In his present paper, Plato explores the 'old quarrel between philosophy and poetry'. For him, philosophy is better than poetry. His attitude amongst the majority of the nineteen papers is that he resented, diminished or completely eliminated the importance of poetry in philosophy. In the Greek culture, poetry had a pedagogic role, to induct the youth into the religious, moral and political norms of their society. The Republic was a sustained effort to gain a voice for philosophy, in the political and cultural life of the city-state. While philosophers may be prepared to admit that art and literature can afford important insights into the complex and intertwined themes one finds in ordinary life, they regard the style through which literature and art seek to arrive at and to make manifest, these insights and truths, as radically different from, and perhaps antithetical to, the style their own investigations must take. As presented by Plato, the contrast between philosophy and poetry is meant to capture a fundamental difference in attitude about how people's minds are to be directed towards the apprehension of what is deemed as truth. Poetry has its links with religion and delights in ambiguity whereas philosophy celebrates clarity. A poet, in all cases except for the epic, sees himself as expressing his emotive responses to the world he finds himself in - he is not looking to solve a problem, but merely express imperfectly what he feels. Plato's exclusion of poetry from the philosophic city is based on the antithesis between philosophic and poetic activity. The philosopher is in pursuit of wisdom while the poet of beauty, each looks down on the other, the one proud of his clarity and inquisitiveness, the other of his profundity and beauty of expression.