In these quaint forms of thought and language, great principles of morals and legislation are enunciated by him for the first time.  They all go back to mind and God, who holds the beginning, middle, and end of all things in His hand.  The adjustment of the divine and human elements in the world is conceived in the spirit of modern popular philosophy, differing not much in the mode of expression.  At first sight the legislator appears to be impotent, for all things are the sport of chance.  But we admit also that God governs all things, and that chance and opportunity co-operate with Him (compare the saying, that chance is the name of the unknown cause).  Lastly, while we acknowledge that God and chance govern mankind and provide the conditions of human action, experience will not allow us to deny a place to art.  We know that there is a use in having a pilot, though the storm may overwhelm him; and a legislator is required to provide for the happiness of a state, although he will pray for favourable conditions under which he may exercise his art.

Book V. Hear now, all ye who heard the laws about Gods and ancestors:  Of all human possessions the soul is most divine, and most truly a man’s own.  For in every man there are two parts—­a better which rules, and an inferior which serves; and the ruler is to be preferred to the servant.  Wherefore I bid every one next after the Gods to honour his own soul, and he can only honour her by making her better.  A man does not honour his soul by flattery, or gifts, or self-indulgence, or conceit of knowledge, nor when he blames others for his own errors; nor when he indulges in pleasure or refuses to bear pain; nor when he thinks that life at any price is a good, because he fears the world below, which, far from being an evil, may be the greatest good; nor when he prefers beauty to virtue—­ not reflecting that the soul, which came from heaven, is more honourable than the body, which is earth-born; nor when he covets dishonest gains, of which no amount is equal in value to virtue;—­in a word, when he counts that which the legislator pronounces evil to be good, he degrades his soul, which is the divinest part of him.  He does not consider that the real punishment of evil-doing is to grow like evil men, and to shun the conversation of the good:  and that he who is joined to such men must do and suffer what they by nature do and say to one another, which suffering is not justice but retribution.  For justice is noble, but retribution is only the companion of injustice.  And whether a man escapes punishment or not, he is equally miserable; for in the one case he is not cured, and in the other case he perishes that the rest may be saved.