BOOK VIII.
Project Gutenberg EPUB edition
Plato and Benjamin Jowett
Which are the necessary and which the unnecessary pleasures? And, like his father, he keeps under by force the pleasures which are of the spending and not of the getting sort, being those which are called unnecessary?
Obviously.
Would you like, for the sake of clearness, to distinguish which are the necessary and which are the unnecessary pleasures?
I should. 266
Necessary desires cannot be got rid of, Are not necessary pleasures those of which we cannot get Erid, and of which the satisfaction is a benefit to us? And they are rightly called so, because we are framed by nature to desire both what is beneficial and what is necessary, and cannot help it.
True.
559 We are not wrong therefore in calling them necessary?
We are not.
And the desires of which a man may get rid, if he takes pains from his youth upwards—of which the presence, moreover, does no good, and in some cases the reverse of good—shall we not be right in saying that all these are unnecessary?
Yes, certainly.
Suppose we select an example of either kind, in order that we may have a general notion of them?
Very good.
Will not the desire of eating, that is, of simple food and condiments, in so far as they are required for health and Bstrength, be of the necessary class?
That is what I should suppose.
The pleasure of eating is necessary in two ways; it does us good and it is essential to the continuance of life?
Yes.
but may be indulged to excess. But the condiments are only necessary in so far as they are good for health?
Certainly.
Illustration taken from eating and drinking. And the desire which goes beyond this, of more delicate food, or other luxuries, which might generally be got rid of, if controlled and trained in youth, and is hurtful to the body, and hurtful to the soul in the pursuit of wisdom and virtue, may be Crightly called unnecessary?
Very true.
May we not say that these desires spend, and that the others make money because they conduce to production?
Certainly.
And of the pleasures of love, and all other pleasures, the same holds good?
True.
And the drone of whom we spoke was he who was surfeited in pleasures and desires of this sort, and was the slave 267 Dof the unnecessary desires, whereas he who was subject to the necessary only was miserly and oligarchical?
Very true.
Again, let us see how the democratical man grows out of the oligarchical: the following, as I suspect, is commonly the process.
What is the process?
The young oligarch is led away by his wild associates. When a young man who has been brought up as we were just now describing, in a vulgar and miserly way, has tasted drones’ honey and has come to associate with fierce and crafty natures who are able to provide for him all sorts of refinements and varieties of pleasure—then, as you may Eimagine, the change will begin of the oligarchical principle within him into the democratical?
Inevitably.
There are allies to either part of his nature. And as in the city like was helping like, and the change was effected by an alliance from without assisting one division of the citizens, so too the young man is changed by a class of desires coming from without to assist the desires within him, that which is akin and alike again helping that which is akin and alike?
Certainly.
And if there be any ally which aids the oligarchical principle within him, whether the influence of a father or of kindred, 560advising or rebuking him, then there arises in his soul a faction and an opposite faction, and he goes to war with himself.
It must be so.
And there are times when the democratical principle gives way to the oligarchical, and some of his desires die, and others are banished; a spirit of reverence enters into the young man’s soul and order is restored.
Yes, he said, that sometimes happens.
And then, again, after the old desires have been driven out, Bfresh ones spring up, which are akin to them, and because he their father does not know how to educate them, wax fierce and numerous.
Yes, he said, that is apt to be the way.
They draw him to his old associates, and holding secret intercourse with them, breed and multiply in him. 268
Very true.