SOC. But, O my friend, when he draws the other into upper air, and gets him out of his pleas and rejoinders into the contemplation of justice and injustice in their own nature and in their difference from one another and from all other things; or from the commonplaces about the happiness of a king or of a rich man to the consideration of government, and of human happiness and misery in general-what they are, and how a man is to attain the one and avoid the other-when that narrow, keen, little legal mind is called to account about all this, he gives the philosopher his revenge; for dizzied by the height at which he is hanging, whence he looks down into space, which is a strange experience to him, he being dismayed, and lost, and stammering broken words, is laughed at, not by Thracian handmaidens or any other uneducated persons, for they have no eye for the situation, but by every man who has not been brought up a slave.

ΣΩ. Ὅταν δέ γέ τινα αὐτός͵ ὦ φίλε͵ ἑλκύσῃ ἄνω͵ καὶ ἐθελήσῃ τις αὐτῷ ἐκβῆναι ἐκ τοῦ Τί ἐγὼ σὲ ἀδικῶ ἢ σὺ ἐμέ; εἰς σκέψιν αὐτῆς δικαιοσύνης τε καὶ ἀδικίας͵ τί τε ἑκάτερον αὐτοῖν καὶ τί τῶν πάντων ἢ ἀλλήλων διαφέρετον͵ ἢ ἐκ τοῦ εἰ βασιλεὺς εὐδαίμων͵ κεκτημένος τ΄ αὖ χρυσίον͵ βασιλείας πέρι καὶ ἀνθρωπίνης ὅλως εὐδαιμονίας καὶ ἀθλιότητος ἐπὶ σκέψιν͵ ποίω τέ τινε ἐστὸν καὶ τίνα τρόπον ἀνθρώπου φύσει προσήκει τὸ μὲν κτήσασθαι αὐτοῖν͵ τὸ δὲ ἀποφυγεῖν - περὶ τούτων ἁπάντων ὅταν αὖ δέῃ λόγον διδόναι τὸν σμικρὸν ἐκεῖνον τὴν ψυχὴν καὶ δριμὺν καὶ δικανικόν͵ πάλιν αὖ τὰ ἀντίστροφα ἀποδίδωσιν· εἰλιγγιῶν τε ἀπὸ ὑψηλοῦ κρεμασθεὶς καὶ βλέπων μετέωρος ἄνωθεν ὑπὸ ἀηθείας ἀδημονῶν τε καὶ ἀπορῶν καὶ βατταρίζων γέλωτα Θρᾴτταις μὲν οὐ παρέχει οὐδ΄ ἄλλῳ ἀπαιδεύτῳ οὐδενί͵ οὐ γὰρ αἰσθάνονται͵ τοῖς δ΄ ἐναντίως ἢ ὡς ἀνδραπόδοις τραφεῖσι πᾶσιν.