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After attending a festival, Socrates, Glaucon and Ariston are forcibly obliged to go home with Polemachus; there they meet Polemarchus’ father, Cephalus, who holds forth concerning old age and the value of money. Being old is bad only if you have a bad character – and/or if you are poor. And the primary value of money is to allow one to die with a clean conscience. Money keeps one from having to lie and cheat, and it allows one to pay one’s debts and perform sacrifices. Socrates inquires: is this all there is to justice? Telling the truth and paying one’s debts? As a counter-example, he poses the case of the friend whose weapons one is holding, who has gone mad, and who is now demanding what is his due, i.e. his property. Should one give back the weapons? Obviously not. Therefore, Cephalus’ account cannot be right. Cephalus withdraws without replying, leaving the argument to Polemarchus.
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Polemarchus takes up the argument where Cephalus leaves off. Justice is giving to each what is owed. But what does that mean? Says Polemarchus: a friend will do good to a friend, evil to an enemy. So: justice must be the craft of doing good to friends, and evil to enemies. But what use will justice then be, except in time of war? It will be useful in partnerships, and when things are held in trust. An awkward consequence: ‘always justice is useful when the things concerned are useless, useless when they are useful.’ Also – if the one who is reliable at holding something would also be good at stealing it - it turns out the just man must be a sort of thief. Polemarchus denies this was at all what he had in mind.
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Polemarchus reaffirms his thesis (credited to the poet Simonides) that ‘justice is helping friends and harming enemies.’ Socrates: does ‘friend’ cover only real friends or also apparent friends? To avoid awkward consequences, Polemarchus eventually for the latter option. Now Polemarchus’ definition must be modified to run, ‘it is just to do good to our friends when they are good and evil to our enemies when they are evil.’ But soon yet another modification proves necessary: ‘to injure someone . . . is not the act of a just man.’ The just man will never harm anyone. Polemarchus agrees.
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Thrasymachus explodes in irritation at the course the discussion has taken. He demands that Socrates not just ask but answer the question, ‘what is justice?’ Also, he will not accept certain answers – ‘justice is the right’, etc. – as satisfactory. Socrates: but what if one of the forbidden answers is the right one? Thrasymachus proposes that he has a better answer, but wants to be paid for teaching it. When finally prevailed upon to speak, he declares: ‘justice is the advantage of the stronger.’ But what does this mean? Thrasymachus explains in political terms. Governments – which are stronger than those governed - establish laws for their own advantage. These laws are called ‘justice’. Therefore, ‘justice is the advantage of the stronger’. Socrates: is it ‘just’ to obey the law? Yes. And are the rulers infallible? No. So sometimes laws are not made to the advantage of rulers? Yes. So sometimes justice is both obedience and disobedience to the stronger.
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S: do you mean, by ‘justice’, ‘what the stronger thought to be to his advantage?’ T: no. When a ruler errs, he is not then, strictly speaking, the ruler. S: what is the point of a craft like medicine, or piloting a ship? T: to heal the sick and preserve the sailors. S: do crafts like these seek their own advantage or that of those they serve? T: that of those they serve. S: the arts are rulers and overseers of those things they serve? T: yes. S: but no craft commands the disadvantage of what it serves; rather, its advantage. By implication, this will apply to justice as well.
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T: Your nanny never wipes your nose, and never taught you the difference between shepherds and sheep. S: How so? T: Rulers, like shepherds, only tend their flocks for their own advantage. Thrasymachus delivers his great speech in favor of the great advantage of perfect injustice, committed on a grand scale. S: you do not seem to be discussing the art of shepherding – and ruling – according to the accepted strict sense (according to which every art or form of rule serves its subjects or subject-matter.) In general, the fine art of getting paid is distinct from the various other arts? T: Yes. S: This is why office-holders demand payment – because they don’t want benefit just for others but for themselves. Therefore, they demand money, or honor, or else they rule to avoid punishment for refusing, in the form of having to be ruled by someone less competent than themselves. Therefore, Thrasymachus is wrong to maintain that justice is the advantage of the stronger.
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Even if he is wrong about justice being the advantage of the stronger, is Thrasymachus right that the life of the unjust is more advantageous than that of the just? S: do you admit that justice is virtue and injustice vice? T: Rather, they should be termed ‘lofty naivete’ and ‘prudent counsel’. In general, injustice is wise and good, justice foolish and bad. S: does the just man try to gain advantage over the just? T: No. S: But the unjust man seeks an advantage over just and unjust alike? T: Yes. An argument from analogy follows. S: skilled musicians and physicians, who are wise and good at what they do, do not try to better others who also know what to do; they only seek to better than those who do not know. Therefore, the just are like these skilled craftsmen, and the unjust unlike them. Ergo, the just are likely to be good and wise, and the unjust the opposite.
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S: Does injustice perhaps have strength? It seems not – since it is now admitted to be ignorance. But can a state perhaps wield power without justice? An argument follows that injustice impairs all coordinated efforts – whether by an individual, a group, or a state; therefore, it is incompatible with strength. But are the just therefore happier than the unjust? Mightn’t the opposite be the case? Everything is said to have its function and its virtue – which allows it to perform its function. The function of the soul is to live and regulate life. And its peculiar virtue is justice. So the soul of the good man must live well; that of the bad man badly. He who lives well is happy; he who lives badly is miserable. Therefore, since misery is unprofitable, injustice can never be profitable. And yet: all this is cast in doubt, in the end, by the fact that we do not know yet what justice is.
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