第116章 BOOK XI(4)

After this preface let our law run as follows, and may fortunefavour us:-No landowner among the Magnetes, whose city the God isrestoring and resettling-no one, that is, of the 5040 families,shall become a retail trader either voluntarily or involuntarily;neither shall he be a merchant, or do any service for privatepersons unless they equally serve him, except for his father or hismother, and their fathers and mothers; and in general for his elderswho are freemen, and whom he serves as a freeman. Now it isdifficult to determine accurately the things which are worthy orunworthy of a freeman, but let those who have obtained the prize ofvirtue give judgment about them in accordance with their feelings ofright and wrong. He who in any way shares in the illiberality ofretail trades may be indicted for dishonouring his race by any one wholikes, before those who have been judged to be the first in virtue;and if he appear to throw dirt upon his father"s house by anunworthy occupation, let him be imprisoned for a year and abstain fromthat sort of thing; and if he repeat the offence, for two years; andevery time that he is convicted let the length of his imprisonmentbe doubled. This shall be the second law:-He who engages in retailtrade must be either a metic or a stranger. And a third law shallbe:-In order that the retail trader who dwells in our city may be asgood or as little bad as possible, the guardians of the law shallremember that they are not only guardians of those who may be easilywatched and prevented from becoming lawless or bad, because they arewellborn and bred; but still more should they have a watch overthose who are of another sort, and follow pursuits which have a verystrong tendency to make men bad. And, therefore, in respect of themultifarious occupations of retail trade, that is to say, in respectof such of them as are allowed to remain, because they seem to bequite necessary in a state-about these the guardians of the law shouldmeet and take counsel with those who have experience of the severalkinds of retail trade, as we before commanded, concerning adulteration(which is a matter akin to this), and when they meet they shallconsider what amount of receipts, after deducting expenses, willproduce a moderate gain to the retail trades, and they shall fix inwriting and strictly maintain what they find to be the rightpercentage of profit; this shall be seen to by the wardens of theagora, and by the wardens of the city, and by the wardens of thecountry. And so retail trade will benefit every one, and do theleast possible injury to those in the state who practise it.