As to the initiation of private suits, let the manner of decidingcauses between all citizens be the same as in cases in which anyfreeman is disobedient to the state in minor matters, of which thepenalty is not stripes, imprisonment, or death. But as regardsattendance at choruses or processions or other shows, and as regardspublic services, whether the celebration of sacrifice in peace, or thepayment of contributions in war-in all these cases, first comes thenecessity of providing remedy for the loss; and by those who willnot obey, there shall be security given to the officers whom thecity and the law empower to exact the sum due; and if they forfeittheir security, let the goods which they have pledged be, and themoney given to the city; but if they ought to pay a larger sum, theseveral magistrates shall impose upon the disobedient a suitablepenalty, and bring them before the court, until they are willing to dowhat they are ordered.
Now a state which makes money from the cultivation of the soil only,and has no foreign trade, must consider what it will do about theemigration of its own people to other countries, and the receptionof strangers from elsewhere. About these matters the legislator has toconsider, and he will begin by trying to persuade men as far as hecan. The intercourse of cities with one another is apt to create aconfusion of manners; strangers, are always suggesting novelties tostrangers. When states are well governed by good laws the mixturecauses the greatest possible injury; but seeing that most cities arethe reverse of well-ordered, the confusion which arises in them fromthe reception of strangers, and from the citizens themselves rushingoff into other cities, when any one either young or old desires totravel anywhere abroad at whatever time, is of no consequence. Onthe other hand, the refusal of states to receive others, and for theirown citizens never to go to other places, is an utter impossibility,and to the rest of the world is likely to appear ruthless anduncivilized; it is a practise adopted by people who use harsh words,such as xenelasia or banishment of strangers, and who have harsh andmorose ways, as men think. And to be thought or not to be thought wellof by the rest of the world is no light matter; for the many are notso far wrong in their judgment of who are bad and who are good, asthey are removed from the nature of virtue in themselves. Even bad menhave a divine instinct which guesses rightly, and very many who areutterly depraved form correct notions and judgments of the differencesbetween the good and bad. And the generality of cities are quite rightin exhorting us to value a good reputation in the world, for thereis no truth greater and more important than this-that he who is reallygood (I am speaking of the man who would be perfect) seeks forreputation with, but not without, the reality of goodness. And ourCretan colony ought also to acquire the fairest and noblest reputationfor virtue from other men; and there is every reason to expect that,if the reality answers to the idea, she will before of the fewwell-ordered cities which the sun and the other Gods behold.
Wherefore, in the matter of journeys to other countries and thereception of strangers, we enact as follows:-In the first place, letno one be allowed to go anywhere at all into a foreign country whois less than forty years of age; and no one shall go in a privatecapacity, but only in some public one, as a herald, or on anembassy; or on a sacred mission. Going abroad on an expedition or inwar, not to be included among travels of the class authorized by thestate. To Apollo at Delphi and to Zeus at Olympia and to Nemea andto the Isthmus,-citizens should be sent to take part in the sacrificesand games there dedicated to the Gods; and they should send as many aspossible, and the best and fairest that can be found, and they willmake the city renowned at holy meetings in time of peace, procuringa glory which shall be the converse of that which is gained in war;and when they come home they shall teach the young that theinstitutions of other states are inferior to their own. And they shallsend spectators of another sort, if they have the consent of theguardians, being such citizens as desire to look a little more atleisure at the doings of other men; and these no law shall hinder. Fora city which has no experience of good and bad men or intercourse withthem, can never be thoroughly, and perfectly civilized, nor, again,can the citizens of a city properly observe the laws by habit only,and without an intelligent understanding of them. And there always arein the world a few inspired men whose acquaintance is beyond price,and who spring up quite as much in ill-ordered as in well-orderedcities. These are they whom the citizens of a well ordered city shouldbe ever seeking out, going forth over sea and over land to find himwho is incorruptible-that he may establish more firmly institutions inhis own state which are good already; and amend what is deficient; forwithout this examination and enquiry a city will never continueperfect any more than if the examination is ill-conducted.
Cleinias. How can we have an examination and also a good one?