Plato: The Republic

3. BOOK III (continued)

Rolling in the dirt, calling each man loudly by his name.

Still more earnestly will we beg of him at all events not to introduce the gods lamenting and saying,

Alas! my misery! Alas! that I bore the harvest to my sorrow.

But if he must introduce the gods, at any rate let him not dare so completely to misrepresent the greatest of the gods, as to make him say--

O heavens! with my eyes verily I behold a dear friend of mine chased round and round the city, and my heart is sorrowful.

Or again:--

Woe is me that I am fated to have Sarpedon, dearest of men to me, subdued at the hands of Patroclus the son of Menoetius.

For if, my sweet Adeimantus, our youth seriously listen to such unworthy representations of the gods, instead of laughing at them as they ought, hardly will any of them deem that he himself, being but a man, can be dishonoured by similar actions; neither will he rebuke any inclination which may arise in his mind to say and do the like. And instead of having any shame or self-control, he will be always whining and lamenting on slight occasions.

Yes, he said, that is most true.

Yes, I replied; but that surely is what ought not to be, as the argument has just proved to us; and by that proof we must abide until it is disproved by a better.

It ought not to be.

Neither ought our guardians to be given to laughter. For a fit of laughter which has been indulged to excess almost always produces a violent reaction.

So I believe.

Then persons of worth, even if only mortal men, must not be represented as overcome by laughter, and still less must such a representation of the gods be allowed.