For we have reached the settlement of Lacedaemon; which, as you truly say, is in laws and in institutions the sister of Crete.

And we are all the better for the digression, because we have gone through various governments and settlements, and have been present at the foundation of a first, second, and third state, succeeding one another in infinite time.

And now there appears on the horizon a fourth state or nation which was once in process of settlement and has continued settled to this day.

If, out of all this, we are able to discern what is well or ill settled, and what laws are the salvation and what are the destruction of cities, and what changes would make a state happy, O Megillus and Cleinias, we may now begin again, unless we have some fault to find with the previous discussion.
MEGILLUS: If some God, Stranger, would promise us that our new enquiry about legislation would be as good and full as the present, I would go a great way to hear such another, and would think that a day as long as this--and we are now approaching the longest day of the year--was too short for the discussion.
ATHENIAN: Then I suppose that we must consider this subject?
MEGILLUS: Certainly.
ATHENIAN: Let us place ourselves in thought at the moment when Lacedaemon and Argos and Messene and the rest of the Peloponnesus were all in complete subjection, Megillus, to your ancestors; for afterwards, as the legend informs us, they divided their army into three portions, and settled three cities, Argos, Messene, Lacedaemon.
MEGILLUS: True.
ATHENIAN: Temenus was the king of Argos, Cresphontes of Messene, Procles and Eurysthenes of Lacedaemon.
MEGILLUS: Certainly.
ATHENIAN: To these kings all the men of that day made oath that they would assist them, if any one subverted their kingdom.
MEGILLUS: True.
ATHENIAN: But can a kingship be destroyed, or was any other form of government ever destroyed, by any but the rulers themselves?
No indeed, by Zeus.

Have we already forgotten what was said a little while ago?
MEGILLUS: No.
ATHENIAN: And may we not now further confirm what was then mentioned?
For we have come upon facts which have brought us back again to the same principle; so that, in resuming the discussion, we shall not be enquiring about an empty theory, but about events which actually happened.