the young of either sex are well nurtured, and have little to do, and occupy themselves chiefly with festivals and dances.  How can they be saved from those passions which reason forbids them to indulge, and which are the ruin of so many?  The prohibition of wealth, and the influence of education, and the all-seeing eye of the ruler, will alike help to promote temperance; but they will not wholly extirpate the unnatural loves which have been the destruction of states; and against this evil what remedy can be devised?  Lacedaemon and Crete give no assistance here; on the subject of love, as I may whisper in your ear, they are against us.  Suppose a person were to urge that you ought to restore the natural use which existed before the days of Laius; he would be quite right, but he would not be supported by public opinion in either of your states.  Or try the matter by the test which we apply to all laws,—­who will say that the permission of such things tends to virtue?  Will he who is seduced learn the habit of courage; or will the seducer acquire temperance?  And will any legislator be found to make such actions legal?

But to judge of this matter truly, we must understand the nature of love and friendship, which may take very different forms.  For we speak of friendship, first, when there is some similarity or equality of virtue; secondly, when there is some want; and either of these, when in excess, is termed love.  The first kind is gentle and sociable; the second is fierce and unmanageable; and there is also a third kind, which is akin to both, and is under the dominion of opposite principles.  The one is of the body, and has no regard for the character of the beloved; but he who is under the influence of the other disregards the body, and is a looker rather than a lover, and desires only with his soul to be knit to the soul of his friend; while the intermediate sort is both of the body and of the soul.  Here are three kinds of love:  ought the legislator to prohibit all of them equally, or to allow the virtuous love to remain?  ‘The latter, clearly.’  I expected to gain your approval; but I will reserve the task of convincing our friend Cleinias for another occasion.  ‘Very good.’  To make right laws on this subject is in one point of view easy, and in another most difficult; for we know that in some cases most men abstain willingly from intercourse with the fair.  The unwritten law which prohibits members of the same family from such intercourse is strictly obeyed, and no thought of anything else ever enters into the minds of men in general.  A little word puts out the fire of their lusts.  ‘What is it?’ The declaration that such things are hateful to the Gods, and most abominable and unholy.  The reason is that everywhere, in jest and earnest alike, this is the doctrine which is repeated to all from their earliest youth.  They see on the stage that an Oedipus or a Thyestes or a Macareus, when undeceived, are ready to kill themselves.  There is an undoubted