On the whole, one may say that Plato puts it up to the Guardians to perpetuate themselves properly, and indicates that this is to be one of their main concerns. His good breeding was biological breeding, not social breeding. He recognized as some of our modern eugenists have failed to--that good parents might throw poor stock, on occasion, and that abject parents might have remarkably good progeny. Even if the Guardians are to be encouraged to have good children, Plato provides that the children themselves must prove their goodness before they are in turn recognized as Guardians. As for the children of the baser sort--well, they were to be rigorously limited to the needs and resources of the community. Plato lived at a time when a great many children were born only to be murdered through “exposure” as it was called; and he had no qualms, apparently, about letting the Guardians send the children with a bad heredity into the discard. If his population could not grow properly in the sunlight without getting rid of the weeds, he was prepared to get rid of the weeds. People who were physically or spiritually too deformed to take part in the good life were to be eliminated. Plato, like a robust Athenian, was for killing or curing a disease; and he gave short shrift to the constitutional invalids. 9 But to breed Guardians is only one-half the problem. The other half comes under the heads of education and discipline; and when Plato discusses these things, he is not speaking, as a modern college president perhaps would, of book-learning alone; he is referring to all the activities that mold a person’s life. He follows the older philosopher, Pythagoras, and anticipates the great organizer, Benedict, by laying down a rule of life for his guardians. He did not imagine that disinterested activities, spacious thoughts, and clear vision would arise in people who normally put their personal comfort and “happiness” above the necessities of their office. Let us recognize the depth of Plato’s insight. It is plain that he did not despise what a modern psychologist would call “the normal biological career.” For the great majority of people happiness consisted in learning a definite trade or profession, in doing one’s daily work, in mating, and when the tension of the day relaxed, in getting enjoyment and recreation in the simple sensualities of eating, drinking, singing, love-making, and what not. This normal biological career is associated with a home, and with the limited horizons of a home; and a host of small loyalties and jealousies and interests are woven into the very texture of that life.