1262bfor there will be less friendship among them if their children and women are in common, and unfriendliness in the subject classes is a good thing with a view to their being submissive to authority and not making revolution. But speaking generally such a law is bound to bring about the opposite state of things to that which rightly enacted laws ought properly to cause, and because of which Socrates thinks it necessary to make these regulations about the children and women. For we think that friendship is the greatest of blessings for the state, since it is the best safeguard against revolution, and the unity of the state, which Socrates praises most highly, both appears to be and is said by him to be the effect of friendship, just as we know that Aristophanes¹ in the discourses on love describes how the lovers owing to their extreme affection desire to grow together and both become one instead of being two. In such a union it would be inevitable that both would be spoiled, or at least one, and in the state friendship would inevitably become watery in consequence of such association, and the expressions “my father” and “my son” would quite go out. For just as putting a little sugar into a quantity of water makes the mixture imperceptible, so it also must come about that the mutual relationship based on these names must become imperceptible,since in the republic described by Plato there will be the least possible necessity for people to care for one another as father for sons or as son for father or as brother for brother. For there are two things that most cause men to care for and to love each other, the sense of ownership and the sense of preciousness; and neither motive can be present with the citizens of a state so constituted. Again, as to the transference of some of the children at birth from the Farmers and Artisans to the Guardians² and of others from the Guardians to the Farmers and Artisans, there is much confusion as to how it is to be done; and the parents who give the children and the officials who transfer them are bound to know which they give to whom. And again, the things spoken of above are bound to occur even more with these transferred children, such as outrage, love-making and murder; for the children of the Guardians transferred to the other citizens will no longer speak of the Guardians as brothers and children and fathers and mothers, nor yet will those living among the Guardians so speak of the other classes, so as to be careful not to commit any such offence because of their relationship.

Such therefore may be our decision as to community of children and women.

In connection with this we have to consider the due regulation of property in a community that is to have the best political institutions: should property be owned in common or privately? This question might indeed be considered separately from the system laid down by law with regard to the children and the women:

1263aI mean, even if there be separate families as is now the case with all nations, is it better for both the ownership and the employment of property to be in common. . . ,³ for example, should the farms be separate property but the farm-produce be brought into the common stock for consumption (as is the practice with some non-Greek races); or on the contrary should the land be common and farmed in common, but the produce be divided for private use (and this form of communism also is said to prevail among some of the barbarians); or should both farms and produce be common property? Now if the tillers of the soil be of a different class⁴ there might be another and easier system, but if the citizens do the work for themselves, the regulations for the common ownership of property would give more causes for discontent; for if both in the enjoyment of the produce and in the work of production they prove not equal but unequal, complaints are bound to arise between those who enjoy or take much but work little and those who take less but work more. And in general to live together and share all our human affairs is difficult, and especially to share such things as these. And this is shown in the partnerships of fellow-travellers, for almost the greatest number of them quarrel because they come into collision with one another as a result of ordinary matters and trifles; and also we come into collision most with those of our servantswhom we employ most often for ordinary attendance. Community of property therefore involves these and other similar difficulties; and the present system, if further improved by good morals and by the regulation of correct legislation, would be greatly superior. For it will possess the merit of both systems, by which I mean the advantage of property being common and the advantage of its being private. For property ought to be common in a sense but private speaking absolutely. For the superintendence of properties being divided among the owners will not cause these mutual complaints, and will improve the more because each will apply himself to it as to private business of his own; while on the other hand virtue will be exercised to make “friends’ goods common goods,” as the proverb⁵ goes, for the purpose of use. Such a system exists even now in outline in some states, showing that it is not impracticable, and especially in the ones that are well-administered parts of it are realized already and parts might be realized; for individuals while owning their property privately put their own possessions at the service of their friends and make use of their friends’ possessions as common property; for instance in Sparta people use one another’s slaves as virtually their own, as well as horses and hounds, and also use the produce in the fields throughout the country if they need provisions on a journey. It is clear therefore that it is better for possessions to be privately owned, but to make them common property in use; and to train the citizens to this is the special task of the legislator. And moreover to feel that a thing is one’s private property makes an inexpressibly great difference for pleasure;

1263bfor the universal feeling of love for oneself is surely not purposeless, but a natural instinct. Selfishness on the other hand is justly blamed; but this is not to love oneself but to love oneself more than one ought, just as covetousness means loving money to excess—since some love of self, money and so on is practically universal. Moreover, to bestow favors and assistance on friends or visitors or comrades is a great pleasure, and a condition of this is the private ownership of property.These advantages therefore do not come to those who carry the unification of the state too far; and in addition to this they manifestly do away with the practice of two virtues, temperance in relation to women (for it is a noble deed to refrain from one through temperance when she belongs to another) and liberality in relation to possessions (for one will not be able to display liberality nor perform a single liberal action, since the active exercise of liberality takes place in the use of possessions).

Such legislation therefore has an attractive appearance, and might be thought to be humane; for he who is told about it welcomes it with gladness, thinking that it will result in a marvellous friendliness of everybody towards everybody, especially when somebody denounces the evils at present existing in states as due to the fact thatwealth is not owned in common— I mean lawsuits between citizens about breach of contract, and trials for perjury, and the flattery of the rich.But the real cause of all these evils is not the absence of communism, but wickedness, since we see far more quarrels occurring among those who own or use property in common than among those who have their estates separate; but we notice that those who quarrel as a result of their partnerships are few when compared with the total number of private owners. And again it is just to state not only all the evils that men will lose by adopting communism, but also all the good things; and life in such circumstances is seen to be utterly impossible.

The cause of Socrates’ error must be deemed to be that his fundamental assumption was incorrect. It is certain that in a way both the household and the state should be a unit, but they should not be so in every way. For in one way the state as its unification proceeds will cease to be a state, and in another way, though it continues a state, yet by coming near to ceasing to be one it will be a worse state, just as if one turned a harmony into unison or a rhythm into a single foot. The proper thing is for the state, while being a multitude, to be made a partnership and a unity by means of education, as has been said before and it is strange that the very philosopher who intends to introduce a system of education and thinks that this will make the city morally good should fancy that he can regulate society by such measures as have been mentioned instead of by manners and culture and laws, just as the legislator introduced community of property in Sparta and Crete by the institution of public messes.