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The Republic by Plato
page 77 of 789 (09%)
such a character; the difficulty is to determine whether the several
principles are one or three; whether, that is to say, we reason with one
part of our nature, desire with another, are angry with another, or whether
the whole soul comes into play in each sort of action. This enquiry,
however, requires a very exact definition of terms. The same thing in the
same relation cannot be affected in two opposite ways. But there is no
impossibility in a man standing still, yet moving his arms, or in a top
which is fixed on one spot going round upon its axis. There is no
necessity to mention all the possible exceptions; let us provisionally
assume that opposites cannot do or be or suffer opposites in the same
relation. And to the class of opposites belong assent and dissent, desire
and avoidance. And one form of desire is thirst and hunger: and here
arises a new point--thirst is thirst of drink, hunger is hunger of food;
not of warm drink or of a particular kind of food, with the single
exception of course that the very fact of our desiring anything implies
that it is good. When relative terms have no attributes, their
correlatives have no attributes; when they have attributes, their
correlatives also have them. For example, the term 'greater' is simply
relative to 'less,' and knowledge refers to a subject of knowledge. But on
the other hand, a particular knowledge is of a particular subject. Again,
every science has a distinct character, which is defined by an object;
medicine, for example, is the science of health, although not to be
confounded with health. Having cleared our ideas thus far, let us return
to the original instance of thirst, which has a definite object--drink.
Now the thirsty soul may feel two distinct impulses; the animal one saying
'Drink;' the rational one, which says 'Do not drink.' The two impulses are
contradictory; and therefore we may assume that they spring from distinct
principles in the soul. But is passion a third principle, or akin to
desire? There is a story of a certain Leontius which throws some light on
this question. He was coming up from the Piraeus outside the north wall,
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