Consider further, Socrates, another kind of language about justice and injustice employed by both laymen and poets. All with one accord reiterate that soberness and righteousness are fair and honorable, to be sure, but unpleasant and laborious, while licentiousness and injustice are pleasant and easy to win and are only in opinion and by convention disgraceful. They say that injustice pays better than justice, for the most part, and they do not scruple to felicitate bad men who are rich or have other kinds of power to do them honor in public and private, and to dishonor and disregard those who are in any way weak or poor, even while admitting that they are better men than the others. But the strangest of all these speeches are the things they say about the gods Footnote 1The gnomic poets complain that bad men prosper for a time, but they have faith in the late punishment of the wicked and the final triumph of justice. and virtue, how so it is that the gods themselves assign to many good men misfortunes and an evil life but to their opposites a contrary lot; and begging priests Footnote 2There is a striking analogy between Plato’s language here and the description by Protestant historians of the sale of indulgences by Tetzel in Germany. Rich men’s doors is proverbial. Cf. 489 B. and soothsayers go to rich men’s doors and make them believe that they by means of sacrifices and incantations have accumulated a treasure of power from the gods Footnote 3Cf. Mill,
Utility of Religion,
Three Essays on Religion, p. 90: All positive religions aid this self-delusion. Bad religions teach that divine vengeance may be bought off by offerings or personal abasement.
Plato, Laws 885 D, anticipates Mill. With the whole passage compare the scenes at the founding of Cloudcuckootown, Aristophanes Birds 960-990, and more seriously the medieval doctrine of the treasure of the church
and the Hindu tapas. that can expiate and cure with pleasurable festivals any misdeed of a man or his ancestors, and that if a man wishes to harm an enemy, at slight cost he will be enabled to injure just and unjust alike, since they are masters of spells and enchantments Footnote 4In Laws 933 D both are used of the victim with ἐπῳδαῖς, which primarily applies to the god. Cf. Lucan, Phars. vi. 492 and 527. that constrain the gods to serve their end. And for all these sayings they cite the poets as witnesses, with regard to the ease and plentifulness of vice, quoting: Evil-doing in plenty a man shall find for the seeking;
Smooth is the way and it lies near at hand and is easy to enter; But on the pathway of virtue the gods put sweat from the first step,
Hes. WD 287-289and a certain long and uphill road. And others cite Homer as a witness to the beguiling of gods by men, since he too said: The gods themselves are moved by prayers, And men by sacrifice and soothing vows,
And incense and libation turn their wills Praying, whenever they have sinned and made transgression.
Hom. Il. 9.497
Book 2