Socrates disliked democracy not because it represented the ultimate elevation of equality, but because it frowns upon the setting of standards, the making of distinctions, the selection of choices, and the adoption of values. In sum, democracy breaks down barriers and boundaries. But politics needs boundaries and limits and standards. An irony is that persons like Socrates would be most secure in a democracy because it is only in that type of regime that one is free to dissent from the status quo and pursue his happiness as he sees fit.

GORGIAS is a dialogue written by Plato prior to the Republic. The dialogue, which involves Socrates and three sophists -- Gorgias, Polus, and Callicles -- ostensibly relates to the question whether the life of an orator is superior to that of a philosopher. But, like the Republic, Protagoras, and Laches, the real question concerns "how one should live." As usual, Socrates triumphs in the dialogue; he beats the orators at their own game of rhetoric. Socrates proves that oratory is harmful and unjust because it is concerned with flattery ("conviction knowledge") rather than truth ("teaching knowledge") as is the case with philosophy. He counsels them to abandon political life for philosophy so they might learn how to put their souls in order before Judgment Day. To drive his point home, Socrates gives them an account of the afterlife similar to the Story of Er he told at the conclusion of the Republic.

PROTAGORAS is a dialogue about virtue and whether it can be taught. Protagoras says it can and he can teach it; but for a fee, of course. In explaining why it is necessary for men to know virtue, Protagoras tells a story about the formation of society. Says Zeus created cities so men could band together to protect themselves from the wild beasts. But their differing opinions and appetites led to conflict. Says that men in cities need two things: justice and conscience, which is a "sense of shame before others." Protagoras says Zeus gave these two qualities to all men, not just some; this is why anyone is competent to teach civic virtue. Socrates will go on to prove that it is absurd for someone to teach justice to others when he is ignorant of it himself.

SYMPOSIUM, or the Banquet, is a dialogue in praise of love. Socrates proves that "love is the desire to possess the good forever." Through Diotima, Socrates argues that love is about conception, birth, creation, and generation, through which men hope to attain "immortality." Philosophy too is love of the good, but of "right opinion," which is the greatest GOOD. Thus, philosophy is the greatest love. Alcibiades comes in at the end and gives a speech about his love for Socrates which is really a condemnation of him. He calls him ugly, says he spurned his sexual entreaties, and accuses Socrates of hubris. Alcibiades went to Socrates so he could learn to manipulate politics to his advantage. Alcibiades was responsible for the disastrous invasion at Syracuse, which demonstrates once again that a man who can't rule himself with justice cannot rule a city.

REPUBLIC: Socrates' challenge in this dialogue is to demonstrate that justice is superior to injustice. He must prove to a skeptical Glaucon that one should be just not because it is necessary but rather because justice inherently is better than injustice. He must prove to Adeimantus that it is better to be just than to seem just. By the end of Book IX it would seem that he's accomplished these goals. In Book IX, for example, Socrates explored the quality of life of the tyrant, the "perfectly unjust" man, and demonstrated that the life of the tyrant is exactly the opposite of what it seems. Glaucon had supposed the life of the tyrant to be an enviable one: a life of complete freedom and unlimited pleasures. In the course of the dialogue, however, Socrates persuades him that this is not so; a person ruled by his desires leads a wretched life. Far from enjoying freedom and pleasure, such a person is "in truth a real slave to the greatest fawning and slavery," a person whose entire life "is full of fear, convulsions, and pains."

For Adeimantus, who had expressed doubt that it is better to be just as opposed to being reputed to be just, Socrates likened the contest between the "clever unjust" man and the truly just man to the race between the tortoise and the hare. According to Socrates, the former is like the hare which starts out fast but is caught and passed at the end: "about the unjust, I shall say that most of them, even if they get away unnoticed when they are young, are caught at the end of the race and ridiculed; and when they get old, they are insulted in their wretchedness by foreigners and townspeople." But the truly just man is like the tortoise, whose slow and steady pace leaves him behind in the beginning but bring him the victor's prize at the end: "Those who are truly runners come to the end, take the prizes, and are crowned. Doesn't it also for the most part turn out that way for the just? Toward the end of every action, association, and life they get a good reputation and bear off the prizes from human beings."

Were the life of the just man as clearly superior to that of the unjust man as the preceding paragraphs suggest, the Republic would have concluded with Book IX. But such is not the case. When the arguments are considered carefully, one finds that the life of the tyrant and his opposite, the philosopher-king, are not so very different from each other. The tyrant may not be free, but neither is the philosopher-king. Against his wishes, the philosopher is compelled to rule; he is forced to return to the darkness of the cave and mingle with the prisoners. And when we compare the city of the just and the unjust, again we find that they are not as different as they seemed at first. In each city the rulers, whether tyrant or philosopher, deprive the citizens of their property, destroy their families, permit incestuous relations, and show little or no respect for the gods. Each in his way rules with impunity and without shame.

Thus, by the end of Book IX, Socrates has not established that the life of the philosopher-king is different from, much less superior to, that of the tyrant. It is for this reason that Socrates finds it necessary to play his trump card -- the claim that the soul is immortal.

Socrates has made the philosophic journey and affirms that justice is superior to injustice. And because "the contest is great, my dear Glaucon, greater than it seems," he wants his friends to benefit from his wisdom in case they are unable to philosophize for themselves. For if he benefits his friends, Socrates will have done justice according to Polemarchus' standard. By sharing with them the story of Er, Socrates will do justice to his friends, giving each "the full measure of what the argument owed him."

The story of Er describes what is to come in the afterworld. The story would have benefitted Cephalus, had he stayed to hear it. Cephalus, it should be recalled, is pious, old, nearing death, and uncertain of what his future holds. Had Cephalus stayed to hear the story of Er, he would have learned that his fate in the next world in large part depends upon the choices he made in this one. And the most important decision one can make in this life is to learn how "to distinguish between the good and the bad life."

The story of Er also gives Glaucon what the argument owed him. Glaucon wished to be shown that justice is by nature superior to injustice. The story of Er indicates that doing justice in this life results in a ten-fold reward in the next world while injustice is punished by like degree. In addition, the story of Er offers Glaucon, who is motivated by glory, the supreme honor, immortality. Adeimantus receives too "what the argument owed him." The story of Er teaches that it is far better to be just than to appear just since the clever unjust man will neither escape punishment in the afterlife nor have learned how to choose wisely from among the pattern of lives to be selected from Lachesis' lap.

The story of Er even vindicates in some measure the position taken by Thrasymachus, who asserted that justice is the advantage of the stronger. By "advantage of the stronger" Thrasymachus means the advantage of the regime's established ruling body. The story of Er supports his view since it indicates that the type of life led by a person will be the one most advantageous to the dominant element in his or her soul. Thrasymachus also benefits from the story because he learns that while justice might indeed be "everywhere the same," justice is not everywhere equal since there are qualitative differences between the different regimes -- wisdom, spriritedness, desire -- of the soul. Specifically, the philosophic element is superior to the timocratic element and both are in turn superior to the oligarchic, democratic, and tyrannical.