If Cleinias and this our reverend company succeed in proving to you that you know not what you say of the Gods, then will God help you; but should you desire to hear more, listen to what we say to the third opponent, if you have any understanding whatsoever.

For I think that we have sufficiently proved the existence of the Gods, and that they care for men: The other notion that they are appeased by the wicked, and take gifts, is what we must not concede to any one, and what every man should disprove to the utmost of his power.
CLEINIAS: Very good; let us do as you say.
ATHENIAN: Well, then, by the Gods themselves I conjure you to tell me--if they are to be propitiated, how are they to be propitiated?
Who are they, and what is their nature?
Must they not be at least rulers who have to order unceasingly the whole heaven?
CLEINIAS: True.
ATHENIAN: And to what earthly rulers can they be compared, or who to them?
How in the less can we find an image of the greater?
Are they charioteers of contending pairs of steeds, or pilots of vessels?
Perhaps they might be compared to the generals of armies, or they might be likened to physicians providing against the diseases which make war upon the body, or to husbandmen observing anxiously the effects of the seasons on the growth of plants; or perhaps to shepherds of flocks.

For as we acknowledge the world to be full of many goods and also of evils, and of more evils than goods, there is, as we affirm, an immortal conflict going on among us, which requires marvellous watchfulness; and in that conflict the Gods and demigods are our allies, and we are their property.

Injustice and insolence and folly are the destruction of us, and justice and temperance and wisdom are our salvation; and the place of these latter is in the life of the Gods, although some vestige of them may occasionally be discerned among mankind.

But upon this earth we know that there dwell souls possessing an unjust spirit, who may be compared to brute animals, which fawn upon their keepers, whether dogs or shepherds, or the best and most perfect masters; for they in like manner, as the voices of the wicked declare, prevail by flattery and prayers and incantations, and are allowed to make their gains with impunity.