The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Alcibiades I by Plato: SOCRATES: Verily, then, you have good reason to be satisfied, if you are
better than the soldiers; and you need not, when you are their superior and
have your thoughts and actions fixed upon them, look away to the generals
of the enemy.
ALCIBIADES: Of whom are you speaking, Socrates?
SOCRATES: Why, you surely know that our city goes to war now and then with
the Lacedaemonians and with the great king?
ALCIBIADES: True enough.
SOCRATES: And if you meant to be the ruler of this city, would you not be
right in considering that the Lacedaemonian and Persian king were your true
rivals?
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