*.*/politics/

… What did Simonides say, and according to you truly say, about justice?

He said that the repayment of a debt is just, and in saying so he appears to me to be right.

I should be sorry to doubt the word of such a wise and inspired man, but his meaning, though probably clear to you, is the reverse of clear to me. For he certainly does not mean, as we were now saying that I ought to return a return a deposit of arms or of anything else to one who asks for it when he is not in his right senses; and yet a deposit cannot be denied to be a debt.

True.
Then when the person who asks me is not in his right mind I am by no means to make the return?

Certainly not.
When Simonides said that the repayment of a debt was justice, he did not mean to include that case?

Certainly not; for he thinks that a friend ought always to do good to a friend and never evil.

You mean that the return of a deposit of gold which is to the injury of the receiver, if the two parties are friends, is not the repayment of a debt, –that is what you would imagine him to say?

Yes.
And are enemies also to receive what we owe to them?
To be sure, he said, they are to receive what we owe them, and an enemy, as I take it, owes to an enemy that which is due or proper to him –that is to say, evil.

Simonides, then, after the manner of poets, would seem to have spoken darkly of the nature of justice; for he really meant to say that justice is the giving to each man what is proper to him, and this he termed a debt.

That must have been his meaning, he said.
By heaven! I replied; and if we asked him what due or proper thing is given by medicine, and to whom, what answer do you think that he would make to us?

He would surely reply that medicine gives drugs and meat and drink to human bodies.

And what due or proper thing is given by cookery, and to what?
Seasoning to food.
And what is that which justice gives, and to whom?
If, Socrates, we are to be guided at all by the analogy of the preceding instances, then justice is the art which gives good to friends and evil to enemies.

سفالوس، پس از بحث کوتاهی که با سقراط دارد، با عذرخواهی برای نظارت بر مراسم قربانی از جلسه خارج می شود و بحث را به دیگران وا می گذارد.

پولمارکوس در دفاع از نظر پدرش، به گفتار سیمونیدس شاعر استناد می کند که سروده:

«عدالت، باز پرداخت دیون است.»

سقراط این بار نیز مثال دوست دیوانه و اسلحه را پیش می کشد تا پولمارکوس اقرار کند که منظور شاعر ، از عدالت آن نیست که اسلحه دوستمان را در حال دیوانگی او به او باز گردانیم زیرا به اعتقاد سیمونیدس، یک دوست همواره باید به دوست خود خوبی کند و از زیان رساندن به او بپرهیزد.

سقراط می پرسد : در مورد دشمنان چه ؟ آیا دیون ما نسبت به آنها نیز باید پرداخت شود؟

پولمارکوس جواب می دهد : بله! اما دین ما نسبت به آنها این است که به ایشان آزار برسانیم!

سقراط نتیجه گیری می کند عدالت از نظر سیمونیدس یعنی آنکه با هر کسی  مناسب حال او رفتار کنیم و او ، نام این کار را دین گذاشته است .

پس از تأیید پولمارکوس، سقراط ، پرسش از پزشکی و آشپزی را پیش می کشد  تا مشخص شود پزشک ، دارو را که مناسب حال بدن است برای آن تجویز می کند و آشپز، ادویه جات را که مقتضای حال غذاست ، اضافه می کند .

بعد از این مقدمه است که سؤال اصلی تر سقراط مطرح می شود :

«در قیاس با پزشکی و آشپزی، عدالت چه کاری را و برای چه کسی انجام میدهد؟»

در مقام جواب ، پولمارکوس از بحث اینگونه نتیجه می گیرد :

«عدالت ، خوبی کردن به دوستان و آسیب رساندن به دشمنان است. »