Chapter 6 - The Better Man, the Better Life (348b8–354c3)

Summary

This chapter tracks Socrates’ placement of the just man among the wise – an idea that is anathema to Thrasymachus for whom the just man is a fool – and extracts the important lesson that underlies Socrates’ ironic claim that injustice that is unmixed with justice makes a city, group, or individual less able to accomplish its unjust ends. It also assesses the final argument of Rep. 1, in which justice makes its way at last into the human soul. It contends that, although this concluding argument is fallacious, flagrantly equivocating on the expression “living well,” it nevertheless leaves the reader with valuable food for thought: Is not a man who is unjust inescapably wretched if his soul lacks its proper excellence?