This book offers an original interpretation of Plato’s Laws and a new account of its enduring importance. Ballingall argues that the republican regime conceived in the Laws is built on "reverence," an archaic virtue governing emotions of self-assessment—particularly awe and shame. Ballingall demonstrates how learning to feel these emotions in the right way, at the right time, and for the right things is the necessary basis for the rule of law conceived in the dialogue. The Laws remains surprisingly neglected in the scholarly literature, although this is changing....
This book offers an original interpretation of Plato’s Laws and a new account of its enduring importance. Ballingall argues that the repub...