Plato's Position On Justice In Comparison Dante And Machiavelli

Plato’s Position on Justice in Comparison to Dante and Machiavelli Plato asserts his position on justice throughout “The Republic.” His views constitute a model for how society should behave based on the values presented by Socrates in the dialogue. From Plato’s teachings we can infer that to establish justice, we must establish several principles in our lives including proper education, moderation, and courage. Although Plato describes how to live a just life through the metaphorical creation of a city, as opposed to focusing on the individual or going about the concept in a more abstract manner, he also asserts that justice is the quality of the soul, and a soul can only be pure if temptations are ignored.
Socrates concludes that education and obedience are parallels. By educating citizens of the laws, a city can preserve its beliefs by encouraging people to fear the …show more content…
Socrates justifies three kinds of desires: appetitive or food, drink, sex, and money; spirited or honor, victory, and good reputation; and rational or knowledge and truth. Socrates then concludes that justice at the individual level is defined by the aspects of the person’s soul or sources of their three desires; if we resist these three temptations to a certain extent, we can each live a more just life. “The Inferno” by Dante Alighieri defines justice from a different perspective. Dante describes a correlation between a soul’s sins on Earth and their punishment in Hell. He does this by creating different circles, or depths, of Hell, and in doing so, he provides an image of what he believes to be the perfection of God’s justice. According to Dante, Hell exists to punish those who have sinned; each of the different punishments located in the various circles testify to the heavenly immaculateness that sins disrupt. The inscription over the gateway to Hell