Explanation by Polemarchus — Farther interrogations by Sokrates — Justice renders what is proper and suitable: but how? in what cases, proper? Under what circumstances is Justice useful?
S. — Simonides meant to say (you tell me) that Justice consists in rendering benefits to your friends, evil to your enemies: that is, in rendering to each what is proper and suitable. But we must ask him farther — Proper and suitable — how? in what cases? to whom? The medical art is that which renders what is proper and suitable, of nourishment and medicaments for the health of the body: the art of cookery is that which renders what is proper and suitable, of savoury ingredients for the satisfaction of the palate. In like manner, the cases must be specified in which justice renders what is proper and suitable — to whom, how, or what?[5] P. — Justice consists in doing good to friends, evil to enemies. S. — Who is it that is most efficient in benefiting his friends and injuring his enemies, as to health or disease? P. — It is the physician. S. — Who, in reference to the dangers in navigation by sea? P. — The steersman. S. — In what matters is it that the just man shows his special efficiency, to benefit friends and hurt enemies?[6] P. — In war: as a combatant for the one and against the other. S. — To men who are not sick, the physician is of no use nor the steersman, to men on dry land: Do you mean in like manner, that the just man is useless to those who are not at war? P. — No: I do not mean that. Justice is useful in peace also. S. — So also is husbandry, for raising food — shoemaking, for providing shoes. Tell me for what want or acquisition justice is useful during peace? P. — It is useful for the common dealings and joint transactions between man and man. S. — When we are engaged in playing at draughts, the good player is our useful co-operator: when in laying bricks and stones, the skilful mason: much more than the just man. Can you specify in what particular transactions the just man has any superior usefulness as a co-operator? P. — In affairs of money, I think. S. — Surely not in the employment of money. When you want to buy a horse, you must take for your assistant, not the just man, but one who knows horses: so also, if you are purchasing a ship. What are those modes of jointly employing money, in which the just man is more useful than others? P. — He is useful when you wish to have your money safely kept. S. — That is, when your money is not to be employed, but to lie idle: so that when your money is useless, then is the time when justice is useful for it. P. — So it seems. S. — In regard to other things also, a sickle, a shield, a lyre when you want to use them, the pruner, the hoplite, the musician, must be invoked as co-operators: justice is useful only when you are to keep them unused. In a word, justice is useless for the use of any thing, and useful merely for things not in use. Upon this showing, it is at least a matter of no great worth.[7]
[5] Plato, Republic, i. p. 332 D. ἡ οὖν δὴ τίσι τί ἀποδιδοῦσα τέχνη δικαιοσύνη ἂν καλοῖτο;
[6] Plato, Republic, i. p. 332 E. ὁ δίκαιος ἐν τίνι πράξει καὶ πρὸς τί ἔργον δυνατώτατος φίλους ὠφελεῖν καὶ ἐχθροὺς βλάπτειν;
[7] Plat. Repub. i. pp. 332-333. 333 E: Οὐκ ἂν οὖν πάνυ γέ τι σπουδαῖον εἴη ἡ δικαιοσύνη, εἰ πρὸς τὰ ἄχρηστα χρήσιμον ὂν τυγχάνει;
The just man, being good for keeping property guarded, must also be good for stealing property — Analogies cited.
But let us pursue the investigation (continues Sokrates). In boxing or in battle, is not he who is best in striking, best also in defending himself? In regard to disease, is not he who can best guard himself against it, the most formidable for imparting it to others? Is not the general who watches best over his own camp, also the most effective in surprising and over-reaching the enemy? In a word, whenever a man is effective as a guard of any thing, is he not also effective as a thief of it? P. — Such seems the course of the discussion. S. — Well then, the just man turns out to be a sort of thief, like the Homeric Autolykus. According to the explanation of Simonides, justice is a mode of thieving, for the profit of friends and damage of enemies.[8] P. — It cannot be so. I am in utter confusion. Yet I think still that justice is profitable to friends, and hurtful to enemies.
[8] Plat. Repub. i. p. 334 B. ἔοικεν οὖν ἡ δικαιοσύνη … κλεπτική τις ρἶναι, ἐπ’ ὠφελείᾳ μέντοι τῶν φίλων, καὶ ἐπὶ βλάβῃ τῶν ἐχθρῶν.
Justice consists in doing good to friends, evil to enemies — But how, if a man mistakes who his friends are, and makes friends of bad men?
S. — Whom do you call friends: those whom a man believes to be good, — or those who really are good, whether he believes them to be so or not: and the like, in reference to enemies? P. — I mean those whom he believes to be good. It is natural that he should love them and that he should hate those whom he believes to be evil. S. — But is not a man often mistaken in this belief? P. — Yes: often. S. — In so far as a man is mistaken, the good men are his enemies, and the evil men his friends. Justice, therefore, on your showing, consists in doing good to the evil men, and evil to the good men. P. — So it appears. S. — Now good men are just, and do no wrong to any one. It is therefore just, on your explanation, to hurt those who do no wrong. P. — Impossible! that is a monstrous doctrine. S. — You mean, then, that it is just to hurt unjust men, and to benefit just men? P. — Yes; that is something better. S. — It will often happen, therefore, when a man misjudges about others, that justice will consist in hurting his friends, since they are in his estimation the evil men: and in benefiting his enemies, since they are in his estimation the good men. Now this is the direct contrary of what Simonides defined to be justice.[9]