SOURCE: Miller, Mitchell. “Platonic Provocations: Reflections on the Soul and the Good in the Republic.” In Platonic Investigations, edited by Dominic J. O'Meara, pp. 163-93. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1985.

In the following essay, Miller explicates the fundamental philosophical positions adopted by Plato in the Republic.

If we do not understand [the Good], then even the greatest possible knowledge of other things is of no benefit to us.

(505a)

The aim of this reflection is to explore the nexus of notoriously obscure notions that lies at the center of Plato's Republic. Anything like a complete discussion would be impossible in this short space. What I hope to do instead is to offer the initial sketch of a unified response to these perennial questions: What does Plato intend by his notion “the Good”? How does the properly metaphysical understanding of the forms and the Good fulfill...