Politics

​And at the same time it is also just, whether ruling is something good or something bad, for all to share in it. This at least imitates the equal yielding in turn, namely, their being unlike when they are outside of office. For some rule and others are ruled in turn, just as if they had become other persons. Indeed, in the very same manner, among those who rule, different individuals rule in different offices. It is clear, then, from these things that the city is not by nature one in the way that some people say, and that what is said to be the greatest good in cities—namely, this [extreme unity]—destroys cities; and yet the good of each thing preserves each thing. And it is also clear in another way that to seek to unify the city excessively is not better. For a household is more self-sufficient than an individual, and a city than a household, and a city wishes to be such precisely at that moment when the association of the multitude happens to be self-sufficient. If, therefore, the more self-sufficient is more desirable, then what is less one is also more desirable than what is more so. But indeed, even if this were best, namely that the association be as much as possible one, not even this appears to be demonstrated by his argument, if “all say ‘mine’ and ‘not mine’ at the same time”; for Socrates thinks this is the sign of the city being perfectly one. For “all” is double. If, on the one hand, it means “each individually,” perhaps what Socrates wishes to achieve would more likely come to pass (for each will call the same person his own son and the same woman his own wife, and similarly concerning property and each of the things that happen). But on the other hand, now those who have women and children in common will not speak in this way, but all indeed, yet not as each of them individually, and similarly as to property, all indeed, but not as each of them individually. It is clear, then, that saying “all” is a certain fallacy (for “all” and “both,” and “odd and even,” because of their double meaning, produce contentious syllogisms even in arguments; therefore, for all to say the same thing is in one way beautiful but impossible, and in another way not at all productive of harmony). In addition to these things, what is said has another harm. For what is common to the greatest number of people receives the least care. For people care most for their own private things, and less for common things, or only so much as falls to each individually. For in addition to other things, they neglect them more on the assumption that someone else is caring for them, just as in household service, a large number of attendants sometimes serve worse than fewer. And each citizen gets a thousand sons, and these are not as the sons of each individually, but any chance person is equally the son of any chance person.