According to Book II of Plato's Republic, Socrates says that education is what needed to train all the citizens and the guardians in a city so that they will be good and just, and the knowledge that is acquired through this education is: wisdom, courage, moderation and justice. In Cicero's Laws, Marcus says that justice or laws and the aim at goodness are what needed in order to live the best kind of life and to govern well. He believes that justice can be found in nature and everyone should possess justice, not just the rulers:
I want it to be understood that what I call 'justice' comes from nature, but that the corruption brought by bad habits is so great that it extinguishes, so to speak, the sparks given by nature and allows the corresponding vices to spring up and flourish... For those who have been endowed by nature with reason have also been endowed with right reason, and hence, with laws, which is right reason in commanding and forbidding; but if with law, then with justice too. But reason has been bestowed on everybody; therefore the same applies to justice (The Laws, Book I, 33-34, 108)
In contrast to Socrates' ideas that justice is what everyone should do his or her own job and not to meddle with others' jobs. Marcus focuses on law and believes that in order for everyone to have happiness; however, law must be established with the government who regulates and enforces the law:
And why is it that, if a law can make what is unjust just, it cannot turn evil into good? but in fact we can distinguish a good law from a bad one solely by the criterion of nature. And not only justice and injustice are different by nature, but all things without exception that are honourable and dishonourable (The Laws, Book I, 44-45, 112)
Marcus also says that law is to keep people to aim towards goodness, and that goodness and law have the same characteristic; that is they are things for the sake of themselves, and not for the sake of other things. And goodness is the ultimate good because if something is not perfectly good then it is not ultimately good; to be ultimately good, first of all, it must be perfectly good:
To bring this whole discourse of mine to an end - the conclusion is obvious from what has been said, namely that one should strive after justice and every moral virtue for their own sake. All good men love what is fair in itself and what is right in itself. It is not in character for a good man to make the mistake of loving what is not intrinsically loveable; therefore, what is right should be sought and cultivated for itself. If this applies to justice, then the other virtues, too, should be cultivated for themselves. What about generosity? Is it free or for profit? When a person is open-handed without reward, it's free; when he's looking for a profit, it's an investment. There is no doubt that a person who is called generosity and open-handed has duty in mind, not gain. So likewise justice looks for no prize and price; it is sought for itself, and is at once the cause and meaning of all the virtue. (The Laws, Book I, 48-49, 114)
To define the ultimate good, Marcus says:
There is no doubt that, as the law should correct wickedness and promote goodness, a code of conduct may be derived from it. That is why wisdom is the mother of all good things; the love of her gives us the word 'philosophy' from the Greek. Of all the gifts which the immortal gods have bestowed on human life none is richer or more abundant or more desirable. In addition to everything else, she alone taught us this most difficult lesson, namely to know ourselves - a precept of such power and significance that is was ascribed, not to any mortal, but to the god of Delphi (The Law, Book I, 58-59, 118)
Thus, ultimate good is wisdom that helps men to live a righteous life, a justice life, including the recognition of gods and the worship of the gods:
And when the same mind examines the heavens, the earth, the sea, and the nature of things, and perceives where those things have come from and to where they will return, when and how they are due to die, what part of them is mortal and perishable, and what is divine and everlasting; and when it almost apprehends the very god who governs and rules them, and realizes that it itself is not a resident in some particular to locality surrounded by manmade walls, but a citizen of the whole world as though it were a single city; then in the majesty of these surroundings, in this contemplation and comprehension of nature, great God! How well it will know itself, as the Pythian Apollo commanded, how it will disdain, despise, and count as nothing those things that are commonly deemed so precious! (The Laws, Book I, 60, 119)
Socrates' education is to make human beings good and to aim their actions towards the searching for goodness which is also virtue and wisdom; however, Marcus' justice and law is the education that makes human beings not only good for themselves and not only to act towards virtuously and to seek wisdom, but also to recognize gods as the supreme power of all things in the world and to worship gods and to obey gods because natural law comes from divine law. In Plato's Republic, Socrates mentions only about who a philosopher is and what a philosopher does, but not about the relation between the wisdom that a philosopher seeks with the law that is a part of practicing wisdom and a part of divine law. Rather, the rulers of a city-state who have acquired the knowledge and the virtues of a philosopher will govern better their city-state, and that's all without describing what kind of law they will practice. Socrates says:
Then the philosopher, by consorting with what is ordered and divine and despite all the slanders around that say otherwise, himself becomes as divine and ordered as a human being can. That's absolutely true. And if he should come to be compelled to put what he sees there into people's characters, whether into a single person or into a populace, instead of shaping only his own, do you think that he will be a poor craftsman of moderation, justice, and whole of popular virtue? He least at all. And when the majority realize that what we are saying about the philosopher is true, will they be harsh with him or mistrust us when we say that the city will never find happiness until its outline is sketched by painters who use the divine model? (Republic, book 6, 500c-e, 174)
The difference is that the philosophers whose Socrates talks about are the guardians who rule the city, and who are well educated, but they do not rule the citizens by any knid of religious law, and they are the ones who are just but there are no concerns whether they will create law:
We hesitated to say the things we've now dared to say anyway. So let's now also dare to say that those who are to be made our guardian in the most exact sense of the term must be philosophers. (Republic, book 6, 503b, 176)
While the philosophers whose Marcus talks about are those who govern the city and create a kind of law that is called religious law which requires the citizens to respect and to follow. Some religious laws that are practiced along with justic which is the natural law. Marcus says:
I note, then, according to the opinion of the best authorities law was not thought up by the intelligence of human beings, nor is it some kind of resolution passsed by communities, but rather and eternal force which rules the world by the wisdom of its commands and prohibitions. In their judgment, that original and final law is the intelligence God, who ordains or forbids everything by reason. Hence that law which the gods have given to the human race is rightly praised, for it represents the reason and intelligence of a wise man directed to issuing commands and prohibitions. (The Laws, Book II, 8-9, 124)
And:
They shall approach the gods in purity; they shall adopt a spirit of holiness; they shall set aside wealth. God himself will punish whoever does otherwise. No one shall have gods of his own, whether new or foreign, unless they have been officially brought in. In private, they shall worship those gods whose worship has been handed down it its proper form by their forefathers... They shall worship as gods those who have always been considered divine and those whose services have secured them a place in heaven - Hercules, Liber, Aesculapius, Castor, Pollux, Quirius - and also those qualities on whose account human beings are allowed to ascend to heaven - Good sense, Moral Excellence, Devotion, Good faith. In their honor there shall be shrines, but none in honor of vices.... (The Laws, Book II, 19-20, 128-129)
2/ Does either character think that anyone has attained the knowledge he says is necessary for living well?
As I already explained at the beginning of the answer for the first question, both Socrates and Marcus think that the knowledge of wisdom and virtue is necessary for seeking the ultimate good because the ultimate good is not the physical good but the spiritual good which is the combination of wisdom and virtue. Let's compare some of the statements that Marcus says and some of the statements that Socrates says in relation to the ultimate good. Marcus:
Furthermore, if goodness is sought for its advantages, not for itself, then there will be one virtue only; and that will most properly be called selfishness. For where each person measures his actions totally by his own advantage, to that extent he totally falls short of being a good man... Finally, if goodness is pursued for the sake of other things, there must be something better than goodness. So is it money or high office or beauty or health? Such things, even when present, are not significant; and how long they are going to remain present is quite unknowable...
Quintus: In what direction, may I ask? For, as far as your talk is concerned, I would gladly run on with you.
Marcus: Towards the ultimate good, which is the standard and goal of every action...
Quintus: ...But there is no doubt about it: the highest good is either to live according to nature (i.e. to enjoy a life of moderation governed by moral excellence) or to follow nature and live, so to speak, by her law (i.e. as far as possible to omit nothing in order to achieve what nature requires, which means the same as this: to live, as it were, by the code of moral excellence.) Hence I'm inclined to think that this question [about ends] can never be decided - certainly not in our present discussion, if we are to complete what we set out to do. (The Laws, Book II, 49-57, 14-7)
For Socrates, the ultimate good is also the virtue and not only knowledge:
Socrates: And isn't this also clear? In the case of just and beautiful things, many people are content with what are believed to be so, even if they aren't really so, and they act, acquire, and form their own beliefs on that basis. Nobody is satisfied to acquire things that are merely believed to be good; however, but everyone wants the things that really are good and disdains mere belief here.
Adeimantus: That's right.
Socrates: Every soul pursues the good and does whatever it does for it sake. It divines that the good is something but it is perplexed and cannot adequately grasp what it is or acquire the sort of stable beliefs it has about other things, and so it misses the benefit, if any, that even those other things may give. Will we allow the best people in the city, to whom we entrust everything, to be so in the dark about something of this kind of this importance?....
Adeimantus: Necessarily. But, Socrates, you must also tell us whether you consider the good to be knowledge or pleasure or something else together.....
Socrates: What? Haven't you noticed that opinions without knowledge are shameful and ugly things? The best of them are blind - or do you think that those who express as true opinion without understanding are any different from blind people who happen to travel the right road?...
Adeimantus: It does seem that way.
Socrates: So that what gives truth to the things know and the power to know the knower is the form of the good. And thought it is the cause of knowledge and truth, it is also an object of knowledge. Both knowledge and truth are beautiful things, but the good is other and more beautiful than they. In the visible realm, light and sight are rightly considered sunlike, but it is wrong to think that they are the sun, so here it is right to think of knowledge and truth as godlike but wrong to think that either of them is the good - for the good is yet more prized... (Republic, book 6, 505d-509a, 179-182)
In book 7 of Plato's Republic, Socrates again confirms that a life of a philosopher is what all the guardians should learn to possess, and that a philosopher is the best guardian while the guardians who are not philosophers are just regular guardians who cannot best govern their city-state:
It isn't possible, for we'll be giving just orders to just people. Each of them will certainly go to rule as to something compulsory, however, which is exactly the opposite of what's done by those whose now rule in each city. This is how it is. If you can find a way of life that's better than ruling for the prospective rulers, your well-governed city will become a possibility, for only in it will the truly rich rule - not those who are rich in gold but those who are rich in the wealth that the happy must have, namely, a good and rational life...
Adeimantus: That's very true.
Socrates: Can you name any life that despises political rule besides that of the true philosophers?
Socrates: But surely it is those who are not lovers of ruling who must rule, for if they don't, the lovers of it, who are rivals, will fight over it.
Adeimantus: Of course.
Socrates: Then who will you compel to become the guardians of the city, if not those who have the best understanding of what matters for good government and who have other honors than political ones and a better life as well?
Adeimantus: No one. (Plato's Republic, book 7, 520e-521c, 192-193)
In conclusion, both Socrates and Marcus think that seeking wisdom, virtue is the life of a philosopher, and that it should be the ultimate good that the rulers aim to in order to live the best kind of life and to govern well.
Rerfercences
Cicero. The Republic and the Laws. Trans. Niall Rudd. New York: Oxford University Press Inc., 1998.
Plato. Republic. Trans. G.M.A. Grube. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1992.
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