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(B) and (C)

Virtue is the order, the health and the harmony of the soul.

There are many virtues, but the greatest is wisdom. All virtues may be reduced to the four cardinal virtues: wisdom, fortitude, temperance and justice.

(Symposium 204E); (Theaetetus 176A); (Phaedo 64 sqq.) (The Republic IV, 441, 443).

(III) The Ideal State (The Republic)

The doctrine attributed to Plato in the field of civics is the doctrine of the Ideal state whose attributes are compared with the attributes of the soul and justice.

In a state, virtue should be the chief aim, and unless philosophers become rulers, or rulers become thorough students of philosophy, there will be unceasing troubles for states and humanity at large. The Ideal state is modelled upon the individual soul, and just as the soul has three parts, so also should the state have three parts: the rulers, the warriors, and the workers.

(Republic VI, 490 sqq.; V, 478; III, 415).

Similarly, just as the harmony of the soul depends upon the proper subordination of its parts, so also does the state depend upon the proper subordination of its parts, in order to enjoy peace.

Here Plato introduces the allegory of the charioteer and the winged steeds, in order to show that virtue is to the soul as justice is to the state:--One horse is of noble origin: while the other is ignoble; and consequently they cannot agree. As the noble horse strives to mount up to the heavenly regions which are suitable to its nature: so the other tries to drag him down. Likewise in dealing with the soul, it is the proper subordination of its parts, that enables the noble in man to attain its excellence; so also in dealing with the state, it is justice, or the proper subordination of the different classes, that makes it an Ideal State.

(Roger's Students Hist. of. Phil. p. 83); (Plato's Republic).

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