Grandmother, parts 2360 - 2363

 2360. So, what was going on in Grandmother’s mind, far from being just an insignificant event in the brain of an old schizophrenic woman, was actually the functioning of a law of nature, which can be seen in the thought processes of individuals, and in the political processes of states.

 
2361. Plato in his “Laws,” speculated that all cities are at war with other cities, families with other families, and individuals are always at war with other individuals.

 2362. He goes on to conclude that individuals are always at war with themselves, and he suggests that the greatest victory an individual can achieve is the victory over the self. You can read it for yourself, it is all there in the first three pages of Book 1 of the Laws.

 2363. Plato was a very famous political theorists, and his ideas resonate even now, even as the form of the  architecture of his age still can still be seen in endless examples of civic buildings worldwide, but regardless of how well regarded Plato’s ideas may still be, the notion that a person has to vanquish the self is just wishful, misguided thinking.