You shall see what will happen presently. All the men in the workshops will spring to their feet and leave their trades deserted when they see that by toiling and moiling from morning till night, doubled over their tasks, they merely eke out a bare existence from such wage-earning, while idle frauds live in unlimited plenty, asking for things in a lordly way, getting them without effort, acting indignant if they do not, and bestowing no praise even if they do. It seems to them that this is ‘life in the age of Cronus,’ and really that sheer honey is distilling into their mouths from the sky!
The thing would not be so dreadful if they offended against us only by being what they are. But although outwardly and in public they appear very reverend and stern, if they get a handsome boy or a pretty woman in their clutches or hope to, it is best to veil their conduct in silence. Some even carry off the wives of their hosts,There is here an allusion to “Scarabee’’; see below, § 30. to seduce them after the pattern of that young Trojan,Paris. pretending that the women are going to become philosophers; then they tender them, as common property, to all their associates and think they are carrying out a tenet of Plato’s,Plato, Republ., V, 459E. when they do not know on what terms that holy man thought it right for women to be so regarded.
