The Republic - Beginning of BOOK VII  - The Allegory of the Cave 
  SOCRATES - GLAUCON
  AND now, I said, let me show in a figure how far our nature is
enlightened or unenlightened: --Behold! human beings living in a
underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching
all along the den; here they have been from their childhood, and
have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can
only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning round
their heads. Above and behind them a fire is blazing at a distance,
and between the fire and the prisoners there is a raised way; and
you will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the
screen which marionette players have in front of them, over which they
show the puppets.
  I see.
  And do you see, I said, men passing along the wall carrying all
sorts of vessels, and statues and figures of animals made of wood
and stone and various materials, which appear over the wall? Some of
them are talking, others silent.
  You have shown me a strange image, and they are strange prisoners.
  Like ourselves, I replied; and they see only their own shadows, or
the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall
of the cave?
  True, he said; how could they see anything but the shadows if they
were never allowed to move their heads?
  And of the objects which are being carried in like manner they would
only see the shadows?
  Yes, he said.
  And if they were able to converse with one another, would they not
suppose that they were naming what was actually before them?
  Very true.
  And suppose further that the prison had an echo which came from
the other side, would they not be sure to fancy when one of the
passers-by spoke that the voice which they heard came from the passing
shadow?
  No question, he replied.
  To them, I said, the truth would be literally nothing but the
shadows of the images.
  That is certain.
  And now look again, and see what will naturally follow it' the
prisoners are released and disabused of their error. At first, when
any of them is liberated and compelled suddenly to stand up and turn
his neck round and walk and look towards the light, he will suffer
sharp pains; the glare will distress him, and he will be unable to see
the realities of which in his former state he had seen the shadows;
and then conceive some one saying to him, that what he saw before
was an illusion, but that now, when he is approaching nearer to
being and his eye is turned towards more real existence, he has a
clearer vision, -what will be his reply? And you may further imagine
that his instructor is pointing to the objects as they pass and
requiring him to name them, -will he not be perplexed? Will he not
fancy that the shadows which he formerly saw are truer than the
objects which are now shown to him?
  Far truer.
  And if he is compelled to look straight at the light, will he not
have a pain in his eyes which will make him turn away to take and take
in the objects of vision which he can see, and which he will
conceive to be in reality clearer than the things which are now
being shown to him?
  True, he now
  And suppose once more, that he is reluctantly dragged up a steep and
rugged ascent, and held fast until he 's forced into the presence of
the sun himself, is he not likely to be pained and irritated? When
he approaches the light his eyes will be dazzled, and he will not be
able to see anything at all of what are now called realities.
  Not all in a moment, he said.
  He will require to grow accustomed to the sight of the upper
world. And first he will see the shadows best, next the reflections of
men and other objects in the water, and then the objects themselves;
then he will gaze upon the light of the moon and the stars and the
spangled heaven; and he will see the sky and the stars by night better
than the sun or the light of the sun by day?
  Certainly.
  Last of he will be able to see the sun, and not mere reflections
of him in the water, but he will see him in his own proper place,
and not in another; and he will contemplate him as he is.
  Certainly.
  He will then proceed to argue that this is he who gives the season
and the years, and is the guardian of all that is in the visible
world, and in a certain way the cause of all things which he and his
fellows have been accustomed to behold?
  Clearly, he said, he would first see the sun and then reason about
him.
  And when he remembered his old habitation, and the wisdom of the den
and his fellow-prisoners, do you not suppose that he would
felicitate himself on the change, and pity them?
  Certainly, he would.
  And if they were in the habit of conferring honours among themselves
on those who were quickest to observe the passing shadows and to
remark which of them went before, and which followed after, and
which were together; and who were therefore best able to draw
conclusions as to the future, do you think that he would care for such
honours and glories, or envy the possessors of them? Would he not
say with Homer,

  Better to be the poor servant of a poor master,

and to endure anything, rather than think as they do and live after
their manner?
  Yes, he said, I think that he would rather suffer anything than
entertain these false notions and live in this miserable manner.
  Imagine once more, I said, such an one coming suddenly out of the
sun to be replaced in his old situation; would he not be certain to
have his eyes full of darkness?
  To be sure, he said.
  And if there were a contest, and he had to compete in measuring
the shadows with the prisoners who had never moved out of the den,
while his sight was still weak, and before his eyes had become
steady (and the time which would be needed to acquire this new habit
of sight might be very considerable) would he not be ridiculous? Men
would say of him that up he went and down he came without his eyes;
and that it was better not even to think of ascending; and if any
one tried to loose another and lead him up to the light, let them only
catch the offender, and they would put him to death.
  No question, he said.
  This entire allegory, I said, you may now append, dear Glaucon, to
the previous argument; the prison-house is the world of sight, the
light of the fire is the sun, and you will not misapprehend me if
you interpret the journey upwards to be the ascent of the soul into
the intellectual world according to my poor belief, which, at your
desire, I have expressed whether rightly or wrongly God knows. But,
whether true or false, my opinion is that in the world of knowledge
the idea of good appears last of all, and is seen only with an effort;
and, when seen, is also inferred to be the universal author of all
things beautiful and right, parent of light and of the lord of light
in this visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in
the intellectual; and that this is the power upon which he who would
act rationally, either in public or private life must have his eye
fixed.
  I agree, he said, as far as I am able to understand you.
  Moreover, I said, you must not wonder that those who attain to
this beatific vision are unwilling to descend to human affairs; for
their souls are ever hastening into the upper world where they
desire to dwell; which desire of theirs is very natural, if our
allegory may be trusted.
  Yes, very natural.
  And is there anything surprising in one who passes from divine
contemplations to the evil state of man, misbehaving himself in a
ridiculous manner; if, while his eyes are blinking and before he has
become accustomed to the surrounding darkness, he is compelled to
fight in courts of law, or in other places, about the images or the
shadows of images of justice, and is endeavouring to meet the
conceptions of those who have never yet seen absolute justice?
  Anything but surprising, he replied.
  Any one who has common sense will remember that the bewilderments of
the eyes are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either from
coming out of the light or from going into the light, which is true of
the mind's eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye; and he who
remembers this when he sees any one whose vision is perplexed and
weak, will not be too ready to laugh; he will first ask whether that
soul of man has come out of the brighter light, and is unable to see
because unaccustomed to the dark, or having turned from darkness to
the day is dazzled by excess of light. And he will count the one happy
in his condition and state of being, and he will pity the other; or,
if he have a mind to laugh at the soul which comes from below into the
light, there will be more reason in this than in the laugh which
greets him who returns from above out of the light into the den.
  That, he said, is a very just distinction.
  But then, if I am right, certain professors of education must be
wrong when they say that they can put a knowledge into the soul
which was not there before, like sight into blind eyes.
  They undoubtedly say this, he replied.
  Whereas, our argument shows that the power and capacity of
learning exists in the soul already; and that just as the eye was
unable to turn from darkness to light without the whole body, so too
the instrument of knowledge can only by the movement of the whole soul
be turned from the world of becoming into that of being, and learn
by degrees to endure the sight of being, and of the brightest and best
of being, or in other words, of the good.
  Very true.
  And must there not be some art which will effect conversion in the
easiest and quickest manner; not implanting the faculty of sight,
for that exists already, but has been turned in the wrong direction,
and is looking away from the truth?
  Yes, he said, such an art may be presumed.
  And whereas the other so-called virtues of the soul seem to be
akin to bodily qualities, for even when they are not originally innate
they can be implanted later by habit and exercise, the of wisdom
more than anything else contains a divine element which always
remains, and by this conversion is rendered useful and profitable; or,
on the other hand, hurtful and useless. Did you never observe the
narrow intelligence flashing from the keen eye of a clever rogue --how
eager he is, how clearly his paltry soul sees the way to his end; he
is the reverse of blind, but his keen eyesight is forced into the
service of evil, and he is mischievous in proportion to his
cleverness.
  Very true, he said.
  But what if there had been a circumcision of such natures in the
days of their youth; and they had been severed from those sensual
pleasures, such as eating and drinking, which, like leaden weights,
were attached to them at their birth, and which drag them down and
turn the vision of their souls upon the things that are below --if,
I say, they had been released from these impediments and turned in the
opposite direction, the very same faculty in them would have seen
the truth as keenly as they see what their eyes are turned to now.
  Very likely.
  Yes, I said; and there is another thing which is likely. or rather a
necessary inference from what has preceded, that neither the
uneducated and uninformed of the truth, nor yet those who never make
an end of their education, will be able ministers of State; not the
former, because they have no single aim of duty which is the rule of
all their actions, private as well as public; nor the latter,
because they will not act at all except upon compulsion, fancying that
they are already dwelling apart in the islands of the blest.
  Very true, he replied.
  Then, I said, the business of us who are the founders of the State
will be to compel the best minds to attain that knowledge which we
have already shown to be the greatest of all-they must continue to
ascend until they arrive at the good; but when they have ascended
and seen enough we must not allow them to do as they do now.
  What do you mean?
  I mean that they remain in the upper world: but this must not be
allowed; they must be made to descend again among the prisoners in the
den, and partake of their labours and honours, whether they are
worth having or not.
  But is not this unjust? he said; ought we to give them a worse life,
when they might have a better?
  You have again forgotten, my friend, I said, the intention of the
legislator, who did not aim at making any one class in the State happy
above the rest; the happiness was to be in the whole State, and he
held the citizens together by persuasion and necessity, making them
benefactors of the State, and therefore benefactors of one another; to
this end he created them, not to please themselves, but to be his
instruments in binding up the State.
  True, he said, I had forgotten.
  Observe, Glaucon, that there will be no injustice in compelling
our philosophers to have a care and providence of others; we shall
explain to them that in other States, men of their class are not
obliged to share in the toils of politics: and this is reasonable, for
they grow up at their own sweet will, and the government would
rather not have them. Being self-taught, they cannot be expected to
show any gratitude for a culture which they have never received. But
we have brought you into the world to be rulers of the hive, kings
of yourselves and of the other citizens, and have educated you far
better and more perfectly than they have been educated, and you are
better able to share in the double duty. Wherefore each of you, when
his turn comes, must go down to the general underground abode, and get
the habit of seeing in the dark. When you have acquired the habit, you
will see ten thousand times better than the inhabitants of the den,
and you will know what the several images are, and what they
represent, because you have seen the beautiful and just and good in
their truth. And thus our State which is also yours will be a reality,
and not a dream only, and will be administered in a spirit unlike that
of other States, in which men fight with one another about shadows
only and are distracted in the struggle for power, which in their eyes
is a great good. Whereas the truth is that the State in which the
rulers are most reluctant to govern is always the best and most
quietly governed, and the State in which they are most eager, the
worst.
  Quite true, he replied.
  And will our pupils, when they hear this, refuse to take their
turn at the toils of State, when they are allowed to spend the greater
part of their time with one another in the heavenly light?
  Impossible, he answered; for they are just men, and the commands
which we impose upon them are just; there can be no doubt that every
one of them will take office as a stern necessity, and not after the
fashion of our present rulers of State.
  Yes, my friend, I said; and there lies the point. You must
contrive for your future rulers another and a better life than that of
a ruler, and then you may have a well-ordered State; for only in the
State which offers this, will they rule who are truly rich, not in
silver and gold, but in virtue and wisdom, which are the true
blessings of life. Whereas if they go to the administration of
public affairs, poor and hungering after the' own private advantage,
thinking that hence they are to snatch the chief good, order there can
never be; for they will be fighting about office, and the civil and
domestic broils which thus arise will be the ruin of the rulers
themselves and of the whole State.
  Most true, he replied.
  And the only life which looks down upon the life of political
ambition is that of true philosophy. Do you know of any other?
  Indeed, I do not, he said.
  And those who govern ought not to be lovers of the task? For, if
they are, there will be rival lovers, and they will fight.
  No question.
  Who then are those whom we shall compel to be guardians? Surely they
will be the men who are wisest about affairs of State, and by whom the
State is best administered, and who at the same time have other
honours and another and a better life than that of politics?
  They are the men, and I will choose them, he replied.