Book VII.. Footnote 358:

Footnote 358:

780B; women and children separate, 806E; on its Cretan origin, 625E ff.

Footnote 359:

846D, 847A, D, 919D, 806E.

Footnote 360:

744B; cf. pp. 55 f. on equality; cf. 757B-D, contrasting the mere arithmetical equality (τὴν ἀριθμῷ ἴσην), which is easily realized, and the true equality, which is very difficult. This latter apportions to each in accord with his nature (πρὸς τὴν φύσιν αὐτῶν). The two are almost opposites (ἐναντιαῖν). Espinas (op. cit., p. 236) thinks that the division into property classes in the Laws is an attempt to realize this principle.

Footnote 361:

744B.

Footnote 362:

736C-D, 704.

Footnote 363:

Op. cit., p. 143; cf. also pp. 163-65, where he compares it to modern collectivism; cf. p. 162; also Poehlmann, op. cit., II, 295.

Footnote 364:

923A; cf. 877D, and much of the legislation on property, above.

Footnote 365:

Cf. pp. 59 f. and notes. The modern analogy is not close, yet in each case the aim is to prevent undue gains whereby the public is oppressed.

Footnote 366:

Cf. p. 30, n. 3.

Footnote 367:

Cf. p. 59 and notes. The socialistic tendency to overemphasize the power of law is also strong here as in the Republic. But cf. p. 36, n. 4, and Laws 807B, 746A-B, 747B.

Footnote 368:

Time and Tide, IX, 5-9. Modern Painters, V, Pt. 8, chap. i, 6 (Vol. VII, 207). Espinas (Revue des Etudes Grecques, XXVII , 246) calls this Platonic denial of “conflict of interest” in trade “le thème éternel de la chimère socialiste.”

Footnote 369:

Laws 626E: τὸ πολεμίους εἶναι πάντας πᾶσιν; cited by Poehlmann, op. cit., I, 557; but he exaggerates the analogy.

Footnote 370:

Cf. 742D-E, 743D-E, 729A, and the remarks on retail trade, 918B-919E, 870B; cf. also, above, on wealth.

Footnote 371:

As seen above, they are all slaves or strangers. A direct comparison is hardly possible, since in the Republic, the masses are the majority of the citizens, while in the Laws, there are none.

Footnote 372:

744D; cf. Shorey, Class. Phil., IX (1914), 363: “Plato’s object, however, is not socialistic equalization of the ‘good things’ of life, but the enforced disinterestedness of the rulers, and the complete self-realization of every type of man, in limitation to his own proper sphere and task.”

Footnote 373:

Cf. pp. 55 and 60, on equality; also note 4, above.

Footnote 374:

Francotte (L’Industrie, II, 250) suggests that l’étatisme, “nationalism,” would be a more applicable term for the Laws. He distinguishes this from socialism, as being not so thoroughgoing a limitation of the individual as is the “socialism” of the Republic. Cf. Shorey, Class. Phil., IX (1914), 358, on the famous “communistic” passage in Laws 739C: ὄντως ἐστὶ κοινὰ τὰ φίλων, etc. He calls it a “rhetorical exaltation of that ideal unity of civic feeling, which Demosthenes upbraids Aeschines for not sharing.” For further communistic ideas of Plato, cf. his incomplete romantic story of Atlantis in the Critias. The ideal is similar to that of the larger works. Cf. Poehlmann, op. cit., II, 348 ff.