THE STORY OF PHILOSOPHY2 The Lives and Opinions

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THE STORY OF PHILOSOPHY
overpopulation (373) ; the second is foreign trade, with the inevitable
a form of
disputes that interrupt it. Indeed, competitive trade is really
war; "peace is only a name" . (Laws, 622) It will be well then to situate
our ideal state considerably inland, so that it shall be shut out from any
high development of foreign commerce. "The sea fills a country with
it breeds in men's minds
merchandise and money-making and bargaining;
habits of financial greed and faithlessness,
alike in its internal and in its
foreign relations" (Laws, 704-7). Foreign trade requires a large navy
to protect it; and navalism is as bad as militarism. "In every case the
guilt of war is confined to a few persons, and the many are friends" (47 1 ) .
The most frequent wars are precisely the vilest civil wars, wars of
Greek against Greek; let the Greeks form a pan-Hellenic league of na-
tions, uniting lest "the whole Greek race some day fall under the yoke of
barbarian peoples" (469).
So our political structure will be topped with a small class of guardians;
it will be protected by a large class of soldiers and "auxiliaries"; and it
will rest on the broad base of a commercial, industrial, and agricultural
population. This last or economic class will retain private property,
private mates, and private families. But trade and industry will be regulated
by the guardians to prevent excessive individual wealth or poverty;
any one acquiring more than four times the average possession of the
citizens must relinquish the excess to the state (Laws, 714 f). Perhaps
interest will be forbidden, and profits limited (Laws, 920). The communism
of the guardians is impracticable for the economic class; the
distinguishing characteristics of this class are powerful instincts of acquisition
and competition; some noble souls among them will be free
from this fever of combative possession, but the majority of men are
consumed with it; they hunger and thirst not after righteousness, nor
after honor, but after possessions endlessly multiplied. Now men engrossed
in the pursuit of money are unfit to rule a state; and our entire plan
rests on the hope that if the guardians rule well and live simply, the
economic man will be willing to let them monopolize administration if
they permit him to monopolize luxury. In short, the perfect society would
be that in which each class and each unit would be doing the work to
which its nature and aptitude best adapted it; in which no class or indi-
vidual would interfere with others, but all would cooperate in difference
to produce an efficient and harmonious whole (433-4) . That would be a
just state.
IX. THE ETHICAL SOLUTION
And now our political digression is ended, and we are ready at last to
answer the question with which we began What is justice? There are
only three things worth while in this world justice, beauty and truth;