This cannot be eradicated, and must therefore be regulated,--the pleasure must be of the right sort.
Such reflections seem to be the real, though imperfectly expressed, groundwork of the discussion.

As in the juxtaposition of the Bacchic madness and the great gift of Dionysus, or where he speaks of the different senses in which pleasure is and is not the object of imitative art, or in the illustration of the failure of the Dorian institutions from the prayer of Theseus, we have to gather his meaning as well as we can from the connexion.
The feeling of old age is discernible in this as well as in several other passages of the Laws.

Plato has arrived at the time when men sit still and look on at life; and he is willing to allow himself and others the few pleasures which remain to them.

Wine is to cheer them now that their limbs are old and their blood runs cold.

They are the best critics of dancing and music, but cannot be induced to join in song unless they have been enlivened by drinking.