[Laws by Plato]@TWC D-Link book
Laws

INTRODUCTION AND ANALYSIS
179/519

This is the ideal state; than which there never can be a truer or better--a state, whether inhabited by Gods or sons of Gods, which will make the dwellers therein blessed.

Here is the pattern on which we must ever fix our eyes; but we are now concerned with another, which comes next to it, and we will afterwards proceed to a third.
Inasmuch as our citizens are not fitted either by nature or education to receive the saying, Friends have all things in common, let them retain their houses and private property, but use them in the service of their country, who is their God and parent, and of the Gods and demigods of the land.

Their first care should be to preserve the number of their lots.

This may be secured in the following manner: when the possessor of a lot dies, he shall leave his lot to his best-beloved child, who will become the heir of all duties and interests, and will minister to the Gods and to the family, to the living and to the dead.

Of the remaining children, the females must be given in marriage according to the law to be hereafter enacted; the males may be assigned to citizens who have no children of their own.


<<Back  Index  Next>>

D-Link book Top

TWC mobile books