The criminal labours under a mental distemper, and the best thing that can happen to him, is to be punished that so he may be cured.

The unpunished wrong-doer is more miserable than if he were punished.
Sokrates in this dialogue maintains, in opposition to the thesis of Protagoras, that pleasure is not the same as good, that there are bad pleasures and good pains; and a skilful adviser, one versed in the science of good and evil, must discriminate between them.

He does not mean that those pleasures only are bad that bring an overplus of future pains, which would be in accordance with the previous dialogue.
The sentiment of the dialogue is ascetic and self-denying.[7] Order or Discipline is inculcated, not as a means to an end, but as an end in itself.
The POLITIKUS is on the Art of Government, and gives the Platonic _beau ideal_ of the One competent person, governing absolutely, by virtue of his scientific knowledge, and aiming at the good and improvement of the governed.

This is merely another illustration of the Sokratic ideal--a despotism, anointed by supreme good intentions, and by an ideal skill.

The Republic is an enlargement of the lessons of the Politikus without the dialectic discussion.
The postulate of the One Wise man is repeated in KRATYLUS, on the unpromising subject of Language or the invention of Names.
The PHILEBUS has a decidedly ethical character.