The Myth of Er is an eschatological story that conclues Plato's Republic (10.614-10.621). It introduces the concept that moral people should be rewarded, and immoral people punished, after death. These rewards and punishments result directly from the individual's conduct, rather than being administered by an external deity. It is not, however, a straightforward description of heaven and hell, but more of a story of the journey between one life and the next, the intermission between death and rebirth. This section of the Republic is one of the first extant texts to deal with the issue of responsibility and choice in personal action, which has become a central question of Western ethics.