137. This then being the case, let us consider what it is that you find fault with in me, and whether you are right or not in saying that I can neither assist myself, nor any of my friends or domestics, nor save myself from the greatest dangers, but that I am in the power of any one who chooses, like men marked with infamy, if he pleases, according to that petulant expression of yours, to strike me on the face, or to take away my property, or expel me from the city, or, worst of all, to kill me, and that to be thus circumstanced, is the most disgraceful of all things, according to your opinion. But mine is this, it has indeed been often mentioned, yet nothing prevents its being again repeated; I deny, Callicles, that to be struck in the face unjustly is most disgraceful, or for my body or purse to be cut, but that to strike unjustly and to cut me and mine, is both more disgraceful and worse, and that to rob, enslave, break open a house, and, in short, to injure in any respect me and mine, is both more disgraceful and worse for him who does the injury than for me who am injured. 138. These things, that were proved to be thus in the former part of our discussion, as I affirm, are held and bound (though it is somewhat rude to say so) in reasons of iron and adamant, as would really appear to be the case, so that unless you or some one stronger than you can break them, it is not possible that any one who says otherwise than as I now say can speak correctly; for my statement is always the same, that I know not how these things are, but that of all the persons with whom I have ever conversed, as now with you, no one, who says otherwise, can avoid being ridiculous. I therefore again assert that these things are so. But if this is the case, and injustice is the greatest of evils to him that commits it, and if, great as this evil is, it is still a greater, if possible, for one who acts unjustly not to be punished, what kind of help will that be, which, if a man cannot procure for himself, he would be really ridiculous? will it not be that which would avert from us the greatest harm? But there is an absolute necessity that this should be most disgraceful, for a man not to be able to assist either himself, or his friends and domestics, next to that, an inability to avoid the second evil, and the third, an inability to avoid the third evil, and so on with the rest; in proportion to the magnitude of each evil, so is it beautiful to be able to avoid each of them, and disgraceful not to be able. Is the case thus or otherwise, Callicles? _Cal._ No otherwise.