surely, the royal science is not like that of a master-workman,

a science presiding over lifeless objects;--the king has a nobler

function, which is the management and control of living beings.

YOUNG SOCRATES: True.

STRANGER: And the breeding and tending of living beings may be observed

to be sometimes a tending of the individual; in other cases, a common

care of creatures in flocks?

YOUNG SOCRATES: True.

STRANGER: But the statesman is not a tender of individuals--not like

the driver or groom of a single ox or horse; he is rather to be compared

with the keeper of a drove of horses or oxen.

YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes, I see, thanks to you.

STRANGER: Shall we call this art of tending many animals together, the

art of managing a herd, or the art of collective management?

YOUNG SOCRATES: No matter;--whichever suggests itself to us in the

course of conversation.

STRANGER: Very good, Socrates; and, if you continue to be not too

particular about names, you will be all the richer in wisdom when you

Statesman