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for, he said, a story. But if someone were to ask us what these are and what the tales are, what should we say? And I said: O Adeimantus, you and I are not poets at the present moment, but founders of a city. And it is fitting for founders to know the models in which the poets must tell their tales, and if they compose contrary to these, it is not to be 13.3.9 permitted, but they are not themselves to compose the tales. Right, he said; but just this very thing—what would the models for theology be? Something like this, I said. What God actually is, must surely always be represented, whether one depicts him in epic or in lyric or in tragedy. For it must. Is not God in reality good, 13.3.10 and must be spoken of as such. Of course. But surely nothing that is good is harmful, is it? It does not seem so to me. Does that which is not harmful do harm? By no means. And that which does no harm, does it do any evil? Not that either. And that which does no evil could not be the cause of any evil. How could it? What then? Is the good beneficial? Yes. A cause 13.3.11 of well-being then? Yes. Then the good is not the cause of all things, but of things that are well it is the cause, and of evil things it is not the cause. Entirely so, he said. Then, I said, God, since he is good, would not be the cause of all things, as the many say, but he is the cause of few things for men, and of many things he is not the cause; for the good things for us are far fewer than the evil. and of the good things we must attribute the cause to no one else, but of the evil things 13.3.12 we must seek some other causes, but not God. Most true, he said, you seem to me to speak. Then, I said, we must not accept from Homer or any other poet this foolish error about the gods, when he errs and says that two jars are set on the threshold of Zeus, full of fates, one of good, the other of evil; 13.3.13 and to whom Zeus gives a mixture of both, that man at one time meets with evil, at another with good. But to whom he does not, but gives the other unmixed, him evil famine drives over the sacred earth; 13.3.14 nor that Zeus is the dispenser “of good and evil alike.” And the violation of oaths and truces, which Pandarus violated, if anyone says it was brought about by Athena and Zeus, we shall not praise; nor the strife and judgment of the gods through Themis and Zeus; nor again, as Aeschylus says, must we let the young hear that “God plants the cause in mortals, when he wills utterly to destroy a house.” 13.3.15 But if anyone composes a poem in which these iambics are, the sufferings of Niobe or of the Pelopidae or the Trojan woes or anything else of the sort, either we must not allow him to say that these are the works of a god, or if of a god, he must discover for them some such explanation as we are now seeking, and must say that God did what was just and good, and they were benefited by being punished. But that those who pay the penalty were miserable, and that the one who did these things was God, the poet must not be allowed 13.3.16 to say. But if they were to say that the wicked were miserable because they needed punishment, and that in paying the penalty they were benefited by God, we must allow it. 13.3.17 But to say that God, who is good, is the cause of evil for anyone—that we must fight by every means, that no one should say these things in his own city, if it is to be well-governed, nor that anyone should hear them, neither younger nor older, whether telling tales in verse or without verse, as what would be said would be neither pious, if it were said, nor beneficial 13.3.18 to us, nor consistent with itself. I am in agreement with you, he said, on this law, and it pleases me. This, then, I said, would be one of the laws and models concerning God, in which it will be necessary for those who speak to speak and those who compose to compose—that God is not the cause of all things, but of the good. And quite, he said, 13.3.19 it is sufficient. And what of this second one? Do you think that God is a sorcerer and, as if by design, appears at different times in different forms, sometimes himself becoming and changing his own form into many shapes, and sometimes deceiving us and making us think such things about him, or that he is simple and of all things least likely to depart from his own form? I am not able, he said, to say so now. 13.3.20 What about this? Is it not necessary, if anything should depart from its own form, that it be changed either by itself or by another? It is necessary. Therefore

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γάρ, ἔφη, λόγον· ἀλλ' εἴ τις αὖ καὶ ταῦτα ἐρωτῴη ἡμᾶς ἅττα ἐστὶ καὶ τίνες οἱ μῦθοι, τίνας ἂν φαῖμεν; Καὶ ἐγὼ εἶπον· ὦ Ἀδείμαντε, οὔκ ἐσμεν ποιηταὶ ἐγώ τε καὶ σὺ ἐν τῷ παρόντι, ἀλλ' οἰκισταὶ πόλεως. οἰκισταῖς δὲ τοὺς μὲν τύπους προσήκει εἰδέναι ἐν οἷς δεῖ μυθολογεῖν τοὺς ποιητάς, παρ' οὓς ἐὰν ποιῶσιν οὐκ ἐπι13.3.9 τρεπτέον, οὐ μὴν αὐτοῖς γε ποιητέον μύθους. Ὀρθῶς, ἔφη· ἀλλ' αὐτὸ δὴ τοῦτο οἱ τύποι περὶ θεολογίας τίνες ἂν εἶεν; Τοιοίδε πού τινες, ἦν δ' ἐγώ, οἷος τυγχάνει ὢν ὁ θεός, ἀεὶ δή που ἀποδοτέον, ἐάν τέ τις αὐτὸν ἐν ἔπεσι ποιῇ ἐάν τε ἐν μέλεσιν ἐάν τε ἐν τραγῳδίᾳ. ∆εῖ γάρ. Οὐκοῦν ἀγαθὸς ὁ θεὸς τῷ ὄντι 13.3.10 τε καὶ λεκτέον οὕτω. Τί μήν; Ἀλλὰ μὴν οὐδέν γε τῶν ἀγαθῶν βλαβερόν. ἦ γάρ; Οὔ μοι δοκεῖ. Ἆρ' οὖν τὸ μὴ βλαβερὸν βλάπτει; Οὐδαμῶς. Ὃ δὲ μὴ βλάπτει, κακόν τι ποιεῖ; Οὐδὲ τοῦτο. Ὃ δέ γε μηδὲν κακὸν ποιεῖ, οὐδ' ἄν τινος εἴη κακοῦ αἴτιον. Πῶς γὰρ οὔ; Τί δέ; ὠφέλιμον τὸ ἀγαθόν; Ναί. Αἴτιον 13.3.11 ἄρα εὐπραγίας; Ναί. Οὐκ ἄρα πάντων γε αἴτιον τὸ ἀγαθόν, ἀλλὰ τῶν μὲν εὖ ἐχόντων αἴτιον, τῶν δὲ κακῶν ἀναίτιον. Παντελῶς γε, ἔφη. Οὐδ' ἄρα, ἦν δ' ἐγώ, ὁ θεός, ἐπεὶ ἀγαθός, πάντων ἂν εἴη αἴτιος, ὡς οἱ πολλοὶ λέγουσιν, ἀλλ' ὀλίγων μὲν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις αἴτιος, πολλῶν δὲ ἀναίτιος· πολὺ γὰρ ἐλάττω τὰ ἀγαθὰ τῶν κακῶν ἡμῖν. καὶ τῶν μὲν ἀγαθῶν οὐδὲν ἄλλο αἰτιατέον, τῶν δὲ κακῶν 13.3.12 ἄλλ' ἄττα δεῖ ζητεῖν τὰ αἴτια, ἀλλ' οὐ τὸν θεόν. Ἀληθέστατα, ἔφη, δοκεῖς μοι λέγειν. Οὐκ ἄρα, ἦν δ' ἐγώ, ἀποδεκτέον οὔτε Ὁμήρου οὔτε ἄλλου ποιητοῦ ταύτην τὴν ἁμαρτίαν περὶ τοὺς θεοὺς ἀνοήτως ἁμαρτάνοντος καὶ λέγοντος ὡς δοιοὶ πίθοι κατακείαται ἐν ∆ιὸς οὔδει κηρῶν ἔμπλειοι, ὁ μὲν ἐσθλῶν, αὐτὰρ ὁ δειλῶν· 13.3.13 καὶ ᾧ μὲν ἂν μίξας ὁ Ζεὺς ἀμφοτέρων δῷ, ἄλλοτε μέν γε κακῷ ὅ γε κύρεται, ἄλλοτε δ' ἐσθλῷ. ᾧ δ' ἂν μή, ἀλλ' ἄκρατα τὰ ἕτερα, τὸν δὲ κακὴ βούβρωστις ἐπὶ χθόνα δῖαν ἐλαύνει· 13.3.14 οὐδ' ὡς ταμίας ὁ Ζεὺς «ἀγαθῶν τε κακῶν τε τέτυκται.» τὴν δὲ τῶν ὅρκων καὶ σπονδῶν σύγχυσιν, ἣν ὁ Πάνδαρος συνέχεεν, ἐάν τις φῇ δι' Ἀθηνᾶς τε καὶ ∆ιὸς γεγονέναι, οὐκ ἐπαινεσόμεθα· οὐδὲ θεῶν ἔριν τε καὶ κρίσιν διὰ Θέμιδός τε καὶ ∆ιός· οὐδ' αὖ, ὡς Αἰσχύλος λέγει, ἐατέον ἀκούειν τοὺς νέους, ὅτι θεὸς μὲν αἰτίαν φύει βροτοῖς, ὅταν κακῶσαι δῶμα παμπήδην θέλῃ. 13.3.15 ἀλλ' ἐάν τις ποιῇ ἐν οἷς ταῦτα τὰ ἰαμβεῖα ἔνεστι, τὰ τῆς Νιόβης πάθη ἢ τὰ Πελοπιδῶν ἢ τὰ Τρωϊκὰ ἤ τι ἄλλο τῶν τοιούτων, ἢ οὐ θεοῦ ἔργα ἐατέον αὐτὰ λέγειν, ἢ εἰ θεοῦ, ἐξευρετέον αὐτοῖς σχεδὸν ὃν νῦν ἡμεῖς λόγον ζητοῦμεν, καὶ λεκτέον ὡς ὁ μὲν θεὸς δίκαιά τε καὶ ἀγαθὰ εἰργάζετο, οἱ δὲ ὤναντο κολαζόμενοι. ὡς δ' ἄθλιοι μὲν οἱ δίκην διδόντες, ἦν δὲ ὁ δρῶν ταῦτα θεός, οὐκ ἐατέον 13.3.16 λέγειν τὸν ποιητήν. ἀλλ' εἰ μὲν ὅτι ἐδεήθησαν κολάσεως λέγοιεν ὡς ἄθλιοι οἱ κακοί, διδόντες δὲ δίκην ὠφελοῦντο ὑπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ, ἐατέον. 13.3.17 κακῶν δὲ αἴτιον φάναι θεόν τινι γίγνεσθαι ἀγαθὸν ὄντα, διαμαχητέον παντὶ τρόπῳ μήτε τινὰ λέγειν ταῦτα ἐν τῇ ἑαυτοῦ πόλει, εἰ μέλλει εὐνομήσεσθαι, μήτε τινὰ ἀκούειν, μήτε νεώτερον μήτε πρεσβύτερον, μήτ' ἐν μέτρῳ μήτε ἄνευ μέτρου μυθολογοῦντα, ὡς οὔτε ὅσια ἂν λεγόμενα, εἰ λέγοιτο, οὔτε ξύμφορα 13.3.18 ἡμῖν οὔτε ξύμφωνα αὐτὰ αὑτοῖς. Ξύμψηφός σοι εἰμί, ἔφη, τούτου τοῦ νόμου κἀμοὶ ἀρέσκει. Οὗτος μὲν τοίνυν, ἦν δ' ἐγώ, εἷς ἂν εἴη τῶν περὶ θεοῦ νόμων τε καὶ τύπων, ἐν οἷς δεήσει τούς τε λέγοντας λέγειν καὶ τοὺς ποιοῦντας ποιεῖν μὴ πάντων αἴτιον τὸν θεόν, ἀλλὰ τῶν ἀγαθῶν. Καὶ μάλα, ἔφη, 13.3.19 ἀπόχρη. Τί δὲ δὴ ὁ δεύτερος ὅδε; ἆρα γόητα τὸν θεὸν οἴει εἶναι καὶ οἷον ἐξ ἐπιβουλῆς φαντάζεσθαι ἄλλοτε ἐν ἄλλαις ἰδέαις, τοτὲ μὲν αὐτὸν γιγνόμενον καὶ ἀλλάττοντα τὸ αὑτοῦ εἶδος εἰς πολλὰς μορφάς, τοτὲ δὲ ἡμᾶς ἀπατῶντα καὶ ποιοῦντα περὶ αὑτοῦ τοιαῦτα δοκεῖν, ἢ ἁπλοῦν τε εἶναι καὶ πάντων ἥκιστα τῆς αὑτοῦ ἰδέας ἐκβαίνειν; Οὐκ ἔχω, ἔφη, νῦν γε οὕτως εἰπεῖν. 13.3.20 Τί δὲ τόδε; οὐκ ἀνάγκη, εἴπερ τι ἐξίσταιτο τῆς αὑτοῦ ἰδέας, ἢ αὐτὸ ὑφ' αὑτοῦ μεθίστασθαι, ἢ ὑπ' ἄλλου; Ἀνάγκη. Οὐκοῦν