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which incline to order and gentleness, and which are represented in
the figure as spun thick and soft, after the manner of the woof--these,
which are naturally opposed, she seeks to bind and weave together in the
following manner:
YOUNG SOCRATES: In what manner?
STRANGER: First of all, she takes the eternal element of the soul and
binds it with a divine cord, to which it is akin, and then the animal
nature, and binds that with human cords.
YOUNG SOCRATES: I do not understand what you mean.
STRANGER: The meaning is, that the opinion about the honourable and
the just and good and their opposites, which is true and confirmed
by reason, is a divine principle, and when implanted in the soul, is
implanted, as I maintain, in a nature of heavenly birth.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes; what else should it be?
STRANGER: Only the Statesman and the good legislator, having the
inspiration of the royal muse, can implant this opinion, and he, only in
the rightly educated, whom we were just now describing.
YOUNG SOCRATES: Likely enough.
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