Seite - 1312 - in The Complete Plato

against pure injustice. Do you remember? I should be much to blame if I had forgotten. Then, as the cause is decided, I demand on behalf of justice that the estimation in which she is held by gods and men and which we acknowledge to be her due should now be restored to her by us; since she has been shown to confer reality, and not to deceive those who truly possess her, let what has been taken from her be given back, that so she may win that palm of appearance which is hers also, and which she gives to her own. The demand, he said, is just. In the first place, I said—and this is the first thing which you will have to give back—the nature both of the just and unjust is truly known to the gods. Granted. And if they are both known to them, one must be the friend and the other the enemy of the gods, as we admitted from the beginning? True. And the friend of the gods may be supposed to receive from them all things at their best, excepting only such evil as is the necessary consequence of former sins? Certainly. Then this must be our notion of the just man, that even when he is in poverty or sickness, or any other seeming misfortune, all things will in the end work together for good to him in life and death; for the gods have a care of anyone whose desire is to become just and to be like God, as far as man can attain the divine likeness, by the pursuit of virtue? Yes, he said; if he is like God he will surely not be neglected by him. And of the unjust may not the opposite be supposed? Certainly. Such, then, are the palms of victory which the gods give the just? That is my conviction. And what do they receive of men? Look at things as they really are, and you will see that the clever unjust are in the case of runners, who run well from the starting-place to the goal, but not back again from the goal: they go off at a great pace, but in the end only look foolish, slinking away with their ears draggling on their shoulders, and without a crown; but the true runner comes to the finish and receives the prize and is crowned. And this is the way 1312