Paus. v. 17, vi. 3. He excelled in portrait statues. See Jowett, "Plato," iv.; "Laws," p. 123.
You have a gallery of handsome people here, (10) Cleiton, runners, and wrestlers, and boxers, and pancratiasts--that I see and know; but how do you give the magic touch of life to your creations, which most of all allures the soul of the beholder through his sense of vision?
(10) Reading after L. Dind. {kaloi ous}, or if vulg. {alloious}, translate "You have a variety of types, Cleiton, not all of one mould, but runners," etc.; al. "I see quite well how you give the diversity of form to your runners," etc.
As Cleiton stood perplexed, and did not answer at once, Socrates added: Is it by closely imitating the forms of living beings that you succeed in giving that touch of life to your statues?
No doubt (he answered).
Soc. It is, is it not, by faithfully copying the various muscular contractions of the body in obedience to the play of gesture and poise, the wrinklings of flesh and the sprawl of limbs, the tensions and the relaxations, that you succeed in making your statues like real beings--make them "breathe" as people say?
Cleit. Without a doubt.
Soc. And does not the faithful imitation of the various affections of the body when engaged in any action impart a particular pleasure to the beholder?
Cleit. I should say so.
Soc. Then the threatenings in the eyes of warriors engaged in battle should be carefully copied, or again you should imitate the aspect of a conqueror radiant with success?
Cleit. Above all things.
Soc. It would seem then that the sculptor is called upon to incorporate in his ideal form the workings and energies also of the soul?
Paying a visit to Pistias, (11) the corselet maker, when that artist showed him some exquisite samples of his work, Socrates exclaimed: (11) Cf. Athen. iv. 20, where the same artist is referred to apparently as {Piston}, and for the type of person see the "Portrait of a Tailor" by Moroni in the National Gallery--see "Handbook," Edw. T. Cook, p. 152.
By Hera! a pretty invention this, Pistias, by which you contrive that the corselet should cover the parts of the person which need protection, and at the same time leave free play to the arms and hands...but tell me, Pistias (he added), why do you ask a higher price for these corselets of yours if they are not stouter or made of costlier material than the others?
Because, Socrates (he answered), mine are of much finer proportion.
Soc. Proportion! Then how do you make this quality apparent to the customer so as to justify the higher price--by measure or weight? For I presume you cannot make them all exactly equal and of one pattern--if you make them fit, as of course you do?
Fit indeed! that I most distinctly do (he answered), take my word for it: no use in a corselet without that.
But then are not the wearer's bodies themselves (asked Socrates) some well proportioned and others ill?
Decidedly so (he answered).
Soc. Then how do you manage to make the corselet well proportioned if it is to fit an ill-proportioned body? (12) (12) Or, "how do you make a well-proportioned corselet fit an illproportioned body? how well proportioned?"
Pist. To the same degree exactly as I make it fit. What fits is well proportioned.
Soc. It seems you use the term "well-proportioned" not in an absolute sense, but in reference to the wearer, just as you might describe a shield as well proportioned to the individual it suits; and so of a military cloak, and so of the rest of things, in your terminology? But maybe there is another considerable advantage in this "fitting"?
Pist. Pray instruct me, Socrates, if you have got an idea.
Soc. A corselet which fits is less galling by its weight than one which does not fit, for the latter must either drag from the shoulders with a dead weight or press upon some other part of the body, and so it becomes troublesome and uncomfortable; but that which fits, having its weight distributed partly along the collar-bone and shoulder-blade, partly over the shoulders and chest, and partly the back and belly, feels like another natural integument rather than an extra load to carry. (13) (13) Schneider ad loc. cf Eur. "Electr." 192, {prosthemata aglaias}, and for the weight cf. Aristoph. "Peace," 1224.
Pist. You have named the very quality which gives my work its exceptional value, as I consider; still there are customers, I am bound to say, who look for something else in a corselet--they must have them ornamental or inlaid with gold.
For all that (replied Socrates), if they end by purchasing an ill-fitting article, they only become the proprietors of a curiously-wrought and gilded nuisance, as it seems to me. But (he added), as the body is never in one fixed position, but is at one time curved, at another raised erect how can an exactly-modelled corselet fit?
Pist. It cannot fit at all.
You mean (Socrates continued) that it is not the exactly-modelled corselet which fits, but that which does not gall the wearer in the using?
Pist. There, Socrates, you have hit the very point. I see you understand the matter most precisely. (14) (14) Or, "There, Socrates, you have hit the very phrase. I could not state the matter more explicitly myself."
XI There was once in the city a fair woman named Theodote. (1) She was not only fair, but ready to consort with any suitor who might win her favour. Now it chanced that some one of the company mentioned her, saying that her beauty beggared description. "So fair is she," he added, "that painters flock to draw her portrait, to whom, within the limits of decorum, she displays the marvels of her beauty." "Then there is nothing for it but to go and see her," answered Socrates, "since to comprehend by hearsay what is beyond description is clearly impossible." Then he who had introduced the matter replied: "Be quick then to follow me"; and on this wise they set off to seek Theodote. They found her "posing" to a certain painter; and they took their stand as spectators. Presently the painter had ceased his work; whereupon Socrates: say that it was Theodote who stood by Alcibiades to the last, though there are apparently other better claimants to the honour.
Plut. "Alc." (Clough, ii. p. 50).
"Do you think, sirs, that we ought to thank Theodote for displaying her beauty to us, or she us for coming to gaze at her?...It would seem, would it not, that if the exhibition of her charms is the more profitable to her, the debt is on her side; but if the spectacle of her beauty confers the greater benefit on us, then we are her debtors."
Some one answered that "was an equitable statement of the case."
Well then (he continued), as far as she is concerned, the praise we bestow on her is an immediate gain; and presently, when we have spread her fame abroad, she will be further benefited; but for ourselves the immediate effect on us is a strong desire to touch what we have seen; by and by, too, we shall go away with a sting inside us, and when we are fairly gone we shall be consumed with longing. Consequently it seems that we should do her service and she accept our court.
Whereupon Theodote: Oh dear! if that is how the matter stands, it is I who am your debtor for the spectacle. (2) (2) In reference to the remark of Socrates above; or, "have to thank you for coming to look at me."
At this point, seeing that the lady herself was expensively attired, and that she had with her her mother also, whose dress and style of attendance (3) were out of the common, not to speak of the waiting-women--many and fair to look upon, who presented anything but a forlorn appearance; while in every respect the whole house itself was sumptuously furnished--Socrates put a question: (3) Or, "her mother there with her in a dress and general get-up ({therapeia}) which was out of the common." See Becker, "Charicles," p. 247 (Eng. tr.)
Pray tell me, Theodote, have you an estate in the country?
Theod. Not I indeed.
Soc. Then perhaps you possess a house and large revenues along with it?
Theod. No, nor yet a house.
Soc. You are not an employer of labour on a large scale? (4) (4) Lit. "You have not (in your employ) a body of handicraftsmen of any sort?"
Theod. No, nor yet an employer of labour.
Soc. From what source, then, do you get your means of subsistence? (5) (5) Or, Anglice, "derive your income."
Theod. My friends are my life and fortune, when they care to be kind to me.
Soc. By heaven, Theodote, a very fine property indeed, and far better worth possessing than a multitude of sheep or goats or cattle. A flock of friends!...But (he added) do you leave it to fortune whether a friend lights like a fly on your hand at random, or do you use any artifice (6) yourself to attract him?
(6) Or, "means and appliances," "machinery."
Theod. And how might I hit upon any artifice to attract him?
Soc. Bless me! far more naturally than any spider. You know how they capture the creatures on which they live; (7) by weaving webs of gossamer, is it not? and woe betide the fly that tumbles into their toils! They eat him up.
(7) Lit. "the creatures on which they live."
Theod. So then you would counsel me to weave myself some sort of net?
Soc. Why, surely you do not suppose you are going to ensnare that noblest of all game--a lover, to wit--in so artless a fashion? Do you not see (to speak of a much less noble sort of game) what a number of devices are needed to bag a hare? (8) The creatures range for their food at night; therefore the hunter must provide himself with night dogs.
At peep of dawn they are off as fast as they can run. He must therefore have another pack of dogs to scent out and discover which way they betake them from their grazing ground to their forms; (9) and as they are so fleet of foot that they run and are out of sight in no time, he must once again be provided with other fleet-footed dogs to follow their tracks and overtake them; (10) and as some of them will give even these the slip, he must, last of all, set up nets on the paths at the points of escape, so that they may fall into the meshes and be caught.
(8) See the author's own treatise on "Hunting," vi. 6 foll.
(9) Lit. "from pasture to bed."
(10) Or, "close at their heels and run them down." See "Hunting"; cf.
"Cyrop." I. vi. 40.
Theod. And by what like contrivance would you have me catch my lovers?
Soc. Well now! what if in place of a dog you can get a man who will hunt up your wealthy lover of beauty and discover his lair, and having found him, will plot and plan to throw him into your meshes?
Theod. Nay, what sort of meshes have I?
Soc. One you have, and a close-folding net it is, (11) I trow; to wit, your own person; and inside it sits a soul that teaches you (12) with what looks to please and with what words to cheer; how, too, with smiles you are to welcome true devotion, but to exclude all wantons from your presence. (13) It tells you, you are to visit your beloved in sickness with solicitude, and when he has wrought some noble deed you are greatly to rejoice with him; and to one who passionately cares for you, you are to make surrender of yourself with heart and soul. The secret of true love I am sure you know: not to love softly merely, but devotedly. (14) And of this too I am sure: you can convince your lovers of your fondness for them not by lip phrases, but by acts of love.
(11) Or, "right well woven."
(12) Lit. "by which you understand."
(13) Or, "with what smiles to lie in wait for (cf. 'Cyrop.' II. iv.
20; Herod. vi. 104) the devoted admirer, and how to banish from your presence the voluptary."
(14) Or, "that it should be simply soft, but full of tender goodwill."
Theod. No, upon my word, I have none of these devices.
Soc. And yet it makes all the difference whether you approach a human being in the natural and true way, since it is not by force certainly that you can either catch or keep a friend. Kindness and pleasure are the only means to capture this fearful wild-fowl man and keep him constant.
Theod. You are right.
Soc. In the first place you must make such demands only of your well-wisher as he can grant without repentance; and in the next place you must make requital, dispensing your favours with a like economy.
Thus you will best make friends whose love shall last the longest and their generosity know no stint. (15) And for your favours you will best win your friends if you suit your largess to their penury; for, mark you, the sweetest viands presented to a man before he wants them are apt to prove insipid, or, to one already sated, even nauseous; but create hunger, and even coarser stuff seems honey-sweet.
(15) Or, "This is the right road to friendship--permanent and openhanded friendship."
Theod. How then shall I create this hunger in the heart of my friends?
Soc. In the first place you must not offer or make suggestion of your dainties to jaded appetites until satiety has ceased and starvation cries for alms. Even then shall you make but a faint suggestion to their want, with modest converse--like one who would fain bestow a kindness...and lo! the vision fades and she is gone--until the very pinch of hunger; for the same gifts have then a value unknown before the moment of supreme desire.
Then Theodote: Oh why, Socrates, why are you not by my side (like the huntsman's assistant) to help me catch my friends and lovers?
Soc. That will I be in good sooth if only you can woo and win me.
Theod. How shall I woo and win you?
Soc. Seek and you will find means, if you truly need me.
Theod. Come then in hither and visit me often.
And Socrates, poking sly fun at his own lack of business occupation, answered: Nay, Theodote, leisure is not a commodity in which I largely deal. I have a hundred affairs of my own too, private or public, to occupy me; and then there are my lady-loves, my dear friends, who will not suffer me day or night to leave them, for ever studying to learn love-charms and incantations at my lips.
Theod. Why, are you really versed in those things, Socrates?
Soc. Of course, or else how is it, do you suppose, that Apollodorus (16) here and Antisthenes never leave me; or why have Cebes and Simmias come all the way from Thebes to stay with me? Be assured these things cannot happen without diverse love-charms and incantations and magic wheels.
(16) For Apollodorus see "Apol." 28; Plat. "Symp." 172 A; "Phaed." 59 A, 117 D. For Antisthenes see above. For Cebes and Simmias see above, I. ii. 48; Plat. "Crit." 45 B; "Phaed." passim.
Theod. I wish you would lend me your magic-wheel, (17) then, and I will set it spinning first of all for you.
(17) Cf. Theocr. ii. 17; Schneider ad loc.
Soc. Ah! but I do not wish to be drawn to you. I wish you to come to me.
Theod. Then I will come. Only, will you be "at home" to me?
Soc. Yes, I will welcome you, unless some one still dearer holds me engaged, and I must needs be "not at home."
XII Seeing one of those who were with him, a young man, but feeble of body, named Epigenes, (1) he addressed him.
(1) Epigenes, possibly the son of Antiphon. See Plat. "Apol." 33 E; "Phaed." 59 B.
Soc. You have not the athletic appearance of a youth in training, (2) Epigenes.
(2) {idiotikos}, lit. of the person untrained in gymnastics. See A. R.
Cluer ad loc. Cf. Plat. "Laws," 839 E; I. ii. 4; III. v. 15; "Symp." ii. 17.
And he: That may well be, seeing I am an amateur and not in training.
Soc. As little of an amateur, I take it, as any one who ever entered the lists of Olympia, unless you are prepared to make light of that contest for life and death against the public foe which the Athenians will institute when the day comes. (3) And yet they are not a few who, owing to a bad habit of body, either perish outright in the perils of war, or are ignobly saved. Many are they who for the self-same cause are taken prisoners, and being taken must, if it so betide, endure the pains of slavery for the rest of their days; or, after falling into dolorous straits, (4) when they have paid to the uttermost farthing of all, or may be more than the worth of all, that they possess, must drag on a miserable existence in want of the barest necessaries until death release them. Many also are they who gain an evil repute through infirmity of body, being thought to play the coward. Can it be that you despise these penalties affixed to an evil habit? Do you think you could lightly endure them? Far lighter, I imagine, nay, pleasant even by comparison, are the toils which he will undergo who duly cultivates a healthy bodily condition. Or do you maintain that the evil habit is healthier, and in general more useful than the good? Do you pour contempt upon those blessings which flow from the healthy state? And yet the very opposite of that which befalls the ill attends the sound condition. Does not the very soundness imply at once health and strength? (5) Many a man with no other talisman than this has passed safely through the ordeal of war; stepping, not without dignity, (6) through all its horrors unscathed. Many with no other support than this have come to the rescue of friends, or stood forth as benefactors of their fatherland; whereby they were thought worthy of gratitude, and obtained a great renown and received as a recompense the highest honours of the State; to whom is also reserved a happier and brighter passage through what is left to them of life, and at their death they leave to their children the legacy of a fairer starting-point in the race of life.
(3) Or, "should chance betide." Is the author thinking of a life-anddeath struggle with Thebes?
(4) e.g. the prisoners in the Latomiae. Thuc. vii. 87.
(5) It is almost a proverb--"Sound of body and limb is hale and strong." "Qui valet praevalebit."
(6) e.g. Socrates himself, according to Alcibiades, ap. Plat. "Symp."
221 B; and for the word {euskhemonos} see Arist. "Wasps," 1210, "like a gentleman"; L. and S.; "Cyr." I. iii. 8; Aristot. "Eth.
Because our city does not practise military training in public, (7) that is no reason for neglecting it in private, but rather a reason for making it a foremost care. For be you assured that there is no contest of any sort, nor any transaction, in which you will be the worse off for being well prepared in body; and in fact there is nothing which men do for which the body is not a help. In every demand, therefore, which can be laid upon the body it is much better that it should be in the best condition; since, even where you might imagine the claims upon the body to be slightest--in the act of reasoning--who does not know the terrible stumbles which are made through being out of health? It suffices to say that forgetfulness, and despondency, and moroseness, and madness take occasion often of ill-health to visit the intellectual faculties so severely as to expel all knowledge (8) from the brain. But he who is in good bodily plight has large security. He runs no risk of incurring any such catastrophe through ill-health at any rate; he has the expectation rather that a good habit must procure consequences the opposite to those of an evil habit; (9) and surely to this end there is nothing a man in his senses would not undergo...It is a base thing for a man to wax old in careless self-neglect before he has lifted up his eyes and seen what manner of man he was made to be, in the full perfection of bodily strength and beauty. But these glories are withheld from him who is guilty of self-neglect, for they are not wont to blaze forth unbidden.
(10) (7) Cf. "Pol. Ath." i. 13; and above, III. v. 15.
(8) Or, "whole branches of knowledge" ({tas epistemas}).
(9) Or, "he may well hope to be insured by his good habit against the evils attendant on its opposite."
(10) Or, "to present themselves spontaneously."
XII Once when some one was in a fury of indignation because he had bidden a passer-by good-day and the salutation was not returned, Socrates said: "It is enough to make one laugh! If you met a man in a wretched condition of body, you would not fall into a rage; but because you stumble upon a poor soul somewhat boorishly disposed, you feel annoyed."
To the remark of another who complained that he did not take his food with pleasure, he said: "Acumenus (1) has a good prescription for that."
And when the other asked: "And what may that be?" "To stop eating," he said. "On the score of pleasure, economy, and health, total abstinence has much in its favour." (2) 176 B. A similar story is told of Dr. Abernethy, I think.
(2) Lit. "he would live a happier, thriftier, and healthier life, if he stopped eating."
And when some one else lamented that "the drinking-water in his house was hot," he replied: "Then when you want a warm bath you will not have to wait."
The Other. But for bathing purposes it is cold.
Soc. Do you find that your domestics seem to mind drinking it or washing in it?
The Other. Quite the reverse; it is a constant marvel to me how contentedly they use it for either purpose.
Soc. Which is hotter to the taste--the water in your house or the hot spring in the temple of Asclepius? (3) (3) In the Hieron at Epidauros probably. See Baedeker, "Greece," p.
240 foll.
The Other. The water in the temple of Asclepius.
Soc. And which is colder for bathing--yours or the cold spring in the cave of Amphiaraus? (4) (4) Possibly at Oropos. Cf. Paus. i. 34. 3.
The Other. The water in the cave of Amphiaraus.
Soc. Then please to observe: if you do not take care, they will set you down as harder to please than a domestic servant or an invalid. (5) (5) i.e. "the least and the most fastidious of men."
A man had administered a severe whipping to the slave in attendance on him, and when Socrates asked: "Why he was so wroth with his own serving-man?" excused himself on the ground that "the fellow was a lazy, gourmandising, good-for-nothing dolt--fonder of money than of work." To which Socrates: "Did it ever strike you to consider which of the two in that case the more deserves a whipping--the master or the man?"
When some one was apprehending the journey to Olympia, "Why are you afraid of the long distance?" he asked. "Here at home you spend nearly all your day in taking walks. (6) Well, on your road to Olympia you will take a walk and breakfast, and then you will take another walk and dine, and go to bed. Do you not see, if you take and tack together five or six days' length of walks, and stretch them out in one long line, it will soon reach from Athens to Olympia? I would recommend you, however, to set off a day too soon rather than a day too late. To be forced to lengthen the day's journey beyond a reasonable amount may well be a nuisance; but to take one day's journey beyond what is necessary is pure relaxation. Make haste to start, I say, and not while on the road." (7) (6) {peripateis}, "promenading up and down."
(7) "Festina lente"--that is your motto.
When some one else remarked "he was utterly prostrated after a long journey," Socrates asked him: "Had he had any baggage to carry?"
"Not I," replied the complainer; "only my cloak."
Soc. Were you travelling alone, or was your man-servant with you?
He. Yes, I had my man.
Soc. Empty-handed, or had he something to carry?
He. Of course; carrying my rugs and other baggage.
Soc. And how did he come off on the journey?
He. Better than I did myself, I take it.
Soc. Well, but now suppose you had had to carry his baggage, what would your condition have been like?
He. Sorry enough, I can tell you; or rather, I could not have carried it at all.
Soc. What a confession! Fancy being capable of so much less toil than a poor slave boy! Does that sound like the perfection of athletic training?
XIV On the occasion of a common dinner-party (1) where some of the company would present themselves with a small, and others with a large supply of viands, Socrates would bid the servants (2) throw the small supplies into the general stock, or else to help each of the party to a share all round. Thus the grand victuallers were ashamed in the one case not to share in the common stock, and in the other not to throw in their supplies also. (3) Accordingly in went the grand supplies into the common stock. And now, being no better off than the small contributors, they soon ceased to cater for expensive delicacies.
(1) For the type of entertainment see Becker, "Charicles," p. 315 (Eng. tr.)
(2) "The boy."
(3) Or, "were ashamed not to follow suit by sharing in the common stock and contributing their own portion."
At a supper-party one member of the company, as Socrates chanced to note, had put aside the plain fare and was devoting himself to certain dainties. (4) A discussion was going on about names and definitions, and the proper applications of terms to things. (5) Whereupon Socrates, appealing to the company: "Can we explain why we call a man a 'dainty fellow'? What is the particular action to which the term applies?
(6)--since every one adds some dainty to his food when he can get it.
(7) But we have not quite hit the definition yet, I think. Are we to be called dainty eaters because we like our bread buttered?" (8) (4) For the distinction between {sitos} and {opson} see Plat. "Rep."
372 C.
(5) Or, "The conversation had fallen upon names: what is the precise thing denoted under such and such a term? Define the meaning of so and so."
(6) {opsophagos} = {opson} (or relish) eater, and so a "gourmand" or "epicure"; but how to define a gourmand?
(7) Lit. "takes some {opson} (relish) to his {sitos} (food)."
(8) Lit. "simply for that" (sc. the taking of some sort of {opson}.
For {epi touto} cf. Plat. "Soph." 218 C; "Parmen." 147 D.)
No! hardly! (some member of the company replied).
Soc. Well, but now suppose a man confine himself to eating venison or other dainty without any plain food at all, not as a matter of training, (9) but for the pleasure of it: has such a man earned the title? "The rest of the world would have a poor chance against him," (10) some one answered. "Or," interposed another, "what if the dainty dishes he devours are out of all proportion to the rest of his meal--what of him?"
(11) (9) Lit. "{opson} (relish) by itself, not for the sake of training," etc. The English reader wil bear in mind that a raw beefsteak or other meat prescribed by the gymnastic trainer in preference to farinaceous food ({sitos}) would be {opson}.
(10) Or, more lit. "Hardly any one could deserve the appellation better."
(11) Lit. "and what of the man who eats much {opson} on the top of a little ({sitos})?" {epesthion} = follows up one course by another, like the man in a fragment of Euripides, "Incert." 98: {kreasi boeiois khlora suk' epesthien}, who "followed up his beefsteak with a garnish of green figs."
Soc. He has established a very fair title at any rate to the appellation, and when the rest of the world pray to heaven for a fine harvest: "May our corn and oil increase!" he may reasonably ejaculate, "May my fleshpots multiply!"
At this last sally the young man, feeling that the conversation set somewhat in his direction, did not desist indeed from his savoury viands, but helped himself generously to a piece of bread. Socrates was all-observant, and added: Keep an eye on our friend yonder, you others next him, and see fair play between the sop and the sauce. (12) (12) Lit. "see whether he will make a relish of the staple or a staple of the relish" ("butter his bread or bread his butter").
Another time, seeing one of the company using but one sop of bread (13) to test several savoury dishes, he remarked: Could there be a more extravagant style of cookery, or more murderous to the dainty dishes themselves, than this wholesale method of taking so many dishes together?--why, bless me, twenty different sorts of seasoning at one swoop! (14) First of all he mixes up actually more ingredients than the cook himself prescribes, which is extravagant; and secondly, he has the audacity to commingle what the chef holds incongruous, whereby if the cooks are right in their method he is wrong in his, and consequently the destroyer of their art. Now is it not ridiculous first to procure the greatest virtuosi to cook for us, and then without any claim to their skill to take and alter their procedure? But there is a worse thing in store for the bold man who habituates himself to eat a dozen dishes at once: when there are but few dishes served, out of pure habit he will feel himself half starved, whilst his neighbour, accustomed to send his sop down by help of a single relish, will feast merrily, be the dishes never so few.
(13) {psomos}, a sop or morsel of bread (cf. {psomion}, N. T., in mod.
Greek = "bread").
(14) Huckleberry Finn (p. 2 of that young person's "Adventures") propounds the rationale of the system: "In a barrel of odds and ends it is different; things get mixed up, and the juice kind of swaps around, and the things go better."
He had a saying that {euokheisthai}, to "make good cheer," (15) was in Attic parlance a synonym for "eating," and the affix {eu} (the attributive "good") connoted the eating of such things as would not trouble soul or body, and were not far to seek or hard to find. So that to "make good cheer" in his vocabulary applied to a modest and well-ordered style of living. (16) (15) {euokheisthai}, cf. "Cyrop." IV. v. 7; "Pol. Ath." ii. 9; Kuhner cf. Eustah. "ad Il." ii. p. 212, 37, {'Akhaioi ten trophen okhen legousin oxutonos}. Athen. viii. 363 B. See "Hipparch," viii. 4, of horses. Cf. Arist. "H. A." viii. 6.
(16) See "Symp." vi. 7; and for similar far-fetched etymologies, Plat.
"Crat." passim.
BOOK IV I Such was Socrates; so helpful under all circumstances and in every way that no observer, gifted with ordinary sensibility, could fail to appreciate the fact, that to be with Socrates, and to spend long time in his society (no matter where or what the circumstances), was indeed a priceless gain. Even the recollection of him, when he was no longer present, was felt as no small benefit by those who had grown accustomed to be with him, and who accepted him. Nor indeed was he less helpful to his acquaintance in his lighter than in his graver moods.
Let us take as an example that saying of his, so often on his lips: "I am in love with so and so"; and all the while it was obvious the going-forth of his soul was not towards excellence of body in the bloom of beauty, but rather towards faculties of the soul unfolding in virtue.
(1) And these "good natures" he detected by certain tokens: a readiness to learn that to which the attention was directed; a power of retaining in the memory the lessons learnt; and a passionate predilection for those studies in particular which serve to good administration of a house or of a state, (2) and in general to the proper handling of man and human affairs. Such beings, he maintained, needed only to be educated (3) to become not only happy themselves and happy administrators of their private households, but to be capable of rendering other human beings as states or individuals happy also.
(1) Or, "not excellence of body in respect of beauty, but of the soul as regards virtue; and this good natural disposition might be detected by the readiness of its possessor to learn," etc. Cf.
Plat. "Rep." 535 B.
(3) Or, "A person of this type would, if educated, not only prove a fortune-favoured individual himself and," etc. Al. Kuhner, "Eos, qui ita instituti sunt, ut tales sint."
He had indeed a different way of dealing with different kinds of people. (4) Those who thought they had good natural ability and despised learning he instructed that the most highly-gifted nature stands most in need of training and education; (5) and he would point out how in the case of horses it is just the spirited and fiery thoroughbred which, if properly broken in as a colt, will develop into a serviceable and superb animal, but if left unbroken will turn out utterly intractable and good for nothing. Or take the case of dogs: a puppy exhibiting that zest for toil and eagerness to attack wild creatures which are the marks of high breeding, (6) will, if well brought up, prove excellent for the chase or for any other useful purpose; but neglect his education and he will turn out a stupid, crazy brute, incapable of obeying the simplest command. It is just the same with human beings; here also the youth of best natural endowments--that is to say, possessing the most robust qualities of spirit and a fixed determination to carry out whatever he has laid his hand to--will, if trained and taught what it is right to do, prove a superlatively good and useful man. He achieves, in fact, what is best upon the grandest scale. But leave him in boorish ignorance untrained, and he will prove not only very bad but very mischievous, (7) and for this reason, that lacking the knowledge to discern what is right to do, he will frequently lay his hand to villainous practices; whilst the very magnificence and vehemence of his character render it impossible either to rein him in or to turn him aside from his evil courses. Hence in his case also his achievements are on the grandest scale but of the worst.
(8) (4) Or, "His method of attack was not indeed uniformly the same. It varied with the individual."
(5) Or, "If any one was disposed to look down upon learning and study in reliance upon his own natural ability, he tried to lesson him that it is just the highly-gifted nature which stands," etc. See Newman, op. cit. i. 397.
(6) Cf. Aristot. "H. A." ix. 1; and "Hunting," iii. 11.
(7) Or, "and the same man may easily become a master villain of the most dangerous sort."
(8) Kuhner ad loc. after Fr. Hermann cf. Plato. "Crito," 44 E; "Hipp.
Or to take the type of person so eaten up with the pride of riches that he conceives himself dispensed from any further need of education--since it is "money makes the man," and his wealth will amply suffice him to carry out his desires and to win honours from admiring humanity. (9) Socrates would bring such people to their senses by pointing out the folly of supposing that without instruction it was possible to draw the line of demarcation (10) between what is gainful and what is hurtful in conduct; and the further folly of supposing that, apart from such discrimination, a man could help himself by means of wealth alone to whatever he liked or find the path of expediency plain before him; and was it not the veriest simplicity to suppose that, without the power of labouring profitably, a man can either be doing well or be in any sort of way sufficiently equipped for the battle of life? and again, the