And if we may assume that our whole discussion about the state has not been mere idle talk, I should like to prove to you, if you will consent to listen, that this institution is good and proper; but if you had rather not, I will refrain.
CLEINIAS: There is nothing which we should both of us like better, Stranger, than to hear what you have to say.
ATHENIAN: Very good; and you must not be surprised if I go back a little, for we have plenty of leisure, and there is nothing to prevent us from considering in every point of view the subject of law.
CLEINIAS: True.
ATHENIAN: Then let us return once more to what we were saying at first.
Every man should understand that the human race either had no beginning at all, and will never have an end, but always will be and has been; or that it began an immense while ago.
CLEINIAS: Certainly.
ATHENIAN: Well, and have there not been constitutions and destructions of states, and all sorts of pursuits both orderly and disorderly, and diverse desires of meats and drinks always, and in all the world, and all sorts of changes of the seasons in which animals may be expected to have undergone innumerable transformations of themselves?
CLEINIAS: No doubt.
ATHENIAN: And may we not suppose that vines appeared, which had previously no existence, and also olives, and the gifts of Demeter and her daughter, of which one Triptolemus was the minister, and that, before these existed, animals took to devouring each other as they do still?
CLEINIAS: True.
ATHENIAN: Again, the practice of men sacrificing one another still exists among many nations; while, on the other hand, we hear of other human beings who did not even venture to taste the flesh of a cow and had no animal sacrifices, but only cakes and fruits dipped in honey, and similar pure offerings, but no flesh of animals; from these they abstained under the idea that they ought not to eat them, and might not stain the altars of the Gods with blood.

For in those days men are said to have lived a sort of Orphic life, having the use of all lifeless things, but abstaining from all living things.
CLEINIAS: Such has been the constant tradition, and is very likely true.
ATHENIAN: Some one might say to us, What is the drift of all this?
CLEINIAS: A very pertinent question, Stranger.
ATHENIAN: And therefore I will endeavour, Cleinias, if I can, to draw the natural inference.
CLEINIAS: Proceed.
ATHENIAN: I see that among men all things depend upon three wants and desires, of which the end is virtue, if they are rightly led by them, or the opposite if wrongly.

Now these are eating and drinking, which begin at birth--every animal has a natural desire for them, and is violently excited, and rebels against him who says that he must not satisfy all his pleasures and appetites, and get rid of all the corresponding pains--and the third and greatest and sharpest want and desire breaks out last, and is the fire of sexual lust, which kindles in men every species of wantonness and madness.

And these three disorders we must endeavour to master by the three great principles of fear and law and right reason; turning them away from that which is called pleasantest to the best, using the Muses and the Gods who preside over contests to extinguish their increase and influx.
But to return:--After marriage let us speak of the birth of children, and after their birth of their nurture and education.

In the course of discussion the several laws will be perfected, and we shall at last arrive at the common tables.