LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 No. 
 
 Accessions No. 
 
TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS 
 
SOCRATES. A Translation of the Apology. Crito, and 
 parts of the Phaedo of Plato, new edition. 
 
 A DAY IN ATHENS WITH SOCRATES. I 2 mo. 
 
 TALKS WITH SOCRATES ABOUT LIFE. 
 
 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. Five Selected 
 Dialogues translated from Plato. 
 
 Each 12mo, cloth, $1.00; Paper, 60 cents. 
 
TALKS 
 
 WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS 
 
 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 FROM THE 
 
 CHARMIDES, LYSIS, LACHES, EUTHYDEMUS, 
 AKD THEAETETUS 
 
 OF 
 
 PLATO 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 1891 
 

 Copyright, 1890, 
 BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. 
 
 JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
XENOPHON tells us that Socrates always went where he 
 could meet most people ; that in workshop and market- 
 place, at the festive board or in the palaestra, he conversed 
 with all men alike, whatever their class or profession. But 
 while no opportunity was neglected of mingling with and, 
 as it were, feeling the heart of his fellow-citizens, the com- 
 panions most truly congenial to him were not men of his 
 own age, but a later generation, the youth of Athens. 
 This, at all events, is what we gather from our chief source 
 of information concerning Socrates, the works of Plato. In 
 nearly all the so-called dramatic dialogues, where not only 
 Socrates the thinker but Socrates the man is revealed to us, 
 it is these charming youths who lend life and animation to the 
 scene and who inspire the master's noblest utterances. And 
 indeed these fresh young minds, filled with eager questionings 
 and unsatisfied longings, may well have called forth the best 
 powers of one whose mission it _ was to turn the eye of the 
 soul towards the Truth. 1 JFor to Socrates education meant 
 not crowding the mind with " knowledge from without," ..' 
 allowing no room for the play of independent thought or the 
 growth of individual character, but the building up of char- 
 acter by the charm of good words 2 and by examples of high 
 thoughts and noble lives, 8 and the awakening to life and 
 activity of that intuitive knowledge of realities which, as he 
 believed, exists in every human soul. 
 
 1 Republic, 519 B. 2 Charmides, 157 A. 3 Laches t 180 C. 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 Perhaps nowhere more clearly than in the dialogues before 
 us do we see the attitude of Socrates towards his younger 
 followers, or rather his fellow-searchers for truth, for as 
 such he preferred to regard them. If a touch of his accus- 
 tomed irony may be discerned in a somewhat exaggerated 
 self-depreciation and deference to their opinions, we mark 
 at the same time his encouragement of their efforts, his ready 
 adaptation to their limited powers of understanding, and 
 above all his steady determination that they shall use their 
 own faculties, and always say what they think. 1 
 
 The application of this apparently simple rule was fraught 
 with peculiar difficulties in a period of transition such as that 
 in which the mission of Socrates was begun. Old schools 
 of philosophy had lost their power and vitality, while the new 
 conceptions destined to lay the foundations of modern phi- 
 losophy were as yet in process of evolution. Meanwhile the 
 field temporarily left vacant was occupied by eristics, or 
 masters " in the art of word-fighting." 2 Then indeed with 
 truth might men be called " slaves of their words." 8 It 
 needed only that a proposition should be boldly enunciated 
 by some " teacher of wisdom," for it to become straightway 
 an axiom ; and the more unintelligible was its meaning, appar- 
 ently the more readily was it adopted. For logic, as yet an 
 unknown study, had not taught men to see through verbal 
 fallacies and consider each proposition in its exact meaning, 
 not " tricked out with empty words." 4 Failing to distinguish 
 between forms of thought and forms of expression, they 
 regarded the two as identical and interchangeable, while 
 their unfamiliarity with abstract ideas constantly led them to 
 confuse the abstract with the concrete. 
 
 1 Tkeaetetus, 171 D. 2 Euthydemus, 272 A. 
 
 3 Tlieaetetus, 173 C. * Laches, 196 B. 
 
PREFACE. M\\ 
 
 The urgency with which Socrates insisted upon a clear-cut 
 definition of every term as a necessary preliminary to any 
 discussion marks a new era in thought. The effort, however 
 unsuccessful, to define any abstract idea or quality must of 
 necessity throw some light upon its essential nature, even 
 when nothing is effected beyond eliminating false concep- 
 tions of it. Subjected to this test, the stock sayings which had 
 formerly passed unchallenged were proved unmeaning and 
 worthless, and he who had most loudly proclaimed them was, 
 " as if by a torpedo fish/* torpified into silence. 1 Nor is this 
 all. Not content with having convicted him of pretending 
 to know when he really knows nothing, 2 Socrates follows 
 up his victim until he has compelled him to strip and try 
 himself against him in argument, 8 and has finally extorted 
 from him an account of how he is " now living and has lived 
 in the past." 4 Nor is it from ill will that he thus deprives 
 men of the false conceptions endeared by long familiarity, but 
 because he is constrained by the law of his nature " never 
 to consent to a lie or to stifle the truth." 5 
 
 A process which has for its chief object the clearing away 
 of old misconceptions and prejudices by what Grote calls 
 the " negative arm of philosophy, without which the positive 
 arm will but strike at random," 6 is not likely to commend 
 itself to those whose minds, deep set in the grooves of custom 
 and tradition, are conscious of no defect in the old loose 
 methods of thought. Instances, to be sure, are not wanting 
 of older men who, like Nicias, deem it no evil thing to be 
 called to account for whatever they have done or are now 
 doing that is not right ; 7 but in the main it is the young 
 
 1 Mcno, So A. 2 Apology, 23 D. 
 
 3 T/ieaetctus, 169 B. 4 Laches, 187 E. 
 
 5 Theaetetus, 151 D. 6 Grote 's Plato, vol. i. p. 388. 
 
 7 Laches, 1 88 A. 
 
viii PREFACE. 
 
 who, untrammelled by the bonds of pride or self-interest, 
 and " capable of progress in everything," 1 willingly lend 
 themselves to the healing cross-examination, and are finally 
 enabled to " bring out more than was within them " ; to 
 " discover of themselves many noble truths." 2 
 
 Had it been the original intention of Plato to arrive at 
 any definite and satisfactory conclusion in these particular 
 dialogues, he must certainly have acknowledged his own 
 failure. The definition of temperance which is attempted 
 in the Charmides, that of friendship in the Lysis, and that of 
 courage in the Laches, are finally confessed to be altogether 
 inadequate, while the examination of the practical value of 
 philosophy undertaken in the Euthydemus, and that of the 
 true nature of knowledge in the Theaetetus, are at last aban- 
 doned as hopeless. "The lights which Plato throws upon 
 his subject," Jowett observes, " are indirect ; but/' he con- 
 tinues, " they are not the less real for that. He has no in- 
 tention of proving a thesis by a cut-and-dried argument ; nor 
 does he imagine that a great philosophical problem can be 
 tied up within the limits of a definition. If he has analyzed a 
 proposition or notion, even with the severity of an impossible 
 logic, if half-truths have been compared by him with other 
 half-truths, if he has cleared up or advanced popular ideas or 
 illustrated a new method, the aim of a Platonic dialogue 
 has been attained." 8 
 
 It is nevertheless undeniable that there is much in 
 Plato's writings which is not only inconclusive but well-nigh 
 incomprehensible to readers not familiar with the state of 
 knowledge at that time. Our intellectual status is so differ- 
 ent from that of the Greek world of the fourth century be- 
 fore Christ, that questions then deemed worthy of careful 
 
 1 Theaetetus, 146 B. 2 /^/^ ^ o TJ. 
 
 3 Jowett's Introduction to Thcaetetus, 
 
PREFACE. IX 
 
 elucidation now seem to us childish and trivial, while points 
 which we should deem of vital necessity to the discussion 
 are not once mentioned, doubtless because they were not 
 even perceived. The modern reader, moreover, who is ac- 
 customed to short cuts to learning and demands that his 
 information shall be presented in condensed form, will no 
 longer brook the long-winded investigations, so often ending 
 only in impotent conclusions, which delighted the leisurely 
 Athenians Unlike modern writers, who discreetly conceal 
 the process by which opinions have been reached, our author 
 takes us, as it were, into his confidence, proclaiming openly 
 that his own mind is not yet made up, and that he, like our- 
 selves, is only groping after truth. Thus he not only records 
 the tentative or contradictory propositions of those whose 
 ideas he is drawing forth, but he lays bare his own hesita- 
 tions and uncertainties, his own doubts and waverings. It 
 is as if some poet should present for our perusal the first 
 rough draft of his manuscript with all its erasures and correc- 
 tions. " There are cases," says Grote, " in which two chemists 
 have carried on joint researches, with many failures and dis- 
 appointments, perhaps at last without success. If a record 
 were preserved of their parley during the investigation, the 
 grounds for testing and rejecting one conjecture and for 
 selecting what should be tried after it, this would be in many 
 points a parallel to the Platonic process." 1 And yet it 
 should not fail to be recognized that "the soul of Plato's 
 thought is present entire at every point in the body of his 
 work, and it is not safe to touch an iota subscript of his text 
 without being aware of this." 2 It behooves us, therefore, to 
 use extreme caution in affirming of any apparent inconsis- 
 tency that it is radical or irreconcilable. 
 
 1 Crete's Plato, vol. i. p. 240. 
 
 2 Paul Shorey, Class. Rev., vol. iv. p. 480. 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 Although certain parts of Plato's dialogues may strike us 
 to-day as obscure or obsolete, it is impossible to read them 
 without being impressed by the modernness of their thought. 
 We are constantly startled by passages which bear as directly 
 upon questions of our own day as if they were written by 
 one conversant with the latest phase of nineteenth-century life. 
 The truth is that we are indebted to Plato for more than we 
 know. Like the man who found in Shakspeare nothing but 
 a collection of quotations, we are constantly recognizing in 
 him thoughts long familiar to ourselves. " Out of Plato," 
 says Emerson, " come all the thoughts that are still written 
 and debated among men of thought. Great havoc makes 
 he among our originalities. We have reached the mountain 
 from which all these drift boulders were detached. The 
 Bible of the learned for twenty-two centuries, every brisk 
 young man who says in succession fine things to each reluc- 
 tant generation is some reader of Plato translating into the 
 vernacular, wittily, his good things." 1 Doubtless the mas- 
 terly realism with which the personages of the Platonic drama 
 are portrayed, the wonderful touches of that nature which 
 makes all centuries akin, contribute in large measure to this 
 sense of modernness which blends and yet contrasts curi- 
 ously with these pictures of old Greek life, with its pleasant 
 daily meetings in Agora and palaestra, its limitless time for 
 social chat and philosophic discussion, its frequent allusions 
 to contemporaneous persons and events. 
 
 Before we turn to the scenes which are to be enacted be- 
 fore us, let us make the acquaintance of the chief characters 
 about to figure there. Two at least of these are already 
 known to readers familiar with the Apology or the Crito. 
 Although the parts assigned them here are insignificant, 
 the actors are at once to be recognized, Chaerephon by 
 
 1 Representative Men. 
 
PREFACE. XI 
 
 the eager impetuosity of his greeting to Socrates on his re- 
 turn from camp, 1 Crito by the prudent fear lest his friend 
 commit an undignified act by going to school with boys, 
 and by the cautious wish to know beforehand exactly what 
 he is to learn from the Sophist brothers, Euthydemus and 
 Dionysodorus. 2 This singular pair of claimants to universal 
 knowledge need not here be presented, as they will best be 
 made known to us later through their own words. Ctesippus, 
 the clever young fellow, " with all the impetuosity of his 
 years," 3 is admirably adapted to enter the lists against such 
 antagonists as these. Stopping at no absurdity, he does his 
 best to surpass their extravagances, and more than once 
 succeeds in turning the laugh against them. 
 
 In striking contrast to the two brothers, follows, in the next 
 dialogue, the grave and dignified teacher of the young Theaete- 
 tus, Theodorus the geometrician. Disclaiming any knowl- 
 edge outside of his own special study, he is yet sufficiently 
 acquainted with the views of the Heracliteans to be stirred to 
 wrath at the bare mention of the loose thinkers whom his 
 exact soul abhors, and whom he characterizes as " admitting 
 nothing fixed, whether in argument or in their own souls." 4 
 The cautious conservatism with which he avoids taking any 
 active part in the discussion a caution which the other 
 two collocutors lose no opportunity to override is as char- 
 acteristic a trait of Theodorus as is, on the part of Socrates, 
 the eager proffer of himself " to be killed and boiled," if 
 need be, provided only he be turned out a good man. 5 
 
 The character of Critias, in the Charmides, although it 
 gives no premonition of his subsequent career, is not so 
 much softened as to lose its value as a portrait. His self- 
 esteem and love of approbation are amusingly played off by 
 
 1 Charmides, 153 B-C. 2 Euthydemus, 272 B-D. 
 
 8 Ibid. 273 A. ' 4 Theaetetus, 180 B. 5 Euthydemus, 285 C. 
 

 XI I PREFACE. 
 
 his young ward Charmides, under the guise of deference and 
 submissiveness. 
 
 The fact that the chief actors in the Laches are histori- 
 cal personages lends a peculiar interest to this dialogue. 
 Prominent as generals no less than as citizens, Laches and 
 Nicias differ as widely in regard to their common interest, 
 the art of warfare, as in their traits of character. That 
 Laches is both a good lover and a good hater is shown by 
 his whole-souled admiration of Socrates and by his round 
 abuse of the cautious and prudent Nicias, who in his turn 
 does not scruple to express in unflattering terms his opinion 
 of his adversary's ability. The spirit of recrimination be- 
 trayed in the remarks of both is set off by the calm and 
 dispassionate manner in which Socrates conducts his inves- 
 tigations. The fiery and impatient Laches is, with some- 
 what questionable consistency, made the mouthpiece of one 
 of Plato's most characteristic and beautiful descriptions, 
 that of the true musician whose life is attuned to a noble 
 harmony of words and deeds, a passage which has been 
 called the keynote of Plato's theory of virtue. 1 
 
 But it is of a younger generation that the most vivid as 
 well as the most attractive portraits are drawn. In the 
 Laches, it is true, the boys whose education is the objective 
 point of the conversation play only a passive part ; but in each 
 of the other dialogues the figures upon whom our attention 
 centres belong to the flower of the Athenian youth, and bear 
 that stamp of breeding which seems to have been a birth- 
 right of noble parentage, and which goes far to justify the 
 aristocratic predilections of Plato. Free from concern as to 
 their own reputation, they have no thought of concealing the 
 " wonder " which Socrates prizes as an " affection peculiar 
 to the philosophic mind." 2 All alike display a charming 
 1 Laches, 188 C-E. 2 TheatMus, 155 D. 
 
PREFACE. Xlll 
 
 simplicity and ingenuousness, which are the more remark- 
 able by reason of the adulation lavished upon them by young 
 and old. It speaks well for the healthiness and symmetry 
 of Hellenic influences that a universal adoration, partaking 
 almost of a religious character, has imparted to them no 
 trace of vanity or self-consciousness, the taint of which must 
 inevitably have diminished their zeal in the pursuit of truth. 
 
 There is Cleinias, the lad in whose future welfare, as scion 
 of an illustrious family, his fellow citizens feel so deep an 
 interest. 1 Led by the kindly guidance of Socrates, he is re- 
 leased from his painful bewilderment, and enabled to form 
 by himself such sound conclusions that he no longer, it is 
 declared, " needs either Euthydemus or any one else to teach 
 him." 2 There is Lysis, with his shy impulsiveness, his artless 
 candour, his absorbed interest in the discussion, and his insa- 
 tiable eagerness to hear " more besides ; " 8 and the maturer 
 Menexenus, his bosom friend, a terrible fellow for pugnacity, 
 as Socrates playfully pretends to know to his cost. 4 And 
 pre-eminent among all is the gracious figure of Charmides, 
 beautiful in mind as in body, an enchanting combination of 
 modest dignity and arch sprightliness. 
 
 But as the Theaetetus is of these five dialogues the most 
 serious and profound, so the chief personage there depicted 
 is the best calculated to excite our admiration and interest. 
 Although the physical beauty of the other youths has been 
 denied him, he is yet one of the most attractive of the group. 
 Much as we are led to expect from the enthusiastic descrip- 
 tion which precedes his appearance, his own revelation to us 
 of his character and intellect does not disappoint us. The 
 very embodiment of unobtrusive modesty, he is yet full of 
 courage in the expression of his opinions, and ever ready 
 
 1 Euthydemus, 275 A. 2 Ibid. 290 E. 
 
 8 Lysis, 211 B. 4 Ibid. 211 C. 
 
xiv PREFACE. 
 
 to throw himself into the breach and assume a part which 
 he would fain have seen filled by another. "You are a 
 beauty, Theaetetus," Socrates exclaims, " for he who speaks 
 beautiful words is himself both beautiful and good." 1 There 
 is a peculiar pathos in the contrast between the bright future 
 predicted for Theaetetus and the touching picture of this 
 noble youth mortally wounded and on his way home to die. 
 
 The allusion to the battle which decided the fate of Theae- 
 tetus, 2 probably that which took place late in the summer 
 of 394 B. c., would fix this date as the one assumed for the 
 dialogue, just as the reference to the fight at Potidaea 3 (432 
 B. c.) leaves no doubt as to the supposed date of the Char- 
 mides. A clew is given also as to the time of action of the 
 Laches by the mention of the battle of Delium (424 B. c.) 
 as a past occurrence, 4 while an allusion to Alcibiades the 
 Older as dead 6 (404 B. c.) assigns certain limits of time to 
 the Euthydemus. Every student of Plato, however, knows 
 that, although historical allusions of this kind are of great 
 value in fixing a time prior to which the dialogue in question 
 could not have been composed, we must be very cautious 
 about drawing any rash conclusions from the juxtaposition in 
 which persons and events are placed, for our author allows 
 no questions of consistency to hinder the free play of his 
 imagination. Availing himself of the poet's privilege to sub- 
 ordinate historical accuracy to dramatic truth, he never hesi- 
 tates, if it suits his purpose, to make his actors take part in 
 events which occurred before they were born, or to allude to 
 incidents which did not take place till long after their death. 
 
 It may also here be noted that, although in the dramatic 
 portions of Plato's dialogues, every word of Socrates, if not 
 actually taken from his lips, is at least such as he might have 
 
 1 Theaetetus, 185 E. 2 Ibid. 142 B. 3 Charmides, 153 B. 
 
 4 Laches, 181 B. 5 Euthydetnus, 275 A. 
 
PREFACE. XV 
 
 uttered, we find, in passing to the philosophical discussions, 
 that "the Socrates of these discourses is in great measure 
 Plato himself, expounding under his master's name and 
 with much of his master's manner doctrines of his own 
 which he had developed under the inspiration of the teach- 
 ings of Socrates, or which he believed Socrates would have 
 approved if he could have lived to appreciate them. We 
 have, in fact, here suddenly passed from the Socratic to the 
 Platonic Socrates. Plato was in the habit of using his master 
 in his dialogues as a mouthpiece for the expression of his 
 own speculations ; and he thus makes him utter many doc- 
 trines which the real Socrates would hardly have understood, 
 and many which that rigid questioner would have subjected 
 to a merciless cross-examination. . . . Still we must re- 
 member that it is through Plato that his master is best known ; 
 and it is the Platonic Socrates, quite as much as the real 
 Socrates who has passed into history. Even Aristotle often 
 quotes Plato's doctrines under the name of Socrates." * 
 
 In the Theaetetus, various schools of philosophy, both past 
 and present, are successively passed in review ; and their lead- 
 ers, even when not referred to by name, were doubtless easily 
 identified by an audience to many of whom they must have 
 been personally known. For none except for Parmenides, 
 the great chief of the Eleatic school, who taught that all ex- 
 istence is one and changeless, does Socrates, or Plato in his 
 name, express any respect. 2 Protagoras is treated with the 
 same good-natured and amused tolerance as elsewhere ; 8 
 while in the Euthydemus, Isocrates, whom Plato chooses to 
 regard as a type of the half-way philosopher, desiring to keep 
 clear of risks and at the same time to reap every attainable 
 advantage, is so severely dealt with that by his side even the 
 
 1 Professor Goodwin's Introduction to Socrates. 
 
 2 Theaetetus, 183 E. 8 Ibid. 161 B-i68 C. 
 
XVI PREFACE. 
 
 Sophist Euthydemus for once appears to advantage. 1 The 
 spirit of compromise never received a sterner rebuke than in 
 this scathing denunciation. 
 
 In the Sophist brothers, already several times alluded to, 
 Plato draws an amusing caricature of a type to whom he 
 has been accused of doing scant justice. That the Sophists 
 were simply the average teachers of the day, representing 
 neither more nor less than the average standard of morality, 
 is now too well established to need further demonstration. 
 In professing to impart virtue and wisdom, they were really 
 not professing to impart what Plato himself understood by 
 these terms, for to them wisdom meant practical knowledge 
 of affairs, while virtue meant mere efficiency in public and 
 private life. Thus their pretentious promises, which enticed 
 men away from nobler studies and pursuits, were not neces- 
 sarily made with intent to deceive. But to an idealist like 
 Plato it was a debasement of terms to class among those who 
 had embraced the high calling of teacher, men to whom ethical 
 doctrine was an accessory rather than a primary purpose, 
 and who regarded as of subordinate interest that which, in 
 ironical phase, he describes as " the one little thing beside . . . 
 a noble soul." 2 That the effort to " grow like unto God " in 
 justice, wisdom, and holiness 3 should be abandoned for the 
 accomplishment of some " slavish task," 4 that truth should 
 be disregarded, truth, the " knowledge of which is wisdom 
 and true virtue, while the ignorance of it is sheer stupidity 
 and vice," 5 this in his eyes was the unpardonable offence 
 of all. It is for this reason that he does not scruple here 
 as elsewhere to expose to ridicule the overweening preten- 
 sions to knowledge and the utter incompetency of the men 
 
 1 Euthydemus, 305 -306 D. 2 Charmides, 154 D. 
 
 8 Theaetetus, 176 B. * Ibid. 175 E. 6 Ibid. 176 C. 
 
PREFACE. Xvii 
 
 whom he has chosen as the personification of false teaching. 
 The famous irony of Socrates was never more characteristi- 
 cally or amusingly displayed than when, under pretence of 
 admiring their skill and cleverness, he makes the brothers 
 Euthydemus and Dionysodorus give an exhibition of their 
 manner of " refuting every proposition whether it happen to 
 be true or false," l which exhibition is in itself the most 
 complete argument against their own method. 
 
 If there is room for wonder that fallacies the grotesque- 
 ness of which is to us so palpable should have been toler- 
 ated, nay, even enthusiastically received, by any intelligent au- 
 dience, it should yet be remembered that " the wisest of men 
 are limited by the conditions of the age in which they live." 2 
 The various sophisms of which Plato here gives us the re- 
 ductio ad absurdum may not unfairly be classed among other 
 " erroneous tendencies of the reasoning process frequently 
 incident to human thought and speech, specimens of those 
 ever renewed inadvertencies of ordinary thinking which it is 
 the peculiar mission of philosophy, or reasoned truth, to 
 rectify." 8 Nor must we forget that even " in modern 
 times there is no fallacy so gross, no trick of language so 
 transparent, no abstraction so barren and unmeaning, no 
 form of thought so contradictory to experience, which has 
 not been found to satisfy the minds of philosophical inquirers 
 at a certain stage, or when regarded from a certain point of 
 view only. The peculiarity of the fallacies of our own age 
 is that we live within them, and are therefore generally un- 
 conscious of them." 4 
 
 To bring to any formal conclusion the ever-renewed search 
 
 1 Euthydemus ; 272 B. 
 
 2 Jowett's Introduction to Purves' Selections from Plato. 
 
 3 Grote's Plato, vol. i. p. 550. 
 
 4 Jowett's Introduction to Euthydemus. 
 
xviii PREFACE. 
 
 for truth was assuredly far from the purpose of one who es- 
 teemed search a greater good than knowledge. But we shall 
 find that in Plato's dialogues the discussion is rarely brought 
 to a close without the introduction of some new thought 
 which has perhaps a more practical value than the problem 
 originally proposed. From the Charmides we have obtained, 
 it is true, no definition of temperance, a name which, 
 like justice in the Republic, stands for the highest ideal 
 of virtue, but we have learned that for the attainment of 
 that ideal no one particular quality can suffice. To be moder- 
 ate, to be prudent, or even to possess that knowledge of self 
 which, in Plato's estimation, is the foundation of all knowl- 
 edge, is not sufficient for perfect temperance. Only by the 
 possession of virtue in its integrity can be brought about the 
 harmonious union between body and soul which makes life 
 itself a harmony sweeter than that of " lute or any instrument 
 for pastime." 1 And so in the Lysis t where, descending to 
 a less lofty plane, we deal with human relationships, the 
 very failure of the attempt to define so familiar a thing as 
 friendship teaches the salutary lesson that to accept or take 
 for granted is not the same as to know, and that what we 
 suppose ourselves to know best we are often most ignorant of. 
 Again in the Laches, although we fail to gain any adequate 
 conception of courage, we learn to estimate the useless- 
 ness of any special knowledge compared with that larger 
 wisdom which is reached only through contemplating the 
 great problems of life, a self-education which ends not 
 with the passing away of childhood, but must needs be pur- 
 sued so long as life itself shall last. 2 
 
 By exemplifying a vain show of knowledge, the Euthyde- 
 mus paves the way for the genuine search which is under- 
 taken in the last of the dialogues before us. The Theaetetus 
 i Laches, 188 D. 2 Ibid. 188 B. 
 
PREFACE. XIX 
 
 bears, it has been said, the same relation to Plato's theory of 
 knowledge as the Gorgias to his theory of morals. One 
 of the most highly finished and perfect in form of the Pla- 
 tonic dialogues, it ranks also as "the most exact in phi- 
 losophic expression," and is pregnant with the deepest 
 thought. What is perhaps its most important contribution to 
 philosophy the discovery that the soul of man is a central 
 principle by which alone perception is transformed into 
 thought excited among its first hearers an enthusiasm 
 which may appear unwarranted by a proposition so familiar 
 to ourselves. So true it is that " the highest effort of philoso- 
 phy in one generation may become the common sense of the 
 next," x and that what to-day stands in the light of a mere 
 truism was little short of a revelation in the eyes of those 
 to whom it threw open a whole world of new ideas. 
 
 But Plato does not long confine his subject to a purely 
 intellectual plane. Since to his mind right conduct is insep- 
 arable from right knowledge, the moral aspect cannot be far 
 from view, and we soon find ourselves contemplating the ever 
 recurring struggle between the two living types, the phan- 
 tom of perception, falsely called Real ; and the Ideal, the 
 only true reality. The " digression " 2 wherein the " two ways 
 of living " are contrasted and the choice of the higher is jus- 
 tified is filled with a solemn beauty which recalls a similar 
 passage in the Republic, where the few " noble natures " 
 and "great souls" whose "thoughts are fixed upon reali- 
 ties " 3 are likened to " one who, overtaken by a mighty tem- 
 pest and storm of dust swept onward by the wind, shelters 
 himself behind a wall, rejoicing if he may pass through his 
 earthly life free from evil deeds and unrighteousness, and on 
 
 1 Jowett's Introduction to Purves' Selections from Plato. 
 
 2 Theaetetus, 172 C-i;; C. 
 8 Republic, 500 B. 
 
XX PREFACE. 
 
 his release, depart hence filled with fair hopes and good 
 will to all." i 
 
 It is interesting to observe that the motives adduced for 
 right action imply a spiritual conception of the future life. 
 The incentive to " become just, holy, and wise withal " is 
 that, since the man " who has made himself the most just " 
 is most like him who himself is " perfectly just," we shall 
 thus " grow like unto God," and so find the '' way of escape 
 hence to yonder place." The " reward of unrighteousness " 
 to be dreaded is that we shall " grow in the likeness of that 
 which we resemble," and may not therefore hope, "when 
 dead, to be received into that place which is free from evil." 2 
 It is surely not fanciful to trace throughout this beautiful 
 passage of the Theaetetus a foreshadowing of the triumphant 
 vindication soon to be shown forth in the trial and death of 
 Socrates, a fit ending to a life wherein " words are attuned to 
 deeds," 3 such a life as is "lived by gods and by men 
 blessed of Heaven." 4 
 
 1 Republic, 496 D-E. 2 Theaetetus, 176 A-i;; A. 
 
 8 Laches, 188 D. 4 Theaetetus, 176 A. 
 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 CHARMIDES 3 
 
 LYSIS 23 
 
 LACHES 41 
 
 EUTHYDEMUS 63 
 
 THEAETETUS 99 
 
 NOTES 149 
 
CHARMIDES. 
 
CHARMIDES. 
 
 CHARACTERS. 
 
 SOCRATES. 
 
 CHAEREPHON, a friend of SOCRATES. 
 CHARMIDES, a young Athenian. 
 CRITIAS, guardian of CHARMIDES. 
 
 The scene is laid in the Palaestra of TAUREAS. 
 
^?s^ 
 
 wviasiir 
 ^WFogJ^ 
 
 TALKS WITH ATM IAN YOUTHS. 
 
 CHARMIDES. 
 
 I RETURNED last evening from the camp at 
 Potidaea, 1 and was well pleased after so long an 
 absence to visit my familiar haunts again. I 
 looked in of course at the palaestra of Taureas, 
 which is right opposite the temple of Basile ; 2 
 and there I found a very large company, some 
 unknown to me, but for the most part old 
 friends. The sight of me took them by sur- 
 prise, and while I was still at a distance they 
 began, each from where he sat, to bid me wel- 
 come. Chaerephon, 3 however, like the crazy- 
 brained fellow that he is, springing out from 
 among them, ran to me and, seizing me by the 
 hand, exclaimed : " Oh, Socrates, can it be that 
 you are safely out of the battle ? " 
 
 Shortly before we came away a battle had 
 taken place at Potidaea, the news of which had 
 only now arrived. 
 
 " Just as you see me," I replied. 
 
4 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 "Nay," said he, "but the report here is that 
 the battle was a very severe one, and that many 
 of our best-known citizens perished there." 
 
 11 And the report," I said, " is not far from true." 
 
 " And were you in the battle? " he asked. 
 
 " I was." 
 
 " Then," said he, " come here, and sit down 
 and tell us all about it, for we have heard no 
 accurate account as yet." 
 
 As he spoke, he led me to a seat beside 
 Critias, the son of Callaeschrus. 4 So I sat down, 
 and> after greeting Critias and the others, gave 
 them all the news of the camp that they wanted, 
 for each one had a different question to ask. 
 
 When we had had enough of this, I in my 
 turn asked them for news of the city, how 
 it fared now with matters of philosophy, and 
 whether any of our youths had become noted 
 for their intellect or their beauty, or for both. 
 154 Just then Critias, looking toward the door, saw 
 a number of young fellows coming in, laughing 
 and making jokes together, while a crowd of 
 others brought up the rear. 
 
 " As to beauties, Socrates," he said, " you will 
 soon, I imagine, see for yourself; for these who 
 are now coming in are the followers and lovers 
 of the youth who passes for the most beautiful of 
 the present day, and he himself I presume is on 
 his way here and already close at hand." 
 
 "Who is he?" I asked, "and who is his 
 father?" 
 
CHARMIDES. 5 
 
 " You probably know him yourself," he re- 
 plied, " only he was not grown up when you 
 went away, my cousin Charmides, the son of 
 my uncle Glaucon." 5 
 
 " By Zeus ! " I exclaimed, " of course I know 
 him. Even then, as a child, he was not one to 
 be passed unnoticed, but now I suppose he 
 must be a well-grown lad." 
 
 " You shall see directly how large he is, and 
 what he has grown to be." 
 
 The words were yet on his lips when Char- 
 mides entered. Now, my friend, you cannot 
 judge by me, for in regard to beauty I am 
 simply like a chalk-mark upon a white wall; 
 almost any one in the bloom of youth appears 
 to me beautiful. But still, this lad did strike 
 me as a marvel, both as to beauty and stature ; 
 and it seemed to me that the rest of the com- 
 pany were one and all in love with him, from 
 the flutter and commotion that greeted his en- 
 trance; while a crowd of other admirers fol- 
 lowed in his train. Now this was less surprising 
 with men of our own age, but I noticed that 
 among the boys also there was not one not 
 even the very smallest who looked in any 
 other direction ; all gazed upon him as if upon 
 some sacred statue. 6 Then Chaerephon calling 
 me by name, 
 
 " Well, Socrates," said he, " what do you 
 think of the youth? Is he not fair of face?" 
 " Marvellously fair," I answered. 
 
6 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 " And yet," said he, " if he would but take 
 off his garments you would think his face ill- 
 favoured, so faultlessly beautiful is his form." 
 
 And all the others confirmed the words of 
 Chaerephon. 
 
 " By Heracles ! " I cried, " you make the fel- 
 low out irresistible, if he has only one little 
 thing besides." 
 
 "What?" asked Critias. 
 
 " If he has a noble soul," I answered ; " and 
 this, in truth, Critias, he ought to have, since he 
 is of your family." 
 
 " In this respect also," said Critias, " he is 
 perfection itself." 7 
 
 "What say you, then?" I asked; "shall we 
 not take the vesture from off his soul and con- 
 sider that, before his outward form? Doubtless 
 at his age he is fond of conversation." 
 
 " Exceedingly so," Critias answered, " espe- 
 cially as he has a turn for philosophy, and in the 
 155 opinion of some, himself included, is a good deal 
 of a poet besides." 
 
 " This gift, dear Critias," said I, " is one 
 which dates far back in your family, from your 
 kinship with Solon. 8 But why will you not call 
 the lad here and show him to me? There could 
 be no harm could there in his conversing 
 with us were he even younger than he is, when 
 you, his guardian and cousin as well, are by? " 
 
 "You are quite right," he said, " and we will 
 send for him." 
 
CHARMIDES. 7 
 
 With that, turning to the attendant, " Boy," he 
 said, " go fetch Charmides ; but first say that I 
 wish to present him to a physician, for the cure 
 of that ailment about which he was complain- 
 ing to me the other day. He said," continued 
 Critias, addressing me, " that of late his head had 
 been feeling heavy when he got up in the morn- 
 ing. Now why should you not pretend that you 
 know some sort of cure for his headache? " 
 
 "Why not indeed?" said I; "only let him 
 come." 
 
 " Oh, he will come," said he. 
 
 And so it happened ; for he did come, and 
 was the cause of much merriment. We who 
 were seated there began, in hot haste, every man 
 to push his neighbour, in order that Charmides 
 might sit by his side, until at last he who was 
 seated at the one end was forced to get up, 
 while he on the other fell over sideways. Char- 
 mides, meanwhile, came and sat down between 
 Critias and myself. 
 
 Now by this time, my friend, I had already 
 begun to be troubled, and the confidence I had 
 felt, of being able to talk to him with perfect 
 ease, was at an end. . . . However, when he 
 asked if I knew the cure for the headache, I with 
 much difficulty just managed to answer that 
 I did. 
 
 "Well," he asked, " what is it? " 
 
 Whereupon I told him that it was a kind of 
 leaf; and that, besides the remedy, there was a 
 
8 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 certain charm which, if pronounced at the same 
 moment that the remedy was applied, effected a 
 perfect cure; but that without the charm the 
 leaf itself was of no avail." 9 
 
 " I will write down the charm from your dic- 
 156 tation," he said. 
 
 " Whether you can persuade me to let you 
 or not?" I asked. 
 
 At this he laughed. " If I can persuade you, 
 Socrates," he said. 
 
 " Very good," said I ; " and are you quite 
 sure of my name?" 
 
 " Yes, unless I am all in the wrong," he an- 
 swered, " for you are not a little talked about 
 by boys of our age; and then too I remem- 
 ber when I was a child seeing you with my 
 cousin Critias." 
 
 11 That is well," I said. " I shall speak to you 
 with all the more freedom about the nature of 
 the charm, for until now I have been at a loss 
 how to show you the extent of its power. Such, 
 Charmides, is its nature that it is not the head 
 alone which it is capable of curing. Doubtless 
 ere now you have heard our competent physi- 
 cians say, when a man comes to them suffering 
 from his eyes, that it is impossible to attempt the 
 cure of the eyes alone, inasmuch as the head 
 must be treated at the same time, if the eyes 
 are ever to be cured; and so again with the 
 head, to suppose that it may be treated by it- 
 self apart from the whole body would be sheer 
 
CHARMIDES. 9 
 
 nonsense. Following out this principle, they 
 apply the regimen to every part of the body, 
 and make it their aim to treat and cure the 
 whole, together with the part. Have you not 
 noticed that this is what they say, and that it 
 is really so? " 
 
 " Certainly I have," he said. 
 
 " And do you not think them right, and agree 
 with them?" 
 
 " By all means," he said. 
 
 Being now sure of his approval I again took 
 heart, and by degrees my confidence was re- 
 stored and I felt renewed life within me. And 
 I said, 
 
 " Well, Charmides, of a like nature is this 
 charm. I learned it yonder on the campaign 
 from one of the physicians of the Thracian king 
 Zamolxis, who also are said to confer immor- 
 tality. 10 This. Thracian told me that the Greek 
 physicians are quite right in speaking as I have 
 said. * But Zamolxis/ he added, * bur King, who 
 is moreover a God, says that just as the cure of 
 the eyes should not be attempted without that of 
 the head also, nor that of the head without the 
 body, even so there is no cure for the body 
 apart from the soul ; and the reason why so 
 many diseases elude the physicians of Greece 
 is that they know nothing of the whole, which 
 ought to be their chief care, since if this be 
 not sound, it is impossible for any part to be 
 well. For all things,' he declared, ' both l}ad and 
 
10 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 good, not only in the body but in every part of 
 the man, have their starting-point in the soul, 
 whence they overflow, in the same way as from 
 157 the head into the eyes. First then and above 
 all the soul must be treated, if the head and the 
 rest of the body are ever to be made whole ; and 
 the cure of the soul/ he said, my boy, ' is 
 brought about by means of certain charms, 
 which charms are good words. By these words 
 temperance is begotten in the soul; and, this 
 once begotten and abiding there, it is easy 
 enough to supply health to the head and the rest 
 of the body.' And as he taught me the cure and 
 the charms, ' Let no one,' he urged, ' persuade 
 you to treat him for headache with this medicine, 
 until he has first yielded up to you his soul to be 
 treated by the charm. For just here,' he de- 
 clared, ' the mistake is made in regard to men. 
 They attempt to treat the body independently 
 of the soul/ And most strenuously did he com- 
 mand me to let no man, were he ever so rich or 
 well-born or fair, prevail upon me to do other- 
 wise than this; whereupon I took my oath to 
 him, and I must needs perform it, and so I will. 
 And if you, following the stranger's injunctions, 
 will first of all consent to yield up your soul to 
 be charmed through the Thracian's charm, I will 
 afterward apply the cure to the head. Other- 
 wise, I know not what I could do for you, dear 
 Charmides." 
 
 On hearing this, Critias exclaimecj : " A god- 
 
CHARMWES. 1 1 
 
 send indeed, Socrates, would this headache prove 
 to the boy, if for the sake of his head he should 
 be compelled to improve his intellect. I can 
 assure you, however, that Charmides has been 
 held to surpass his fellows, not in outward form 
 alone, but in this very quality for which you say 
 you have a charm, temperance you call it, do 
 you not? " n 
 
 " Precisely that." 
 
 " Know then," he went on, " that he is ac- 
 counted far the most temperate among our 
 youths, and, considering his age, in all other 
 respects inferior to none." 
 
 " And by good rights, Charmides," said I, 
 " do you surpass others in all these respects, for 
 I suppose there is no one here present who could 
 readily point out two Athenian houses, the union 
 of which was likely to bring forth a fairer and 
 better descendant than those from which you 
 are sprung. Your father's family, that of Critias, 
 son of Dropidas, has been handed down to us 
 in the eulogies of Anacreon and Solon and many 
 other poets, as pre-eminent in beauty and virtue 
 58 and whatever else is deemed a blessing. And 
 it is the same on your mother's side, for of 
 your uncle Pyrilampes it is said that often as 
 he was sent on embassies to the great King, 
 or anywhere else on the continent, no one in 
 any place was ever held his superior, whether 
 in beauty or in stature. Indeed, that whole 
 house is no whit inferior to the other. Such 
 
12 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 being your ancestry, it is to be expected that 
 you should be first in all things. And so far, 
 dear son of Glaucon, as the eye judges of your 
 outward form, you are, methinks, in no respect 
 inferior to any of your predecessors. So that if, 
 as our friend here assures us, you are well en- 
 dowed with temperance and other virtues besides, 
 then indeed, dear Charmides, your mother bore 
 you to be blessed. The case, therefore, stands 
 thus : If, as Critias here says, you have already 
 acquired temperance, and are sufficiently tem- 
 perate, you need no further charm, whether that 
 of Zamolxis or of Abaris the Hyperborean, 12 
 but may be given at once the cure for head- 
 ache. If, however, you still seem to come short 
 of this, the charm must be used before the cure 
 is applied. Tell me yourself, then, whether you 
 agree with our friends, and think that you have 
 a sufficient share of temperance already, or are 
 you still lacking in this?" 
 
 Hereupon Charmides blushed and looked even 
 lovelier than before, for this modesty of his well 
 became his years. His answer, nevertheless, was 
 not without dignity, for what he said was that, 
 under the circumstances, it was not easy either 
 to agree to the assertion or to deny it. 
 
 " For if I deny that I am temperate," said 
 he, " not only is that an absurd thing for any 
 one to say about himself, but I shall be making 
 Critias out a liar, as well as many others who, 
 according to him, hold me as temperate ; if, on 
 
CHARMWES. 13 
 
 the other hand, I declare that I am temperate, 
 I shall be praising myself, which is of course 
 offensive;, so that I really have no answer to 
 give you." 
 
 " What you say, Charmides," I remarked, 
 " seems to me reasonable; and I think we had 
 best consider together whether you do possess 
 the quality in question or not, in order that 
 neither you may be forced into saying what 
 you do not like, nor I into taking up the prac- 
 tice of medicine inconsiderately. If, therefore, 
 it is agreeable to you, I should like to look into 
 the matter with you ; if not, we will let it go." 
 
 "I should like it of all things," he said; " so 
 pray begin just where you think best." 
 
 [158 E.-i62 A. In compliance with the request of 
 Socrates, Charmides, after much hesitation, pro- 
 poses two successive definitions of temperance. 
 The first calmness or repose is rejected on 
 the ground that most actions are better performed 
 quickly than slowly. The second modesty 
 reached after ' a right manly effort of mind/ 
 is pronounced deficient, on the strength of a 
 quotation from Homer to the effect that " mod- 
 esty is no good thing for a needy man." 13 Char- 
 mides then bethinks him of another definition, 
 attending to one's own affairs. Upon this, Soc- 
 rates exclaims, 
 
 161 C. "Oh, you rogue, you got this from Critias 
 here or from some other of the wise men." 
 
14 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 " From some other most likely," Critias pro- 
 tests, " for it was certainly not from me." 
 
 " But what difference does it make," asks 
 Charmides, " where I got it?" 
 
 " None at all," Socrates admits, " for of course 
 we are not here to examine who said it, but 
 whether or not it is true." 
 
 " You are right there," is the rejoinder. 
 
 " Of course I am; still I shall be surprised if 
 we ever do find out the meaning, for it looks as 
 if it were a sort of riddle." 
 
 After demonstrating, incidentally, that no one 
 in a civilized community can be absolutely in- 
 dependent of other men, Socrates resumes as 
 follows:] 
 
 162 A. "Well, as I said just now, he who defined 
 temperance as attending to one's own business 
 was speaking in riddles, for he was not, I pre- 
 sume, quite a fool; or perhaps it was some fool 
 that told you, Charmides? " 
 
 " On the contrary," said he, " I supposed him 
 to be particularly wise." 
 
 " Then most assuredly he was proposing it as 
 a riddle, meaning how hard it is to know what 
 attending to one's own business is." 
 
 "Very likely," said he. 
 
 " Well, what is it to attend to one's own busi- 
 ness? Can you tell me? " 
 
 " Not I, by Zeus ; and I really should not won- 
 der if he who said this may not know himself what 
 
CHARM IDES. 15 
 
 he meant." And as he spoke he glanced mean- 
 ingly at Critias and smiled. 
 
 Now, it had been evident for some time past 
 that Critias was getting uneasy, and anxious 
 about sustaining his reputation before Char- 
 mides and the others, and that he had barely 
 restrained himself up to this moment; but now 
 he could do so no longer. And this makes me 
 all the more certain that my suspicion was true, 
 and that it was from Critias that Charmides had 
 heard the answer concerning temperance. Char- 
 mides, however, who did not wish to undertake 
 the defence of the definition himself, but to have 
 Critias do it, kept urging him on and pointing 
 out how he had been worsted in the argument. 
 This was too much for Critias, and he got an- 
 gry with Charmides, just, I thought, as a poet 
 might get angry with some actor who has recited 
 his verses badly. Thus, looking him straight in 
 the face, he said, 
 
 " So you think, Charmides, do you, that just 
 because you do not know what the man means 
 who said that temperance is attending to one's 
 own business, he himself, forsooth, does not 
 know? " 
 
 " But, my excellent Critias,'* said I, " it is no 
 wonder that Charmides, at his age, should know 
 nothing about what you, with your superior age 
 and experience, doubtless do understand. If you 
 therefore agree that temperance is what he now 
 calls it, and are ready to accept the definition, I 
 
1 6 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 would much rather examine with you whether 
 or not it is true." 
 
 " I agree to it entirely," he said, " and I do 
 accept the definition." 
 
 [162 .-175 D. In imitation of the verbal hair- 
 splitting of Prodicus, 14 Cn'tias, to suit his own pur- 
 pose, draws distinctions between making, doing, 
 and acting, and quotes Hesiod's saying, " Work 
 is no disgrace," in support of what he now pro- 
 claims to be his true meaning; namely, that 
 temperance consists in the performance of good 
 works, which, whether for one's self or for others, 
 are a man's own or proper business ; intemper- 
 ance, in the performance of works which, being 
 useless or ignoble, are of alien character. 
 
 But what, it is objected, if one be unconscious 
 of his own temperance? As the physician can- 
 not always know whether by healing a patient 
 he is or is not conferring a benefit upon him, 
 so a man, although acting with temperance or 
 wisdom, may himself remain uncertain or even 
 ignorant of it. 
 
 164 C. Critias now declares that he will own himself 
 mistaken, rather than admit that a man who does 
 not know himself can possess temperance ; for 
 that this is a quality inseparably linked with knowl- 
 edge of self is shown by the coupling together 
 in the Delphic temple of the two injunctions : 
 Be temperate ; Know thyself. He therefore pro- 
 poses to substitute for the previous definition 
 
CHAKMIDES. I/ 
 
 that of self-knowledge. Here Socrates pauses 
 to inquire into the purpose of temperance. As 
 a science, it must be the science of something. 
 What, then, is this thing? The answer is that, 
 unlike other sciences, all of which are applied to 
 an object outside of themselves, temperance, 
 while including within itself all the other sciences, 
 is pre-eminently the science of itself, its own re- 
 production being its legitimate end. 
 
 The demand for a more definite answer is met 
 by a complaint from Critias that Socrates is try- 
 ing to refute him. 
 
 1 66 C. " And if I do refute you," Socrates replies, 
 " have I any motive save that which leads me to 
 scrutinize my own words also, the fear of un- 
 consciously imagining myself to know when I 
 do not know? And as to the search I am now 
 making, it is chiefly indeed for myself, but for 
 my other friends as well. For is it not a gain 
 in which all men share, to have everything put 
 in its true light?" 
 
 169 Further investigation arouses doubt as to the 
 reality or use of such a science as the one just 
 described, and a longing for the help of " some 
 great man " 15 to solve it. ' And here/ Soc- 
 rates remarks, ' Critias, hearing my words and 
 beholding my perplexity, for all the world like 
 those who, seeing their neighbour yawn, are 
 themselves similarly affected, seemed himself also 
 to have fallen a prey to perplexity. But, accus- 
 tomed as he was to be treated with universal 
 
1 8 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 deference, he was ashamed and unwilling before 
 all the others to confess himself incapable of 
 maintaining the point which I had challenged. 
 So, to cover his perplexity, he muttered some- 
 thing quite unintelligible,' 
 
 Self-knowledge is finally abandoned as a defi- 
 nition of temperance, on the ground that it is 
 an impossibility and that even if it were possible 
 it would be useless. 16 One last attempt is made, 
 by defining it as the knowledge of good and evil, 
 but this also proves itself inadequate, and Soc- 
 rates ends by confessing that he and his friends 
 have been defeated in their attempt to define 
 that quality which the " namer of things " 17 has 
 called temperance or wisdom.] 
 
 175 D. "Now on my own account I am not so 
 much troubled ; but on yours, Charmides, I am 
 truly distressed if with such an outward form and, 
 yet more, with such temperance of soul, you are 
 to derive no benefit from this temperance of 
 yours, nor any help from its presence in your life. 
 And still more am I distressed about the charm 
 which I learned from the Thracian, if indeed 
 that which I took such pains to acquire is in 
 reality a thing of no worth. I do not, however, 
 believe that this is actually the case, but rather 
 that I myself am poor at searching; for tem- 
 
 176 perance is surely a great blessing, and if you 
 really have it, happy are you. Consider, there- 
 fore, whether you do possess it and have no 
 
CHARMIDES. 1 9 
 
 need of the charm. For, if you do, I would 
 advise you rather to account me a foolish bab- 
 bler, incapable of finding out anything at all 
 with the help of reason, if you will only be- 
 lieve that the more you grow in temperance 
 the happier you will be." 
 
 Then Charmides said : " By Zeus, Socrates, I 
 do not know whether I possess it or not. How, 
 indeed, should I know a thing, the nature of 
 which even you are incapable of ascertaining? 
 At least this is what you say, though I do not 
 much believe you. But as for myself, Socrates, 
 I do think that I am in great need of the charm ; 
 and there is no reason, so far as I am concerned, 
 why I should not let myself be charmed by you 
 every day, until you say that it is enough." 
 
 " That is well, Charmides," said Critias ; " only 
 do this and I shall deem it a proof of your tem- 
 perance, that you give yourself up to be charmed 
 by Socrates, and never desert him in great mat- 
 ters or in small." 
 
 " Rest assured," he answered, " that I shall 
 follow him and never be a deserter. Indeed, I 
 should be doing a dreadful thing to disobey 
 you who are my guardian, and not do as you 
 command." 
 
 " Well, I do command it," Critias said. 
 
 " Then I shall do it," he said, " beginning from 
 this very day." 
 
 " Come now," said I, " what are you two plot- 
 ting about?" 
 
2O TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 " Nothing," said Charmides ; " our plots are 
 already laid." 
 
 " So you are going to use force, are you," I 
 asked, " and not let me even present my case? " 
 
 " Yes, you must expect force," he replied, 
 "since Critias here commands ; therefore you had 
 best be considering what you will do about it." 
 
 " But there is no longer any use in consider- 
 ing," said I ; " for if you have made up your 
 mind to accomplish anything, no matter what, 
 and that by force to boot, no human being is 
 capable of opposing you." 
 
 " Then do not you oppose me either," he 
 said. 
 
 " Indeed I shall not," I answered. 
 
LYSIS. 
 
LYSIS. 
 
 CHARACTERS. 
 
 SOCRATES. 
 
 LYSIS, ) 
 
 / young Athenians. 
 MENEXENUS, ) 
 
 HIPPOTHALES, an admirer of LYSIS. 
 CTESIPPUS of Paeania. 
 
 The scene is laid in a newly built Palaestra, jttst otitside the 
 walls of Athens. 
 
LYSIS. 
 
 I WAS walking straight across from the Acad- 
 emy to the Lyceum, by the outside road close 
 under the wall, 1 when, on reaching the little gate 
 by the fountain of Panops, I met Hippothales 
 the son of Hieronymus, and Ctesippus the Paea- 
 nian, and several other youths gathered together 
 in a group. 2 As he saw me approaching, Hip- 
 pothales called out, 
 
 " Ho, Socrates, where are you from, and whither 
 bound?" 
 
 " I have come from the Academy and am go- 
 ing straight across to the Lyceum," I answered. 
 
 " Come straight here instead," he cried. " Why 
 not turn aside to us? It is worth your while, I 
 can tell you." 
 
 " Where, pray? " I asked ; " and whom do you 
 mean by * us '? " 
 
 " Here," he said, pointing to an enclosed 
 
 space with an open door, right opposite the 
 
 wall. " Here is where we spend our time ; and 
 
 204 not we only, but many others, and handsome 
 
 fellows too." 
 
 " But what is this place, and how do you spend 
 your time in it? " 
 
 " It is a newly built palaestra," he replied ; 
 " and our time is spent for the most part in con- 
 
24 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 versation, of which we would gladly give you 
 a share." 
 
 " Very kind of you," said I ; " and who is the 
 teacher there?" 
 
 " Your friend and admirer, Miccus," he 
 answered. 
 
 " By Zeus ! " I exclaimed, " he is no ordinary 
 man, in fact, an accomplished Sophist." 
 
 " Will you come with us then," he asked, 
 " and see for yourself who are there ? " 
 
 [204 B.-2O6 D. Still another motive for visiting the 
 palaestra is shortly presented. A certain fair 
 and well-born youth, Lysis by name, is greatly 
 beloved by Hippothales, who, as shown by a 
 humorous account from Ctesippus, has so over- 
 whelmed the object of his admiration with praise 
 and adulation, that he has made himself odious 
 to the modest youth. Conscious of his own 
 want of success, Hippothales appeals to Socrates 
 to know by what word or course of action he 
 may best ingratiate himself.] 
 
 " That is not easy to tell," I replied. " If, 
 however, you cared to have him converse with 
 me, I might perhaps be able to give you an 
 example of what I think you ought to say 
 to him, instead of the verses and songs in 
 which your friends here tell me you address 
 him." 
 
 "No difficulty about that," he said. " If you 
 
LYSIS. 25 
 
 and Ctesippus here will go inside and sit down 
 for a talk together, he will, I think, join you of 
 his own accord; for he is especially fond, Soc- 
 rates, of listening. And besides, as they are cele- 
 brating the Hermaea, 3 the young men and boys 
 are allowed to mingle together, so he is sure to 
 join you. But if he does not, he is well acquainted 
 with Ctesippus, through Menexenus, who is a 
 cousin of Ctesippus and, as it happens, the most 
 intimate friend of Lysis. Therefore if he does 
 not come to you of his own accord, Ctesippus 
 shall summon him." 
 
 " Yes," I said, " that is the best way." 
 Herewith, taking hold of Ctesippus, I went 
 into the palaestra, the others bringing up the 
 rear. 
 
 On entering we found that the sacred rites 
 were nearly over, and that the boys, all in their 
 festive array, had offered the sacrifices and were 
 having a game at knuckle-bones. The greater 
 part of them were in the court outside ; but in a 
 corner of the disrobing-room 4 a few were play- 
 ing at odd and even, with a quantity of bones 
 which they took out of little wicker baskets. A 
 group of lookers-on surrounded them. Among 
 these was Lysis, who, with a chaplet upon his 
 107 head, shone out pre-eminent among the boys and 
 youths, and seemed worthy of note, not for beauty 
 alone, but for graces of character as well. As 
 for us, we withdrew to the opposite side, and sit- 
 ting down (for it was quiet there), entered into 
 
26 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 conversation. Now Lysis kept turning round to 
 look at us, evidently longing to draw near. For 
 a while, however, he was at a loss what to do, 
 as he hesitated to come forward alone. But by- 
 and-by, Menexenus, in the midst of his game, 
 came in from the court, and seeing Ctesippus 
 and myself, came over and sat down by us. As 
 soon as Lysis saw this, he followed him and sat 
 down too by the side of Menexenus. There- 
 upon all the others came in also, and Hippo- 
 thales among them, when he saw what a crowd 
 was gathered there. But, so fearful was he of 
 annoying Lysis, that he placed himself where he 
 thought he should be concealed by the others 
 and escape observation. Standing in this posi- 
 tion, he listened. 
 
 Then, looking at Menexenus : " Which of 
 you two, son of Demophon," I asked, " is the 
 elder?" 
 
 " There is a dispute between us as to that," he 
 answered. 
 
 " And you might dispute also, I suppose," said 
 I, "which is the nobler?" 
 
 " Certainly we might." 
 
 " And which the handsomer?" 
 
 At this they both began to laugh. 
 
 44 As to which is the richer," I said, "I shall 
 not inquire ; for you are friends, are you not? " 
 
 " That we are," they replied. 
 
 " And friends, they say, have all things in com- 
 mon ; so that in this respect at least there will 
 
LYSIS. 27 
 
 be no difference between you, that is, if you 
 speak the truth about your friendship." 
 
 They assented. 
 
 I was on the point of asking which was the 
 juster and which the wiser of the two ; but be- 
 fore I had time, some one came in for Menexe- 
 nus, saying that the director of the gymnasium 
 was calling for him, as it was, I believe, his turn 
 to offer some sacrifice. So he went off, and I 
 fell to questioning Lysis. 
 
 ./*' I suppose, Lysis," said I, " that your father 
 and mother love you very dearly? " 
 
 " Indeed they do," he said. 
 
 " And they would like to have you as happy 
 as possible? " 
 
 " Of course they would ! " 
 
 " Well, do you think any one happy, who is 
 a slave and is never allowed to do what he 
 wishes? " 
 
 " Not I, by Zeus," he replied. 
 
 " And since your father and mother love you 
 and want you to become happy, it is evident, 
 is it not, that they strive in every way to make 
 you happy? " 
 
 " Of course they do ! " he said. 
 \ " And so they allow you to do just as you 
 please, and never scold you or prevent you 
 from doing whatever you may wish?" 
 
 " In faith, Socrates, but they do ; they pre- 
 vent me very often." 
 
 " What do you mean? " I cried. " They wish 
 
28 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 208 your happiness, and yet prevent your doing what 
 you wish? Tell me, pray j/n, during a race, you 
 wanted to mount one of your father's chariots 
 and take the reins, would they not allow you, 
 would they hinder you from doing it? " 
 
 " By Zeus," exclaimed he, " they would never 
 allow me ! " 
 
 " Whom then would they allow? " 
 
 " My father has a charioteer, to whom he pays 
 a wage." 
 
 "What! they allow a hireling rather than you 
 to do whatever he likes with the horses, and they 
 , give him money over and above? " 
 
 "Why not, pray? " he asked. S 
 /" But they do, I suppose, trust you to manage 
 the pair of mules ; and if you wished to take the 
 whip and beat them, they would allow that? " 
 
 " Allow me, indeed ! " he said. 
 
 " What ! " I asked, " is no one allowed to beat 
 them?" 
 
 " Oh yes, of course," said he ; " the mule- 
 driver." 
 
 " Is he a slave or a free man? " 
 
 ' A slave." 
 
 " They think more then, it seems, of a slave 
 than of you, their son ! They entrust their pos- 
 sessions to him rather than to you, and allow him 
 to do what he likes, while you they prevent! 
 ./Well, tell me yet further. Do they give you tne 
 control of yourself, or do they not trust you 
 even thus far? " 
 
L YSIS. 29 
 
 " Trust me indeed ! " 
 
 "What! does some one else control you?" 
 
 " Yes, my tutor here." 
 
 " Not a slave, surely? " 
 
 " Why not? " he said. " He belongs to us." 
 
 " Well, it is a hard thing," I said, " that you, 
 who are free-born, should be controlled by a 
 slave. And in what way does this tutor of yours 
 control you? " 
 
 " He takes me to my teacher's, of course." 
 
 " But surely, they, your teachers, do not also 
 control you ? " 
 
 " Assuredly they do." 
 
 " Well, your father seems nothing loath to 
 set plenty of rulers and masters over you ! Of 
 course, however, when you come home to your 
 mother, she, thinking only of your happiness, 
 allows you to do whatever you like with the 
 wool or the web, when she is weaving? Nor 
 does she, I imagine, hinder you from disturb- 
 ing the shuttle or the comb, or any of the 
 other weaving implements?" 
 
 "By Zeus!" he answered, laughing; "not 
 only does she prevent me, but if I were so much 
 as to touch them, I should get a beating." 
 
 " By Heracles ! " I cried ; " surely you have 
 never done an injury to your father or mother? " 
 
 * Not I, by Zeus ! " he answered. 
 
 "Then for what reason, pray, do they pre- 
 vent you so harshly from being happy and do- 
 ing what you like, and keep you the whole 
 
30 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 day long enslaved to others, in a word, doing 
 hardly anything that you wish ; insomuch that 
 you apparently get no good from all your pos- 
 sessions, which every one else has more control 
 209 over than yourself, nor even from your own 
 body, fair as it is, since this too is taken in charge 
 and governed by another; while you, Lysis, have 
 control of nothing, nor do anything that you 
 desire?" 
 
 " Because I am not old enough yet, Socrates," 
 he said. 
 
 " That would not prevent, son of Demo- 
 crates," said I ; " for there are cases, I imagine, 
 where your father and mother do trust you, with- 
 out waiting till you are old enough. When for 
 instance they want some one to read or write for 
 them, it is you, I presume, that they call upon to 
 do this, rather than any other member of the 
 household; is it not?" 
 
 " To be sure," he answered. 
 
 " And you are free, are you not, to choose 
 which letters shall be written first, and which 
 second in order, and the same in reading? And 
 when you take your lyre, neither your father 
 nor your mother, I presume, hinders you from 
 loosening or tightening such of the strings as 
 you choose, or from playing with your fingers, 
 or striking with the plectrum, 5 or do they 
 hinder you in this ? " 
 
 " Certainly not." 
 
 " And what, Lysis, can be their reason for not 
 
L YSIS. 3 I 
 
 hindering you here, when they do so in the mat- 
 ters of which we first spoke? " 
 
 " I suppose," said he, " it is because in the 
 one case I understand, and in the other I do not." 
 
 " Oh, that is it, my dear fellow ! " said I. " Your 
 father then is not waiting for you to be of the 
 right age to be trusted with all these things; 
 but the first day he thinks your judgment better 
 than his own, he will entrust to you not only the 
 care of his property but of himself. 
 
 210 A. "The case then, dear Lysis, stands thus. In 
 matters which we understand all will trust us, 
 Greeks and barbarians, men and women alike, 
 and here we shall do as we please, and none will 
 purposely hinder us, but we shall be free our- 
 selves, and have control of others also ; and these 
 things will belong to us, for we shall get the 
 good of them. But in matters which we do not r 
 understand no one will trust us to do as we like, 
 but all will hinder us, so far as they can, not 
 strangers only, but father and mother, and one 
 yet nearer than these if there be any such ; and 
 we shall be subject to others ; and these things 
 will not belong to us, for we shall get no good 
 from them. Do you agree that this is so?" 
 
 "I do." 
 
 " And shall we be friends to any one, or will 
 any one love us in respect to the matters wherein 
 we are useless? " 
 
 " Certainly not." 
 
32 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 " Then neither does your father love you, nor 
 in fact does any one love any one else in so far 
 as you or he is useless." 
 
 " It seems not." 
 
 " If you therefore, my boy, are wise, all men 
 will be your friends and all as your kindred, for 
 you will be useful and good. If not, there is no 
 one, not even father or mother or kinsman, who 
 will be your friend. Now then, Lysis, is it pos- 
 sible to pride one's self upon a knowledge of 
 subjects of which one has no knowledge?" 
 
 " How could it be possible?" he answered. 
 
 " And if you still require a teacher, you have 
 as yet no knowledge? " 
 
 " Very true." 
 
 " And if you have no knowledge you cannot 
 pride yourself upon knowing?" 
 
 " By Zeus, Socrates," he cried, " I do not think 
 I can." 
 
 On hearing this I glanced at Hippothales and 
 came very near making a mistake, for I was on 
 the point of saying, " This, Hippothales, is the 
 way to talk to your favourite, humbling him and 
 setting him down, instead of flattering and spoil- 
 ing him as you do." But when I perceived 
 how confused and distressed he was by what 
 had been said, I remembered that he had wished 
 his presence kept a secret from Lysis ; so I 
 checked myself and refrained from speech. 
 211 Meanwhile Menexenus came back, and sat 
 \ down again beside Lysis, in the place he had 
 
LYSIS. 33 
 
 previously left. Then Lysis, in a most winning 
 and affectionate way, whispered softly in my ear, 
 so that Menexenus might not hear, 
 
 " Do, Socrates, tell Menexenus also what you 
 have been telling me." 
 
 " Tell him yourself, Lysis," I said, " for you 
 have been paying close attention." 
 
 " Indeed I have," he said. 
 
 " Try your best then," said I, " to recall it, that 
 you may give him an exact account of it all ; and 
 if there is anything you forget, you may ask me 
 about it the next time we meet." 
 
 " Yes, Socrates," he said, " I certainly will, 
 you may depend upon it. But do tell him some- 
 thing besides, so that I may listen also until 
 it is time to go home." 
 
 " Well," I said, " I suppose I must, since you 
 >oid me. But mind that you come to my rescue 
 if Menexenus attempts to overthrow me. Or per- 
 haps you do not know that he is pugnacious? " 
 
 " That he is, by Zeus ! " said he ; " excessively 
 so. And that is just why I want you to argue 
 with him." 
 
 " That I may make myself ridiculous?" I 
 asked. 
 
 " Oh no, indeed," he answered, " but that you 
 may give him a lesson." 
 
 "How could I?" I cried. "No easy matter 
 that, for he is a terrible fellow, a pupil of 
 Ctesippus, who by the way is here himself. Do 
 you not see him?" 
 
 3 
 
34 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 " Pay no attention to any one else, Socrates," 
 he said, " but come and argue with him." 
 
 "It shall be done," I said. 
 
 As we talked thus together, Ctesippus called 
 out, 
 
 " Why are you two feasting there all by your- 
 selves, and giving us no share in the talk? " 
 
 " Why, of course," said I, " you must have 
 a share. This boy here does not quite under- 
 stand something I have been telling him, but says 
 he thinks Menexenus knows about it, and bids 
 me ask him." 
 
 "Well," said he, "why don't you ask? " 
 
 "I am going to ask," I said; "and do you, 
 Menexenus, answer what I am about to ask you. 
 You must know that from childhood there is one 
 thing that I have coveted, just as all/men do 
 covet, some one thing, some another, -fone man 
 for instance horses, another dogs; one wealth, 
 another honour. Now, things of that kind I am 
 indifferent about ; but I have a passion for gain- 
 ing friends, and would much rather get a good 
 friend than the best cock or quail in the world. 
 Yes, by Zeus, rather than a horse or a dog either ! 
 By the Dog, 6 I verily believe that I would choose 
 a friend, before all the gold of Darius even, so 
 great a lover of friends am I. When therefore 
 I behold you two, Lysis and yourself, I am struck 
 212 with amazement, and think what good fortune 
 it is for you, young as you are, to have been 
 able with such speed and ease to acquire this 
 
L YSIS. 
 
 35 
 
 treasure, and to gain, each for himself, quickly 
 yet surely, such a friend as you find in Lysis, 
 and he in you. For my own part, so far am I 
 from such a possession that I do not even know 
 how one man becomes the friend of another; 
 and it is precisely in regard to this that I want 
 to question you, as one having experience." 
 
 [212 A.-22I E. The, inquiry which ensues leads to 
 the following question from Socrates : 
 
 213 C. " Whom then," he asks, " may we call friends 
 one to the other? " 
 
 " By Zeus, Socrates," is the answer, " I for my 
 part cannot very well make out." 
 
 " May it not be then, Menexenus," Socrates 
 asks, " that we have not made our search at all 
 in the right way? " 
 
 " I do not believe you have, Socrates," Lysis 
 exclaims, blushing as he speaks ; ' for so ab- 
 sorbed was he in the conversation as he had 
 evidently been from the first that the words 
 seemed to have escaped him involuntarily. 
 Wishing to let Menexenus rest, and pleased with 
 the earnestness shown by Lysis,' Socrates finishes 
 with him the inquiry as to the true basis of 
 friendship, the result of which is as follows:] 
 
 " If then," said I, " you are friends one to the 
 other, there must be some sort of congeniality in 
 your natures." 
 
 " Most assuredly," they both exclaimed. 
 
36 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 '' And if any one longs for another or loves 
 him, you may be sure, my boys, that he could 
 222 never have felt this longing, or love, or friend- 
 ship, if there had not been some congeniality in 
 the soul, or in some quality of it, either its 
 moral character or habits or general type." 
 
 " Of course," said Menexenus. 
 
 But Lysis was silent. 
 
 " Very good," said I ; " and it has been proved 
 that we must necessarily love what is of a nature 
 congenial to our own." 
 
 " So it seems," he said. 
 
 " Therefore he who unfeignedly loves, not he 
 who merely pretends to love, must of necessity 
 be loved by his beloved." 
 
 To this Lysis and Menexenus gave but faint 
 assent, while Hippothales turned all colours, for 
 
 iy- i . 7 ? ? ? 
 
 [222 B.-E. Further investigation, however, brings 
 about the discovery that things of like nature 
 cannot be mutually useful, and, after one more 
 fruitless attempt at a satisfactory definition, 
 Socrates thus recapitulates the steps already 
 taken:] 
 
 " If then neither they who love nor they who 
 are loved, neither the like nor the unlike, neither 
 those who are good nor those who are of kin, 
 nor any of the others we have passed in review, 
 I cannot remember them for their number, if 
 
. 
 
 LYSIS. 37 
 
 none of these, I say, are examples of friendship, 
 why then I know not what more I can say." 
 223 With these words I had thought to stir up 
 some one of the elders. But just then, like some 
 kind of evil spirit, in came the tutors of Menexe- 
 nus and Lysis, 7 with the brothers of the boys, 
 and, calling out, ordered them to go straight 
 home ; for by this time it was late. At first we 
 and the bystanders were for driving them off. 
 As they, however, paid us no heed, but went on 
 storming and shouting, with their outlandish 
 accent, as loudly as ever, we came to the con- 
 clusion that they had been drinking a trifle at 
 the Hermaea, and would be hard to deal with; 
 so that, fairly worsted by them, we broke up 
 the assembly. But as they were going off, I 
 said, 
 
 " In truth, Lysis and Menexenus, we have been 
 cutting a ridiculous figure, I, old man that I 
 am, and you along with me. For these people 
 will go off and say of us that though we imagine 
 ourselves to be friends, I include myself with 
 you, we have not yet been able to find out 
 what a friend is." 
 
LACHES. 
 
LACHES. 
 
 CHARACTERS. 
 
 SOCRATES. 
 
 LYSIMACHUS, son of ARISTIDES. 
 
 MELESIAS, son of THUCYDIDES. 
 
 Two BOYS, sons ^/"LYSIMACHUS and MELESIAS. 
 
 NICIAS, ) 
 
 v Athenian generals. 
 LACHES, \ 
 
LACHES. 
 
 178 Lysimachus. You have now, Nicias and Laches, 
 seen the man who fights in armour, 1 though you 
 do not yet know why Melesias and I urged your 
 going with us to see him, as we did not tell you 
 at the time. This we will now do, for we think 
 it right to be open with you. Some there are 
 who turn matters of this kind into ridicule and, if 
 asked advice, will not say what they really think, 
 but guess at the wishes of their questioner, and 
 speak contrary to their own convictions. You, 
 however, we believe capable not only of forming 
 an opinion, but, having formed it, of stating it 
 frankly; and so we have taken you into our 
 counsel touching that which we are about to 
 
 179 unfold. Well, what I have been so long in get- 
 ting at is this. Here are our two sons : this one, 
 who belongs to Melesias, is named after his grand- 
 father Thucydides; the other one, who is mine, 
 likewise bears the name of his grandfather and 
 of my father, Aristides we call him. 2 Now 
 we are determined to give them the best pos- 
 sible care, not letting them when they are only 
 half grown do exactly as they please, after 
 the fashion of many parents, but beginning at 
 once to do the best we possibly can for them. 
 
42 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Knowing, therefore, that you too have sons, we 
 supposed that you, if any one, would have taken 
 thought what treatment would most improve 
 them ; and if you have not paid much attention 
 to this, we will remind you that it is a duty not 
 to be neglected, and will exhort you to make 
 common cause with us in the care of our sons. 
 
 And you must hear, Nicias and Laches, what 
 brought this to our minds, though the tale be 
 somewhat long. We two, Melissus and I, live to- 
 gether, and our sons with us. Now, as I said in 
 the beginning, we will be open with you. Of 
 our fathers we have each of us many and noble 
 deeds to relate to the lads, deeds done in 
 war and in peace, in managing the affairs of 
 the allies, as well as of this city, but of our 
 own deeds neither of us has a word to say. 
 This is of course humiliating, and we blame our 
 fathers for having let us run wild when we were 
 young, while they themselves were attending to 
 the interests of others. And these things we 
 hold up as a warning to our boys, telling them 
 that if they disobey us and are indifferent to 
 their own improvement their lives will be in- 
 glorious ; while if they apply themselves they will 
 doubtless become worthy of the names they bear. 
 And as they, on their part, promise to obey, we 
 are now considering what they must study or 
 practise, if they would become men of worth. 
 Now some one suggested to us this art, saying 
 what a fine thing it is for a youth to learn how 
 
LACHES. 43 
 
 to fight in armour, and praising the man whose 
 exhibition you have seen, and advising us to 
 see it for ourselves. Accordingly we thought it 
 our duty to go to see the show, taking you 
 with us as spectators and at the same time, if 
 you are willing, as advisers and partners in the 
 1 80 care of our sons. This is what we wished to 
 impart to you. It is for you now to advise us 
 whether in your opinion the art is one to be 
 studied or not, and whether there is any other 
 pursuit or branch of knowledge that you could 
 recommend for a young man, and to say, more- 
 over, what you will do in regard to joining us. 
 
 Nicias. For my part, Lysimachus and Mele- 
 sias, I commend your intention and am ready to 
 join you ; and so I think is Laches here. 
 
 Ladies. You are right, Nicias, in so thinking. 
 What Lysimachus has said about his own father 
 and the father of Melesias is quite true, it seems 
 to me, not only of them, but of ourselves and all 
 who have to do with public affairs, they treat 
 their children and their other private concerns 
 very nearly as he says, setting them aside and 
 making them of no account. You are quite right, 
 Lysimachus, in what you say. But I wonder 
 that you summon us to advise with you about 
 the lads' education, and not rather Socrates ; for 
 in the first place he is of your own deme, and 
 then besides he is forever haunting places where 
 may be found such high thinking or noble living 
 as you are in search of for your lads. 
 
44 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Lys. What do you mean, Laches? Has our 
 friend Socrates turned his attention to any of 
 these matters? 
 
 Lack. Certainly he has, Lysimachus. 
 
 Nic. I, no less than Laches, can testify to that, 
 for he lately recommended to me a man as teacher 
 of music for my boys, Damon, the pupil of 
 Agathocles, 3 who is not only the most accom- 
 plished of men in music, but is in all other re- 
 spects a most suitable person to consort with 
 boys of my son's age. 
 
 Lys. Those who are of my time of life, friends 
 Socrates, Nicias, and Laches, do not know young 
 men at all well, because our age keeps us for the 
 most part at home. But if you, son of Sophro- 
 niscus, have any good advice to offer this fellow- 
 demesman of yours, pray do so. This is but 
 right, since you are my friend by right of de- 
 scent from your father. He and I were al- 
 ways comrades and friends, and up to the day 
 of his death there was never any difference be- 
 tween us. And I recollect hearing these boys 
 say something on the subject only lately. When 
 they are talking together at home, they are con- 
 stantly bringing up the name of Socrates, and 
 181 lauding him extravagantly. Tell me, boys, is this 
 the Socrates whom you are all the time talk- 
 ing about? 
 
 Boy. Yes, father, the very same. 
 
 Lys. You have done well, Socrates, by Hera, 
 in reflecting such credit upon that best of men, 
 
LACHES. 45 
 
 your father, and above all in reviving the family 
 bonds between us. 
 
 Lack. Yes, indeed, Lysimachus, you had 
 better not let him go; for I remember seeing 
 him on another occasion when he reflected credit 
 not only upon his father, but upon his fatherland. 
 In the flight from Delium, he and I made the 
 retreat together ; and I can only say that if others 
 had shown themselves such as he, our city would 
 have held her own and not at that time suffered 
 such loss. 4 
 
 Lys. This is high praise, Socrates, which you 
 are receiving from men worthy of trust in the 
 matters whereof they speak. Rest assured that 
 I rejoice to hear of your being held in esteem, 
 and count me one of your warmest well-wishers. 
 You ought long ago to have looked upon us as 
 kinsmen and come constantly to our house, as 
 was fitting ; and, now that we have revived ac- 
 quaintance, you must, I insist, from this day for- 
 ward be^on intimate terms with us and with 
 these youths, that our friendship may thus be 
 preserved. We shall rely upon you then to do 
 your part, and shall not fail to keep you in mind 
 of it. But what do you say to what we were 
 speaking about? What think you? Is it useful 
 or is it not for our boys to learn fighting in 
 armour? 
 
 Soc. Well, of course, Lysimachus, I will, as 
 best I can, advise you and do all else that you 
 bid. But it seems to me fairer, seeing that I am 
 
46 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 younger and less experienced than the others, 
 to let me first hear what they have to say and 
 to learn of them, and then if anything contrary to 
 what has been said occurs to me I can inform 
 you of it, and convince you and the others of its 
 truth. So why, Nicias, should not one of you 
 speak first? 
 
 [181 D.-iS/ D. Nicias, as champion of the art in 
 question, sets forth its various advantages, but 
 is met by the objection, from Laches, that the 
 Lacedaemonians, although greatest in matters of 
 war, have never known this art : 
 
 183 A. "And even," Laches asserts, " if they them- 
 selves had not known it, surely the teachers of 
 the art must have been aware that the Lacedae- 
 monians pay more attention than all the rest of 
 the Hellenes to matters of the kind, and that 
 any one who had gained their esteem would be 
 sure to command the highest price elsewhere, 
 as is the case with any tragic poet who has gained 
 the esteem of our own people. Insomuch that 
 any one who thinks he can write a fine tragedy 
 does not go about exhibiting in the other cities 
 of Attica, but hurries straight here, as a matter 
 of course, and exhibits to us. 5 But I observe 
 that these fighters in armour, on the contrary, 
 regard Lacedaemon as a holy place where one 
 may not set foot even on tiptoe ; and so, keeping 
 on the outer edge of the circle, they prefer to 
 exhibit anywhere else, and especially to those 
 
LACHES. 47 
 
 who by their own confession are inferior to others 
 in matters relating to war. . . . Neither has any 
 one of the men who practise this art ever distin- 
 guished himself in war. . . . For instance, this 
 very Stesilaus, whom you and I have seen ex- 
 hibiting to such a crowd and talking so boast- 
 fully about himself, I saw upon another occasion 
 give in good earnest a far finer exhibition of him- 
 self, though an involuntary one. 6 He was serving 
 on board a ship which had attacked a merchant- 
 man, and was fighting with a kind of scythe-spear, 
 a weapon as peculiar as he himself was peculiar 
 among men. It is not worth while to speak of 
 the man himself, but only of what befell this 
 same amusing invention of the scythe-spear. In 
 fighting, he got it entangled in the rigging of the 
 other ship, and there it stuck fast. Stesilaus 
 tugged at it, hoping to get it free, but without 
 success. Meanwhile the ships were slipping 
 asunder. For a time he ran along his own ship, 
 holding on to his spear the while; but, as the 
 other ship passed by, drawing him and his spear 
 after it, he let the spear slide through his hands 
 184 till at last he was holding on only by the tip 
 end. Then there arose great laughter and clap- 
 ping of hands from those in the merchantman, 
 at the figure he cut ; and when some one threw 
 a stone which fell at his feet on the deck, and 
 he let go the spear, even those on his own 
 trireme could no longer keep back their laughter 
 at the sight of that scythe-spear swinging mid- 
 
48 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 air from the merchantman." The lesson drawn 
 is that " no one, except he be of surpassing 
 valour, can escape being ridiculous if he boasts 
 of possessing the art in question." 
 
 1 86 A. Socrates, on being asked for his opinion 
 declares that where the education of children, 
 " the greatest of our possessions," is in question, 
 our first care should be to secure the advice of 
 one who has had good teachers and is himself 
 skilled in the care of the soul. " As for me," 
 he adds, " I am the first to admit that I have 
 never had a teacher in these matters, though 
 from my youth up I have longed for one. But 
 I have not the means to give the Sophists their 
 hire, 7 and they alone proclaim themselves able 
 to turn me out a perfect man ; while as to dis- 
 covering the art for myself, I am as yet inca- 
 pable of it." . . . 
 
 Socrates now suggests that Nicias and Laches, 
 who add to the advantages of wealth that of riper 
 years, be asked to give proof of their qualifica- 
 tions. Lysimachus accordingly requests that 
 these two will, with the help of Socrates, ex- 
 amine the subject in question, and answer what- 
 ever Melesias may think proper to ask.] 
 
 187 D. NIC. You do of a truth, Lysimachus, ap- 
 pear to know Socrates only through his father, 
 and to have had no acquaintance with the man 
 himself, unless perhaps you may have met him 
 amongst your fellow-demesmen when as a child 
 
LACHES. 49 
 
 he was accompanying his father to a temple 
 or to some other gathering of the people. 8 But 
 that you have not come across him since he has 
 grown older is very plain. 
 
 Lys. Why, Nicias, what do you mean? 
 
 Nic. You do not seem aware that if any one 
 comes into close contact with Socrates and is 
 drawn into a conversation with him, no matter 
 what subject is first started, the man keeps lead- 
 ing him about in argument until he falls into the 
 pitfall, and has to give an account of himself, and 
 of the way in which he is now living and has 
 1 88 lived in the past; and when once he has him 
 there, Socrates will not let him out until he has 
 put him to a full and thorough test in all these 
 matters. 9 Now I, for my part, am used to him, 
 and know that this must be suffered at his hands ; 
 and I know, moreover, that I myself shall suffer 
 it. But it delights me, Lysimachus, to be in his 
 company, and I deem it no evil thing to be 
 called to account for whatever we have done or 
 are now doing that is not right. Rather is a 
 man in this way compelled to use greater zeal 
 for the time to come, if only he does not shun 
 the lesson, but, with Solon, desires to learn so long 
 as he has life, and does not imagine that old age 
 brings sense of itself. 10 To me it is far from 
 an unusual or even an unpleasant thing to be 
 cross-examined by Socrates ; and I knew some 
 time back that, when he was present, the talk 
 would not be confined to youths but would be 
 4 
 
50 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 extended to ourselves. As I say, then, so far as 
 I am concerned, there is nothing to prevent his 
 talking to us just as he likes. But see how 
 Laches feels about it. 
 
 Lack. My feeling about discussions, Nicias, is 
 simple, or rather not simple, but two-sided. To 
 one and the same person, indeed, I might appear 
 in the light of a lover and at the same time a 
 hater of discourse. For when I hear a man 
 speaking of virtue or any form of wisdom, if 
 he be a true man and worthy of the words he 
 utters, I rejoice exceedingly to see that speaker 
 and words are in accord and harmonize one with 
 the other; and such a man I deem to be a true 
 musician, for he is attuned to the sweetest har- 
 mony, not that of the lute or any instrument 
 for pastime, but to that of true living, his life 
 itself a symphony wherein words are attuned to 
 deeds. No Ionian mode is this, nor yet a Phry- 
 gian, nor a Lydian, but the pure Dorian, the 
 only truly Greek harmony. 11 When such a man 
 speaks I rejoice, and I appear a lover of dis- 
 course, so eagerly do I receive his words. But 
 one who is of opposite character is a vexation 
 to me, and all the more the better I think he 
 speaks; and then, on the contrary, I am taken 
 for a hater of discourse. With the words of 
 Socrates I am not familiar; but of his deeds 
 I have had, as you know, experience in the past, 
 and, by these, I know him worthy to express 
 189 freely the noblest thoughts. If this, then, is the 
 
LACHES. 51 
 
 case, I am at one with him ; and I would gladly be 
 questioned by such a man as he, and not ill- 
 pleased to learn of him. Nay, I am of the same 
 mind with Solon save in one particular. As I 
 grow old, my desire is to learn, indeed, many 
 things, but only of good men. Let him, then, 
 grant me this, a teacher who is himself good, 
 that I may appear no reluctant or unapt scholar. 
 But as to whether the teacher is younger than 
 myself, or whether he has not as yet attained 
 celebrity or anything of that kind, I care nothing 
 at all. And so, Socrates, I would inform you, 
 that you may instruct me and cross-examine me 
 just as you please, and in your turn learn of me 
 all that I know. Such is my feeling toward you 
 ever since the day when you met danger at my 
 side, and gave that proof of valour which is the 
 true one for a man to give. Say, then, whatever 
 you please, and do not take our respective ages 
 into account. 
 
 Soc. I cannot, apparently, accuse either of 
 you of not being ready to consult and inves- 
 tigate with me. 
 
 Lys. But it is a subject, Socrates, that con- 
 cerns us both, for I count you as one of our- 
 selves. Consider then in my stead what, for our 
 boys' sake, we ought to learn of these men, and 
 talk and advise with them. For already, by 
 reason of my age, I forget much of what I have 
 in mind to ask; and if other talk comes in be- 
 tween, I cannot remember very well what I may 
 
52 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 have heard. Do you, therefore, talk over and 
 discuss among yourselves the subjects we have 
 started. I will listen, and afterward Melesias and 
 I will do whatever you think best. 
 
 [189 D.-2OO. As the object of the present inquiry is 
 to ascertain how virtue may be imparted, the 
 first step is to learn its true nature by attempt- 
 ing the definition of some one part, as, for in- 
 stance, courage. 
 
 190 E. Of this Laches confidently asserts that "it is 
 not hard to define. If a man remains at his 
 post and repels the enemy, and does not flee 
 before them, he surely is a man of courage." 
 
 But here, Socrates objects, we have but an 
 imperfect illustration, since some modes of war- 
 fare, such as the Scythian, consist solely in re- 
 treat. What, then, he asks, is that power or 
 quality which makes a man brave not only in war 
 and dangers of the sea, in disease and poverty, 
 pains and fears, but which enables him to fight 
 also against desires and pleasures, both at his 
 post and in the retreat? 
 
 192 E. "Endurance of the soul," is the answer. 
 
 But this too is shown to be not universally 
 applicable, since there may be such a thing as 
 foolish endurance. 
 
 194 " Let us, however," Socrates urges, "stand 
 by our search and endure to the end, lest 
 courage laugh us to scorn for not making 
 a courageous search; for it is quite possible 
 
LACHES. 53 
 
 that courage may turn out to be the same as 
 endurance." 
 
 To this Laches replies : " I am quite prepared, 
 Socrates, not to give up ; for although I am un- 
 accustomed to this kind of argument, a certain 
 spirit of dissatisfaction has got hold of me as to 
 what has been said, and I am really vexed at 
 not being able to express what is in my mind. 
 I seem to have an idea of what courage is ; but 
 it has, I know not how, slipped away from me, 
 so that I cannot get hold of the right word or 
 say what it is." 
 
 11 But must not the good huntsman, my friend," 
 asks Socrates, " follow up his prey, and relax 
 no effort?" 
 
 " By all means," is the answer. 
 
 " Well, should you like to summon Nicias to 
 the chase, and see if he is better equipped than 
 we are? " 
 
 " I should like it," Laches replies. " Why 
 not do so? " 
 
 " Come then, Nicias," Socrates urges, " and, if 
 you have the strength, rescue these your friends 
 who are tempest-tossed in a sea of argument and 
 sore perplexed. You see, indeed, in what straits 
 we are. If you will tell us what you take cour- 
 age to be, you will put an end to these perplexi- 
 ties of ours and at the same time confirm your 
 own opinions." 
 
 Nicias, recalling an old saying of Socrates, that 
 " Courage is a kind of wisdom," now ventures to 
 
54 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 195 define it as " the knowledge of what is or is not 
 to be feared." 
 
 " What strange things he is saying, Socrates ! " 
 Laches remarks. 
 
 " How, Laches, do you mean?" 
 
 " How? Why, surely, knowledge is different 
 from courage ! " 
 
 " Nicias says not." 
 
 " But that is not true, by Zeus ! " Laches ex- 
 claims ; " there is just where he talks nonsense." 
 
 " Shall we not then," Socrates suggests, " in- 
 struct rather than abuse him ? " 
 
 " Nay, Socrates," cries Nicias ; " I believe what 
 Laches wants is to make out that I am talking 
 nonsense, because he himself is proved to have 
 talked it." 
 
 " I shall most certainly try to make this out, 
 Nicias," Laches admits, " for it is nonsense you 
 are talking." 
 
 The objection which Laches brings is that 
 physicians and other professional men are not a 
 whit more courageous for all their knowledge. 
 
 *' What do you think, Nicias," Socrates asks, 
 "of what Laches says? There does seem to 
 be something in it." 
 
 " Yes," Nicias replies, " something in it there 
 is, but it is not true." And he proceeds to show 
 that the physician's knowledge extends only to 
 the disease, not to its ultimate effect upon his 
 patients, so that he cannot judge whether it is 
 better for them to die or to get well. Not even 
 
LACHES. 55 
 
 the soothsayer can decide this, nor indeed can 
 any one else, save he who knows thoroughly 
 what is or is not to be feared ; and he alone is 
 courageous. 
 
 196 A. At this Laches, waxing wroth, exclaims : " I 
 do not understand, Socrates, what he means to 
 say, unless it be that the courageous man is a 
 god. 12 He seems unwilling frankly to acknowl- 
 edge that what he says amounts to nothing, but 
 turns and twists about, in order to conceal that 
 he is in a quandary. If you and I had wished 
 to avoid the appearance of contradicting our- 
 selves, we too might have twisted about in the 
 same way. Now, had we been arguing in a 
 court of law, there might have been some sense 
 in such behaviour ; but why in such a meeting 
 as this should any one trick himself out to no 
 purpose with empty words?" 
 
 " I do not think one ought, Laches," Socrates 
 rejoins. "But let us see; perhaps Nicias is not 
 merely talking for argument's sake, and does 
 mean something by what he says. Let us ques- 
 tion him more closely as to what he has in mind, 
 and if there seems to be anything in it, let us 
 agree with him ; if not, let us enlighten him." 
 
 " Very well, Socrates," is the reply. " If you 
 wish to question him, do so. For my part, I 
 have had enough of questioning." 
 
 " No trouble about that, for the same ques- 
 tioning will do for you and for me." According 
 to the definition of Nicias, Socrates continues, 
 
56 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 courage would appear to be an attribute which be- 
 longs to no animal, not even to a lion or a bull. 
 197 In great delight Laches exclaims : "Aye, by 
 the gods, Socrates ; you are right there." 
 
 Nothing daunted, Nicias asks : " Do you sup- 
 pose that children, who by reason of their ig- 
 norance are afraid of nothing, can be called 
 courageous? Nay, to me it seems that fearless- 
 ness and courage are not at all the same thing. 
 Few, I imagine, possess courage together with 
 forethought; while foolhardiness, recklessness, 
 and fearlessness are the share of many, men and 
 women and children and beasts alike. Hence 
 what you and many others call courage I call 
 foolhardiness; only wise actions do I count as 
 courageous." 
 
 " See, Socrates," Laches cries, " how well this 
 fellow tricks out his argument, at least in his 
 own opinion ! Those whom all unite in calling 
 courageous he undertakes to defraud of this 
 honour." 
 
 " Not I, Laches," Nicias replies, " never fear; 
 you I do call wise, and Lamachus too, that is, 
 if you are courageous, and a great many other 
 Athenians besides." 
 
 "I might answer; but I shall say nothing, 
 that you may not taunt me with being a true 
 Aexonian." 13 
 
 " Answer nothing at all, Laches," Socrates in- 
 terposes ; " for you have not observed, I imagine, 
 that he has got this wisdom of his from our 
 
LACHES. 57 
 
 friend Damon ; and Damon is forever with Pro- 
 dicus, who of all the Sophists seems to me best 
 at drawing word-distinctions of this kind." 
 
 " And far more fitting it is, Socrates," Laches 
 replies, " for a Sophist to invent subtleties of 
 this kind, than for a man whom the State deems 
 worthy to stand at its head." 
 
 " Nevertheless, my best of friends, it is most 
 fitting that he to whom the greatest concerns are 
 confided should have the greatest share of wis- 
 dom ; and it seems to me quite worth while to 
 examine what Nicias was thinking of in defining 
 courage as he did." 
 
 "Then examine for yourself, Socrates," is the 
 somewhat surly reply. 
 
 " That is just what I intend doing, my excellent 
 friend ; " and so, with the warning that Laches 
 must stand ready to lend his aid, Socrates pro- 
 ceeds to show that if courage included the knowl- 
 edge ascribed to it by Nicias, it would embrace 
 not merely a part of virtue, but the whole of it. 
 
 Laches now taunts Nicias with the failure of 
 his attempt to define courage:] 
 
 Lack. For my part, my dear Nicias, I cer- 
 :oo tainly thought you were going to make the dis- 
 covery, so contemptuous were you when I was 
 answering Socrates. Great indeed, I may say, 
 was my hope that you would find it out by the 
 help of Damon's wisdom. 
 
 Nic. It is clever of you, Laches, to take no 
 
58 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 further account of having just shown yourself 
 ignorant in regard to courage, but to be only on 
 the lookout whether I also am in the same case; 
 and it is, I suppose, a matter of indifference to 
 you that you and I are equally ignorant of what 
 a man of any pretensions ought to know. You 
 have acted, it seems to me, in a truly human 
 fashion, looking not to yourself but to others. 
 It strikes me, however, that I have now said quite 
 enough on the subject in question ; and if there 
 remains anything not sufficiently explained, this 
 may be remedied later with the help of others, 
 and especially of Damon, whom you imagine 
 yourself to have laughed down, although you 
 have never even seen him. And when I am 
 sure of my own ground, I will instruct you also 
 without grudging, for you seem to me in great 
 need of instruction. 
 
 Lack. How wise you are, Nicias, to be sure ! 
 But all the same, when it comes to the education 
 of these lads, I advise my friend Lysimachus 
 here and Melesias, to dismiss you and me, but, 
 as I said before, not to let our friend Socrates 
 go. If my children were of a proper age, that 
 is what I should do. 
 
 Nic. Yes, I agree to that, and advise them 
 to seek no further, if Socrates is willing to take 
 charge of the lads. Indeed I would most gladly 
 confide my Niceratus M to him, if he would only 
 consent; but whenever I bring the matter up 
 to him he is sure to recommend some one else, 
 
LACHES. 59 
 
 and is not willing to do anything himself. But 
 you might see, Lysimachus, if he will perhaps 
 listen to you more readily. 
 
 Lys. That would be only fair of him, Nicias, 
 for I would do for him what I would not for 
 many others. What say you then, Socrates? 
 Will you comply with our wishes and unite to 
 help these lads become as good as possible? 
 
 Soc. It would be a dreadful thing, Lysimachus, 
 not to be willing to help any one to become better. 
 And so, if our late conversation had proved that 
 I knew and these two^did not, it would be right 
 to urge me most strongly to undertake the duty; 
 but as it is, we are all in the same perplexity. 
 Why then should any one of us be chosen before 
 the other? To my mind, no one deserves the 
 preference. This being the state of the case, 
 201 consider whether the advice I am about to give 
 you is good. I declare to you, my friends, and 
 let no one report it. outside, that it behooves us 
 all earnestly to seek out the best teacher we can 
 get, for ourselves first of all, for we need him, 
 and then for the lads, sparing neither money 
 nor anything else. But to remain in our present 
 condition I cannot advise. And if any one makes 
 fun of us because we think it right at our age to 
 go to school, we must, I think, shield ourselves 
 behind Homer, who says that " shame ill be- 
 comes a beggar-man." And so, paying no heed 
 to any one's remarks, we will make our own edu- 
 cation and that of the lads our common care. 
 
6O TALKS WITH A THENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Lys. What you say, Socrates, pleases me. 
 And I desire that as I am the eldest, so I may 
 also be the most eager to learn with these boys. 
 Pray then do me this favour. Come without 
 fail to my house to-morrow early, that we may 
 take counsel together about these matters. But 
 for the present we must bring our interview to 
 a close. 
 
 Soc. I will do as you wish, Lysimachus, and 
 to-morrow, God willing, I will come. 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 
 
 CHARACTERS. 
 
 SOCRATES, -who narrates to his friend CRITO a conversation in which 
 the following persons take part : 
 
 EUTHYDEMUS, ) 
 
 > two brothers. Sophists. 
 
 DlONYSODORUS, ) 
 
 CLEINIAS, son of AXIOCHUS, a young Athenian. 
 CTESIPPUS of Paeania, an admirer of CLEINIAS. 
 
 The scene is laid in the Lyceum. 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 
 
 271 Crito. Who was it, Socrates, whom you were 
 talking with yesterday in the Lyceum? There 
 was such a crowd around you that, although I 
 tried to get near enough to listen, I could not 
 make out anything distinctly. By bending over, 
 however, I could look down upon you, and it 
 seemed to me that it was a stranger you were 
 talking with. Who was he? 
 
 Socrates. Which one are you asking about, 
 Crito? There were two of them. 
 
 Cri. The man I mean was seated next but 
 one from you on the right; between you was 
 the young son of Axiochus, 1 who seems to me, 
 Socrates, to have grown wonderfully, and to be 
 not far from the age of our own Critobulus. 
 But while he is slight in build, this lad is well 
 developed and of fine presence. 
 
 Soc. Euthydemus is the man you mean, 
 Crito ; and the one seated on my left was his 
 brother Dionysodorus, who also took part in the 
 conversation. 2 
 
 Cri. I do not know either of them, Socrates. 
 They are, I suppose, some more new Sophists. 
 Where do they come from, and what branch of 
 wisdom do they profess? 
 
64 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Soc. By descent they are from hereabouts, 
 from Chios, I believe, whence they removed to 
 Thurii; 3 but they were banished from there, and 
 have been living a number of years now in these 
 parts. As for their wisdom which you were 
 asking about, it is marvellous, Crito, they are 
 simply all-wise. For my part, I never knew till 
 now what the pancratiasts really were. These two 
 are ready for every kind of contest, and that 
 not after the fashion of the Acarnanians, the 
 pancratiast brothers, who knew how to fight only 
 with the body. In the first place, they are most 
 skilful with the body, and have a superior mode 
 of fighting, by which they overcome all others ; 
 for they are complete masters of the art of fight- 
 ing in armour, and able, moreover, to impart it to 
 272 any one else who will pay them. 4 And secondly, 
 they are excellent in controversies of law ; con- 
 tending themselves, and teaching others to speak 
 and to compose speeches such as are suitable for 
 courts of justice. Up to this time they have ex- 
 celled in these branches alone, but now they have 
 put the finishing touch to their pancratiastic art. 
 The one kind of combat which they had hitherto 
 left untried they have now brought to such per- 
 fection that no one is able even to stand against 
 them, so formidable have they become in the 
 art of word-fighting and refuting whatever state- 
 ment is made, whether it happens to be true or 
 false. Really, Crito, I have a mind to put myself 
 into the hands of these men ; for they promise 
 
EUTIIYDEMUS. 65 
 
 that in a short time they will make any one 
 whomsoever skilful in these matters. 
 
 Cri. Why, Socrates ! Are you not afraid that 
 at your time of life you are too old for that? 
 
 Soc. Not in the least, Crito. I have ample 
 reason and encouragement for not fearing it. 
 For they themselves were, one might say, old 
 men when they first took up this art of disputa- 
 tion which I covet. Why, only last year, or the 
 year before, they had not yet knowledge of it ! 
 But one thing I do fear, that I may bring con- 
 tempt upon these strangers, just as I do upon 
 Connus, the son of Metrobius the cithara-player, 
 who is still giving me lessons upon the cithara. 
 For when the boys, my fellow-pupils, see me 
 there, they make fun of me and dub Connus 
 " old man's teacher." Now I trust that no one 
 will insult these two strangers in this way, but I 
 dare say they may fear it for themselves, and 
 be unwilling to receive me. And therefore, 
 Crito, as I then persuaded certain old men to go 
 with me as fellow-pupils, so I shall try to prevail 
 upon others now. And you, why should not 
 you make one of us? We might bring your 
 sons with us as a bait ; for in the desire to get 
 hold of them, they will, I know, instruct us 
 also. 
 
 Cri. There can be no objection, Socrates, I 
 am sure, if you wish it. But first, pray, give me 
 some account of the men's art, that I may know 
 what it is we are to learn of them. 
 5 
 
66 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Soc. You shall hear without delay. I cer- 
 tainly could not plead inattention as an excuse, 
 for I did attend most carefully; and as I remem- 
 ber what they said, I shall endeavour to give you 
 the whole story from the beginning. 
 
 By the favour doubtless, of some god, I hap- 
 pened to be seated alone in the robing-room just 
 where you saw me, and I had in mind to get up 
 and go away, when, in the very act of rising, 5 
 there came to me the accustomed divine sign. 
 273 Accordingly I sat down again, and a little while 
 after came in these two, Euthydemus and Dio- 
 nysodorus, and with them a number of others, 
 their pupils I suppose they were. On enter- 
 ing, they began to pace around the covered 
 course. Hardly, however, had they taken two or 
 three turns when Cleinias came in, who, as you 
 rightly observe, is vastly improved ; and in his 
 train a great number of admirers, amongst 
 them Ctesippus the Paeanian, 6 a young man of 
 good natural parts, but with the impetuosity 
 of his years. Cleinias, as he entered, seeing 
 me seated by myself, crossed over and sat 
 down at my right, just where you say he was. 
 When Dionysodorus and Euthydemus saw him 
 there, I observed for I was watching them 
 closely that they at first stopped still and 
 talked together, casting every now and then a 
 glance at us. Then they drew near; and one of 
 them, Euthydemus, took a seat next the youth, 
 the other a seat next me on the left, while the 
 
E UTHYDEMUS. 6j 
 
 rest found places for themselves just as it 
 chanced. As I had not seen them for some 
 time, I saluted them, and then, turning to 
 Cleinias, 
 
 " You must know, Cleinias," I said, " that these 
 two men, Euthydemus and Dionysodorus, are 
 skilled in matters not of trifling, but of most 
 serious import. They understand everything 
 that has to do with war ; all that a man who is 
 to be a leader need know about the disposition 
 and conduct of armies, and all about fighting in 
 armour. And they can, moreover, make him 
 capable of defending himself in the courts of 
 justice, if any one does him an injury." 
 
 These words drew upon me their contempt. 
 Glancing at each other they burst out laughing, 
 and Euthydemus said, 
 
 " We no longer care for that kind of thing, 
 Socrates ; we only use it incidentally." 
 
 Wondering at this, I said, 
 
 " Grand, indeed, must be your chief pursuit, if 
 such as this is only incidental ! In the name of 
 the gods, then, tell me what is this grand pur- 
 suit of yours? " 
 
 " Virtue, Socrates," he replied ; " and this we 
 believe ourselves capable of imparting more 
 speedily and effectually than any other man." 7 
 
 44 Oh, Zeus ! " I exclaimed, " what a wonderful 
 thing is this ! Where did you discover such a 
 treasure? As I said just now, I have always 
 supposed the art you had mastered was that of 
 
68 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 fighting in armour; and this is what I have 
 said of you, remembering that when you first 
 stayed here it was what you professed. But 
 if you really possess this other knowledge, then 
 take pity on me. I call upon you even as upon 
 gods, and entreat your forgiveness for what I 
 274 have said of you heretofore. But see to it, 
 Euthydemus and Dionysodorus, that you are 
 saying what is true, for your promise is so 
 great that there is no wonder it is questioned." 
 
 " You may rest assured, Socrates," they an- 
 swered, "that all is as we have said." 
 
 " Then I count you far happier with this pos- 
 session of yours than is the great King with 
 his kingdom. But tell me, do you intend to 
 exhibit this knowledge, or what do you intend 
 to do?" 
 
 " Why this, Socrates, is the very reason we are 
 here, to exhibit it, and to impart it, if any one 
 wishes to learn of us." 
 
 " Well, I give you my word that all who do 
 not possess it will wish to do so, myself to begin 
 with, then Cleinias here, and beside us, Ctesip- 
 pus and all the rest of the company." 
 
 Thus I spoke, pointing to the admirers of Clei- 
 nias, who by this time were gathered around us. 
 Now Ctesippus, as it chanced, had been seated 
 at some distance from Cleinias, so that whenever 
 in talking with me Euthydemus happened to 
 lean forward, Cleinias, who was placed between 
 us two, was hidden from the sight of Ctesippus. 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 69 
 
 He, therefore, being anxious to see his favourite 
 and to hear at the same time, was the first to 
 jump up and place himself directly opposite us; 
 on seeing which, the others also gathered around 
 us, the admirers of Cleinias, and the followers 
 of Euthydemus and Dionysodorus as well. And 
 these it was whom I pointed out to Euthydemus, 
 when I said that they were all ready to be in- 
 structed. To this Ctesippus and the others gave 
 eager assent, all with one voice urging them to 
 show what their art could do. 
 
 Then I said, 
 
 " I hope, on every account, Euthydemus and 
 Dionysodorus, that you will do this company 
 and myself the favour of giving us an exhibition. 
 To do it in full would of course be no slight 
 task; but at least tell me whether you would be 
 able to make him alone a virtuous man who 
 already believes it is his duty to learn of you, 
 or him also who is not yet convinced of this, 
 because he disbelieves the whole thing, either 
 that virtue can be taught or that you are teachers 
 of it. Tell me, is it the business of this particular 
 art or of some other, to convince one of this mind 
 that virtue may be taught, and that you are the 
 men from whom it may best be learned? " 
 
 " Certainly, Socrates," Dionysodorus replied, 
 " it is the business of this particular art." 
 
 " So then, Dionysodorus," said I, " you two, of 
 /5 all living men, can best turn others toward phi- 
 losophy and the cultivation of virtue?" 
 
7O TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 " Yes, Socrates ; at least we ourselves think so." 
 
 " Pray, then," said I, " put off to another time 
 your exhibition for other cases, and show us now 
 what you can do for this particular one. Con- 
 vince this lad here that it is his duty to follow 
 philosophy and cultivate virtue, and you will be 
 doing a favour to me and all the others For 
 the fact in regard to this youth is that we are 
 most anxious, I and all the rest of us, to have 
 him grow up the best of men. He is the son of 
 Axiochus, and thus grandson of Alcibiades the 
 elder and own cousin to the present Alcibiades, 
 Cleinias is his name. He is young still, and 
 we are fearful, as we may well be considering his 
 age, lest some one get ahead of us, and, by turn- 
 ing his mind to some other pursuit, bring about 
 his ruin; so that you have come most oppor- 
 tunely. Pray, then, if you have no objection, 
 make trial of the boy, and let your conversation 
 be held before us." 
 
 After I had spoken pretty nearly these words, 
 Euthydemus began in a brisk and even confident 
 way. 
 
 " Of course, Socrates," said he, " we have no 
 objection, if only the young man himself is will- 
 ing to answer." 
 
 " Oh, as to that," I replied, " he is well accus- 
 tomed to it. These friends of his are in the 
 habit of coming and asking him all manner of 
 questions, and arguing with him ; so that he is 
 fairly confident about answering." 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. fl 
 
 And now, Crito, how shall I fitly describe to 
 you what followed? It is no light task to take 
 up in detail a wisdom which is, so to speak, in- 
 finite. It behooves me, even as the poets, to 
 begin my narration by invoking Memory and 
 the Muses. Euthydemus, so far as I can recol- 
 lect, began in some such way as this, 
 
 " To what class of men, Cleinias, do they be- 
 long who learn, to the wise or the ignorant? " 
 
 Taken aback by the vastness of the question, 
 the young fellow blushed and looked at me ; and 
 I, perceiving that he was in trouble, 
 
 " Take heart, Cleinias," I said, " and answer 
 boldly just which you think, for in that way you 
 will probably derive the greatest benefit." 
 
 Hereupon Dionysodorus, his face wearing a 
 broad smile, bent over and said softly in my 
 ear, 
 
 " I tell you beforehand, Socrates, and do you 
 mark my words, that whatever the boy answers 
 he is sure to be refuted." 
 
 While he was speaking, Cleinias was giving his 
 answer, so that I did not have a chance to bid 
 276 the lad be on his guard, and he answered that 
 they who learn are the wise ; whereupon Euthy- 
 demus asked, 
 
 " Are there such people as teachers, or are 
 there not? " 
 
 He assented. 
 
 " And teachers are the teachers of those who 
 learn, are they not, just as the cithara-playcr and 
 
72 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 the writing-master were your teachers and those 
 of other boys, and you their pupils? " 
 
 " Yes," he replied. 
 
 " And at the time you were learning, you did 
 not yet know the things you were learning, did 
 you?" 
 
 "No," he said. 
 
 " But were you wise, if you did not know 
 them?" 
 
 " Of course not," he said. 
 
 " Then if not wise, you were ignorant? " 
 
 " Very ignorant." 
 
 " So then, learning what you did not know, 
 you were ignorant when you were learning." 
 
 The lad nodded assent. 
 
 " Thus, Cleinias, it is the ignorant who learn, 
 not the wise, as you suppose." 8 
 
 Hardly had he spoken thus, when, for all the 
 world like a chorus which has had its cue from 
 the trainer, the followers of Euthydemus and 
 Dionysodorus began with one accord to laugh and 
 cheer; and before the lad had fully recovered 
 his breath, Dionysodorus took up the argument. 
 
 " Tell me, Cleinias," he said, u when the read- 
 ing-master used to dictate to you, which of the 
 boys would learn the dictation, the wise or the 
 ignorant? " 
 
 " The wise," Cleinias answered. 
 
 " Then it is the wise who learn, not the igno- 
 rant, and the answer you gave Euthydemus just 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 73 
 
 Then again there was great laughter and ap- 
 plause from the two men's admirers, who were 
 enraptured at their cleverness, while the rest of 
 us, amazed, held our peace. Euthydemus, how- 
 ever, perceiving our amazement arid anxious to 
 win yet more admiration, did not let the lad go 
 but went on questioning him, and, like some nim- 
 ble dancer, gave the question a double turn upon 
 itself and asked, 
 
 "What is it that learners learn, what they 
 know or what they do not know? " 
 
 Here Dionysodorus again whispered softly to 
 me, 
 
 " This, Socrates, is just such another question 
 as the one before." 
 
 " Heavens ! " I exclaimed ; " and your last 
 question seemed so brilliant." 
 
 " All that we ask, Socrates," he rejoined, 
 " are of the same sort, admitting of no possible 
 escape." 
 
 " This is the reason, I suppose," said I, 
 " that you have such a reputation among your 
 followers." 
 
 In the mean time Cleinias had answered that 
 learners learn what they do not know, and Euthy- 
 demus was putting him through the same kind of 
 277 questioning as before. 
 
 " Tell me this," he said. " You know your 
 letters, do you not?" 
 
 " Yes," he answered. 
 
 "All of them, I suppose?" 
 
74 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 He admitted that he did. 
 
 " And when any one dictates, no matter what 
 it be, does he not dictate letters? " 
 
 He admitted it. 
 
 " But if you know them all, he is dictating what 
 you already knew, is he not?" 
 
 This too he admitted. 
 
 "How now?" said he; "surely it is not you 
 who learn what is dictated, but he who does not 
 know letters." 
 
 "Not so," he answered ; " it is I who learn." 
 
 " But since you know all the letters, you are 
 only learning what you know." 
 
 He confessed that it was so. 
 
 " Therefore," said he, " you have not answered 
 correctly." 
 
 Hardly had Euthydemus thus spoken, when 
 Dionysodorus, taking up the argument as if it 
 were a ball, aimed another throw at the lad, and 
 said, 
 
 ".Euthydemus is playing a trick upon you, 
 Cletnias. Tell me this : To learn is to ac- 
 quire knowledge of whatever one learns, is it 
 not?" 
 
 Cleinias assented. 
 
 " And what is to know, but already to have 
 knowledge?" 
 
 He assented. 
 
 " Or not to know, but not yet to have knowl- 
 edge?" 
 
 He agreed to that. 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 
 
 75 
 
 "And are they who acquire anything those 
 who have it already, or those who do not 
 have it?" 
 
 " Those who do not have it." 
 
 " But have you not admitted that they who do 
 not know belong to those who as yet do not 
 have?" 
 
 He nodded assent. 
 
 " And they who learn belong to those who 
 acquire, not to those who already have?" 
 
 This he acknowledged. 
 
 " And so, Cleinias, it is they that do not know 
 who learn, not they that know." 
 
 And now for the third time Euthydemus was 
 about to bear down upon the lad for another 
 bout, when, perceiving that the young fellow 
 was out of his depth, and wishing to let him 
 rest awhile and not get disheartened, I said 
 encouragingly, 
 
 " You must not be surprised, Cleinias, if 
 this talk seems to you strange. Very likely 
 you do not perceive that these strangers are 
 doing to you just what is done in the initia- 
 tion rites of the Corybantes, 9 at the enthrone- 
 ment of him whom they are about to initiate. 
 On that occasion there is dancing and frol- 
 icking, as you must know, if you have ever 
 been initiated. And so now these two are 
 merely dancing, and, as it were, gambolling 
 playfully about you, by way of prelude to your 
 initiation." 
 
76 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 [277 .-282 D. Socrates now shows that confusion 
 has arisen from using the word " learning," once 
 in its sense of the acquisition of knowledge, 
 and again in the sense of knowledge already ac- 
 quired. The horse-play of the brothers is com- 
 pared to the action of one who, when a man is 
 about to seat himself, suddenly withdraws the 
 chair from under him and laughs in glee to see 
 him tumble over backward. Assuming that they 
 have now had their fill of this kind of amuse- 
 ment, he proceeds, with many apologies for his 
 own lack of skill, to set them an example of 
 serious questioning by means of which the fol- 
 lowing conclusions are reached. 
 
 Happiness, the object of all men's desire, comes 
 from the possession of good things, whether ex- 
 ternal gifts or moral qualities, such as courage, 
 justice, and the like. But since only by right 
 use do these possessions become a good and not 
 an evil fortune, wisdom, which alone ensures 
 their right use, must prove the truest blessing, 
 as ignorance is in reality the only evil. Cleinias, 
 on declaring his belief that wisdom does not 
 come unsought, but must be acquired, is ear- 
 nestly exhorted by Socrates to apply himself to 
 the quest of it, and replies with like earnestness :] 
 
 " Indeed, Socrates, I will do my best." 
 And I, delighted to hear this, 
 " Here, Dionysodorus and Euthydemus," I said, 
 "is my example of what I think an exhortation 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 77 
 
 ought to be, though unskilful, I dare say, and ex- 
 pressed laboriously with many words. And now 
 let one of you, whichever pleases, go over the 
 same ground in a scientific manner; or if you 
 do not care for this, begin where I left off and 
 show the lad in due sequence whether he must 
 needs acquire every kind of knowledge, or whether 
 there is but one kind which a man need acquire 
 in order to be good and happy, and what that is. 
 For, as I said in the beginning, we have it much 
 at heart that the lad should become a wise and a 
 good man." 
 
 283 Thus, Crito, did I speak, and, all eagerness to 
 know what was to follow, I watched to see how 
 they would take hold of the subject, and whence 
 start in their exhortations to the practice of wis- 
 dom and virtue. The elder of the two, Diony- 
 sodorus, had the first word ; and upon him we 
 all fixed our gaze, expecting to hear something 
 wonderful. And this, in fact, was our good for- 
 tune, for a wonderful discourse it certainly was, 
 Crito, which the man began, and one well worth 
 your hearing, so stimulating was it to the pursuit 
 of virtue. 
 
 " Tell me, Socrates," he began, " you and the 
 rest who say that you want this youth to become 
 a wise man, do you speak in jest, or do you 
 really wish it in good earnest? " 
 
 From this I inferred that they had all along 
 supposed us to be in jest when we urged them to 
 converse with the lad, and that this was why they 
 
78 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 too had jested and had not treated it seriously. 
 With this thought I said, in a still more decided 
 way, that we were exceedingly in earnest. There- 
 upon Dionysodorus, 
 
 " Look to it, Socrates," he said, " that you do 
 not come to deny what you now assert." 
 
 " I have looked to it," I said, " and shall never 
 deny it." 
 
 "Well, what is it you say?" he asked, "that 
 you wish him to become wise?" 
 
 " That I do." 
 
 " Very well ; which is Cleinias now, wise or 
 not?" 
 
 " He himself says not, but then he is no 
 braggart." 
 
 " And you," he said, " wish him to become 
 wise, and not ignorant? " 
 
 We owned that we did. 
 
 " Then that which he is not you wish him to 
 become, and to be no longer that which he is 
 now?" 
 
 I was disconcerted at this ; and he, taking ad- 
 vantage of my discomfiture, added, 
 
 " In wishing him to be no longer that which he 
 is now, what are you wishing but his destruction? 
 Fine friends and admirers, indeed, are those who 
 would do everything to bring their favourite to 
 destruction ! " 
 
 At this, Ctesippus, moved to anger on his 
 favourite's account, cried out, 
 
 " Stranger of Thurii, if it were not too ill- 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 79 
 
 bred to speak thus, I should say, ' On your 
 head be the evil ! ' 10 What are you thinking of 
 in falsely accusing me and the others of a 
 thing which it seems to me impious even to 
 utter; namely, that I could wish to bring him 
 to destruction?" 
 
 [283 .-284 E. Euthydemus replies to this sally by 
 denying the possibility of speaking falsely. That 
 which has no existence, he argues, is not, and 
 cannot therefore be spoken of. But that which 
 has existence is ; and he who says what is, speaks 
 the truth. 
 
 Still further incensed by this specious reason- 
 ing, Ctesippus aims a pointed thrust at Dionyso- 
 dorus, who forthwith exclaims:] 
 
 " You insult me, Ctesippus, you insult me ! " 
 
 " Not I, by Zeus ! " he answered. " On the 
 contrary, I have a regard for you. I am only 
 warning you as a friend, and endeavouring to per- 
 suade you never again in my presence to say so 
 ill-mannered a thing as that I wish to ruin those 
 285 whom I hold most dear." 
 
 Here, thinking that they were getting too rude 
 to one another, I began to rally Ctesippus. 
 
 " It strikes me, Ctesippus," I said, " that we 
 ought to accept from the strangers whatever they 
 are kind enough to give us, and not have dis- 
 putes about a word. For if they know the art 
 of so utterly destroying people as to turn them 
 
80 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 from bad and foolish men into good and sensible 
 ones, whether they have found out for them- 
 selves or have learned from some one else this 
 kind of ruin and destruction matters not, if, I 
 say, they know how to effect this (and it is evi- 
 dent that they do, for they certainly spoke of 
 their newly discovered art of making good men 
 out of bad), why we will allow them. Let them 
 destroy the lad for us and make him wise, and 
 all the rest of us as well. If, however, you younger 
 ones are afraid, then let the danger be upon my 
 head, as if I were a Carian. 11 For being an old 
 man, I am ready to make the venture ; and so I 
 offer myself up to this Dionysodorus, as it might 
 be to Medea the Colchian. Let him destroy, yea, 
 boil me, if he likes ; let him, in short, do whatever 
 he pleases, if only he turns me out a good man." 
 
 " I too, Socrates," said Ctesippus, " am ready 
 to give myself up to the strangers, and let them 
 flay me, if they wish, even more severely than 
 they have done already, if only my skin may find 
 its end, not like that of Marsyas, in a wine-bottle, 
 but in virtue. Now Dionysodorus imagines that 
 I am angry with him, whereas I am not angry, 
 but only contradict things that he says against 
 me which I do not think are right. But I must 
 beg of you, most noble Dionysodorus, not to call 
 contradiction insult; for insult is quite a different 
 thing." 
 
 " Are you speaking of contradiction, Ctesip- 
 pus," Dionysodorus asked, " as a real thing? " 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 8 1 
 
 " Of course I am," he answered ; " most em- 
 phatically so. And you, Dionysodorus, do you 
 not believe in contradiction? " 
 
 " I defy you," he said, " to prove that you ever 
 heard one person contradict another." 
 
 " Very good," he said ; " we shall soon see if I 
 cannot show you that Ctesippus can contradict 
 Dionysodorus." 
 
 [285 E.-2QO E. In spite of this boast, the sophistry 
 of his opponent soon reduces Ctesippus to si- 
 lence. But Socrates, throwing himself into the 
 breach, speedily proves that even the Sophist's 
 art, " all amazing " as it is, has not taught him 
 the art of throwing another without falling him- 
 self. By this time Ctesippus has regained his 
 usual confidence, and exclaims: 
 
 288 B. " Wonderful talk is this of yours, men of 
 Thurii or Chios, or wherever else you come from, 
 and whatever you may be pleased to be called ! 
 You stop at no nonsense." 
 
 Here Socrates, fearful lest further insults should 
 follow, calms Ctesippus by saying, 
 
 " I tell you, Ctesippus, what I told Cleinias 
 just now, that you have no conception of how 
 wonderful is the wisdom of these strangers. Till 
 now they have been unwilling to exhibit to us 
 in good earnest, but, after the example of Pro- 
 teus the Egyptian Sophist, 12 have been casting 
 their spells upon us. Let us therefore, after the 
 example of Menelaus, not let the men go until 
 6 
 
82 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 they have shown us what is their real aim ; for it 
 is my belief that when they once begin in good 
 earnest, they will reveal something of surpassing 
 beauty. Let us, then, pray and beseech them 
 to show this forth. And I think that I will give 
 them once more an example of the way in 
 which I pray them to reveal themselves to me. 
 I will begin, then, from where I left off, and for 
 their sakes will do my best to go through the re- 
 mainder in due order, hoping so to excite their 
 pity and compassion at the sight of my efforts 
 and my earnestness, that they too may show 
 themselves in earnest." 
 
 Philosophy, or the study of wisdom, has 
 been found to be the acquisition of knowledge. 
 What then is the special knowledge which 'will 
 bring us happiness, by enabling us to use to 
 the greatest advantage the good that is within 
 us? Among the various arts proposed to this 
 end is the composition of speeches. But this, 
 as Cleinias shrewdly remarks, cannot make us 
 happy, since " there are some speech-makers 
 who do not know how to use the very speeches 
 they compose." " I had certainly supposed," 
 Socrates ironically asserts, " that knowledge, 
 which we have been so long seeking, would 
 have been found in this quarter. For these 
 men, Cleinias, the speech-makers, whenever 
 I come across them, appear to me excessively 
 wise, and this very art of theirs is something 
 lofty and inspired. And indeed, no wonder; for 
 
E UTHYDEMUS. 8 3 
 
 it is a branch of the art of enchantment, and 
 but little inferior to it. The one consists in the 
 charming of snakes and spiders and scorpions 
 and other beasts and nuisances ; the other in the 
 charming and persuading of jurors and assem- 
 blies, and other bodies of men." He then pro- 
 poses the general's art, which is, however, rejected 
 by Cleinias on the ground that, instead of using 
 and improving his spoils, the general delivers 
 them over to the statesman just as the huntsman 
 hands over his prey to the cook. 
 
 Amazed at the perspicacity displayed by 
 Cleinias, Crito here interrupts the narrative by 
 exclaiming:] 
 
 290 E. Cri. What are you saying, Socrates? 
 Did the boy speak like that? 
 
 Soc. Do you not believe it, Crito? 
 
 Cri. No, by Zeus, I do not ! for I am thinking 
 that if he talked thus, he needed neither Euthy- 
 demus nor any one else to teach him. 
 
 Soc. Nay, by Zeus ! perhaps I have not re- 
 membered aright, and Ctesippus was the one 
 who said it. 13 
 
 291 Cri. Ctesippus, indeed ! 
 
 Soc. Well, this much, at all events, I am sure 
 of: it was neither Euthydemus nor Dionysodorus. 
 But may it not be, my good Crito, that some one 
 there who was superior to them said it? For 
 that I heard the words I am positive. 
 
 Cri. Aye, by Zeus, Socrates, some one 
 
84 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 who I should think was their superior indeed, 
 and very much so ! But what art did you seek 
 after this; and did you discover, or not, that 
 which you were in search of? 
 
 Soc. Discover it, my friend? No, but we 
 made ourselves very ridiculous. Like children 
 in pursuit of larks, we were always fancying we 
 had got hold of the several kinds of knowledge, 
 and they were always slipping away from us. 
 
 [291 B.-292 E. The kingly or political art is now 
 tried, but proves no less inadequate than the pre- 
 ceding ones. Here Crito a second time breaks 
 in upon the narrative.] 
 
 Cri. By Zeus, Socrates, you do seem to 
 have got into a quandary. 
 
 Soc. Seeing, then, Crito, that I had fallen into 
 293 such extremity, I sent forth my whole voice in 
 supplication to the strangers, calling upon them, 
 as upon the Dioscuri, 14 to rescue us myself and 
 the lad as well from the triple wave of the 
 discussion, and to be by all means serious, and 
 to show us in good earnest what that knowledge 
 was through the attainment of which we might 
 live the rest of our life in the right way. 
 
 [293 A. -303 A. The narrative is now resumed. In 
 "haughty language," Euthydemus asks whether 
 Socrates prefers to be instructed in this knowl- 
 edge, or to have it proved that it is already his. 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 8$ 
 
 " Why, my good fellow," asks Socrates, " does 
 it lie with you to do this? " 
 
 " Certainly," is the reply. 
 
 " Then by Zeus," Socrates cries, " prove that 
 it is mine. For to a man of my years, this is 
 far easier than getting it by study." 
 
 Thus urged, Euthydemus proceeds with the 
 following sequence : 
 
 " Do you know anything? 
 
 " If you do, you have knowledge. 
 
 " If you have knowledge, you know all things." 
 
 " But," Socrates remonstrates, " there are many 
 things which I do not know." 
 
 " Then you have not knowledge, as just now 
 you said you had." 
 
 Following out their theory that they who know 
 one thing must know all, the two brothers now 
 claim for themselves a knowledge not only of all 
 the various arts, which are in turn enumerated by 
 Ctesippus, but of all things else. ' Boldly facing 
 every question,' we are told, ' they rushed on, 
 like wild boars, to meet the blow.' The refusal 
 of Socrates to follow their example and confess 
 what he does not understand brings upon him 
 the taunt of Euthydemus that he is " an old fogy 
 and in his dotage." 
 
 295 D. ' Now I knew,' Socrates explains, ' that he 
 was angry with me for exacting of him pre- 
 cise statements, when he had thought to catch 
 me in a network of words. And I remembered 
 Connus, and how angry he used to get with me 
 
86 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 every time that I would not give in to him, and 
 how he afterwards took less interest in me and 
 set me down as a dullard. Therefore, as I 
 was minded to study with him, I bethought me 
 that I had better yield the point, for fear that 
 he might think me a fool and not receive me 
 as pupil. So I said, 
 
 " ' Why, of course, Euthydemus, you must do 
 as you think best; for you, who possess the art, 
 understand how to talk far better than I who 
 have no knowledge of it. Pray, then, ques- 
 tion me again from the beginning.' " 
 
 The declaration of Euthydemus that Socrates 
 does know and has always known all things, 
 " when a child, and when he was born, and when 
 he was begotten, and even before his birth, and 
 before heaven and earth were," gives rise to 
 the inquiry where he can have learned such a 
 thing as that good men are unjust. " No- 
 where," Dionysodorus exclaims, and is forth- 
 with reproached by his brother for " spoiling 
 the argument." Amid the blushes of the cul- 
 prit, Socrates exclaims, 
 
 297 A. " What do you mean, Euthydemus? Do 
 you not think that your brother, who knows all 
 things, has spoken correctly? " 
 
 Quickly catching at this cue, 
 
 " Am I, then," begins Dionysodorus, " the 
 brother of Euthydemus?" 
 
 " Let that alone, my good fellow," Socrates 
 rejoins, " at least until Euthydemus shall have 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. S/ 
 
 taught me that I know good men to be unjust. 
 Do not, pray, grudge my learning this." 
 
 " You are trying to run away, Socrates," is the 
 retort, " and are refusing to answer." 
 
 " Naturally enough," Socrates admits ; " for 
 since I am inferior to either one of you singly, it 
 were strange, indeed, if I did not run away from 
 the two of you. I am of course a mere weakling 
 by the side of Heracles, and even he was not able 
 to fight both against the hydra (a she-sophist, 
 who through her sophist art could, if one head 
 of her argument were cut off, shoot out many 
 more in place of it), and the crab beside, a 
 certain other sophist who had, I believe, just 
 come sailing in from the sea. When therefore, 
 with tongue and teeth, this creature began to 
 harass him on the left side, he called for help 
 upon his nephew lolaus, and he indeed abun- 
 dantly supplied it; whereas if Patrocles, who is 
 my lolaus, were to come, he would only make 
 matters worse." 15 
 
 This allusion to relationships leads to the fol- 
 lowing propositions : " If a man is a father, he can- 
 not be other than a father. . . . But if he be not 
 father to every man, he is other than a father, 
 and cannot be yours. . . . Thus you, Socrates, 
 are without a father." Then follow a succes- 
 sion of quibbles, one leading to another, not by 
 any natural connection of ideas, but by some 
 chance word taken advantage of by one or other 
 of the brothers. Ctesippus, excited, as Socrates 
 
88 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 slyly conjectures, by the presence of his favour- 
 ite, now begins to try his hand at the same game, 
 and by proposing two alternatives, neither of 
 which is tenable, succeeds in placing Euthyde- 
 mus between the horns of a dilemma. Again 
 Dionysodorus, more zealous than discreet, takes 
 the words from his brother's mouth, exclaiming 
 triumphantly, 
 
 300 D. " Neither and both ! There, I know well 
 enough you can make nothing out of that 
 answer." 
 
 * Here/ goes on the narrative, ' Ctesippus, as 
 was his custom, burst out into a loud laugh, 
 exclaiming,' 
 
 " Oh, Euthydemus, this brother of yours has 
 given two answers to one question. He is 
 worsted and undone ! " 
 
 ' This delighted Cleinias, and he laughed so 
 heartily that Ctesippus became ten times more 
 turbulent than before.' 
 
 ' I have my suspicion, however,' Socrates re- 
 marks, ' that our sly rogue of a Ctesippus had 
 stolen this saying of his from the brothers them- 
 selves, for nowhere else among men is cleverness 
 of this sort to be found.' 
 
 " And why, Ctesippus," Socrates now asks, " do 
 you laugh at things so serious and beautiful?" 
 
 " Have you, then, Socrates," inquires Diony- 
 sodorus, " ever beheld a beautiful thing?" 
 
 " Indeed I have," is the reply; " and many of 
 them too." 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 89 
 
 301 " Were they distinct from beauty, or identical 
 with it?" 
 
 ' Then, indeed/ Socrates confesses, ' did I 
 find myself in the extreme of perplexity, and 
 methought I had got my deserts for having 
 ventured to speak above my breath. I said, 
 however, that they were distinct from beauty, 
 but that beauty was to a certain extent present 
 with each one.' 
 
 " Then if an ox is present with you, are you an 
 ox ; and because I am present with you, are you 
 Dionysodorus? " 
 
 After further absurdities, the proposition is 
 finally reached and assented to by Socrates, that 
 every man has a right to do as he pleases with 
 his own. Whereupon Dionysodorus, ' after a 
 long pause, during which he pretended to be 
 pondering some grave matter,' asks, 
 302 B. " Tell me, Socrates, have you an ancestral 
 Zeus?" 16 
 
 Socrates foresees what is coming, and after 
 'twisting about as if caught in a net/ replies that 
 he has not, inasmuch as the ancestral god of 
 Athens is Apollo, father of Ion the founder 
 of the Ionian race. But his subsequent admis- 
 sion that Zeus and Athene are guardians of the 
 phratriae is enough for Dionysodorus. 
 
 " These gods then," he cries, " are yours ; and 
 having life they are animals ; and therefore, like 
 any other of our possessions, they may be given 
 away or sold or offered in sacrifice.] 
 
90 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 303 A. Hereupon, Crito, struck dumb as it were 
 by the argument, I remained speechless ; but 
 Ctesippus, advancing to my rescue, cried, - 
 
 " Bravo, Heracles ! noble words are these ! " 
 With this, 
 
 "Is Heracles bravo?" asked Dionysodorus, 
 "or is bravo Heracles?" 
 
 " Oh, Poseidon ! " exclaimed Ctesippus, 
 " what clever talk ! I give up. These two are 
 invincible." 
 
 Then, indeed, dear Crito, there was not one 
 of the company present who did not praise 
 extravagantly both the argument and the men 
 themselves, insomuch that they were nearly over- 
 powered by the laughter and applause and merri- 
 ment. For up to this time it was only the 
 admirers of Euthydemus who had, at each hit, 
 made such an uproar; but now the very pillars 
 of the Lyceum seemed to join in the din, and to 
 rejoice over the pair. For myself, I was brought 
 to such a state that I had to confess I had never 
 before laid eyes upon men so wise; and, quite 
 spellbound by their wisdom, I fell to praising 
 and congratulating them. 
 
 " Happy are you two," I said, " who are so 
 wonderfully gifted by nature as to have wrought 
 with such ease and speed so great a work. Your 
 discourses, Euthydemus and Dionysodorus, are 
 filled with beauties many and varied ; but the most 
 sublime part of all is that you care nothing for 
 the generality of men, nor even for those who 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. QI 
 
 are revered and held in high esteem, but only 
 for those who are like yourselves. For I know 
 well that there are very few who, like you, would. 
 be satisfied with these arguments; in fact, such 
 is the opinion which most men have of them, 
 that they would, I am quite sure, be more 
 ashamed to use such arguments in refuting other 
 men, than to be themselves refuted by them. 
 And there is this, moreover, that is kind and 
 friendly about your arguments. When you say 
 that there is no such thing as the beautiful, or 
 the good, or white, or anything else of the 
 sort, in fact no difference at all between one 
 thing and another, you do, as you say, effectu- 
 ally stop men's mouths ; and not other men's 
 only, but your own apparently as well, which 
 makes the thing charming and deprives your 
 words of harshness. But, best of all, so skilful 
 and admirable is this invention of yours that 
 there is no one who in a very short time may 
 not also acquire the art, as in the case of Cte- 
 sippus, who, I observed, was very soon able to 
 304 imitate you off-hand. Now this feature of it, 
 the being able to impart it quickly, is all very 
 fine, but it is really not for your own interest to 
 discourse in public ; and, if you take my advice, 
 you will be careful not to talk before many 
 people, lest what they learn so quickly they 
 give you no thanks for. Rather do you two 
 converse together by yourselves ; or if before 
 any one else at all, let it be only before one 
 
92 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 who will pay you for it. And if you are wise, 
 you will advise your followers also never to talk 
 before any one else besides you and themselves. 
 For that which is scarce, Euthydemus, is valu- 
 able ; and water, for all it be, according to Pin- 
 dar, the best thing, is also the cheapest. 17 But 
 come, do not forget that you are to receive 
 myself and Cleinias here, as your pupils." 
 
 And so, Crito, having exchanged these words 
 and a few others, we went our ways. It is for 
 you now to consider in what spirit you will ap- 
 proach these men, since they declare themselves 
 able to teach any one who is willing to pay for 
 it, without any exception of age or of character. 
 But what it particularly concerns you to hear is 
 their assertion that not even the pursuit of 
 making money need prevent or hinder any 
 one whomsoever from readily acquiring their 
 wisdom. 18 
 
 Cri. I suspect, Socrates, that, fond as I am 
 of listening and delighted as I am to learn, I 
 belong not to those who are like Euthydemus, 
 but to those who you say prefer to be refuted 
 by such arguments rather than to refute with the 
 help of them. And though it seems ridiculous 
 for me to be admonishing you, still I do want to 
 tell you a thing that has come to my ears. You 
 must know, then, that as I was walking .up and 
 down, I was joined by a man who had just come 
 away from the group around you, a man who 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 93 
 
 thinks himself exceedingly wise, one of those 
 clever writers of speeches for the law courts. 
 " Well, Crito," he asked, " are you not listening to 
 these wise men? " " No, by Zeus ! " I answered ; 
 " for where I was standing I could not hear a 
 word, on account of the crowd." " That is a pity," 
 he said, " for it was worth hearing." " How do you 
 mean? " " You would have heard the conversa- 
 tion of men who are the most skilful of our day 
 in talk of that kind." " And what," I asked, " did 
 they prove to you ? " " What, indeed, but the 
 kind of thing one might always hear from men 
 who talk nonsense and bestow unworthy pains 
 upon a worthless object ! " These were about 
 the words he used. " But still," said I, " philoso- 
 phy is a pleasing thing." " Pleasing, indeed, my 
 good fellow? It amounts to nothing at all; and 
 305 had you been there, you would, I think, have 
 been very much ashamed of your friend, so 
 preposterous was his conduct in giving himself 
 up to men who take no thought as to what 
 they themselves mean, and yet are sticklers for 
 every word. And these, as I said just now, 
 are among the best of our day ! But, indeed, 
 Crito," he added, " the thing itself, and the men 
 who practise it, are alike contemptible and 
 absurd." 
 
 Now, I thought to myself, Socrates, that 
 neither this man nor any one else was right 
 in blaming the thing itself; but your willing- 
 ness to discuss with such men as these before a 
 
94 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 number of people, it seemed to me that he 
 might justly find fault with. 
 
 [305 B.-3O6 D. Without noticing the reproach, 
 Socrates explains that this man of the law 
 courts is one of a class who regard philoso- 
 phers in the light of rivals and disputants of their 
 own rightful claim to supremacy. " Nor is it 
 unnatural," he adds ironically, " that they should 
 look upon themselves as wise; for to have a 
 fair share of philosophy, and a fair amount of 
 political knowledge as well, is a very sensible 
 thing ; that is, if they possess just enough of each 
 to keep clear of risks and conflicts, and to reap 
 the advantages of their own wisdom." Such a 
 notion as this is * more plausible than truthful,' 
 and they who hold it are blind to the fact that to 
 aim at a mean between two good things is to fail 
 of attaining either, and that while they wish to 
 stand first they are in reality only third. ' In 
 this position, midway between philosophy and 
 politics/ they imagine themselves to be at the 
 head of each, whereas their knowledge is in 
 reality of the most superficial kind. 19 ] 
 
 Cri. Well, Socrates, as I am always telling 
 you, I am in great perplexity in regard to my 
 sons, and what I ought to do with them. The 
 younger one, to be sure, is still small, but Crito- 
 bulus is already of an age to need some one who 
 will be of help to him. So often as I come under 
 
EUTHYDEMUS. 95 
 
 your influence I deem it sheer madness to have 
 taken so much trouble on my children's account, 
 making such a marriage as to ensure their being 
 of noble descent, and seeking a fortune so as to 
 enrich them, and yet to have taken no thought 
 for their education. But when, on the other 
 hand, I see any of the men who profess to teach 
 others, I am confounded, and when I come to 
 307 examine them, they seem to me, one and all, to 
 tell you the truth, perfect monstrosities ; so that I 
 know not how I can encourage the lad to follow 
 philosophy. 
 
 Soc. My dear Crito, do you not know that in 
 every profession there are many who are incom- 
 petent and who count for little, while they who 
 excel are few and of priceless worth? Why, 
 do you not regard the arts of gymnastics and 
 money-making and public speaking and general- 
 ship as noble pursuits? 
 
 Cri. Yes, most certainly I do. 
 
 Soc. Well, but do you not see that in every 
 one of these the greater number are absurdly 
 deficient in their performance? 
 
 Cri. Aye, by Zeus ! what you say is most 
 true. 
 
 Soc. And would you, for this reason, shun all 
 these pursuits yourself, and not let your son 
 follow them? 
 
 Cri. That would not be right, Socrates. 
 
 Soc. Then do not you, Crito, act wrongly, 
 but, dismissing the question whether they who 
 
96 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 follow philosophy are good or bad, put phi- 
 losophy herself to a high and thorough test; 
 and if she proves herself to you a poor thing, 
 turn from her not your sons alone, but all other 
 men beside. If on the other hand she proves 
 herself what I myself believe that she is, then 
 follow her rejoicing, and serve her, as the saying 
 goes, yourself and your children. 
 
THEAETETUS. 
 
THEAETETUS. 
 
 CHARACTERS. 
 
 > whose conversation leads to a reading of the dialogue. 
 TERPSION, ) 
 
 SOCRATES. 
 
 THEAETETUS, a young Athenian. 
 
 THEODORUS of Cyrene, a geometrician, teac/ierofTnE\ETETVS. 
 
 The scene opens in front of EUCLID'S house in Megara, where 
 EUCLID and TERPSION meet. The reading of the dialogiie takes place 
 within the house. 
 
THEAETETUS. 
 
 Euclid. Just arrived, Terpsion, or are you 
 long in from the country? 
 
 Terpsion. Tolerably long. And you I was 
 looking for you in the Agora, 1 and wondering 
 that I did not find you there. 
 
 Euc. But I was not in the city. 
 
 Terp. Where then ? 
 
 Euc. On my way down to the harbour, I met 
 Theaetetus, who was being carried to Athens 
 from the camp before Corinth. 2 
 
 Terp. Alive or deacl? 
 
 Euc. Alive, but barely so; for not only does 
 it go hard with him from his wounds, but, what is 
 worse, the disease which has broken out in the 
 army is upon him. 
 
 Terp. Surely not the dysentery ! 
 
 Euc. Yes. 
 
 Terp. What a man is this who you say is in 
 danger! 
 
 Euc. A true and gallant one indeed, Terp- 
 sion ! Only just now I heard great praises of 
 his behaviour in the battle. 
 
 Terp. That is not strange; on the contrary, 
 it would have been more surprising if you had 
 not heard them. But how comes it that he did 
 not stop here at Megara? 
 
IOO TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Euc. He was bent upon getting home. I en- 
 treated him, you may be sure, and advised him 
 to stay, but he would not. And I may tell you 
 that, on my way back from escorting him, I re- 
 membered the words of Socrates, and marvelled 
 at the prophetic insight shown by him in this as 
 in other matters. It was, I think, shortly before 
 his own death that he met Theaetetus, then 
 a mere stripling, and was greatly impressed 
 by his natural ability, after they had been to- 
 gether and conversed awhile. And when I came 
 to Athens, he repeated to me the conversation he 
 had had with him, and well worth hearing it 
 was, and declared that Theaetetus would un- 
 doubtedly make a name for himself, if he lived 
 to reach man's estate. 
 
 Terp. And he spoke the truth, it seems. But 
 what was the conversation? Could you manage 
 to repeat it? 
 
 Euc. No, by Zeus ; at least not thus from mem- 
 143 ory. But as soon as I got home I made notes, 
 and afterward as, at my leisure, I recalled more 
 I would write it out. Then, whenever I went to 
 Athens, I used to ask Socrates what I had not 
 been able to recollect, and to set it right upon 
 my return ; so that I have nearly the whole con- 
 versation written out. 
 
 Terp. True. I have heard you mention this 
 before ; in fact, I have always intended asking 
 you to show it me, but have put off doing so till 
 this moment. But is there any reason why we 
 
THEAETETUS. IOI 
 
 should not go over it now? For my part I am 
 really in need of rest, having walked in from the 
 country. 
 
 Euc. Why, I myself escorted Theaetetus as far 
 as Erineum ; 3 so that I should not be sorry to 
 rest, either. Suppose we go in ; and as we take 
 our ease, the boy shall read aloud to us. 
 
 Terp. A good suggestion. 4 
 
 Euc. Here you have the scroll, Terpsion. I 
 must tell you that I wrote down the conversation, 
 not as if it were being related to me by Socrates, 
 which was actually the case, but as if he were 
 speaking to those with whom he said he had 
 talked, Theodorus the geometrician, 5 and our 
 Theaetetus. And, to avoid the troublesome 
 connecting links between the parts of the dia- 
 logue, as when for instance Socrates says of 
 himself, " I then said," or " I remarked," or 
 again of the person answering, that " he agreed," 
 or " here he refused assent," - - I have set every- 
 thing down as if he were actually talking with 
 them, and have struck out all the rest. 
 
 Terp. That is not at all out of the way, 
 Euclid. 
 
 Euc. Well, boy, take the scroll and read. 
 
 The servant of Euclid reads. 
 
 Socrates. If I had the affairs of Cyrene more 
 at heart, Theodorus, I should question you in re- 
 gard to men and matters there, whether any of 
 
IO2 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 the youths are turning their attention to geome- 
 try or to any other study. But as it is, I care less 
 for those youths than for our own, and am far 
 more concerned to know which of our young men 
 are likely to make a name for themselves ; so 
 that I am on the lookout myself, as far as may 
 be, and am always questioning others when I ob- 
 serve that young men like their society. Now 
 not a few of them are followers of yours, and 
 rightly too, such is your reputation for knowl- 
 edge on all subjects, especially geometry. So if 
 you have come across any one worth the men- 
 tion, I should be glad to know of it. 
 
 Theodorus. Yes, Socrates, I have come across 
 a certain youth, one of your fellow-citizens, who 
 does indeed deserve being brought to your no- 
 tice. Really, if he were handsome I should be 
 afraid to speak as strongly as I feel, lest it might 
 be supposed I were in love with him. But in 
 point of fact, now don't be angry with me ! 
 he is not handsome, but is very like you in the 
 flatness of his nose and the setting of his eyes, 
 although this is less marked in him than in you ; 6 
 and so I may speak without fear. You must 
 144 know, then, that of all the people I have ever met, 
 and I have associated with many, I never 
 found any one so marvellously endowed by na- 
 ture. The ease with which he acquires what is 
 difficult to others, his peculiar gentleness, and, 
 to crown all, his surpassing courage, such a 
 combination I should not have supposed pos- 
 
THEAE TE TVS. 1 03 
 
 sible, nor do I know of any similar one. 7 For 
 they who, like him, are keen and quick-witted 
 and have a strong memory are also for the most 
 part quickly moved to anger, and are unresist- 
 ingly swept along as ships without ballast, being 
 more like madmen than men of courage; while 
 they who have more poise bring to their studies 
 a sluggish spirit, and are weighted with forget- 
 fulness. Whereas so calmly and steadily and 
 effectually does he set about his studies and 
 investigations, and so quietly withal, like the 
 noiseless flow of a stream of oil, that it is mar- 
 vellous how one of his age can accomplish all 
 this as he does. 
 
 Soc. You give us good news ; and which of 
 our citizens is his father? 
 
 Theod. I have heard the name, but I do not 
 remember it. However, the youth himself is one 
 of those just entering over there, the one in 
 the middle. He and some of his companions 
 were just anointing themselves in the outer 
 race-course, 8 but they seem now to have finished 
 and to be coming this way. See if you know 
 him. 
 
 Soc. Yes, I know him. He is the son of 
 Euphronius of Sunium, who was just such a 
 man, my friend, as you describe this youth to be, 
 and universally esteemed, and who also, now I 
 think of it, left a large property. But the young 
 fellow's name I do not know. 
 
 Theod. Theaetetus is his name, Socrates. 
 
104 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 The property, I believe, certain guardians of his 
 have made away with ; but for all that, Socrates, 
 he is remarkable for his liberality, with money 
 as well as in other matters. 
 
 Soc. As you describe him he is a noble fel- 
 low. Pray bid him come here and sit down 
 by me. 
 
 Thcod. That I will. Theaetetus, come here 
 and sit by Socrates. 9 
 
 Soc. Yes, Theaetetus, pray do, that I may 
 gaze upon myself and see what manner of face I 
 have ; for Theodorus tells me that mine is like 
 yours. 
 
 [Socrates and Theaetetus soon come to the 
 conclusion that since Theodorus is no painter, 
 his opinion as to likeness or unlikeness of face 
 does not deserve much attention.] 
 
 145 B. Soc. But how if it were the mind of one 
 of us two that he was praising for virtue and wis- 
 dom? Would it not be right for the one eagerly 
 to study him who is praised, and for the other 
 with equal eagerness to exhibit himself? 
 
 Theaet. By all means, Socrates. 
 
 Soc. This then, dear Theaetetus, is the mo- 
 ment for" you to exhibit, and for me to observe 
 you ; for you must know that although Theo- 
 dorus has praised many a man to me, both 
 stranger and citizen, he has never yet praised 
 any one as he did you just now. 
 
THEAETETUS. 1 05 
 
 Theaet. It is pleasant to hear that, Socrates ; 
 but have a care ! He may have been joking. 
 
 Soc. That is not in character with Theodorus. 
 So pray do not draw back from your agree- 
 ment, under the pretext that he was in joke, or 
 he himself will be forced to bear me witness, and 
 his word no one will ever call in question. No, 
 you had better stand boldly by the agreement. 
 
 Theaet. Well, I suppose I must, if you wish it. 
 
 [Socrates now bespeaks the aid of Theaetetus 
 and the rest of the company in the solution of 
 what he calls a " little matter of perplexity," 
 and introduces it as follows:] 
 
 Soc. Here, then, is the question that I am 
 puzzled about and cannot by myself fully grasp : 
 What is knowledge 1 ? Is it a thing possible 
 146 to define? What say you? Which of us will 
 speak first? Whichever of us misses, and 
 whenever he misses, shall, as the children say 
 when they play at ball, sit down a donkey. 
 But he who comes off victorious, without once 
 missing, shall be king over us, and shall give out 
 whatever question he pleases. Why are you 
 silent? I trust, Theodorus, that my fondness 
 for argument has not led me to commit any 
 rudeness, in my anxiety that we should all take 
 part in the conversation and become friendly 
 and familiar together. 
 
 Theod. No indeed, Socrates, such a wish is 
 
106 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 far from rude ; but pray bid one of the younger 
 ones answer you. For I have no experience in 
 debate of this kind, and, moreover, am not of an 
 age to accustom myself to it ; whereas it would 
 suit them and they would make much better 
 progress, for youth is capable of progress in 
 everything. And so, having begun with Theae- 
 tetus, do not let him off, but go on questioning 
 him. 
 
 Soc. Well, Theaetetus, you hear what Theo- 
 dorus says, whom I imagine you would be loath 
 to disobey; nor indeed is it right for one who 
 is so much younger to disobey the commands 
 of a man experienced in matters of this kind. 
 Speak out then frankly and fearlessly. What 
 do you understand by knowledge? 
 
 Theaet. Well, Socrates, since you both bid 
 me answer, I suppose I must. And of course if 
 I make a false step you will set me right. 
 
 Soc. Certainly we shall, that is, if we can. 
 
 [146 .-148 B. Theaetetus begins by enumerat- 
 ing the different arts and sciences, but is cut 
 short by the reminder of Socrates that a general 
 notion of knowledge itself, not the various appli- 
 cations thereof, is the object of their search. He 
 then bethinks him of a certain geometrical gen- 
 eralization worked out recently by himself and 
 his friend, the younger Socrates. This he pro- 
 ceeds to give, much to the admiration of his 
 hearer, who exclaims:] 
 
THEAETETUS. IO/ 
 
 Soc. Capital, my boys ! No one could have 
 done better! Small danger now that Theodorus 
 will be accused of bearing false witness ! 
 
 Theaet. But I assure you, Socrates, that I could 
 never answer your question about knowledge, as 
 I did that about linear measurement and square 
 root, and yet it is, I imagine, something of this 
 kind that you are looking for. And thus again 
 it looks, as if Theodorus were a deceiver. 
 
 Soc. How so? Suppose he had praised your 
 running, and declared that he had never met a 
 youth who was such a swift runner ; and suppose 
 you were afterward worsted in a race by one who, 
 besides being swift, was in the prime of life, 
 would his praise, think you, be any the less true? 
 
 Theaet. No, I do not think it would. 
 
 Soc. And do you think that knowledge is, as 
 I said just now, a slight thing to be discovered, 
 and not one of the loftiest of all things in the 
 world ? 
 
 Theaet. Nay, by Zeus, I think it is ; one of 
 the very loftiest. 
 
 Soc. Take heart, then, about yourself, and be- 
 lieve that Theodorus is right, and strive in every 
 way to apprehend the true nature of knowledge, 
 and of all other things. 
 
 Theaet. If it is only a question of striving, 
 Socrates, it shall be brought to light 
 
 Soc. Come, then : you gave a capital example 
 just now. Taking pattern by the answer you 
 gave about square roots, endeavour, as you 
 
108 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 brought all these, many as they are, under one 
 head, to include in the same way the many forms 
 of knowledge under one name. 
 
 TJicaet. But you must know, Socrates, that 
 many a time, when I have heard questions re- 
 peated of your asking, I have tried to do this 
 very thing. I cannot convince myself, however, 
 that I have any satisfactory statement to make, 
 nor have I heard anybody else make such a 
 one as you call for ; and yet I cannot get rid 
 of my concern about it. 
 
 Soc. That is because you are in travail, dear 
 Theaetetus, and your mind is big with thought. 
 
 Thcaet. I do not know how that is, Socrates. 
 I only tell you how I feel. 
 
 149 Soc. Can it be, my simple friend, that you 
 have never heard me spoken of as the son of 
 a midwife, strong and sturdy, Phaenarete by 
 name? 
 
 Theaet. Why, yes, this I have heard. 
 
 Soc. And that I practise the same art, 
 have you heard this too? 
 
 Theaet. No, never. 
 
 Soc. Know then that I do. But do not, I beg 
 of you, betray me to others, for they, my friend, 
 are not aware that I possess the art; and not 
 knowing it, they do not say this of me, but what 
 they do say is that I am the strangest of mortals, 
 and that I bring men to their wits' end. 10 This 
 you have heard, have you not? 
 
 Theaet. Yes, I have. 
 
THEAETETUS. 109 
 
 [149 B.-T5O C. In the well-known passage which 
 follows, Socrates brings out various points of 
 resemblance between his mother's profession and 
 his own office of helping men to evolve their 
 own thoughts.] 
 
 Soc. Now I am certainly not especially wise 
 myself, nor has any discovery been born to me, as 
 the offspring of my own mind. But it is neverthe- 
 less true of those who come to me, that although 
 at the outset some of them show themselves 
 ignorant, and even surprisingly so, yet as our in- 
 tercourse goes on, they all those at least to 
 whom the god is favourable make the most 
 amazing progress ; and this not only in their own 
 opinion but in that of others as well. And it is 
 as clear as day that what they have learned was 
 never of my teaching, but that they have discov- 
 ered of themselves the many noble truths which 
 they attain, although for the bringing of them 
 forth the god and I myself are responsible. . . . 
 151 D. Go back, then, Theaetetus, to the beginning, 
 and try to define what knowledge is. And never 
 once admit that you are not able. For if God 
 be favourable, and you show a manful spirit, you 
 will be able, 
 
 Theaet. Indeed, Socrates, after such an ex- 
 hortation from you, it would be shameful if one 
 did not use every effort to speak out that which 
 is within him. Well, it seems to me that he 
 who knows anything perceives the thing that he 
 
I 10 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 knows ; and therefore knowledge, so far as I can 
 at present see, is nothing else than perception. 11 
 
 Soc. Well and nobly said, my boy ! That is 
 the right way to speak out your thoughts. 
 
 [151 D.-I55 C. Further examination shows that in 
 identifying knowledge with perception, or the 
 transitory and changing impression produced by 
 objects, Theaetetus is in accord with Protagoras, 
 Heraclitus, Empedocles, 12 and indeed all the 
 other philosophers, save Parmenides. The fa- 
 mous maxim of Protagoras, " Man is the measure 
 of all things; as they seem to him, so they are," 
 is but one with the theory of Heraclitus, that 
 " nothing in reality exists, but is ever becoming." 
 And even Homer expresses the same idea when 
 he sings of " Ocean, creator of gods and Tethys 
 the mother," meaning thereby that all things are 
 engendered by flux and motion. But the theory, 
 although apparently borne out by many phe- 
 nomena in physical and mental life, does yet 
 abound in extraordinary contradictions : if, for 
 example, taking six dice, we compare them with 
 four others, their number is increased; if with 
 twelve, it is diminished. " Suppose then," Soc- 
 rates continues, " that Protagoras or any one 
 else were to ask you, ' Is there anything, Theae- 
 tetus, that grows larger or smaller except by 
 growth?' what would you answer?" 
 
 154 C. " If my answer, Socrates, is to agree with 
 the present form of the question, I should say 
 
THEAETETUS. Iu 
 
 ' no ; ' if I am to take care not to contradict my 
 former answer, ' yes.' " 
 
 " Well spoken, by Hera, my friend, and even 
 divinely. But yet if you do reply ' yes,' you will 
 find yourself in the same case with Euripides : 
 ' The tongue will be convinced, but not the 
 mind.' " 13 
 
 " I assume, Theaetetus," Socrates adds, after 
 amplifying this and similar contradictions, " that 
 you follow me, for you seem to me not unfa- 
 miliar with questions of this kind."] 
 
 Theaet. Yes, and by the gods, Socrates, 
 I do wonder exceedingly what it all means. 
 Sometimes, indeed, when I contemplate these 
 things, I turn positively giddy. 
 
 Soc. It is evident, my friend, that Theodorus 
 made no bad guess as to your character. For 
 this very thing wonder is an affection pe- 
 culiar to the philosophic mind. In truth, phi- 
 losophy has no beginning save this; and he 
 who said that Iris was the offspring of won- 
 der proved himself, methinks, no bad hand at 
 tracing pedigree. 14 But do you now under- 
 stand why these things are the result of what 
 we call the doctrine of Protagoras, or do you 
 not as yet? 
 
 Theaet. Not yet, I think. 
 
 Soc. Well, will you be grateful to me if I aid 
 you in drawing out the truth hidden away in the 
 mind of a man, or rather men, of renown? 
 
112 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 TJieaet. How could I but be grateful, and in 
 large measure too? 
 
 Soc. But first look about carefully, lest we be 
 overheard by one of the uninitiated, they, I 
 mean, who do not admit the existence of any- 
 thing which they cannot hold fast in their two 
 hands, and who do not believe that action and 
 generation and all that is unseen can be classed 
 as really existent. 15 
 
 Theaet. The men of whom you speak, Socra- 
 
 156 tes, are hard and stubborn indeed. 
 
 [156 A.-i6o E. Socrates proceeds to examine the 
 hypothesis upon which the doctrine of the school 
 of Protagoras is founded. 
 
 On being asked whether he does not " relish 
 the taste of these theories," Theaetetus replies : 
 
 157 C. " For my part, Socrates, I do not know, for 
 I cannot make out whether you believe it all 
 yourself, or are only drawing me out." And he 
 adds : " When I hear you going on thus, it does, 
 I confess, seem to me that there is marvellous 
 reason in it, and that all you have set forth must 
 be accepted." 
 
 " Let us then," Socrates urges, " not abandon 
 what remains unfinished of the subject, such 
 as its aspect in relation to dreams and diseases, 
 and especially madness and its delusions of sight, 
 hearing, and other senses, ... in all which 
 cases appearances are the reverse of what they 
 seem." 
 
THEAETETUS. 113 
 
 Still speaking in the name of those who hold 
 appearances to be the truth, Socrates declares 
 that knowledge is not absolute, but relative, 
 nothing, in fact, having reality save in its rela- 
 tion to some percipient. Thus the same food 
 which to the well man is sweet, is bitter to the 
 sick, nor is the latter to be deemed the more 
 ignorant of the two, because of the difference in 
 his perception. And hereby is justified the say- 
 ing of Protagoras, " I am judge of all things." 
 
 " Admirable indeed," so Socrates reviews the 
 situation, " is your assertion that knowledge is 
 nothing but perception ; and it comes to the 
 same thing whether, with Homer and Heraclitus 
 and all that set, you say that all things are flux 
 and motion ; or with Protagoras, wisest of all men, 
 that man is the measure of all things ; or with 
 Theaetetus, that perception is knowledge."] 
 
 Soc. Is it not so, Theaetetus? May we not 
 say that this is, as it were, your new-born child? 
 161 . . . Must he, think you, be reared at all hazards 
 and on no account put away? Or can you bear 
 to see him proved spurious, and not be exceeding 
 wroth if any one takes from you your first-born? 
 
 Theod. Theaetetus will bear it, Socrates, for 
 he is not in the least irritable. But by the gods 
 tell me, is this in its turn untrue? 
 
 Soc. You are certainly a lover of argument, 
 Theodorus, and a simple fellow to boot, if you 
 think that I am in some sort a bagful of argu- 
 8 
 
114 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 ments and can easily draw one out to prove that 
 these things are not true after all. But you do not 
 see the real state of the case, that not a single 
 one of the arguments comes from me, but invari- 
 ably from him who is talking with me, and that 
 I myself only understand this one simple thing, 
 how I may apprehend and accept in a spirit of 
 fairness the argument of some other man who is 
 wise. And so I shall try to get one now out 
 of our philosopher here, and not speak at all 
 myself. 
 
 Theod. That is the better way, Socrates ; pray 
 do as you say. 
 
 Soc. Well, Theodorus, do you know what sur- 
 prises me in your friend Protagoras? 
 
 [161 .-162 A. The matter for surprise is this: If 
 it be true that all men are equally capable of 
 forming a right judgment, how can any one man, 
 even Protagoras himself, be held as pre-eminent 
 and therefore fit for the guidance of others ? Nay, 
 why should not any animal who is gifted with per- 
 ception be also pronounced a " measure of all 
 things "? This attack upon his old master's fun- 
 damental principle is used by Theodorus as an 
 excuse for not taking part in the discussion.] 
 
 Theod. The man was a friend of mine, Soc- 
 rates, as you have just said. I therefore should 
 neither be willing on the one hand to have Protago- 
 ras refuted by my admissions, nor on the other to 
 
THEAE TE TUS. I I 5 
 
 oppose you against my own conviction. Pray, 
 then, try Theaetetus again. Surely he seemed 
 to be answering very suitably just now. 
 
 Soc. Suppose, Theodorus, you were to go into 
 the palaestras at Lacedemon, should you think it 
 fair, when the other people were naked, some 
 of them, by the way, poor specimens enough, - 
 not to strip yourself also, and let your figure be 
 compared with theirs? 
 
 Thcod. Why, don't you suppose that I should, 
 if I could persuade them to let me? And just 
 so I shall now, I think, persuade you to let me 
 look on, and, instead of dragging me into the 
 gymnasium now that I have grown stiff, to try 
 yourself against some younger and more supple 
 opponent in my place. 
 
 Soc. Why, of course, Theodorus, friend to you 
 cannot be foe to me, as the proverb has it. So 
 let us, by all means, go back to our wise The- 
 aetetus. First then, referring to the matter just 
 under discussion, tell me, Theaetetus, are you not 
 amazed if you are to be suddenly proved inferior 
 in wisdom to none, whether men or even gods? 
 Or do you suppose that the measure of Protago- 
 ras applies less to gods than to men? 
 
 Theaet. Not I, by Zeus ! To answer your ques- 
 tion, I am indeed greatly amazed. When we 
 were considering the doctrine that what " seems" 
 to each man " is " really so to him, I thought it 
 admirable. But now of a sudden, all is reversed. 
 
 Soc. That is because you are young, dear boy, 
 
II 6 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 and therefore quick to hear and to be convinced 
 by popular talk. 
 
 [162 D.-i68 E. Theaetetus is now urged not to rest 
 satisfied until his own and the Protagorean 
 theory has been examined under another aspect. 
 If perception be really identical with knowl- 
 edge, what shall we say of things that we per- 
 ceive, but do not know, such as letters in a 
 foreign language which, though seen, are not 
 understood by us? 
 
 163 C. "We shall say," replies Theaetetus, "that 
 what we actually see and hear of them we do 
 understand, that is, we see and understand their 
 form and colour, and we hear and recognize their 
 rising and falling inflections, but what the 
 grammarians and interpreters teach about them, 
 we neither perceive nor know, whether by sight 
 or hearing." 
 
 " That is excellent, Theaetetus ! " cries Soc- 
 rates ; " I will not stop to argue the point with 
 you, because I want to let you grow. But look! 
 here comes something else, which we must con- 
 sider how we may fight against." 
 
 The "something else" is the knowledge which 
 comes from memory. If by means of this we can 
 continue to know what we no longer see, it fol- 
 lows that perception can be no essential part of 
 knowledge ; and thus the fable of Protagoras is 
 seen to be forever destroyed. 
 
 164 E. " And yet, my friend," Socrates adds, " I 
 
THE A E TE TUS. 1 1 7 
 
 doubt not that, were the father of the aforesaid 
 fable still alive, he would have had much to say 
 in its defence. But now, since it is an orphan, 
 we are heaping abuse upon it. Nor do even the 
 guardians whom Protagoras left in charge, care to 
 give their help, as, for instance, Theodorus here. 
 And so, for the sake of fair play, it seems that we 
 ourselves must come to the rescue." 
 
 "It is not I, Socrates, who am guardian," 
 Theodorus pleads in excuse, " but rather Cal- 
 lias, the son of Hipponicus. For I was earlier 
 than he turned aside from abstract questions to 
 the study of geometry. If you, however, will 
 come to the rescue, I shall be very grateful." 
 
 Socrates accordingly, impersonating the old 
 philosopher, declares, in his name, that truth is an 
 ever-varying quality. Thus an evil mind sees 
 no less truly than does a good one, for a man's 
 own experience is to him the only reality, nor 
 can he possibly grasp anything outside of it. A 
 good man, nevertheless, has the power so to 
 change the condition of another's mind, that 
 opinions like his own may be generated there in 
 place of evil ones. In like manner wise and good 
 rhetoricians have power in the state to make the 
 good not only discerned, but chosen in prefer- 
 ence to the evil. At the close of his defence, 
 Protagoras expresses disapproval of the unfair 
 and frivolous spirit shown by his adversary, 
 whose method has been that of disputation rather 
 than of argument] 
 
Il8 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 1 68 C. Soc. Thus, Theodorus, have I to the best 
 of my ability contributed to the defence of your 
 friend, slight help from slight source. Had 
 he been alive himself, he would have defended 
 his own in far more stately fashion. 
 
 Theod. You are jesting, Socrates, for you 
 have defended him right valiantly. 
 
 Soc. That is kind of you, my friend. But tell 
 me, did you, I wonder, when Protagoras was 
 speaking just now, notice how he upbraided us, 
 because by addressing our discourse to a boy, 
 we were making the boy's timidity a weapon 
 against his own arguments ; and how he de- 
 nounced this as a sorry kind of jest; and how, 
 holding up to our admiration his " measure of 
 all things," he bade us address ourselves to his 
 doctrine in sober earnest? 
 
 Theod. How could I help noticing it, Socrates? 
 
 Soc. Well, do you advise us to obey him? 
 
 Theod. I do, emphatically. 
 
 Soc. But don't you see that all here present, 
 with the exception of yourself, are children? 
 If then we are to obey the man, you and I must 
 apply ourselves seriously to his doctrine, and ad- 
 dress our questions and answers to one another, 
 so that he may at least not have occasion to re- 
 proach us with again turning our study of his 
 doctrine into a frolic with boys. 
 
 Theod. What! would not Theaetetus follow 
 the investigation of a doctrine better than many 
 a man with a long beard? 
 
THE A E TE TUS. 1 1 9 
 
 Sac. But not better, Theodorus, than you your- 
 self. Pray do not imagine that it is my duty to 
 stand up for your departed friend in every way, 
 169 and yours in no way whatever. So come, my 
 good fellow, follow this matter just a little further, 
 that we may see whether you are to be the 
 measure of diagrams, or whether all other men 
 are, equally with you, sufficient unto themselves 
 in astronomy and all other branches wherein 
 you are reputed to excel. 
 
 Theod. It is not easy, Socrates, for one seated 
 by your side to get off from rendering an ac- 
 count of himself, and I was talking nonsense 
 just now when I said you would excuse me 
 from stripping myself, and would not rather, 
 like the Lacedaemonians, force me into doing it; 
 although you, to be sure, seem rather to take 
 after Sciron. For the Lacedaemonians command 
 one either to strip or to go away, while you, me- 
 thinks, do the business rather after the fashion of 
 Antaeus : if a man is once within your reach, 
 you will not let him go till you have compelled 
 him both to strip and to try himself against you 
 in argument. 16 
 
 Soc. You have described my malady perfectly, 
 Theodorus, only I am a far more doughty oppo- 
 nent than they. For many a Heracles and a 
 Theseus mighty in the art of controversy has ere 
 now fallen upon me and given me a sound drub- 
 bing; but none the more for that do I desist, so 
 strongly am I imbued with a love for this kind of 
 
120 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 exercise. Pray, then, do not refuse to close in 
 with me, for your own good no less than for mine. 
 
 Theod. I will make no further opposition. 
 Lead whithersoever you will ; in any case I shall 
 have to bear, by cross-examination, whatever 
 fate you spin for me. But I warn you that I 
 shall not be able to go beyond the limit proposed 
 by you. 
 
 Soc. That far is quite sufficient ; and pray give 
 your utmost heed that we do not unconsciously 
 fall into any childish fashion of talking, and again 
 bring that reproach upon ourselves. 
 
 Tkeod. I will certainly try, so far as I can. 
 
 [169 D.-I72 C. The investigation now assuming a 
 more serious character, the conclusion is finally 
 reached that to confess every man's opinions the 
 " measure of all things " is to acknowledge your 
 own to be in error, inasmuch as certain other 
 opinions will surely be at variance with them ; 
 neither, it is added, can any man be the measure 
 of a thing which he has not learned. And thus 
 the famous truth of Protagoras is true neither to 
 the discoverer of it nor to any one else. 
 
 171 C. "Ah, but, Socrates," cries Theodorus, "we 
 are running my friend very hard." 
 
 " But I really do not see, my dear fellow," 
 Socrates rejoins, " that we are outrunning what 
 is right. Though it is likely, to be sure, that be- 
 ing older he is also wiser than ourselves; and if 
 he could at this moment thrust his head up from 
 
THEAETETUS. 121 
 
 yonder where he is, he would soon, I doubt not, 
 convict me of talking great nonsense, and you of 
 accepting the same, and then down he would sink 
 and be off again in a trice. 17 But all the same we 
 must, it seems to me, use our own faculties, such 
 as they are, and always say what we think." 
 
 It soon becomes apparent, however applica- 
 ble may be the doctrine of Protagoras in matters 
 of right and wrong, that in questions of ex- 
 pediency, both present and future, whether in 
 matters of State or in private affairs, all men are 
 not equally capable of right judgment] 
 
 Soc. But here from one question, Theodorus, 
 we are being forced into another, from a lesser 
 into a greater one. 
 
 Theod. Well, Socrates, we have plenty of 
 time, have we not? 
 
 Soc. Apparently so. In truth, my good fellow, 
 I have often before reflected, just as I am doing 
 now, how natural it is that they who have spent 
 much time in the study of philosophy should cut 
 a ridiculous figure when they come to speak in 
 court. 18 
 
 Tlieod. Exactly what do you mean? 
 
 Soc. I mean that, in point of breeding, those 
 who from earliest youth have knocked about in 
 law courts and places of that kind are, com- 
 pared with those trained in philosophy and other 
 such pursuits, like slaves in comparison with free 
 men. 
 
122 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Theod. In what way? 
 
 Soc. In that the leisure you spoke of is always 
 at the command of the philosophers. They have 
 their argument out in peace and at leisure; and 
 just as we now for the third time are changing 
 from one subject to another, so do they also, if, 
 like us, they prefer to discuss a subject which 
 comes later in order rather than the matter in 
 hand. And they care not whether they speak 
 briefly or at length, if only they get at the truth. 
 Whereas the others always talk in a hurry, 
 for the running of the water drives them on, 
 and they have not time to speak on what 
 they have at heart; while there the opponent 
 stands armed with the constraining power of 
 a written brief outside of which they dare not 
 speak, the so-called affidavits. 19 And their 
 talk is always about some fellow-slave, and is 
 addressed to the master who sits holding in his 
 hand the penalty to be awarded ; and the trial is 
 never about some indifferent matter, but always 
 about the speaker himself, and ofttimes the 
 173 race is for life. From all these causes they be- 
 come sharp and shrewd, and apt at flattering the 
 master by word and courting his favour by deed, 
 and their souls are stunted and not upright. For 
 slavery from childhood takes away all growth and 
 self-respect and freedom, and makes crooked 
 deeds a necessity, and surrounds with great fears 
 and dangers souls which, being as yet tender, are 
 unable to pass through them save at the ex- 
 
THE A E TE TUS. 1 2 3 
 
 pense of justice and truth. And, having straight- 
 way recourse to falsehood and retaliation, they 
 become so cramped and warped that by the time 
 they have passed from youth to man's estate 
 their minds have no longer any soundness in 
 them, though in their own opinion they have 
 become both wise and capable. Such, Theo- 
 dorus, are these men. And now what do you 
 wish? Shall we describe those of our chorus, 20 
 or shall we dismiss this subject and go back to 
 our discussion, lest we take undue advantage of 
 that liberty and free exchange of intercourse 
 which we were talking about just now? 
 
 Theod. On no account, Socrates ; pray let us 
 have the whole. For you were quite right in 
 declaring that we who belong to such a chorus 
 as this are not the slaves of our own words; 
 but our arguments are, so to speak, servants of 
 ours, each waiting to be perfected when it shall 
 seem to us good. For neither judge nor specta- 
 tor stands over us, as with the poets, to censure 
 or control. 
 
 Soc. Very well, since it so pleases you, we 
 will speak of the leaders ; for what need to speak 
 of those who only dabble superficially in phi- 
 losophy? In the first place, then, from youth 
 up they have never so much as known their way 
 to the Agora, nor yet to the courts of justice or 
 the council hall or any other public place of 
 assembly. Laws and ordinances, whether they 
 be written or spoken, they neither see nor hear. 
 
124 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Struggles of political leagues for leadership, as- 
 semblies, banquets, revelries with flute-girls, - 
 it does not occur to them, even in their dreams, 
 to take part in these. Whether matters have 
 gone well or ill in the State, whether misfortune 
 has come to any one from ancestors on the male 
 or the female line, 21 he is more ignorant of than of 
 how many gallons are said to be contained in the 
 sea. Nor is he even conscious that he does not 
 know these things, as it is not for the sake of 
 gaining repute that he holds aloof; but the truth 
 is that his body alone is placed in the city and 
 there abides, while his soul, regarding all this as 
 petty and of no account, and " borne," in the 
 words of Pindar, " hither and thither," 22 takes 
 measure of things on the earth, and under the 
 earth, and observes the stars in the heavens, and 
 174 searches out the nature of every created being, 
 each in its entirety, stooping to none of those 
 which lie close at hand. 
 
 Theod. How do you mean, Socrates? 
 
 Soc. I mean, Theodorus, after the fashion of 
 Thales, who gazing up at the stars tumbled into 
 a well ; 23 on which occasion a clever and quick- 
 witted Thracian handmaid is reputed to have 
 scoffingly said that in his eagerness to know 
 what was going on in heaven he did not notice 
 what lay in front of him, beneath his very feet. 
 And the same raillery serves for all who pursue 
 philosophy. A man of this sort is in truth igno- 
 rant of both friend and neighbour, not only of 
 
THEAE TE TUS. 1 2 5 
 
 what he is doing, but almost whether he is a hu- 
 man being or some other creature. But when it 
 comes to what man really is, and what it befits 
 such a nature as his to do or to suffer, in dis- 
 tinction from all others, this he is ever inves- 
 tigating and sparing no pains to discover. You 
 understand me, Theodorus, I suppose, or do 
 you not? 
 
 Theod. Yes, indeed; and what you say is 
 true. 
 
 Soc. Consequently, my friend, when a man 
 of this kind comes into relation with others, 
 whether, as I said before, in private or on a public 
 occasion, when, in a court of justice or else- 
 where, he is forced to talk of things which lie 
 beneath his feet and before his very eyes, he 
 makes himself a laughing-stock not to Thracian 
 handmaids only, but to the crowd in general; 
 and by reason of his inexperience he tumbles 
 into wells and every other kind of perplexity; 
 and his excessive awkwardness makes him ap- 
 pear like a fool. For when insulted, he can re- 
 tort no insulting personalities, because, never 
 having paid attention to such matters, he knows 
 no harm of any one ; and so, in this quandary, 
 he cuts a ridiculous figure. And when, on hear- 
 ing others praised and lauded, he is seen to be 
 laughing, not affectedly but in good earnest, he 
 is set down as a simpleton. 
 
 But the fact is, when a king or a tyrant is com- 
 mended it seems to him like congratulating some 
 
126 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 herdsman, perhaps a swineherd, or a shepherd, 
 or some cowherd because he has many creatures 
 to milk; only he thinks that the animal which 
 the tyrant has to tend and milk is far more 
 treacherous and choleric than is the herdsman's 
 charge, and that a man of this kind is, from want 
 of leisure, no less rough and uneducated than 
 the herdsman, being girt about by a wall, his 
 mountain fold. 
 
 Does he hear the owner of ten thousand or 
 more acres spoken of as possessing a vast prop- 
 erty, he regards it as a mere nothing, so accus- 
 tomed is he to embrace within his view the whole 
 earth. Do they extol pedigree, saying how 
 such a one is noble because he can boast of weal- 
 thy ancestors for seven generations back, it 
 seems to him that the commendation can proceed 
 175 only from persons of dull and contracted vision, 
 who by reason of ignorance are not able to em- 
 brace the whole within their ken, nor to consider 
 that every one of us has had thousands untold of 
 ancestors and progenitors, among whom there are 
 in every case rich men and beggars, kings and 
 slaves, Greeks and barbarians, many times ten 
 thousand for every one. That men should pride 
 themselves upon a list of twenty-five ancestors, 
 and go back to Heracles, the son of Amphitryon, 
 is to him a sign of extreme pettiness; and in- 
 asmuch as the twenty-fifth ancestor back of 
 Amphitryon was just what fortune made him, 
 and also the fiftieth before him again, he laughs 
 
THEAE TE TUS. 1 2 7 
 
 to think that they have not the wit to reckon this 
 up, and thus put an end to the vain glory of a 
 foolish mind. 24 
 
 In all these cases a man of this kind is laughed 
 at by the crowd, because while as to some things 
 he appears haughty, as to others he does not 
 know what lies beneath his feet, and is helpless 
 when it comes to details. 
 
 Theod. You describe everything just as it is, 
 Socrates. 
 
 Soc. But when he himself, my friend, draws 
 another up to his own height, one who is willing 
 to rise with him beyond the question of " In what 
 way do I injure you or you me?" to the exami- 
 nation of righteousness and injustice in them- 
 selves, what each of these is, and wherein they 
 differ from each other and from all things else, 
 or from the question, " Is a monarch happy be- 
 cause he has great wealth?" to the consideration 
 of monarchy itself and the sum of human happi- 
 ness and misery, what each of these consists 
 in, and in what manner the nature of man is 
 fitted to acquire the one and avoid the other, 
 when that little, dried up pettifogger's soul has to 
 give an answer to all these questions, then indeed 
 does he give the philosopher his revenge. Diz- 
 zied by the unwonted experience of hanging from 
 such heights and gazing downward through the 
 air, distressed, confused, and stammering, he is 
 a laughing-stock, not to Thracian handmaids nor 
 to any of the ignorant, they do not even per- 
 
128 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 ceive it, but to all who have been brought up 
 not as slaves, but in the opposite fashion. 25 
 
 Such, Theodorus, is the character of these 
 two, the one, called by you philosopher, who, 
 brought up in freedom and leisure, may well be 
 excused if he appear helpless and incompetent 
 when some slavish task devolves upon him, as 
 when for example he does not know how to pack 
 up his bedding or to flavour a sauce or a flatter- 
 ing phrase; the other, who is able to perform 
 deftly and quickly all such tasks, but does not 
 know how to throw his cloak over his shoulder 
 176 like a free man, 26 still less how to make choice of 
 fitting speech wherewith to celebrate worthily 
 the true life lived of gods and of men blessed of 
 heaven. 
 
 Theod. Ah, Socrates, if your words could 
 only persuade others as they do me, there would 
 be more peace and less evil among men ! 
 
 Soc. But it is not possible, Theodorus, to de- 
 stroy evil, for the opposite of good must needs 
 always exist ; nor is its abiding-place to be im- 
 agined among the gods, for it hovers of necessity 
 about mortal nature here below. Therefore it 
 behooves us to make good our escape hence 
 to yonder place as fast as may be. And the 
 way of escape is this, to grow as like unto 
 God as possible; and to grow like him is to 
 become just and holy, and wise withal. 27 But in 
 sooth, my friend, it is far from easy to persuade 
 people that not for the reason which most 
 
THEAETETUS. 129 
 
 men give for cultivating virtue and not vice, 
 namely, to make a good instead of a bad ap- 
 pearance, not for this reason, I say, is the one 
 to be shunned and the other pursued. For this, 
 it seems to me, is nothing but an oft repeated 
 old wives' tale. 
 
 But the truth we will proclaim in this wise: 
 God is never in any wise unjust, for he is per- 
 fectly just, and there is nothing more like him 
 than the man among us who has made himself the 
 most just. Upon this depends the real ability of 
 a man, or else his nothingness and unmanliness. 
 The knowledge of this truth is wisdom and true 
 virtue, the ignorance of it sheer stupidity and 
 vice ; and all else that looks like cleverness and 
 wisdom is in matters of politics mere coarseness, 
 in the arts vulgarity. 
 
 It is far better, then, never to admit that he 
 who is unrighteous and profane in talk and be- 
 haviour is clever by reason of his villany. Such 
 men glory in this reproach, and flatter them- 
 selves that they are regarded not as mere fools 
 and cumberers of the ground, 28 but as patterns for 
 all men who wish to live with safety in a state. 
 But they must be told the truth, they are all 
 the more what they believe they are not, for the 
 very reason that they hold this belief. For they 
 know not the reward of unrighteousness, a thing 
 which least of all others they ought to be igno- 
 rant of, and which is not, as they imagine, stripes 
 and death, evils frequently not incurred by 
 9 
 
I3O TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 those who have done wrong, but something 
 impossible to escape from. 
 
 Theod. What do you mean ? 
 
 Soc. Two living types, my friend, are set 
 before them, the one divine and of perfect 
 blessedness, the other with naught of the divine 
 and of utter misery. But this they do not per- 
 ceive, and their excessive folly and stupidity 
 makes them unconscious that on account of their 
 177 evil deeds they are growing like the one and 
 unlike the other. And the penalty they pay is 
 that the life led by them is in the likeness of 
 that which they resemble. If we tell them that 
 unless they get rid of their boasted cleverness, 
 they will not, even when dead, be received into 
 that place which is free from evil, but must ever 
 continue here upon earth in that way of life 
 which is like unto themselves, evil consorting 
 with evil, 29 they will listen to us, but only as 
 clever knaves might listen to a set of fools. 
 
 Theod. Indeed they will, Socrates. 
 
 Soc. I am quite aware of it, my friend. There 
 is, however, this about them, that if they are 
 confronted with one person alone, and made 
 to give their reasons in regard to what they 
 censure, that is, if they are willing to stand 
 their ground and not run away like cowards, 
 they end, my good sir, by becoming strangely 
 dissatisfied with their own reasons; and that 
 famous rhetoric of theirs shrivels away, as it 
 were, so that they seem no better than children. 
 
THEAE TE TUS. 1 3 I 
 
 But all these are mere digressions, and we 
 had best restrain ourselves, or we shall have 
 yet more of them flowing in to choke up our 
 main argument. If you approve, therefore, we 
 will return to our former subject. 
 
 TJieod. For my own part, Socrates, I do not 
 find it at all unpleasant to listen to such digres- 
 sions as these, for they are easier for one of my 
 age to understand. But still, if you wish it, we 
 will go back again. 
 
 [177 C.-I79 E. The discussion is now resumed at 
 the point where it was interrupted by the digres- 
 sion. That some men are wiser than others, and 
 that the wiser man alone can be a fit " measure," 
 is at last fully conceded by Theodorus. 
 
 It still remains to be considered whether in 
 the matter of momentary impressions also each 
 man's judgment is infallible. Such a supposition 
 would seem to be supported by the theory of 
 a universal flux or continual change and motion, 
 and the Heracliteans are accordingly summoned, 
 though not without a protest from Theodorus, 
 who declares that they are " no more possible to 
 deal with than madmen."] 
 
 Theod. For in accordance with their own 
 
 compositions, they are forever in motion; and 
 
 as for carrying on an argument, and quietly 
 
 questioning and answering by turn, this to 
 
 1 80 them is nothing short of impossible. . . . On 
 
132 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 the contrary, if one of them is asked a ques- 
 tion, he pulls forth, as from a quiver, some enig- 
 matical saying and shoots it out. And if you 
 try to get at the meaning of what he has said, 
 you will be struck down by some other new- 
 fangled saying, but with none of these men will 
 you ever arrive at any conclusion ; nor, for that 
 matter, will they do so with one another, for 
 they are exceedingly wary of admitting anything 
 as fixed, whether in argument or in their own 
 souls, on the supposition, I believe, that to be 
 fixed is to be stationary; against which principle 
 they wage fierce war and drive it out wherever 
 they can. 
 
 Soc. Apparently, Theodorus, you have seen 
 these men in a state of warfare, and have never 
 had anything to do with them in time of peace, 
 as they are not intimates of yours. But I ima- 
 gine that, when quietly by themselves, they do 
 impart ideas of another kind to their disciples, 
 whom they desire to make like themselves. 
 
 TJieod. Disciples, indeed, my good sir ! None 
 of that sort are ever disciples one of the other. 
 No, indeed, they grow up of their own accord, 
 each getting inspiration wherever he may chance 
 upon it, and each one thinking that the other 
 knows nothing. No, from these, as I was about 
 to say, you will never get any explanation, either 
 with their consent or without it. 30 We must 
 perforce take the doctrine up ourselves, and 
 consider it as we would a problem. 
 
THEAE TE TUS. 1 3 3 
 
 [180 C.-i83 B. Upon the theory of universal mo- 
 tion, all things are not only forever changing 
 place, .but are also continually undergoing 
 change of condition. To admit this doctrine, 
 therefore, is to deny the possibility of impres- 
 sions; since before there is time to receive an 
 impression, the object itself will have changed. 
 After some further parley the doctrine of 
 Protagoras and of the Heracliteans is finally 
 dismissed as untenable.] 
 
 Soc. So, then, Theodorus, we have got rid of 
 your friend, and do not as yet agree with him 
 that every one is the measure of all things, except 
 indeed he be some wise man ; nor will we agree 
 either that knowledge is perception, at least not 
 on the doctrine of universal motion. But perhaps 
 Theaetetus here has something more to propose. 
 
 Thcod. You have spoken capitally, Socrates ; 
 so much so that I must be now released from the 
 obligation of answering you, as it was agreed I 
 should be, whenever our talk about the doctrine 
 of Protagoras was at an end. 
 
 Theaet. But not, Theodorus, before you and 
 Socrates, as you proposed awhile ago, have re- 
 viewed the doctrine of those who maintain that 
 everything is at rest. 
 
 Thcod. So young, Theaetetus, and yet teach- 
 ing your elders to act unjustly and break their 
 faith ! Nay, rather get ready to answer Socrates 
 yourself during the rest of the discussion. 
 
134 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Theaet. Of course, if he desires it. But I 
 would much rather have listened, as I said. 
 
 Theod. It is challenging horsemen upon an 
 open plain, to challenge Socrates to argument. 
 Only question him and you will hear. 
 
 Soc. On the contrary, Theodorus, I do not 
 think I shall obey the request of Theaetetus. 
 
 Theod. But why will you not obey it? 
 
 Soc. Such is my reverence for Melissus and 
 the others, who hold that the universe is one 
 and moveless, that I am ashamed to examine 
 these doctrines in an unworthy manner. But I 
 feel this less with them than with Parmenides, 
 the One. 31 For, to my thinking, Parmenides 
 is, in the words of Homer, " venerable at once 
 and awesome." I met the man when he was 
 very aged and I a very young lad, and to me 
 the depth of his mind seemed altogether mag- 
 184 nificent. I fear therefore that we may not un- 
 derstand even his words, and; may be left still 
 farther behind as to his meaning; and more 
 than all am I fearful that other questions, if 
 once allowed, will force themselves in, and pre- 
 vent us from considering that which was the 
 starting-point of our discussion, the nature of 
 knowledge. . . . 
 
 Let us try, then, by the help of our art, to de- 
 liver Theaetetus of his conceptions in regard to 
 knowledge. 
 
 Theod. By all means do so, if you think it 
 best. 
 
THEAE TE TUS. 1 3 5 
 
 [184 B.-ipi E. Returning to the original defini- 
 tion, Socrates questions the accuracy of the 
 common statement, that sight and sound are 
 discerned with the eyes and ears. " A free use 
 of words and phrases," he declares, " is for the 
 most part a sign of breeding ; a too punctilious 
 accuracy is, on the other hand, underbred. Some- 
 times however, as on the present occasion, where 
 a statement is not correct it must needs be called 
 in question. Consider, then, which is more cor- 
 rect, that we see with the eyes or by means of 
 the eyes, and hear with the ears or by means 
 of the ears?" 
 
 " It seems to me, Socrates," is the reply, " that 
 we perceive by means of our organs rather than 
 with them." 
 
 " Yes," Socrates rejoins; "for it were indeed 
 strange if, as though we were so many Trojan 
 horses, there were placed within us a quantity of 
 senses, but no one general principle, whether it 
 be called soul or anything else, to which they all 
 tend and with which, albeit by means of these 
 senses as instruments, we perceive all objects 
 that can be perceived." 32 
 
 The conclusion is finally reached that, although 
 tangible objects are noted by the help of the 
 senses, abstract ideas, such as being and non- 
 being, likeness and unlikeness, identity and dif- 
 ference, are perceived by no bodily organ, but 
 by the soul alone ; whereupon with a burst of 
 enthusiasm Socrates exclaims: 
 
136 'TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS, 
 
 185 E. " You are beautiful, Theaetetus, and not ugly, 
 as Theodorus says ; for he who speaks beau- 
 tiful words is himself both beautiful and good. 
 And besides being beautiful, you are doing me a 
 kindness by sparing me a long discussion; that 
 is, if you believe that the soul perceives some 
 things by her own power alone, and others by the 
 help of bodily organs. 33 For this was my own be- 
 lief and what I was wishing might be yours also. 
 It is now demonstrated that our knowledge of 
 the essential part of things what we call the 
 realities is derived, not from the senses, but 
 from the reflections made by the soul upon the 
 report of the senses ; and that perception which 
 is dependent upon the senses solely, can never 
 make these realities known to us. In this way is 
 knowledge proved to be essentially different from 
 perception. 
 
 187 B. "And now," Socfates concludes, "having 
 wiped out all that has gone before and arrived 
 where we now are, see if you can discern more 
 clearly. Tell me then again what knowledge is." 
 " It is impossible, Socrates, to say that it is 
 all opinion, since false opinion does exist; but 
 knowledge, I think, is true opinion, and this 
 shall be my answer. If, like the preceding one, 
 it is proved incorrect, we will try to find some 
 other." 
 
 " That is the way, Theaetetus, to answer, 
 boldly, not hesitatingly as before, since by taking 
 this course we shall either find what we seek or 
 
THEAE TE TUS. 1 3 7 
 
 be less likely to think we know what we really 
 do not; and this in itself would be no contemp- 
 tible gain," 
 
 Socrates now confesses himself puzzled as to 
 the nature and origin of false opinion, and doubt- 
 ful whether he had best let the whole question 
 go, or take it up again in a new manner. 
 
 " How can you hesitate, Socrates," urges 
 Theaetetus, " if there seems any need at all of 
 it? Just now, in speaking about leisure, you 
 and Theodorus said very properly that there is 
 no pressure of haste in matters like these." 
 
 " You do right to remind me, and it is perhaps 
 not a bad moment to go back upon our steps, 
 for it is surely better to go over a little ground 
 well than over much ground superficially." 
 
 The question soon arises how it can be possi- 
 ble to form a false opinion, if opinion be indeed 
 the discovery of realities revealed by the mind 
 to itself alone. While disclaiming any special 
 knowledge on the subject, Socrates gives his 
 own views as follows: "It seems to me," he 
 says, " that the process of thought is nothing 
 190 but a conversation where the mind asks and 
 answers its own questions, both affirming and 
 denying. And when, whether gradually or by 
 sudden impulse, it has come to a decision, and 
 unhesitatingly affirms the same, this we call its 
 opinion. . . . And yet if we do not admit the 
 existence of false opinion at all, we shall be forced 
 to admit many absurdities. . . . Now if we can 
 
138 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 191 find a way out of these and can be set free, we 
 may then, being exempt from ridicule ourselves, 
 afford to talk about them as other people's diffi- 
 culties. But if we continue to be perplexed at 
 every turn, we must, I suppose, humble our- 
 selves, and let the argument trample over us 
 like seasick passengers and do with us as it 
 may please." 
 
 As a possible way out of the difficulty, Socrates 
 now offers the following illustration : ] 
 
 191 C. Soc. For the sake, then, of the argument, 
 imagine within our souls a tablet of wax, 34 larger 
 in one man, in another smaller, made of purer 
 wax in one, of less pure in another, harder in 
 some cases, softer in others, and then again 
 something between the two. 
 Theaet. I have done so. 
 
 Soc. Well, let us say that this is a gift of 
 Memory, mother of the Muses, and that what- 
 ever we may wish to remember, whether seen 
 or heard or even imagined by us, we must 
 stamp upon it, applying it to our perceptions 
 and thoughts, just as if taking an impression 
 from a seal ring. And whatever has once been 
 impressed we remember and know as long as its 
 image exists there ; but if it gets wiped out or 
 cannot receive the impression, we forget and do 
 not know it. ... 
 
 194 C. Now when the wax in the soul of a man is 
 deep and abundant and smooth and duly tern- 
 
THEAETETUS. 139 
 
 pered, the impressions which come byway of the 
 perceptions and are impressed upon this heart 
 of the soul, as Homer calls it, alluding allegori- 
 cally to its likeness to wax, 35 these, I say, being 
 pure ,and of adequate depth, are also lasting. 
 And men of this kind have in the first place 
 facility in learning, and in the second retentive 
 memories ; and, thirdly, they do not confuse the 
 impressions which come from the perceptions, 
 but have a right notion of them. For as these 
 impressions are clear and have plenty of room, 
 they are speedily assigned each to its own proper 
 impress, or so called reality ; and these men are 
 called wise. Do you not agree to that? 
 
 Theaet. Most assuredly I do. 
 
 Soc. But when the heart is rough, for which 
 the all-wise poet commends it, or when it is un- 
 clean, and the wax impure or else either exces- 
 sively soft or hard, they in whom it is soft, 
 learn easily, but forget; if it is hard, they do the 
 reverse ; and they in whom it is rough and wild 
 and inclined to be stony, or full of some admix- 
 ture of earth or dung, have indistinct impressions. 
 Again, when it is hard they are indistinct also, 
 for then there is no depth ; and when it is soft 
 195 they are no less indistinct, because from blending 
 together they speedily become blurred. And if 
 besides all this, from the littleness of the soul, 
 they are in want of room and all crowded to- 
 gether, they are still more indistinct than the 
 rest. 
 
140 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Now all such people are subject to false 
 opinions. When they see or hear or think of 
 an object, they are not able to assign each thing 
 swiftly to its own impression, but are slow about 
 it ; and because they assign wrongly they are apt 
 to see and hear and think defectively; and of 
 these men again we say that they are dupes, and 
 ignorant of realities. 
 
 Theaet. Truer word was never spoken, Socrates. 
 
 Soc. May we say, then, that false opinions are 
 within us? 
 
 Tkeaet. Most assuredly. 
 
 Soc. And true opinions as well? 
 
 Tkeaet. And true as well. 
 
 Soc. May we then assume it to be agreed that 
 these two kinds of opinion do incontestably exist? 
 
 Theaet. Most emphatically. 
 
 Soc. What a strange and odious being, of a 
 truth, Theaetetus, is a man who loves to talk ! 
 
 Theaet. How so? Why do you say this? 
 
 Soc. Out of vexation at my own dulness and 
 downright garrulity. For there is no other word 
 to use when a man drags about his propositions 
 till they get upside down, and is so stupid that 
 he cannot be convinced, nor yet can he be made 
 to part with a single one of his pet ideas. 
 
 Theaet. But why are you vexed at this? 
 
 Soc. Not only am I vexed, but I am uneasy 
 as to how I shall answer if some one asks me : 
 " Have you found out, Socrates, that false opinion 
 consists neither in the relation of perceptions to 
 
THEAETETUS. 141 
 
 one another, nor in that of thought, but in the 
 union of perception and thought?" "Yes," I 
 presume I shall answer, pluming myself, as if 
 we had made some fine discovery. 
 
 Theaet. For my part, Socrates, I can see no 
 reason to be ashamed of what has just been 
 brought out. 
 
 [195 D.-I97 C. Socrates now explains that the pre- 
 vious illustration has to do only with what is 
 perceived by the senses, and that where some 
 abstract idea, like that of number, is in question, 
 another test of false and true opinion must be 
 applied.] 
 
 197 C. Soc. Consider now whether it be not possible 
 to possess knowledge and yet not have it in 
 hand, just, for instance, as if some one had cap- 
 tured wild -birds doves or others and were 
 keeping them in a dove-cote which he had pre- 
 pared for them within his own home. In one 
 sense we might say that he always has them, 
 seeing they are owned by him, might we not? 
 
 Theaet. Yes. 
 
 Soc. But in another sense he has not a single 
 one of them ; although he has acquired power 
 over them, since he has them under his own con- 
 trol and within his own precincts, to take and to 
 hold whenever he pleases, to capture if he likes 
 and then let go again ; all of which he may 
 do as often as he sees fit. 
 
142 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 Theaet. That is true. 
 
 Soc. Once more, then, just as a while ago we 
 set up some sort of a waxen figment in the soul, 
 so let us now fashion in each mind a kind of 
 dove-cote filled with all manner of birds, some in 
 flocks apart from the rest, some in small num- 
 bers, some singly and flying among the others in 
 any chance direction. 
 
 Theaet. Regard it as done. What next? 
 
 Soc. We must assume that in childhood this 
 is an empty receptacle, and that instead of birds 
 there are varieties of knowledge. Now, whatever 
 kind of knowledge a man acquires and shuts up 
 within his precincts, we must say that he has 
 learned or discovered the thing of which it is the 
 knowledge, and that just this is knowing. 
 
 Theaet. So be it. 
 
 198 D. Soc. Let us, then, pursuing the figure of the 
 chase and possession of birds, say that the chase 
 is twofold, one before possession, for mere 
 possession's sake; the other in order that the 
 possessor may take and hold in his hands what 
 he had long ago acquired. So that things which 
 by study he had long ago learned and come to 
 know, he can once more gain knowledge of, by 
 resuming and holding fast the knowledge of 
 each thing which he used to possess, but had 
 not uppermost in his mind. . . . 
 
 199 A. But it can never happen that a man is igno- 
 rant of what he knows, although of course he 
 
THE A E TE TUS. 1 43 
 
 may get hold of a false opinion in regard to 
 it. For he may have a knowledge, not of this, 
 but of something else instead, as when, chasing 
 them as they fly, he by mistake gets hold of one 
 kind of knowledge in place of another; when, for 
 instance, imagining eleven to be twelve he takes 
 the knowledge of eleven for that of twelve, the 
 ring-dove as it were within him instead of the 
 pigeon. 
 
 Theaet. Yes, that is reasonable. 
 
 Soc. Thus, then, we are rid of the notion that 
 we do not know what we know, for it is no 
 longer the case that we do not possess what we 
 do possess, whether we deceive ourselves about 
 it or not. But all the same I suspect that a still 
 greater danger is taking shape beside us. 
 
 [199 C.-2IO B. The difficulty is thus stated: how 
 can a man seek, unless he knows what he is seek- 
 ing? how, in other words, can one whose mind 
 is filled with knowledge take anything for that 
 which it is not? 
 
 " Perhaps," Theaetetus suggests, " we did 
 wrong to make our birds stand for forms of 
 knowledge only, and ought to have imagined, 
 flying about in the soul, forms of ignorance as 
 well; so that in regard to the same thing the 
 pursuer would at one time get hold of a form of 
 ignorance, at another of a form of knowledge. 
 
 " It is not easy," Socrates declares, " to abstain 
 
144 TALKS WITH ATHENIAN YOUTHS. 
 
 from praising you. Nevertheless I must ask you 
 to reconsider what you have said." 
 
 Examination proves the suggestion of Theae- 
 tetus to be of no avail, and it is finally agreed 
 that before we can understand false opinion, 
 knowledge itself must be understood. A final 
 definition is attempted by Theaetetus, namely, 
 "true opinion with the addition of reason;" 
 but this too, after an elaborate investigation, is 
 proved untenable, and the dialogue is in the 
 following manner brought to a close.] 
 
 2IO B. Soc. Are we then, my friend, still in tra- 
 vail with knowledge, or have we brought forth 
 everything? 
 
 Theaet. Yes, and I declare, by Zeus, that by 
 your help I have said more than there was in me. 
 
 Soc. And yet does not this art of ours de- 
 clare that all which has been brought forth is 
 not worth rearing? 
 
 Theaet. It does decidedly. 
 
 Soc. Well, Theaetetus, if, after this experience, 
 you should ever attempt to conceive other 
 thoughts, they will be the better by reason of 
 this present search ; if not, you will be less ex- 
 acting and more kindly to your companions, for 
 you will have the wisdom not to think you know 
 what you do not know. Just so much as this 
 and no more can my art accomolish ; nor do I 
 know aught of the things that are known by 
 the great and wondrous men who have been 
 
THEAETETUS. 145 
 
 and are to-day. This art, however, both I and 
 my mother have received from God, she 
 for women, I for fair and noble youths. 
 
 And now I must present myself at the Porch 
 of the King, 36 to answer the indictment which 
 Meletus has served against me. To-morrow 
 morning, Theaetetus, let us meet here again. 
 
 10 
 
NOTES. 
 
NOTES ON CHARMIDES. 
 
 NOTE i, p. 3. 
 
 In the Symposium Alcibiades speaks of the fortitude dis- 
 played by Socrates during the expedition to POTIDAEA (432-429 
 B. c.), of his indifference to cold and hunger, and of his coolness 
 and courage in battle. 
 
 NOTE 2, p. 3. 
 
 The TEMPLE or sacred enclosure here referred to was, until 
 recently, supposed to be that adjacent to the King's Porch 
 (see Note 36 on Theaetettis], the text being altered from ftacriXqs 
 to pacriXiKrjs to suit this meaning. 
 
 The recent discovery of an inscription mentioning land sacred 
 to BASILE has established the fact that there was a goddess or 
 other sacred person of this name, though whether or not she 
 was identical with Basileia, worshipped as the personification 
 of royalty, it is impossible to determine. Equally uncertain is 
 it whether the word here translated temple refers to a building 
 or merely to a sacred precinct, perhaps the same described 
 in the inscription as lying on the southern outskirts of the city, 
 and about to be planted with two hundred olive-trees and leased 
 to a tenant. 
 
 NOTE 3, p. 3. 
 
 This is the same CHAEREPHON of whom Socrates says in the 
 Apology : " You know, of course, what sort of man he was, 
 and how eager in whatever he undertook. Well, once he went 
 to Delphi, and had the boldness to consult the oracle on this 
 matter, and to ask if any one were wiser than I." Apol. 21 A. 
 
150 NOTES ON CHARMIDES. 
 
 NOTE 4, p. 4. 
 
 Critias, a near connection of Plato and a poet and orator, 
 was perhaps the author of the treatise On the Athenian State 
 (ascribed falsely to Xenophon), which is the earliest fragment 
 extant of Attic prose. He is here represented in a more favour- 
 able light than in history, where he appears as the greediest 
 and most bloodthirsty of the detested Thirty Tyrants. 
 
 NOTE 5, p. 5. 
 
 CHARMIDES, who was the maternal uncle of Plato, is said to 
 have shown in private debate extraordinary fitness' for the career 
 of a statesman, but to have been prevented, by want of self-confi- 
 dence, from taking any part in the popular assemblies. (Xen. 
 Mem. iii. 7.) It has been conjectured that Plato, to whose aris- 
 tocratic mind such abstinence doubtless appeared more than 
 excusable, introduced him into this dialogue with a view to 
 removing any unfavourable impression of him that may have 
 existed. While praising the youth for the modesty so becom- 
 ing to his years, he does not fail to point out the real dignity 
 which underlies his character and the humour which enlivens 
 it. Charmides was afterward one of the Ten who governed in 
 Peiraeus under the Thirty Tyrants. He and Critias were both 
 killed in the battle at Munychia, fighting against Thrasybulus 
 and the democratic party. 
 
 NOTE 6, p. 5. 
 
 That among the Greeks personal beauty was measured by the 
 form even more than by the face is clearly shown by Chaere- 
 phon's subsequent words, even if it were not sufficiently proved 
 by the excellence of Greek statuary. 
 
 Ttye almost reverential admiration excited by beauty is well 
 illustrated by the attitude of these young boys, as it is by the 
 talk of the Trojan graybeards in the Iliad, who, as they watch 
 Helen's approach, whisper to each other, 
 
NOTES ON CHARM IDES. 151 
 
 ' Small blame is theirs, if both the Trojan knights 
 And brazen-mailed Achaians have endured 
 So long so many evils for the sake 
 Of that one woman. She is wholly like 
 In feature to the deathless goddesses." 
 
 Iliad, iii. 154-158 (Bryant's translation). 
 
 NOTE 7, p. 6. 
 
 The words here translated " perfection itself " soon lost their 
 literal signification of "beautiful and good," and came to mean 
 /'an accomplished gentleman." In this sense KaXbs <aya66s was 
 frequently applied to the upper classes, as in Plato's Republic 
 (viii. 569 A.), where the aristocrats are spoken of as "those who 
 are called rich and beautiful and good." 
 
 NOTE 8, p. 6. 
 
 Several fragments of SOLON'S poems still exist, relating chiefly 
 to his political and legislative activity. His intention of making 
 a version in hexameter of his laws is mentioned in the Life of 
 Solon by Plutarch, who gives what purport to be the first lines 
 of this version. 
 
 This allusion to Solon, and the praise bestowed afterward 
 upon the ancestors of Charmides, seem to show that Plato, who 
 was nephew to Charmides, was not without pride of family. 
 
 NOTE 9, p. 8. 
 
 The use of charms as healing agents, in earlier days very 
 prevalent among the Greeks, was, even in the fifth century, 
 by no means confined to the ignorant classes. It is therefore 
 quite in keeping with his assumed character that Socrates pro- 
 fesses to have a charm for the cure of headache. Only as the 
 conversation progresses does he lay aside the character of phy- 
 sician and healer, and allow it to become evident that he refers 
 not to magic words or incantations, but to some subtler charm, 
 such as the "songs which have power to charm young men 
 into virtue" (Laws, 671 A.), or the influence of the "potent 
 charmer " who can " charm away the fears of the child within 
 
152 NOTES ON CHARMIDES. 
 
 us," that he may no longer "dread death as a bugbear." 
 Phaedo, 77 E. 
 
 NOTE 10, p. 9. 
 
 Herodotus reports a story that ZAMOLXIS acquired his wisdom 
 from Pythagoras, whose slave he was, and that on his return to 
 Thrace he practised the healing art among his own people with 
 such success that he was honoured as a god. The legend that 
 he conferred immortality is easily accounted for by his having 
 taught the doctrine of a future life. 
 
 This whole passage is curiously in harmony with the mind- 
 healing theory of to-day. 
 
 NOTE ii, p. n. 
 
 Plato's definition of TEMPERANCE, it need hardly be said, in- 
 cludes far 'more than the common definition of this virtue. 
 SGX^JOO-VI/T/, or temperance, a quality which embraces sound- 
 ness of mind, good sense, moderation, and various other virtues, 
 including wisdom itself, is defined in the Republic (iv. 442 
 C.-D.) as the submission of the soul's impulses and desires to the 
 rule of reason, inducing thereby harmony within the soul itself. 
 
 In the Gorgias we are told that the temperate man is one 
 who " will fulfil his duties toward gods and men, ... his deal- 
 ings in relation to men being just, toward the gods reverent, 
 . . . and he will, moreover, be courageous, . . . and, being just 
 and courageous and holy, he must needs be perfectly good, and 
 he who is good does well and nobly all that he does ; and he 
 who does well fares well and is blessed and happy." Gorg. 
 507 A.-D. 
 
 NOTE 12, p. 12. 
 
 ABARIS was a celebrated Thracian sage, who is said once to 
 have delivered the earth from a plague, and about whom various 
 fabulous stories are told, such as that he lived without food. 
 
 NOTE 13, p. 13. 
 
 " Shame ill becomes a beggar-man." 
 
 Odyss. xvii. 347. 
 
 This line is also quotsd in the Laches, 201 A. 
 
NOTES ON CHARMIDES. 153 
 
 NOTE 14, p. 1 6. 
 
 PRODICUS is always spoken of by Plato in a tone of good- 
 natured raillery. In the Laches he is said to be of all the 
 Sophists " the best at pulling words to pieces, " and in the Pro- 
 tagoras an amusing account is given of the man and his ways. 
 He is chiefly known by the fable of the Choice of Herakles 
 preserved to us by Xenophon Mem. ii. i, 21. 
 
 NOTE 15, p. 17. 
 
 Plato elsewhere alludes to the hoped-for advent of some great 
 and, perhaps, superhuman master, whose judgment on all sub- 
 jects is to be final. In the Phaedo (77 E.) we are told that 
 diligent search must be made for a " potent charmer " who shall 
 charm away the fear of death, as in Laches (196 A.) it is hinted 
 that he " who has a knowledge of what is or is not to be feared " 
 may prove to be a god. 
 
 NOTE 1 6, p. 1 8. 
 
 This declaration in regard to self-knowledge is in direct oppo- 
 sition to the views expressed by Socrates in all the other Pla- 
 tonic dialogues. But formal consistency with his own writings 
 was no part of Plato's plan, his aim being to carry each separate 
 point of view to its extreme conclusion, without reference to 
 the opinions which he has elsewhere set forth. 
 
 NOTE 17, p. 18. 
 
 When, in the Cratylus, an attempt is made to discover the 
 origin of words, the idea that they were imposed by some an- 
 cient legislator is rejected, for the reason that " it is impossible 
 to know things save either by being taught their names or by 
 finding them out ; " whereupon Cratylus suggests that some 
 power greater than human assigned to all things their first 
 names. Crat. 438 B.-C. 
 
NOTES ON LYSIS. 
 
 NOTE i, p. 23. 
 
 The ACADEMY, where Plato afterward taught, was about a 
 mile north of the city, the road thither being lined on either side 
 with the tombs of the most illustrious Athenians. Outside the city 
 in a different direction was the Lyceum, thus named in honour 
 of Apollo Lyceus, or the wolf-god, to whom it was dedicated. 
 Here is laid the scene of the Theaetetus, and here in after days 
 cams Aristotle with his followers. Spacious gardens were at- 
 tached to both these gymnasiums, the stream to which the 
 FOUNTAIN OF PANOPS gave birth flowing through that of the 
 Lyceum. This fountain, or spring, is casually mentioned by 
 Hesychius, as follows: " Panops is an Attic hero. There is of 
 him a temple and a statue and a spring.' 1 
 
 NOTE 2, p. 23. 
 
 Here, as in the Enthydemus, CTESIPPUS is represented as 
 a rollicking, somewhat bumptious fellow, full of high spirits and 
 fun. That he formed one of the Socratic circle is evident from 
 his presence at the death of Socrates. (See Phaedo, 59, C.) 
 Nothing further is known of the other characters here named. 
 
 NOTE 3, p. 25. 
 
 As Hermes was the god who presided over the gymnasium 
 and palaestrum, Athenian boys celebrated his festival (the Her- 
 maea) in these resorts, where, after offering sacrifices, they 
 were allowed to play games and amuse themselves freely. 
 
 MENEXENUS, whose name occurs just below, is frequently 
 mentioned by Plato, one of whose dialogues bears his name. 
 We hear of him in the Phaedo as one of the friends present at 
 the death of Socrates. 
 
NO TES ON L YSIS. \ 5 5 
 
 NOTE 4, p. 25. 
 
 In this room, which was called the Apodyterium, were left 
 the garments of those who were bathing or exercising. The 
 gymnastic exercises probably took place in the large oblong 
 court, which was the principal feature of the palaestrae or gym- 
 nasia. It was surrounded by a colonnade, a double row of pillars 
 on one side forming a spacious portico, out of which led various 
 apartments for the use of bathers. 
 
 In the court and porticos were seats, and here the philosophers 
 and teachers were in the habit of collecting their listeners around 
 them. 
 
 NOTE 5, p. 30. 
 
 The plectrum was a little stick or wand used for striking the 
 lyre. 
 
 NOTE 6, p. 34. 
 
 This seems to have been a favourite oath with Socrates, and 
 has been thought to refer to the dog-headed Anubis, the Egyp- 
 tian Hermes. 
 
 NOTE 7, p. 37. 
 
 The care of a Greek boy after the age of six or seven devolved 
 upon an attendant or pedagogue. It was his duty, not to teach 
 but to have general charge of his young master, accompanying 
 him to school and elsewhere, and often carrying his books for 
 him. Although the pedagogue was always a slave, so responsi- 
 ble a position was supposed to be occupied by one, if not of 
 education, at least of character and refinement. That this, how- 
 ever, was not universally the case, is evident from a passage in 
 Plutarch : " Of those slaves who are capable they appoint some 
 as husbandmen, some as skippers, some as traders, some as 
 stewards, some as money-lenders ; but whenever they find some 
 drunken, greedy fellow, of no use for any kind of work, they 
 turn the boys over to him." Plut, de lib. educ. 7. 
 
NOTES ON LACHES. 
 
 NOTE i, p. 41. 
 
 Those who taught the art of fighting in armour and the use of 
 weapons were accustomed, after the manner of the Sophists, to 
 give exhibitions of their skill, with the view of attracting pupils. 
 
 Freedom of movement with courage and coolness in action are 
 among the advantages enumerated by Nicias, in the course of 
 the dialogue, as derived from proficiency in this kind of combat. 
 
 NOTE 2, p. 41. 
 
 The THUCYDIDES here mentioned is not the historian, but 
 the politician who, being the rival of Pericles for supremacy in 
 the State, was ostracized in 444 B. c. The father of Lysimachus 
 was ARISTIDES the Just, whose reputation for " justice," was 
 such that he was chosen by the allies to assess the sum which 
 each member of the confederacy of Delos was to pay into the 
 common treasury. 
 
 In Meno (94 A. D.) the insignificant characters of LYSIMACHUS 
 and MELESIAS are held up as a proof that virtue cannot be taught, 
 since, had it been possible to impart it, like gymnastics or any 
 other branch of education, their fathers would have "found 
 out some one who would have made good men of them." 
 
 NOTE 3, p. 44. 
 
 At the time when the enemies of Pericles were beginning to 
 attack him through his friends, DAMON and Anaxagoras were 
 compelled to leave Athens, because, as former teachers of 
 Pericles, they had always remained on terms of intimacy with 
 him. 
 
NOTES ON LACHES, 157 
 
 NOTE 4, p. 45. 
 
 Socrates' behaviour during this retreat is thus described by 
 Alcibiades, rather to the disadvantage of his present panegyrist: 
 " I observed how far superior he was to Laches in presence of 
 mind, for he then appeared just- as you have described him, 
 stalking about there as he does here to-day, his head erect, and 
 casting his eyes around, and calmly scrutinizing friend and foe. 
 It was plain to see, even from a distance, that if any one were 
 to lay hands upon this man, he would stoutly defend himself." 
 Symp. 221 B. 
 
 NOTE 5, p. 46. 
 
 The parallel here drawn between Athens and Lacedaemon 
 is hardly supported by facts. The Lacedaemonians were op- 
 posed to all changes, in education as in other things. So the 
 Sophist Hippias (Hippias Major, 283) declares that in spite of 
 his numerous visits to Sparta he has never made any money 
 in that city by his teaching, and adds that "it is not lawful 
 among them to introduce a foreign mode of education " (Ibid. 
 284). 
 
 Athens, on the other hand, with her wealth and prosperity 
 and the stimulus imparted to the arts by the refined taste of 
 Pericles, became not only the commercial capital of Greece, but 
 the chief centre of the artistic and literary world. Whoever 
 had anything to exhibit naturally found his way to the city, 
 where constant opportunity for seeing and hearing master- 
 pieces had produced the most accomplished critics of antiquity, 
 and where at certain seasons all Greece was assembled as 
 audience. 
 
 NOTE 6, p. 47. 
 
 LACHES was, with Charoeades, commander of the twenty ships 
 sent to Sicily in 427 B. c. by the Athenians to assist the Leon- 
 tines against the Syracusans. It may have been in the course of 
 this expedition that he saw Stesilaus under the trying circum- 
 stances described in the text. Laches was relieved of his 
 
158 NOTES ON LACHES. 
 
 command after a little more than a year, but appears again in 
 418 B. c. as one of the commanders of the Athenian contingent 
 in the battle of Mantinea, where he lost his life. 
 
 NOTE 7, p. 48. 
 
 The poverty of Socrates is pleaded upon a more important 
 occasion, when in suggesting the penalty of a fine, he remarks : 
 " But in my case that will be neither more nor less than im- 
 prisonment, for I have no money wherewith to pay it." 
 Apol. 37 C. 
 
 NOTE 8, p. 49. 
 
 In Greece the religious element was never wanting in any 
 concern of daily life. Thus, although the division of Attica 
 into demes or townships was originally made for political rea- 
 sons solely, each deme had from the first its own peculiar cele- 
 brations and observances, and its inhabitants were united by 
 religious no less than by secular bonds. 
 
 NOTE 9, p. 49. 
 
 Compare this with the account put into the mouth of Alcibia- 
 des (Symp. 216 A.). "Often," he says, " I have been brought 
 to such a state by this Marsyas that it has seemed to me im- 
 possible to live as I am. . . . For he compels me to acknowl- 
 edge that I am greatly at fault in that, while busying myself 
 about the interests of the Athenians, I am neglecting my own 
 soul. . . . Therefore, stopping my ears as if to shut out the voice 
 of sirens, I tear myself away by force, lest I grow old sitting at 
 his feet." 
 
 NOTE 10, p. 49. 
 
 Plutarch quotes Solon as saying that he 
 
 " Each day grew older and learnt something new." 
 
 The subsequent career of Nicias proved that, in his case at 
 least, old age did not bring with it wisdom. He was a man 
 whose sterling integrity and dignity of character had raised him 
 deservedly to posts of highest honour ; but the irresolution and 
 
NOTES ON LACHES. 159 
 
 timidity which grew upon him with increasing years cost his 
 country, in the fateful expedition against Syracuse, a shameful 
 defeat, and sent him to an unhonoured grave. 
 
 NOTE n, p. 50. 
 
 The ancients recognized seven, if not more scales or kinds 
 of music, differing from each other not simply in pitch but in 
 quality, somewhat as do the minor and major keys of modern 
 music. Plato (Rep. III. 398 C.-399 E.) discusses several of 
 these varieties. He excludes from his ideal republic the Ionian 
 and Lydian, on the ground that they are soft and adapted to 
 drinking-songs, but admits the Phrygian and Dorian, since they 
 encourage fortitude and endurance in dangers, and self-restraint 
 and moderation in good fortune. 
 
 " Anon they move 
 
 In perfect phalanx to the Dorian mood 
 Of flutes and soft recorders ; such as raised 
 To height of noblest temper heroes old 
 Arming to battle. 
 
 Milton, Par. Lost, i. 550. 
 
 NOTE 12, p. 55. 
 
 See Note 15 on Charmides for other allusions to the advent 
 of one whose knowledge will exceed that now possessed by any 
 mortal. 
 
 NOTE 13, p. 56. 
 
 Plutarch tells us that, in spite of his advanced age, LAMACHUS, 
 who, with Nicias, was a leader in the expedition against 
 Syracuse, displayed a courage and intrepidity worthy of an 
 Alcibiades. 
 
 The citizens of the deme of AEXONE, to which Laches be- 
 longed, were noted for their abusiveness of speech. 
 
 NOTE 14, p. 58. 
 
 NICERATUS afterwards perished at the hands of the Thirty 
 Tyrants. 
 
NOTES ON EUTHYDEMUS. 
 
 NOTE i, p. 63. 
 
 CLEINIAS, the son of Axiochus, is not named in any other 
 Platonic dialogue, except casually in the spurious Axiochus, 
 where he summons Socrates to the deathbed of his father. 
 
 CRITOBULUS, the son of Crito, is casually mentioned else- 
 where. 
 
 NOTE 2, p. 63. 
 
 EUTHYDEMUS is not to be confounded with his namesake of 
 Xenophon's Memorabilia, an accomplished youth who profited 
 by the searching cross-examination of Socrates. That the man 
 and his teachings were widely known is evident from a passage 
 in the Cratylus, where his name follows that of Protagoras. 
 "You do not believe with Euthydemus," Socrates there de- 
 clares, "that all men possess all things equally at the same 
 time and always ; for in that case, and if virtue and vice were 
 possessed equally by all, some would not, as is actually the case, 
 be bad, and others good." Crat. 386 D. 
 
 DIONYSODORUS is known only as the helpmeet of his brother, 
 although the ingenious hypothesis of a German writer (Teich- 
 muller) identifies him with the orator Lysias, who is mentioned 
 in the Republic as son of the aged Cephalus and brother of 
 Euthydemus and Polemarchus. 
 
 NOTE 3, p. 64. 
 
 THURII was an Italian colony of Athens, which maintained 
 close relations with the mother-country. 
 
 We seem to read here between the lines a sly suspicion that 
 this exile was due not simply to political reasons, but in part 
 to the odium in which the Sophists were held by their own 
 countrymen. 
 
NOTES ON EUTHYDEMUS. l6l 
 
 NOTE 4, p. 64. 
 
 This passing hit at the practice of receiving pay for instruction 
 is in keeping with the views of both Socrates and Plato upon 
 the subject. 
 
 The PANCRATIAST was a professional athlete who devoted 
 himself to feats of strength, such as boxing and wrestling, to 
 the exclusion of other gymnastic exercises, thus developing to 
 an abnormal degree certain parts of the body, sometimes at the 
 expense of his general health. 
 
 The inhabitants of ACARNANIA, one of the outlying districts 
 of Greece, were noted for their skill in the use of the sling and 
 other arts of warfare, and were consequently in great demand 
 as mercenary troops. The brothers mentioned in the text, al- 
 though they had evidently attained some contemporary celebrity, 
 are not known to fame. 
 
 NOTE 5, p. 66. 
 
 The familiar sign or daemon seems in this instance, as in so 
 many others, to have been a presentiment which " made itself 
 heard," as Socrates says (Apol. 31 D.-E.), " only to turn me back 
 from what I am about to do, but never to impel me forward." 
 
 NOTE 6, p. 66. 
 
 PAEANIA was the same deme of Attica to which Demosthenes 
 the orator belonged. See Note 2 on Lysis for further mention 
 of Ctesippus. 
 
 NOTE 7, p. 67. 
 
 The teaching of virtue, which Protagoras proclaimed to be 
 the true end of his art, is attempted merely in name by these less 
 respectable Sophists, who seem to have adopted the doctrines 
 of the Eleatic philosophers only to employ them in paradoxical 
 quibbles. 
 
1 62 NOTES ON EUTHYDEMUS. 
 
 NOTE 8, p. 72. 
 
 Aristotle, in his treatise on Fallacies, was the first to analyze 
 and classify verbal puzzles of this kind. 
 
 A well known author has aptly remarked that even in our 
 own day " a sophism, perfectly analogous in character to those 
 which Plato here exposes to ridicule, may, in another case, 
 easily escape detection from the hearer, and even from the 
 reasoner himself. People are constantly misled by fallacies 
 arising from the same word bearing two senses. ... If these 
 fallacies appear so obviously inconclusive that they can deceive 
 no one, the reason lies not in the premises themselves, but in 
 the particular conclusions to which they lead; which conclu- 
 sions are known on other grounds to be false, and never to be 
 seriously maintained by any person." Grote's Plato, vol. i. 
 p. 549. 
 
 NOTE 9, p. 75. 
 
 The wild music and dances in honour of Cybele were en- 
 couraged and shared by the CORYBANTES, the name by which 
 the priests of this goddess in Phrygia were known. 
 
 In the rites of initiation games and other frolics played apart, 
 as is the case in many secret societies of to-day. 
 
 NOTE 10, p. 79. 
 
 The bare suggestion of wishing a friend's destruction is sup- 
 posed to convey with it an evil omen which Ctesippus would 
 fain have transferred from his own head to that of the evil 
 wisher. 
 
 NOTE n, p. 80. 
 
 The Cappadocians, Cretans, and Carians, owing to their un- 
 enviable reputation for faithlessness, were known as the three 
 bad kappas, their common initial letter; the Carians espe- 
 cially being regarded as the lowest dregs of the population and 
 treated no better than dogs. The name of CARIAN, and of 
 
NOTES ON EUTHYDEMUS. 163 
 
 Thracian as well, was synonymous with that of slave, probably 
 because most of the Greek slaves came from those provinces. 
 
 The allusion below is to the story of Medea, who having, 
 by process of boiling, turned an old ram into a lamb, persuaded 
 the daughters of Pelias to cut their father in pieces and boil 
 him, under the pretence that he would thus be restored to 
 youth. 
 
 Further on the story of MARSYAS is referred to, the Phry- 
 gian satyr, who, having picked up the discarded flute of Athene 
 and finding that of itself it emitted beautiful sounds, presumed 
 to challenge Apollo and his cithara. On being adjudged by the 
 Muses the inferior of Apollo, he was flayed alive and his skin 
 suspended in the cave where rose the river of which he was 
 the god. The character of the satyr makes the use of his skin 
 for a wine-jar peculiarly appropriate. 
 
 The tale is doubtless a fabled account of the rival claims of 
 cithara and flute; the former being used in the worship of 
 Apollo, the other in that of Cybele. 
 
 NOTE 12, p. 81. 
 
 PROTEUS, the sea-god, who assumed all sorts of shapes to 
 avoid being forced to disclose his knowledge (Horn. Od. iv. 384 
 foil), is no unfitting prototype of teachers who took every oppor- 
 tunity to throw their adversary off the track by quibbles, each 
 more absurd than the last. Whoever wished to obtain an answer 
 from Proteus was obliged to hold him fast until he returned 
 to his proper form, a feat said to have been accomplished by 
 Menelaus. 
 
 This same Proteus is portrayed by Euripides (Helena) as king 
 of Egypt, at whose court rather than at that of King Priam of 
 Troy, he supposes Helen to have tarried. 
 
 NOTE 13, p. 83. 
 
 His own supposed want of memory was a standing joke with 
 Socrates himself. " It so happens," he declares, * ; that I am a 
 forgetful man, and if any one talks to me at length I quite lose 
 track of the subject." Prof. 334 C. 
 
1 64 NOTES ON EUTHYDEMUS. 
 
 NOTE 14, p. 84. 
 
 The electric lights called by modern sailors St. Elmo's fire 
 were regarded by the ancients as manifestations of the Dioscuri, 
 otherwise known as the twin brothers Castor and Pollux, 
 who were supposed to care for mariners and travellers generally. 
 Hence Socrates, in danger from the waves of discussion, thinks 
 of the Dioscuri, whom he would naturally invoke if exposed 
 to a tempestuous sea. The expression "triple wave" refers 
 to a notion current among the Greeks that every third wave 
 was greater than its two predecessors. "You do not seem 
 aware that when I have barely escaped the first and second 
 waves, you are now bringing upon me the third and most terrible 
 one of all." Rep. 472 A. 
 
 NOTE 15, p. 87. 
 
 The Lernean HYDRA was slain by Heracles, with the aid of 
 his nephew lolaus. That the newly arrived monster should 
 be described as bearing down from the left makes the allusion 
 to Dionysodorus, who was seated at the left of Socrates, seem 
 more pointed. 
 
 Of PATROCLES, the nephew of Socrates, little or nothing 
 further is known. 
 
 NOTE 1 6, p. 89. 
 
 The epithet "ancestral" was given by the ancients to the 
 deity from whom they derived their origin. Zeus was wor- 
 shipped in some cities as the ancestral deity, and, according to 
 the Scholiast on Aristophanes' Clouds (1468), bore this epithet 
 also in Athens, though Socrates here seems to say that he 
 was worshipped in Athens only as a god of the family and of 
 the phratry or tribal division. 
 
 NOTE 17, p. 92. 
 
 These words are found in the opening of the first and the 
 close of the third Olympian odes. 
 
NOTES ON EUTHYDEMUS. 165 
 
 NOTE 1 8, p. 92. 
 
 We may detect here a good-natured rallying of Crito upon his 
 well known love of acquisition. 
 
 NOTE 19, p. 94. 
 
 This description is supposed to refer to I SOCRATES, a rhe- 
 torical teacher, political essayist, and writer of speeches to be 
 spoken in the courts of justice. In his youth he was a pupil of 
 Socrates, but thought he derived little benefit from the pursuit 
 of philosophy. He seems, in Plato's opinion, to have resembled 
 the "four," spoken of in the Gorgias, who, "banded together 
 in the quest of wisdom," exhorted one another to "take care 
 lest, by becoming over-wise, they should unwittingly work their 
 own ruin." Gorg. 487 C. 
 
 Yet in the Phaedrus Plato speaks in no unflattering terms of 
 Isocrates, who was not only a friend of kings and a teacher 
 of teachers, but was also the founder of an important branch 
 of literary prose. His death is said to have been caused by 
 the report of the fatal battle which made Philip of Macedonia 
 master of Greece. 
 
 " As that dishonest victory 
 At Chaeronea, fatal to liberty, 
 Killed with report that old man eloquent." 
 
 Milton, Sonnet X. 
 
NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 NOTE i, p. 99. 
 
 The Agora was not only the centre of civic politics and the 
 chief place for the transaction of business, but the public prome- 
 nade where at certain hours all the world was to be found. 
 In the Gorgias (485 D.) the philosopher is censured by the 
 worldly Callicles because he " avoids the heart of the city and 
 the Agora, where, as the poet tells us, men acquire eminence." 
 
 EUCLID of Megara must not be confounded with the celebrated 
 mathematician of the same name. That he was an ardent fol- 
 lower of Socrates is shown by the story of his nightly visits to 
 him, in woman's disguise, at a time when the Megarians were 
 forbidden under pain of death to visit Athens. After the death 
 of Socrates, he founded in Megara a school which combined the 
 Eleatic philosophy, familiar to him from youth, with the dialec- 
 tics and ethical teachings of his master. 
 
 NOTE 2, p. 99. 
 
 Of the many engagements which took place at CORINTH, that 
 of 394 B. c., when the Athenians and their allies were severely 
 defeated by the Lacedaemonians, is probably referred to in the 
 text. A peculiar interest is lent to this battle by the beautiful 
 monument to the young knight Dexileos, with its inscription : 
 " One of the five horsemen who perished at Corinth in the 
 archonship of Eubulides." 
 
 NOTE 3, p. 101. 
 
 ERINEUM, a town near Eleusis, on the road from Megara to 
 Athens, was said to be the spot where Pluto descended to Hades 
 with Persephone. Paus. i. 38, 5. 
 
NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 NOTE 4, p. 101. 
 
 Here a break, occurs, the conversation being resumed within 
 the house of Euclid. 
 
 The change from the narrative to the dramatic form has been 
 held by some writers to determine the chronological order of 
 Plato's dialogues, those which are narrative being presumably 
 earlier than the Theaetetus, those which are dramatic of later 
 date. 
 
 This dialogue is the only one supposed to be read from the 
 notes of a person who had taken no part in it. 
 
 There is a passage in the so-called letters of Xenophon from 
 which we gather that, although Plato undoubtedly borrowed 
 from the transcript of Euclid, so much was added of his own 
 invention that the original was no longer to be recognized. 
 
 NOTE 5, p. 101. 
 
 THEODORUS of Cyrene, a former pupil of Protagoras, was a 
 celebrated mathematician and geometrician, with whom Plato 
 is said to have studied. He is not to be confounded with the 
 later Cyrenaic philosopher, Theodorus the Atheist. 
 
 NOTE 6, p. 102. 
 
 In the Symposium (215-217) Socrates is compared by Alcibi- 
 ades to the masks of Silenus and also to Marsyas the Satyr. 
 
 Those passages and that of the text are the principal descrip- 
 tions given by Plato of the personal appearance of Socrates. 
 
 NOTE 7, p. 103. 
 
 The rare union of the qualities held by Plato to be the pecu- 
 liar property of the philosopher is elsewhere spoken of : " How," 
 he asks. " shall we find a nature that is at once gentle and high- 
 spirited ? For gentleness of nature seems to be at variance with 
 high spirit." Repub. 375 C. 
 
1 68 NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 NOTE 8, p. 103. 
 
 The only one of these " companions " subsequently mentioned 
 is Socrates the younger (147 C). 
 
 From the allusion to a race-course and to the anointing of 
 the youths, the scene is evidently a gymnasium, probably the 
 Lyceum. See the Euthyphro, which in point of time is the 
 sequence of this dialogue. " What new thing has happened, 
 Socrates," it is there asked, " that you have left the Lyceum 
 and come here to the Porch of the King ? " And compare the 
 closing words of the Theaetetus : "And now I must take my 
 way to the Porch of the King to answer the indictment which 
 Miletus has served against me." 
 
 NOTE 9, p. 104. 
 
 The rather peremptory mode of address and the use of the 
 vocative bespeak the relationship of master and pupil. 
 
 The deme to which EUPHRONIUS, the father of Theaetetus, 
 belonged was in Attica, so that he was accounted an Athenian, 
 although his residence was not within the city. 
 
 NOTE 10, p. 108. 
 
 The effect produced by Socrates upon his hearers is de- 
 scribed in the Meno, 80 A.-B. : " Both in outward form and in 
 your effect upon others, you seem to me, if I may be allowed 
 a jest, very like the flat torpedo fish, who renders torpid those 
 that come near and lay hold of him. Even so you seem now 
 to have done to me, for my soul and my speech are in fact 
 torpid, so that I am not able to answer you. Thousands of 
 times ere now and to many people have I said all manner of 
 things about virtue, and very well too, I thought ; but now I 
 cannot even say what virtue is." 
 
 NOTE n, p. no. 
 
 The full meaning of what Plato calls perception or sense- 
 knowledge is better conveyed by the German " Wahrnehmung " 
 
NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 169 
 
 than by any one English word, and its comprehensiveness is 
 shown by a sentence which occurs later in the dialogue ~ 
 
 " The senses have sundry names, those of sight, hearing, 
 smelling, and likewise those of cold, heat, and pleasures, pains, 
 desires, and fears." Theaet. 1 56 B. 
 
 NOTE 12, p. no. 
 
 PROTAGORAS, the celebrated philosopher of Abdera, nick- 
 named " the All-Wise," is chiefly known to us by the maxim, 
 " Man is the measure of all things," of which the following is 
 an amplified form : " As things appear to me, so they are to me ; 
 as they appear to you, so to you ; for you are a man, and so am 
 I." Theaet. 152 A. Plato, although he often misinterprets 
 the doctrines of Protagoras and, as in this dialogue, " runs him 
 hard," evidently holds him in affectionate regard. In his dia- 
 logue of the Protagoras, he not only makes him the mouth- 
 piece of admirable views on punishment and education, but 
 gives him a certain advantage in the discussion. 
 
 HERACLITUS of Ephesus, sometimes called the "weeping 
 philosopher," who maintained the doctrine of universal motion, 
 should not be held responsible for the loose and sceptical views 
 which his followers adopted after his death, and which are 
 treated with such contempt by Theodorus (180 A.-B.). 
 
 EMPEDOCLES of Agrigentum, whom Aristotle calls a " Ho- 
 meric spirit." was a poet and statesman as well as philosopher. 
 A disciple of Parmenides, he soon departed from the Eleatic 
 doctrine of unity and fixedness, and taught that fire, air, water, 
 and earth are the fundamental principles of all things. 
 
 NOTE 13, p. in. 
 
 Eurip. Hippolytus, 612 : " My tongue has sworn, but my mind 
 is unsworn." This passage is referred to several times by Plato, 
 and also by Aristophanes and Cicero. 
 
 NOTE 14, p. in. 
 
 The personification of Divine Philosophy in IRIS may have 
 been suggested by the parentage of this messenger of the gods. 
 
I/O NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 " Electra, the daughter of deep-flowing ocean, did Thaumas 
 espouse, and to Iris, swift-footed, gave birth." Hes. Theog 
 265. 
 
 " By wondering (6avpafiv)" says Aristotle, " men now as 
 in olden days begin the study of philosophy ; " and he stated 
 further that philosophy ceases with the cessation of wonder. 
 Metaph. I. A similar doctrine was taught by Democritus and 
 by the Stoics. 
 
 NOTE 15, p. 112. 
 
 Those who were initiated into the sacred mysteries were be- 
 lieved to possess truths handed down by tradition from dis- 
 tant ages. Plato, therefore, calls such as content themselves 
 with " that which lies nearest them " and is perceived by the 
 senses the " uninitiated." These are the materialists described 
 in the Sophist (246 A.-B.) as men who " maintain that only 
 what may be touched and handled has real existence, because 
 they define soul and body as one and the same ; and they will 
 not hear of anything different, but if any one asserts that aught 
 can exist without a body they utterly despise him." 
 
 In comparison with these, Protagoras is an idealist. He held 
 that, since all things are relative, it can hardly be said that a 
 thing is, but rather that it is ever coming into being through its 
 relation to some other thing. The same, he maintained, is true 
 of qualities : they are the product of two kinds of motion, one of 
 which is active and proceeds from the subject, while the other 
 is passive and proceeds from the object of perception. Thus 
 colour may be explained as the product of motion, proceeding 
 on the one hand from the eye, and on the other from the object 
 which appears to possess colour. By some such hidden process 
 is that which we call " appearance " caused. 
 
 NOTE 16, p. 119. 
 
 From this passage and that of 162 A., it may be inferred that 
 the Lacedaemonians allowed none to enter their gymnasiums 
 who would not take part in the exercises. 
 
 SCIRON was a robber, who, as the story goes, compelled the 
 
NOTES ON THEAETETUS. \>]\ 
 
 travellers whom he had robbed to wash his feet, and then hurled 
 them down from the top of a high rock which stood near the 
 frontier of Megara. He met his reward at the hands of Theseus ; 
 but, the earth refusing to receive him, he was suspended mid- 
 air, and finally changed into a rock in commemoration of his 
 past misdeeds. 
 
 ANTAEUS, the Lydian giant, son of Poseidon and Earth, 
 compelled all whom he met to wrestle with him, gaining, himself, 
 fresh strength from every contact with Earth, his mother. It was 
 only by lifting him from the ground that Heracles was finally 
 able to vanquish and slay him. 
 
 NOTE 17, p. 121. 
 
 The image of the old philosopher suddenly raising up his 
 head and as suddenly disappearing again may have been sug- 
 gested by " Charon's steps," a flight of stairs used in the theatre 
 for introducing ghosts upon the scene. 
 
 A covert sarcasm may here be intended on the well known 
 unwillingness of Protagoras to listen to the statements made 
 by his opponents. 
 
 NOTE 18, p. 121. 
 
 It is interesting to compare this remark with the statement 
 of Socrates that "at the age of more than seventy years, I 
 am now for the first time appearing before a court of justice, 
 so that I am an utter stranger to the manner of speaking there." 
 ApoL 17 D. 
 
 See also the Gorgias (486 B.), where Callicles asserts that 
 Socrates, if made to appear before a court, would stand " dizzy 
 and gaping, and with never a word to say." 
 
 NOTE 19, p. 122. 
 
 The rule that nothing outside of the subject-matter might be 
 touched upon was not strictly observed, as appears from an allu- 
 sion in the Apology to the defendant turning suppliant (ApoL 
 
 34 C.). 
 
 The expression rendered, " the so-called affidavits," refers to 
 one of the first steps in an Athenian legal procedure, wherein 
 
1/2 NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 each party in a suit made oath to the justice of his cause. 
 Many scholars regard this as an interpolation. 
 
 The "master" just below mentioned is probably the Demus, 
 or sovereign people, represented in the court by the presiding 
 officer. The personification of the people was familiar to the 
 Athenians of Plato's time from various examples, notably that in 
 the Knights of Aristophanes. From the significant language 
 here used, it would seem that Plato had some particular case 
 in mind, very probably the trial of Socrates. 
 
 The "clepsydra," or water-clock, was always placed in full 
 view of the orator. It consisted of a globe with a short neck 
 for the introduction of the water, small holes being pierced 
 on the bottom for its escape. As the length of time necessary 
 for this process varied with the temperature, the gauge was 
 far from a perfect one. 
 
 If this dialogue was written or finished after Plato's return 
 from Sicily, it is possible that the whole passage may refer to the 
 tyrant Dionysius and his habit of presiding in court, in which 
 case the description of the sycophant which follows may apply 
 to the historian Philistius, whose machinations nearly caused 
 Plato's destruction. But as the dialogue is supposed to have 
 occurred just before the trial of Socrates (see the closing sen- 
 tence), it is more natural to see here a prophetic allusion to 
 that event. 
 
 NOTE 20, p. 123. 
 
 The first recorded victory in a contest of tragedy was won 
 by Thespis in 536. From this time dramatic and dithyrambic 
 choral performances held in honour of the god Dionysus formed 
 a regular part of the two great yearly festivals, and always 
 bore the character of a contest. The chief cost, that of the 
 choruses, was defrayed by some wealthy citizens who, under the 
 title of choragus, received and dedicated the crown or the prize, 
 usually a tripod, which was awarded by the judges to the vic- 
 torious chorus. 
 
 NOTE 21, p. 124. 
 
 Here Plato may have had in mind the contemptible action 
 of the rhetorician Lysias, in bringing up at the trial of the 
 
NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 173 
 
 younger Alcibiades all the sins of the father, and laying them 
 upon the son. 
 
 NOTE 22, p. 124. 
 
 A passage in the Republic (500 B.-C.) emphasizes the indif- 
 ference of the true philosopher to worldly considerations and 
 interests. "Is not," it is asked, "the bitterness which many 
 feel toward philosophy due to the outsiders who, like disorderly 
 revellers, enter in there where they do not belong, abusing and 
 wrangling with each other, and forever talking of people, a theme 
 which least of all befits philosophy ? . . . For he whose thoughts 
 are truly fixed upon realities has not the leisure to look down- 
 wards upon the affairs of men, nor in the struggle against them 
 to become filled with envy and ill-will ; but, from beholding and 
 contemplating principles which are fixed and immovable and 
 which neither injure nor are injured by each other but act 
 always in accordance with reason and order, he imitates these 
 and, so far as he is able, grows into their likeness." 
 
 After the usual fashion of Plato, the quotation from Pindar 
 given a few lines above is freely interwoven into his text. 
 
 NOTE 23, p. 124. 
 
 Chaucer, in "The Milleres Tale," 3458-60, uses a similar 
 illustration. 
 
 "He walked in the feldes for to prie 
 Upon the starres, what ther sholde befalle 
 Til he was in a marie-pit y-falle." 
 
 THALES, one of the seven wise men, a native of Miletus in 
 Ionia, is one of those to whom the maxim written on the Temple 
 of Apollo at Delphi, " Know thyself," has been ascribed. He 
 was not only the earliest of the Greek philosophers (born prob- 
 ably 624 B. c.), but the founder also of geometry and astron- 
 omy, and is thought to have predicted the eclipse of the sun 
 which occurred in 585 B. c. According to his theory of the uni- 
 verse, water was the origin of all things and the life-giving 
 element. 
 
 It has been conjectured that the " Thracian handmaid " rep- 
 resents Antisthenes, the founder or precursor of the Cynics, 
 
1/4 NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 whose contempt of culture, and even of knowledge, was in 
 Plato's eyes "slavish." The epithets applied to the handmaid 
 are not ill suited to this philosopher, whose reputation was that 
 of a gay and charming companion. 
 
 NOTE 24, p. 127. 
 
 An Athenian dramatist of the fourth century seems to have 
 borrowed from this passage, in the lines of which the following 
 is a literal translation : 
 
 " Family is my despair. If you love me, mother, speak not 
 about each man's family. They who have nothing good in their 
 own nature straightway fly to the tombs, and begin to count 
 over the number of their ancestors. But they gain naught there- 
 by, nor can you mention one who has no ancestors ; how else, 
 indeed, were he born?" Menander, Fragm. 533. 
 
 If Plato's real opinion is expressed in the words of the text, 
 his well known bias in favour of aristocracy would seem to have 
 proceeded not from belief in the intrinsic value of good birth, 
 but from a conviction that it is true of inherited position as it is 
 of inherited fortune that they who have received it " do not care 
 over-much for it," while " they who have made their own for- 
 tune (or position) value it as their own work, besides valuing it 
 for its uses, as the others do." {Repub. 330 C.) He accepted 
 aristocracy in its literal meaning, the rule of the best, that 
 " small remnant of true philosophers " (Repub. 496 B.), whose 
 leadership if followed would ensure the fulfilment of justice, and 
 who alone are capable of mastering political science, of all 
 sciences the most difficult (see Laws, 864 A.). 
 
 It is reported of Socrates that, on hearing Alcibiades boast 
 of his lands and possessions, he showed the youth a map of the 
 world, bidding him point them out upon it. 
 
 NOTE 25, p. 128. 
 
 The same idea is found in the allegory of the Cave (Repub. 
 515 .-516 A.). " If any one were to draw him by force up the 
 steep narrow way, and not let go of him till he had drawn him 
 
NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 175 
 
 into the sunlight, would he not suffer and be in distress ; and 
 after he had come to the light, and his eyes were full of it, 
 would he not be unable to behold any one of those things that 
 are called truth? " 
 
 NOTE 26, p. 128. 
 
 The cloak was a large oblong cloth first thrown over the left 
 shoulder and passed round the back to the right side, and then 
 over the right arm, to be finally brought again over the left 
 shoulder. According to a man's skill or awkwardness in wear- 
 ing this garment he was held to be a gentleman or a boor. 
 
 As it was customary for travellers to carry their own bedding, 
 it formed a chief part of the equipment needed for a journey, 
 and thus the term just above translated by this word came to 
 be applied to luggage in general. 
 
 In contrast to the "flattering speech" of the slave, see the 
 description in Laches (188 D.) of the "harmonious language," 
 the use of which marks the true freeman. 
 
 NOTE 27, p. 128. 
 
 Many passages in Plato's writings, like that of the text, de- 
 scribe holiness as perfected only through union with the divine. 
 
 "In their search to discover within themselves the nature 
 of God they have the less difficulty, because they have been 
 compelled to gaze steadfastly upon him; thus their memory 
 clings to him, and they become inspired, and derive his char- 
 acter and his ways, so far as it is possible for man to partake 
 of the nature of God. Phaedrus, 253 A. 
 
 " Rightly does the mind of the philosopher alone have wings ; 
 for he, so far as may be, keeps ever before him the memory of 
 those things in virtue of which even God himself is divine. 
 Therefore a man who uses aright such memories as these is for- 
 ever being initiated into perfect mysteries, and alone attains the 
 mystery of perfection." Phaedrus, 249 C. 
 
 " By constant intercourse with the steadfast and the divine 
 he himself becomes divine and steadfast, so far as is possible 
 to man." Repub. 500 D. 
 
[76 NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 NOTE 28, p. 129. 
 
 " He who is really fighting for the right," Socrates elsewhere 
 declares, " must, if he would be safe even for a short time, lead 
 a private life, not a public one." Apol. 32 A. 
 
 The words " cumbering the ground," cited also in the Apology 
 (28 D.), are carelessly quoted from the speech of Achilles to 
 Thetis his mother. Horn. //. 18, 104. 
 
 NOTE 29, p. 130. 
 
 See the Phaedo, where the future of a spiritual nature is 
 contrasted with that of an earthly one. 
 
 " When then the soul departs in this state, she goes to the 
 world which is invisible like herself, to the world divine and 
 immortal and full of thought ; there, set free from error, folly, 
 fears, and the fierce passions and other ills of humanity, her lot 
 is a happy one indeed. . . . But if on her release she be found 
 unclean and polluted by her intercourse with the body ... it 
 cannot be supposed that she will depart hence pure and uncon- 
 taminated. . . . Rather will she become again entangled in that 
 bodily form which, by reason of companionship and intercourse 
 and constant solicitude for the body, has become an essential 
 part of her nature" (Phaedo, 81 A.-C.). This passage is imi- 
 tated by Milton in the Comus, 467 ff. : 
 
 " The soul grows clotted by contagion, 
 Imbodies and imbrutes, till she quite lose 
 The divine property of her first being ; 
 Such are those thick and gloomy shadows damp, 
 Oft seen in charnel vaults and sepulchres." 
 
 NOTE 30, p. 132. 
 
 This attack upon the followers of Heraclitus is very appro- 
 priately put into the mouth of Theodorus, to whom, as a geome- 
 trician, their vague and ambiguous statements must have been 
 peculiarly distasteful. Heraclitus himself derived his title, " the 
 obscure," in great part from the enigmatical brevity of his sen- 
 tences, but his disciples appear in this respect to have gone 
 beyond their master. 
 
NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 177 
 
 NOTE 31, p. 134. 
 
 In direct opposition to the Heraclitean theory was the doc- 
 trine of PARMENIDES that existence is One and unchangeable 
 and eternal, and that change and motion are but appearances. 
 It is in allusion to his words (quoted 180 E.), "All Being is 
 One and self-contained," that he is here called "the One." 
 The great chief of the Eleatic school is elsewhere described at 
 the age of sixty-five as " very old and gray-haired, but of noble 
 appearance." Parmenides, 127 B. 
 
 MELISSUS of Samos, a statesman and warrior as well as phi- 
 losopher, was a follower of Parmenides, and a slightly younger 
 contemporary of the Eleatic Zeno. 
 
 None of the followers of Parmenides seem to have preserved 
 his doctrines without serious changes. From maintaining all 
 knowledge derived from the senses to be illusory, they finally 
 tended toward complete negation and scepticism. 
 
 NOTE 32, p. 135. 
 
 The image suggests that just as the warriors in the Wooden 
 Horse at Troy, although contained in the same image, were 
 complete and independent persons, so our faculties may be dis- 
 tinct entities, not parts of one soul, although contained in the 
 same human form. 
 
 NOTE 33, p. 136. 
 
 It has been well remarked, " These ideas must not be 
 
 measured by their familiarity to ourselves. To the Greek mind 
 
 they were a revelation and a triumphant vindication of mind 
 over sense." Jowett. 
 
 NOTE 34, p. 138. 
 
 The tablet here spoken of is not a waxen writing-tablet, but a 
 block of wax used for sealing. Locke employs a similar illus- 
 tration in describing the different kinds of memory. 
 
 " If the organs or faculties of perception, like wax overhard- 
 ened with cold, will not receive the impression, ... or, like wax 
 
 12 
 
178 NOTES ON THEAETETUS. 
 
 01 a temper too soft, will not hold it when well imprinted ; or 
 else, supposing the wax of a temper fit, but the seal not applied 
 with sufficient force to make a clear impression, in any of 
 these cases the print left by the seal will be obscure. 1 ' Human 
 Understanding, 29, 3. 
 
 NOTE 35, p. 139. 
 
 The likeness in Greek between Krjpos (wax) and neap (heart) 
 is the occasion of a pun which cannot be rendered in English. 
 The epithet " all-wise poet," which follows in the next speech of 
 Socrates, refers, of course, not to Homer's mistaken praise of 
 the heart's shagginess, but to his knowledge of the human heart 
 itself. //. 2, 851 ; 1 6, 554. 
 
 NOTE 36, p. 145. 
 
 The duties which devolved upon the ancient kings were after- 
 wards divided between nine archons. One of these officers 
 represented the king in his capacity of high priest, and at the 
 PORCH OF THE KING tried cases of homicide and other acts 
 of impiety. It was here, therefore, that Meletus and Anytus 
 brought their indictment of Socrates. 
 
 These porticos or colonnades, of which there were many in 
 Athens, were often attached to temples or public buildings, 
 and formed a convenient protection from the weather, besides 
 being a pleasant lounging-place at all seasons. They were fre- 
 quently ornamented with paintings commemorating mythical 
 and historical events relating to the history of Athens. 
 
 THE 
 
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