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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Alcibiades I by Plato: justice, is convicted out of his own mouth.
Alcibiades rejoins, that the Athenians debate not about what is just, but
about what is expedient; and he asserts that the two principles of justice
and expediency are opposed. Socrates, by a series of questions, compels
him to admit that the just and the expedient coincide. Alcibiades is thus
reduced to the humiliating conclusion that he knows nothing of politics,
even if, as he says, they are concerned with the expedient.
However, he is no worse than other Athenian statesmen; and he will not need
training, for others are as ignorant as he is. He is reminded that he has
to contend, not only with his own countrymen, but with their enemies--with
the Spartan kings and with the great king of Persia; and he can only attain
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