Page:The Republic of Plato (3rd ed.) (Lindsay, 1923).djvu/416

Rh hand in turn. Now the souls, when they came thither, had to go at once to Lachesis. Then a prophet first marshalled them inorder, and then taking lots and patterns of lives from the lap of Lachesis, mounted upon a high pulpit and spoke, ‘The word of the daughter of Necessity, maid Lachesis. Souls of a day, here beginneth another circle that bears the mortal race to death. The angel will not cast lots for you, but you shall choose your angel. Let him whose lot falls first have first choice of a life to which he shall be bound by Necessity. But virtue has no master, and as a man honours or despises her, so will he have more of her or less. The responsibility is on him that chooseth. There is none on God.’

“So saying, the prophet cast the lots to all, and each man took up the lot that fell beside him, except Er. Him the prophet forbade. And as each took it up he knew what order in the lot he had obtained. And after this the prophet laid on the ground before them the patterns of lives, many more patterns than there were persons present. Now there were patterns of all kinds. There were lives of all living creatures, and with them all human lives, Among them were tyrannies, some lasting, others destroyed in mid course and ending in poverty and exile and beggary. There were lives of famous men also, some famed for their comeliness and beauty, or for their strength and prowess, others for their lineage and the virtues of their ancestors; similarly there were lives of unknown men; and also the lives of women. But there was no determination of soul, because of necessity the soul becomes different according as she chooses a different life. All other things were mixed with each other, and with wealth and poverty; some with disease and some with health, and there were also mean conditions of these things. And it is here, it seems, my dear Glaucon, that man’s greatest danger lies; and for those reasons we must give all heed that each of us, putting aside all other learning, may search after and study this alone, if in any way he may be able to learn and discover who will give him capacity and knowledge to