This chapter addresses an inevitable question: How are later books of the Republic, and specifically Book 4, related to Book 1? It contends that justice as conceived in Book 1 is “external,” concerned with how one entity regards and treats another, and so is at odds with the novel definition of justice in Book 4, according to which it is “internal,” a matter of what happens within a single entity, whether a city or a soul. It is argued that in Book 4, Socrates, having been tasked with persuading Glaucon and Adeimantus that there is profit in being just, identifies a reward for being just, namely, the harmonious internal state of city and soul. Although he briefly calls this healthy and therefore desirable condition “justice,” he more frequently and aptly identifies it as “moderation.” This chapter makes the case that it is the account of justice found in Book 1 that more closely reflects Socrates’ (or Plato’s) understanding of it.

This chapter begins by exploring the dramatic elements of the dialogue’s brief but rich opening scene, which introduces the bully Polemarchus and sets up the dialogue’s alliances: Glaucon–Socrates and Polemarchus–Adeimantus. It then examines Cephalus’ turn to justice in the nick of time – as death approaches – and his surprising belief that without wealth a man has no alternative but to be unjust. It analyzes the objections Socrates raises to Cephalus’ conception of justice as payment of debts to men and gods, and suggests that the examples Socrates uses in his challenge to Cephalus are not simple exceptions to the rule but rather shift the conception of justice away from mechanical rule-following to the responsibility one incurs – when circumstances place one in a position of responsibility – to protect others from harm. The relationship between Cephalus and Polemarchus, father and son, is described and assessed, as is the relationship between their distinct views of justice.

This chapter establishes the philosophical value of Republic 1 and challenges the widely held assumption that the later books, 2–10, represent Plato’s real views. It notes that some scholars, seeing Rep. 1 as lacking gravitas – in both style and content – think it was originally not even part of the Republic; others see it as introducing ideas to be developed later; a third group sees it as introduced only to be rebuffed. The case is made for reading the Republic forward – that is, reading what comes later in light of Rep. 1, rather than reading Rep. 1 in light of what comes later: Reading in this way makes it possible to doubt the sincerity of some of Socrates’ later proposals – in particular, the idea that justice is internal. An argument is made for taking seriously, philosophically, the dramatic elements of Rep. 1, including its humor. Finally, the views of Rep. 1’s three interlocutors are related to one another.

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?

This chapter considers Thrasymachus’ cynical rant, in which “the stronger” emerge as unjust men who think “night and day” about nothing other than their own advantage: No longer like unerring craftsmen, rulers are rather like other unjust men; the tyrant is revealed as Thrasymachus’ ideal. This chapter further probes what Socrates might mean by his odd claim that no one – not even good and decent men – rules willingly: If it is the work of good and just men to benefit others, do the reluctant rulers of Book 1, so similar to Rep. 7’s philosophers who have to be compelled to rule, qualify as just?

Polemarchus defines justice as the meting out of benefits and harms to friends and enemies as is fitting; his just man therefore necessarily requires skill: At what, however, is the just man skilled? Would not the skill of justice endorse thieving if that is what will help friends and harm enemies? Since t-justice (justice as a technē) is still justice, it must correctly identify friends and enemies lest it help enemies and harm friends. Socrates replaces these categories with good or just men and bad or unjust ones and asks: Is it just to harm those who are just, those who have committed no injustice? In Socrates’ final lesson to Polemarchus, the just man’s expertise is shown to harm no one, to make no one worse – that is, more unjust. Implicit in Socrates’ analogy with heat and dryness is that t-justice helps all people by making them “better,” more “lay-just” (or l-just), more just in the ordinary way. The chapter concludes with a brief excursus on the final argument in the Hippias Minor, in which “he who does wrong intentionally is the good man.”