The Intelligent Troglodyte’s Guide to Plato’s Republic, 2016a

78 The Democratic Soul
See 558c-562a. The democratic soul is like the oligarchic soul in being ruled by
the appetitive part, but whereas the necessary desires (the beneficial appetites) are
dominant in the oligarchic soul, unnecessary desires (the drones of the soul) are, in
the democratic soul, on at least an equal footing. In the story Socrates tells, a
young man, having been raised in an oligarchic household, “tastes the honey of the
drones” and begins associating with people who can provide him with every sort
of appetitive pleasure. Not having been educated well, the rational part of his soul
has nothing to say to dissuade him. Just as the rational part works in the oligarchic
soul to figure out ways to acquire and retain wealth, its cleverness now comes to
be exercised in finding creative ways of achieving these dissolute pleasures. What
becomes of such a person? “If he’s lucky,” Socrates says, “and does not go
beyond the limits in his bacchic frenzy, and if, as a result of his growing somewhat
older, the great tumult in him passes, he welcomes back some of the exiles” –
some of the neglected desires, for wealth, for honor, for learning (of a sort) – “and
ceases to surrender himself completely to the newcomers. Then, putting all his
pleasures on an equal footing, he lives, always surrendering rule over himself to
whichever desire comes along, as if it were chosen by lot, until it is satisfied; and
after that to another, dishonoring none but satisfying all equally.” This makes for
a somewhat disorderly life, but the democratic person considers it “pleasant, free,
and blessedly happy.”
What does it mean to call someone a “well-rounded person”? Are
democratic people, with their equal valuing of all pleasures, more wellrounded
than aristocratic people?
How might a democratic person practice philosophy differently than an
aristocratic person?
What is so bad about democratic souls that Socrates ranks them just one
step above the most unjust of souls?
Interpersonal love is an important part of life, and it is interesting, given
how wide-ranging the discussion in the Republic is, how little attention