And if we would do Plato justice, we must examine carefully the character of his proposals.

First, we may observe that the relations of the sexes supposed by him are the reverse of licentious: he seems rather to aim at an impossible strictness.

Secondly, he conceives the family to be the natural enemy of the state; and he entertains the serious hope that an universal brotherhood may take the place of private interests--an aspiration which, although not justified by experience, has possessed many noble minds.

On the other hand, there is no sentiment or imagination in the connections which men and women are supposed by him to form; human beings return to the level of the animals, neither exalting to heaven, nor yet abusing the natural instincts.

All that world of poetry and fancy which the passion of love has called forth in modern literature and romance would have been banished by Plato.