‘Yes.’  And in time of war he must be a man of courage and absolutely devoid of fear, if this be possible?  ‘Certainly.’  But we are talking now of a general who shall preside at meetings of friends—­and as these have a tendency to be uproarious, they ought above all others to have a governor.  ‘Very good.’  He should be a sober man and a man of the world, who will keep, make, and increase the peace of the society; a drunkard in charge of drunkards would be singularly fortunate if he avoided doing a serious mischief.  ’Indeed he would.’  Suppose a person to censure such meetings—­he may be right, but also he may have known them only in their disorderly state, under a drunken master of the feast; and a drunken general or pilot cannot save his army or his ships.  ’True; but although I see the advantage of an army having a good general, I do not equally see the good of a feast being well managed.’  If you mean to ask what good accrues to the state from the right training of a single youth or a single chorus, I should reply, ‘Not much’; but if you ask what is the good of education in general, I answer, that education makes good men, and that good men act nobly and overcome their enemies in battle.  Victory is often suicidal to the victors, because it creates forgetfulness of education, but education itself is never suicidal.  ’You imply that the regulation of convivial meetings is a part of education; how will you prove this?’ I will tell you.  But first let me offer a word of apology.  We Athenians are always thought to be fond of talking, whereas the Lacedaemonian is celebrated for brevity, and the Cretan is considered to be sagacious and reserved.  Now I fear that I may be charged with spinning a long discourse out of slender materials.  For drinking cannot be rightly ordered without correct principles of music, and music runs up into education generally, and to discuss all these matters may be tedious; if you like, therefore, we will pass on to another part of our subject.  ’Are you aware, Athenian, that our family is your proxenus at Sparta, and that from my boyhood I have regarded Athens as a second country, and having often fought your battles in my youth, I have become attached to you, and love the sound of the Attic dialect?  The saying is true, that the best Athenians are more than ordinarily good, because they are good by nature; therefore, be assured that I shall be glad to hear you talk as much as you please.’  ‘I, too,’ adds Cleinias, ’have a tie which binds me to you.  You know that Epimenides, the Cretan prophet, came and offered sacrifices in your city by the command of an oracle ten years before the Persian war.  He told the Athenians that the Persian host would not come for ten years, and would go away again, having suffered more harm than they had inflicted.  Now Epimenides was of my family, and when he visited Athens he entered into friendship with your forefathers.’  I see that you are willing to listen, and I have the will to speak, if I had only the ability.  But,