"Consider further - most foolish Socrates - that the just is always a loser in comparison with the unjust. First of all, in private contracts: wherever the unjust is the partner of the just you will find that, when the partnership is dissolved, the unjust entity always has more and the just less. Secondly, in their dealings with the State: when there is an income tax, the just man will pay more and the cunning unjust usually less on the same amount of income; and when there is anything to be received, one gains next to nothing and the other much. Observe also what happens when they take an office; there is the just man sit solitaire neglecting his personal affairs and perhaps suffering other losses, and getting nothing out of the public, because he is just; moreover he is probably hated by his friends and acquaintance for refusing to serve them in unlawful ways."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
351d
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Republic_(Plato)
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Republic (Plato)
87 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Republic (Plato) →
Related Quotes
"Once I was with the poet Sophocles when someone asked: 'How's your sex life, Sophocles? Are you still able to enjoy a…"
"So, Socrates, the cause of a person's attitude toward these desires is also the cause of his family's attitude toward…"
"If Polemarchus and I are making a mistake in our investigation it isn't intentional. If we were searching for gold, y…"
"Well, even you must know that cities are governed either as tyrannies, democracies, or aristocracies. Of course, I sa…"
"But tell me, this physician of whom you were just speaking, is he a moneymaker, an earner of fees, or a healer of the…"
"When there is an income tax, the just man will pay more and the unjust less on the same amount of income."
"Tyranny is not a matter of minor theft and violence, but of wholesale plunder, sacred and profane, private or public.…"
"Mankind censure injustice fearing that they may be the victims of it, and not because they shrink from committing it."
"τῆς δὲ ζημίας μεγίστη τὸ ὑπὸ πονηροτέρου ἄρχεσθαι, ἐὰν μὴ αὐτὸς ἐθέλῃ ἄρχειν"
"A few of us old fellows get together now and then, like regular birds of a feather. Most of us sit and cry about the …"