Q0434

Plato

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

The heaviest penalty is to be ruled by someone worse than oneself.
Thinker Plato
School Platonism
Source Republic I 347d (and related)
Theme Responsibility
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Republic I 347d (and related), within the tradition of Platonism. The wording below is a verified rendering prepared for careful reading rather than a claim of unique translation authority.

A short reading

Read in the register of responsibility, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In Plato's wider work, similar claims are usually offered as prompts for judgment: what would have to be true for the sentence to hold, and what would follow if it did?

How to cite this quotation

APA: Plato. (n.d.). The heaviest penalty is to be ruled by someone worse than oneself. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0434

MLA: Plato. “The heaviest penalty is to be ruled by….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0434.

Chicago: Plato. “The heaviest penalty is to be ruled by….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0434.

Same thinker

More from Plato

  1. Justice is doing one's own work and not meddling in others'.
  2. Love is the desire for the perpetual possession of the good.
  3. Let us not become haters of argument — that is a great danger to the soul.
  4. Extreme freedom seems to change into nothing but extreme slavery.
  5. Picture human beings as if living in an underground, cave-like dwelling.

All quotations by Plato

Same theme

More on responsibility

  1. Justice is doing one's own work and not meddling in others'.
  2. Existence precedes essence.
  3. Man is condemned to be free.
  4. In choosing himself, man chooses all men.
  5. The Master said: The gentleman seeks it in himself; the petty person seeks it in others.

Browse the responsibility theme