Страница 747 из 1391

Still grander are the gifts of heaven which Musaeus and his son

vouchsafe to the just; they take them down into the world below,

where they have the saints lying on couches at a feast,

everlastingly drunk, crowned with garlands; their idea seems to

be that an immortality of drunkenness is the highest meed of

virtue. Some extend their rewards yet further; the posterity, as

they say, of the faithful and just shall survive to the third and

fourth generation. This is the style in which they praise

justice. But about the wicked there is another strain; they bury

them in a slough in Hades, and make them carry water in a sieve;

also while they are yet living they bring them to infamy, and

inflict upon them the punishments which Glaucon described as the

portion of the just who are reputed to be unjust; nothing else

does their invention supply. Such is their manner of praising the

one and censuring the other.