His city is equipped for war rather than for peace, and this would seem to be justified by the ordinary condition of Hellenic States.

The myth of the earth-born men is an embodiment of the orthodox tradition of Hellas, and the allusion to the four ages of the world is also sanctioned by the authority of Hesiod and the poets.

Thus we see that the Republic is partly founded on the ideal of the old Greek polis, partly on the actual circumstances of Hellas in that age.

Plato, like the old painters, retains the traditional form, and like them he has also a vision of a city in the clouds.
There is yet another thread which is interwoven in the texture of the work; for the Republic is not only a Dorian State, but a Pythagorean league.

The 'way of life' which was connected with the name of Pythagoras, like the Catholic monastic orders, showed the power which the mind of an individual might exercise over his contemporaries, and may have naturally suggested to Plato the possibility of reviving such 'mediaeval institutions.' The Pythagoreans, like Plato, enforced a rule of life and a moral and intellectual training.