Plato And The Unjust Man

To understand Plato’s view of the nature of human beings one must also understand his view of the world and the soul in turn. Plato’s Republic is a Socratic dialogue, this excerpt from Book IX relays the second of a three-part argument aiming to prove that a man who leads a just life leads a happier and more fulfilled life than the unjust man.

Plato registered the world around him as two separate realities, the visible world and the intelligible world. The essential difference in these worlds is in that the visible world is changing whereas the intelligible world is unchanging and eternal. The visible world consists of physical objects in their images, shadows, and reflections. Physical objects are in a constant state of flux, they are transient

It is possible to divide man into three basic types; the man of reason or logic who seeks wisdom; the spirited man who seeks success and honor, and the man of desire who seeks gain and appetite. Although each man is dominated by one component of the soul, the three elements are in constant conversation. Upon being asked each person would say that his or her class lives the best and the philosophers feel they must discuss which of these classes’ lives best. Each believe their greatest pleasure in life to be the paramount, however Socrates argues that only the man of reason could have experienced the happiness of knowledge because he alone of the three possesses it. He explains that the pleasures of the other types of men are not true pleasures as they are “the pleasures of necessity, since he would have no use for them if necessity were not laid upon him” Of these three classes, the man of reason (the lover of wisdom) possesses knowledge of the Forms, in turn, Justice. Therefore the man of justice and reason is correct in his judging himself to be the happiest, solidifying his argument that the lover of wisdom has the greatest pleasure and in turn the just man leads a happier life than the unjust man. Plato also suggests that of the three type of man the man of reason would be the most kingly i.e. the most suitable to rule. He envisions an ideal society where those who have knowledge of the Forms have