Y. Soc. Impossible.

  Str. Then the nearest approach which these lower forms of government
can ever make to the true government of the one scientific ruler, is
to do nothing contrary to their own written laws and national customs.

  Y. Soc. Very good.

  Str. When the rich imitate the true form, such a government is
called aristocracy; and when they are regardless of the laws,
oligarchy.

  Y Soc. True.

  Str. Or again, when an individual rules according to law in
imitation of him who knows, we call him a king; and if he rules
according to law, we give him the same name, whether he rules with
opinion or with knowledge.

  Y. Soc. To be sure.

  Str. And when an individual truly possessing knowledge rules, his
name will surely be the same-he will be called a king; and thus the
five names of governments, as they are now reckoned, become one.

  Y. Soc. That is true.

  Str. And when an individual ruler governs neither by law nor by
custom, but following in the steps of the true man of science pretends
that he can only act for the best by violating the laws, while in
reality appetite and ignorance are the motives of the imitation, may
not such an one be called a tyrant?

  Y. Soc. Certainly.

  Str. And this we believe to be the origin of the tyrant and the
king, of oligarchies, and aristocracies, and democracies-because men
are offended at the one monarch, and can never be made to believe that
any one can be worthy of such authority, or is able and willing in the
spirit of virtue and knowledge to act justly and holily to all; they
fancy that he will be a despot who will wrong and harm and slay whom
he pleases of us; for if there could be such a despot as we
describe, they would acknowledge that we ought to be too glad to
have him, and that he alone would be the happy ruler of a true and
perfect State.

  Y. Soc. To be sure.

  Str. But then, as the State is not like a beehive, and has no
natural head who is at once recognized to be the superior both in body
and in mind, mankind are obliged to meet and make laws, and
endeavour to approach as nearly as they can to the true form of
government.

  Y. Soc. True.

  Str. And when the foundation of politics is in the letter only and
in custom, and knowledge is divorced from action, can we wonder
Socrates, at the miseries which there are, and always will be, in
States? Any other art, built on such a foundation and thus
conducted, would ruin all that it touched. Ought we not rather to
wonder at the natural strength of the political bond? For States
have endured all this, time out of mind, and yet some of them still
remain and are not overthrown, though many of them, like ships at sea,
founder from time to time, and perish, and have perished and will hire
after perish, through the badness of their pilots and crews, who
have the worst sort of ignorance of the highest truths-I mean to
say, that they are wholly unaquainted with politics, of which, above
all other sciences, they believe themselves to have acquired the
most perfect knowledge.

  Y. Soc. Very true.

  Str. Then the question arises:-which of these untrue forms of
government is the least oppressive to their subjects, though they
are all oppressive; and which is the worst of them? Here is a
consideration which is beside our present purpose, and yet having
regard to the whole it seems to influence all our actions: we must
examine it.

  Y. Soc. Yes, we must.

  Str. You may say that of the three forms, the same is at once the
hardest and the easiest.

  Y. Soc. What do you mean?

  Str. I am speaking of the three forms of government, which I
mentioned at the beginning of this discussion-monarchy, the rule of
the few, and the rule of the many.

  Y. Soc. True.

  Str. If we divide each of these we shall have six, from which the
true one may be distinguished as a seventh.

  Y. Soc. How would you make the division?

  Str. Monarchy divides into royalty and tyranny; the rule of the