Book 1
632
Clin. What then, Stranger, should be the next step in our argument?
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Ath. We ought, as I think, to do as we did at first— start from the beginning to explain first the institutions which have to do with courage; and after that we shall, if you wish, deal with a second and a third form of goodness. And as soon as we have completed our treatment of the first theme, we shall take that as our model and by a discussion of the rest on similar lines beguile the way; and at the end of our treatment of goodness in all its forms we shall make it clear, if God will, that the rules we discussed just now had goodness for their aim.
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Meg. A good suggestion! And begin with our friend here, the panegyrist of Zeus—try first to put him to the test.
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Ath. Try I will, and to test you too and myself; for the argument concerns us all alike. Tell me then: do we assert that the common meals and the gymnasia were devised by the lawgiver with a view to war?
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Meg. Yes.
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Ath. And is there a third institution of the kind, and a fourth? For probably one ought to employ this method of enumeration also in dealing with the subdivisions (or whatever we ought to call them) of the other forms of goodness, if only one makes oneÕs meaning clear.
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Meg. The third thing he devised was hunting: so I and every Lacedaemonian would say.
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Ath. Let us attempt also to state what comes fourth,—and fifth too, if possible.
