Argument Analysis: Socrates On Death

 The three agree that if they people of the city are brave they will need to learn that death is not taught as something scary. This will be done by eliminating any stories that describes death as something negative or where the afterlife is taught as something bad. They also agree that the heroes in these stories should not be shown as ones who grieve over the death of a loved one. If death is to be described as honorable, then smart people would not be sad if someone else had died. “What we claim is that a good man won’t think that death is a terrible thing for another good one to suffer…” (388d). Socrates disagrees with grieving because it is an excessive show of emotion he also thinks that that laughter should not be shown in excess either.

As an answer to this question Socrates asks if the guardian of the city should be an imitator. They all thing this is not a good idea as it would distract the guardian from his job at ruling the city. “What I want you to consider is whether our guardians should be imitators or not… each individual can practice one pursuit well, he cannot practice many well, and if he tried to do this and dabbled in many things, he would surely fail to achieve distinction in all of them.” (396e). They decide if the guardian does engage in any form of imitation it should only be to imitate good actions and not degrading ones or he would be inclined to do bad things. This makes the group agree that good men should never imitate anything

They all agree that music includes speech, harmonic mode and rhythm. It is stated that both harmonic mode and rhythm come from the songs content. They decide to eliminate any music that would inspire such things as lamenting and drunkenness. Socrates states the songs should encourage soldiers to be courageous, inspire people to be obedient and to be devout to the gods. Since the music would be limited the instruments should also be limited. “We won’t maintain craftsmen who make triangular lutes, harps, and all other such multi stringed and polyharmonic instruments.” (399c). The group also decided that only courageous and orderly rhythms should be allowed. Good rhythm is necessary if you are to be graceful. They all agree that good rhythm, harmony, speech and grace are all that is needed to have a good soul. This leads to the conversation of limited the all craftsmen and musicians, they would need to be sure that they only produce objects of harmony and grace. This would mean the children of the city would grow up around things that will teach them to be good and obedient. Socrates states that music leaves a great impact on the human soul, therefore it is a crucial part of teaching morals. Socrates states there is a connection between harmonious living and music. He states that only the virtuous would appreciate and value harmonious things and they would not want to see ugly things. “Then if the fine habits in someone’s soul