nly the philosopher can use his experience to understand knowledge. And because the philosopher is the only one that can reason, he is the only one who can decide which life is the most pleasant and just. Plato goes even further with the just life and claims that the king lives seven hundred and twenty-nine times as pleasantly than the dictator. In addition, if the good and just man has a life that is much more pleasant than the bad and unjust man, then the just life will also have more grace, beauty and excellence. This confirms Plato’s idea that being just is good in itself and for its consequences. In this case, being just provides one with reason and thus the capabilities of achieving true happiness. The life of the most unjust man is that of the dictator. This unjust man’s soul is in complete disorder and the parts of the soul are far from performing their natural tasks. Plato claims that a city governed by dictatorship is the unhappiest, as a result, the soul of the dictator will be like the city: enslaved and ruled by the part that is the worst. The most miserable of dictators is he who is the dictator of the city. The dictator is constantly threatened by attacks by those who are enslaved and he himself is enslaved by the need to cater to those who help him maintain his position. Here, Plato succeeds in showing that the unjust man lacks justice in his soul and thus results in his ultimate unhappiness. In the end, Plato successfully demonstrates that the truly just man is happier than the truly unjust man. While doing so he also showed that there is such a thing a justice within a city as well as in an individual. Thus, Plato’s reply to the fool would be that indeed there is such a thing as justice. And justice is good because it benefits in this life as well as the next. Therefore, even though a man may wish to behave unjustly when he can, as with the myth of the ring of Gyges, behaving justly will hav...
