Criticism-6
With unrivaled eloquence he sawed off the branch on which he sat.
To all these criticisms one can reply very simply, that they destroy a straw man.
Plato explicitly exempts the majority from his communistic plan;
he recognizes clearly enough that only a few are capable of the material self-denial which he proposes for his ruling class;
only the guardians will call every guardian brother or sister;
only the guardians will be without gold or goods.
The vast majority will retain all respectable institutions — property, money, luxury, competition, and whatever privacy they may desire.
They will have marriage as monogamic as they can bear;
and all the morals derived from it and from the family;
the fathers shall keep their wives and the mothers shall keep their children ad libitum and nauseam.
As to the guardians, their need is not so much communistic disposition as a sense of honor, and love of it;
pride and not kindness is to hold them up.
And as for the maternal instinct, it is not strong before the birth, or even the growth, of the child;
the average mother accepts the newborn babe rather with resignation than with joy;
love for it is a development, not a sudden miracle, and grows as the child grows, as it takes form under the painstaking care of the mother;
not until it has become the embodiment of maternal artistry does it irrevocably catch the heart.
[ 00’29” ] eloquence (雄辩)
[ 00’30” ] unrivaled (无可匹敌的；无敌的)
[ 00’36” ] saw off (锯东西)
[ 00’46” ] saw off the branch on which one sat (搬起石头砸了自己的脚)
[ 01’25” ] explicitly (明确地；明白地)
[ 01’33” ] exempt...from (将……排除在外)
[ 01’59” ] material self-denial (自我物质否定)
[ 04’51” ] ad libitum (随意的，拉丁文)
[ 04’54” ] nauseam (诸如此类的，拉丁文)
[ 06’18” ] overprotection (过度保护)
[ 06’47” ] Avram Noam Chomsky (乔姆斯基，美国哲学家，语言学家。乔姆斯基的《生成语法》被认为是20世纪理论语言学研究上最伟大的贡献。)
[ 08’57” ] resignation (退却感)
[ 09’57” ] painstaking care (含辛茹苦的养育)
[ 10’13” ] maternal artistry (母性的艺术)
[ 10’44” ] irrevocably (不能取消地；不能撤回地)
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