Such a philosophy is both foolish and false, like that opinion of the clever rogue who assumes all other men to be like himself.

And theories of this sort do not represent the real nature of the State, which is based on a vague sense of right gradually corrected and enlarged by custom and law (although capable also of perversion), any more than they describe the origin of society, which is to be sought in the family and in the social and religious feelings of man.

Nor do they represent the average character of individuals, which cannot be explained simply on a theory of evil, but has always a counteracting element of good.

And as men become better such theories appear more and more untruthful to them, because they are more conscious of their own disinterestedness.

A little experience may make a man a cynic; a great deal will bring him back to a truer and kindlier view of the mixed nature of himself and his fellow men.
The two brothers ask Socrates to prove to them that the just is happy when they have taken from him all that in which happiness is ordinarily supposed to consist.