_Comp._--What should Law be, Sokrates, other than the various assemblage of consecrated and binding customs and beliefs?[15] _Sokr._--Do you think, then, that discourse is, the things spoken: that sight is, the things seen? that hearing is, the things heard? Or are they not distinct, in each of the three cases--and is not Law also one thing, the various customs and beliefs another? _Comp._--Yes! I now think that they are distinct.[16] _Sokr._--Law is that whereby these binding customs become binding. What is it? _Comp._--Law can be nothing else than the public resolutions and decrees promulgated among us. Law is the decree of the city.[17] _Sokr._--You mean, that Law is social opinion. _Comp._--Yes I do. [Footnote 15: Plato, Minos, 313 B. [Greek: Ti/ ou)=n a)/llo no/mos ei)/ê a)\n a)ll' ê)\ ta\ nomizo/mena?]] [Footnote 16: Plato, Minos, 313 B-C. I pass over here an analogy started by Sokrates in his next question; as [Greek: o)/psis] to [Greek: ta\ o(rô/mena], so [Greek: no/mos] to [Greek: ta\ nomizo/mena], &c.] [Footnote 17: Plato, Minos, 814 A. [Greek: e)peidê\ no/mô| ta\ nomizo/mena nomi/zetai, ti/ni o)/nti tô=| no/mô| nomi/zetai?]] [Side-note: Cross-examination by Sokrates--just and lawfully-behaving men are so through law; unjust and lawless men are so through the absence of law. Law is highly honourable and useful: lawlessness is ruinous. Accordingly, bad decrees of the city--or bad social opinion--cannot be law.] _Sokr._--Perhaps you are right: but let us examine. You call some persons wise:--they are wise through wisdom. You call some just:--they are just through justice. In like manner, the lawfully-behaving men are so through law: the lawless men are so through lawlessness. Now the lawfully-behaving men are just: the lawless men are unjust. _Comp._--It is so. _Sokr._--Justice and Law, are highly honourable: injustice and lawlessness, highly dishonourable: the former preserves cities, the latter ruins them. _Comp._--Yes--it does. _Sokr._--Well, then! we must consider law as something honourable; and seek after it, under the assumption that it is a good thing. You defined law to be the decree of the city: Are not some decrees good, others evil? _Comp._--Unquestionably. _Sokr._--But we have already said that law is not evil. _Comp._--I admit it. _Sokr._--It is incorrect therefore to answer, as you did broadly, that law is the decree of the city. An evil decree cannot be law. _Comp._--I see that it is incorrect.[18] [Footnote 18: Plato, Minos, 314 B-C-D.] [Side-note: Suggestion by Sokrates--Law is the _good_ opinion of the city--but good opinion is true opinion, or the finding out of reality. Law therefore wishes (tends) to be the finding out of reality, though it does not always succeed in doing so.]