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These shall receive the highest honours both in life and death.

(It would perhaps be better to confine the term 'guardians' to

this select class: the younger men may be called 'auxiliaries.')

And now for one magnificent lie, in the belief of which, Oh that

we could train our rulers!-at any rate let us make the attempt

with the rest of the world. What I am going to tell is only

another version of the legend of Cadmus; but our unbelieving

generation will be slow to accept such a story. The tale must be

imparted, first to the rulers, then to the soldiers, lastly to

the people. We will inform them that their youth was a dream, and

that during the time when they seemed to be undergoing their

education they were really being fashioned in the earth, who sent

them up when they were ready; and that they must protect and

cherish her whose children they are, and regard each other as

brothers and sisters. 'I do not wonder at your being ashamed to

propound such a fiction.' There is more behind.