SOCRATES: Nor are states well administered, when individuals do their own
work?

ALCIBIADES: I should rather think, Socrates, that the reverse is the
truth. (Compare Republic.)

SOCRATES: What! do you mean to say that states are well administered when
friendship is absent, the presence of which, as we were saying, alone
secures their good order?

ALCIBIADES: But I should say that there is friendship among them, for this
very reason, that the two parties respectively do their own work.

SOCRATES: That was not what you were saying before; and what do you mean
now by affirming that friendship exists when there is no agreement? How
can there be agreement about matters which the one party knows, and of
which the other is in ignorance?

ALCIBIADES: Impossible.

SOCRATES: And when individuals are doing their own work, are they doing
what is just or unjust?

ALCIBIADES: What is just, certainly.

SOCRATES: And when individuals do what is just in the state, is there no
friendship among them?

ALCIBIADES: I suppose that there must be, Socrates.

SOCRATES: Then what do you mean by this friendship or agreement about
which we must be wise and discreet in order that we may be good men? I
cannot make out where it exists or among whom; according to you, the same
persons may sometimes have it, and sometimes not.

ALCIBIADES: But, indeed, Socrates, I do not know what I am saying; and I
have long been, unconsciously to myself, in a most disgraceful state.

SOCRATES: Nevertheless, cheer up; at fifty, if you had discovered your
deficiency, you would have been too old, and the time for taking care of
yourself would have passed away, but yours is just the age at which the
discovery should be made.

ALCIBIADES: And what should he do, Socrates, who would make the discovery?

SOCRATES: Answer questions, Alcibiades; and that is a process which, by
the grace of God, if I may put any faith in my oracle, will be very
improving to both of us.

ALCIBIADES: If I can be improved by answering, I will answer.

SOCRATES: And first of all, that we may not peradventure be deceived by
appearances, fancying, perhaps, that we are taking care of ourselves when
we are not, what is the meaning of a man taking care of himself? and when
does he take care? Does he take care of himself when he takes care of what
belongs to him?

ALCIBIADES: I should think so.

SOCRATES: When does a man take care of his feet? Does he not take care of
them when he takes care of that which belongs to his feet?

ALCIBIADES: I do not understand.

SOCRATES: Let me take the hand as an illustration; does not a ring belong
to the finger, and to the finger only?

ALCIBIADES: Yes.

SOCRATES: And the shoe in like manner to the foot?

ALCIBIADES: Yes.

SOCRATES: And when we take care of our shoes, do we not take care of our
feet?

ALCIBIADES: I do not comprehend, Socrates.

SOCRATES: But you would admit, Alcibiades, that to take proper care of a
thing is a correct expression?

ALCIBIADES: Yes.

SOCRATES: And taking proper care means improving?

ALCIBIADES: Yes.

SOCRATES: And what is the art which improves our shoes?

ALCIBIADES: Shoemaking.

SOCRATES: Then by shoemaking we take care of our shoes?

ALCIBIADES: Yes.

SOCRATES: And do we by shoemaking take care of our feet, or by some other
art which improves the feet?

ALCIBIADES: By some other art.



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