cross-questioned about the objects passing before
him, he is at a loss (in aporia), believing what he saw previously to be more real. The
unmistakable allusion here to the Socratic method of refutation of conventional
opinion (the elenchos), makes it clear that only the philosopher can effect the
reformation necessary for enlightenment, though it is a dangerous proceeding, for the
ignorant prisoners are liable to kill the man who attempts to lead them up the steep
ascent.
Given the bleak picture of unreformed human life in the allegory, it is not
surprising that Socrates concludes that the philosopher, with his eye on the good, will
be reluctant to involve himself in human affairs and may make a fool of himself if he
is put on trial in the lawcourts, where the shadow of justice prevails. The Republic itself
is an attempt to envisage the reformation necessary in social arrangements if justice
is to flourish in the individual and the community. Socrates recognizes that the ideal
state is a pattern laid up in heaven which anyone can find and establish in himself
(Republic, 592b). At the same time, without the ideal environment, he clearly feels that
the individual effort will meet with the greatest difficulty.
The nature of the ideal state is defined in carefully argued stages, but in the final
blueprint, the city, which will be an aristocracy based on merit, will be divided into
three classes, the chief of which is the class of guardians, the philosophic rulers, whose
orders will be carried out by the second class of auxiliaries. The third class constitutes
workers, whether farmers or businessmen. The guardians, who may be male or
female, are not allowed to own property or handle money. Their needs are to be
provided for by the rest of the community. All women are to be held in common to
all men, and children are to be held in common to be brought up in state nurseries.
No child shall know its parents; no parent shall know its own child. There will be
mating festivals, at which rulers will arrange for the best men to mate with the best
women, in a rigged ballot to avoid dissent, with the object of ensuring that the best
offspring results. The conflict of interest between the family and the state will therefore
be eliminated. The state will be one large family and so have maximum unity. In the
Assemblywomen of 392 (written before the Republic), Aristophanes makes a comedy
of arrangements similar to these.
The ideal state will embody the four cardinal virtues of wisdom, courage, temper-
ance and justice. Its wisdom, sophia, will reside in the guardians, its courage, andreia,
in the auxiliaries, and its temperance, sophrosyne, in the harmonious acceptance of
200 THE GREEKS