No More Learning



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T
1.
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13627
SOCRATES
(469-399 B. C. )
BY HERBERT WEIR SMYTH
REAT teachers are not often great writers: some indeed have
written nothing, and among these the greatest is Socrates.
If the qualities of his genius made Socrates a teacher
chrough the spoken, not through the written word, he created a liter-
ature in which, through the devotion of his pupils, his message to the
world has been transmitted to us. It is fortunate that Xenophon and
Plato were so different in character and aptitudes. If the historian
was incapable of grasping the full significance of his master's search
for truth and its transforming power, he pictures for us the homelier
side of the life of Socrates,- his practical virtues, his humanity,—
and defends him from calumny and reproach. In the larger vision of
Plato the outlines of the man were merged into the figure of the ideal
teacher. To disengage with certainty the man Socrates from the
dialectician into whose mouth Plato puts his own transcendental phi-
losophy, is beyond our powers; but in the pages of Xenophon, un-
illumined indeed by Plato's matchless urbanity and grace, we have
a record of Socrates's conversations that bears the mark of verisimil-
itude.
The life of Socrates falls in a period of the history of thought
when the speculations of a century and more had arrived at the hope-
less conclusion that there was no real truth, no absolute standard
of right and wrong, no difference between what is essential and what
is accidental; and that all man can know is dependent upon sensa-
tion, and perception through the senses. But the position of. Socrates
in history is not to be understood by a mere statement of his meth-
ods, or his results in regenerating philosophical investigation.
Born in 469, or perhaps 471, the son of the statuary Sophroniscus
and Phænarete a midwife, he received the education of the Athenian
youth of the time in literature, which embraced chiefly the study
of Homer, in music, and in geometry and astronomy. He is said to
have tried his hand for a time at his father's trade; and a group of
the Graces, currently believed to be his work, was extant as late as
the second century A. D. Like the Parisian, whose world is bounded
by the boulevards, Socrates thought Athens world enough for him.
――


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13628
SOCRATES
He remained in his native city his entire life; unlike the Sophists,
who traveled from city to city making gain of their wisdom. On
one occasion indeed he attended the games at Corinth; and as a sol-
dier underwent with fortitude the privations of the campaign at Poti-
dæa, where he saved the life of Alcibiades, whose influence, directly
or indirectly, was to work ruin alike to Athens and his master. He
was engaged in the battles of Delium in 424 and Amphipolis in 422.
His life was by preference free from event. Warned by the deterrent
voice of his "divine sign," he took no part in public affairs except
when he was called upon to fulfill the ordinary duties of citizenship.
Until his trial before the court that sentenced him to death, he ap-
peared in a public capacity on only two occasions; in both of which
he displayed his lofty independence and tenacity of purpose in the
face of danger. In 406, withstanding the clamor of the mob, he alone
among the presidents of the assembly refused to put to vote the
inhuman and illegal proposition to condemn in a body the generals
at Arginusæ; and during the Reign of Terror in 404 he disobeyed
the incriminating command of the Thirty Tyrants to arrest Leon,
whom they had determined to put to death.
He seems at an early age to have recoiled from pec ulations as
to the cause and constitution of the physical world; believing that
they dealt with problems not merely too deep for human intellect but
sacred from man's finding out. "Do these students of nature's laws,"
he indignantly exclaimed, "think they already know human affairs
well enough, that they begin to meddle with the Divine ? »
To Socrates "the proper study of mankind is man. " In the
market-place he found material for investigation at once more tan-
gible and of a profounder significance than the atomic theory of
Democritus. "Know thyself" was inscribed on the temple of the
god of Delphi; and it was Socrates's conviction that a "life without
self-examination was no life at all. " Since the Delphian oracle de-
clared him to be the wisest of men, he felt that he had a Divine
mission to make clear the meaning of the god, and to seek if haply
he might find some one wiser than himself; for he was conscious that
he knew nothing.
To this quest everything was made subordinate.
He was pos-
sessed of nothing, for he had the faculty of indigence. Fortunately,
as Renan has put it, all a Greek needed for his daily sustenance was
a few olives and a little wine. "To want nothing," said Socrates, "is
Divine; to want as little as possible is the nearest possible approach
to the Divine life. " Clad in shabby garments, which sufficed alike
for summer and winter, always barefoot (a scandal to Athenian pro-
priety), taking money from no man so as not to "enslave himself,"
professing with his "accustomed irony" to be unable to teach anything


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SOCRATES
13629
himself, he went about year after year,- in the market-place, in
the gymnasium, in the school,-asking continually, "What is piety?
What is impiety? What is the honorable and the base? What is
the just and the unjust? What is temperance or unsound mind?
What is the character fit for a citizen? What is authority over
men? What is the character befitting the exercise of such author-
ity? " Questioning men of every degree, of every mode of thought
and occupation, he discovered that each and all of the poets, the poli-
ticians, the orators, the artists, the artisans, thought that "because
he possessed some special excellence in his own art, he was him-
self wisest as to matters of another and a higher kind. " The Athen-
ian of the day multiplied words about equality, virtue, justice; but
when examined as to the credentials of their knowledge, Socrates
found all alike ignorant. Thus it was that he discovered the pur-
port of the divine saying-others thought they knew something, he
knew that he knew nothing.
The Sophists claimed to have gained wisdom, which they taught
for a price: Socrates only claimed to be a lover of wisdom, a philos-
opher. Though he continued to affect ignorance, in order to con-
found ignorance, he must have been conscious that if in truth he was
the "wisest of men," he had a heaven-attested authority for leading
men to a right course of thinking. Only by confessing our ignor-
ance, he said, and by becoming learners, can we reach a right course
of thinking; and by learning to think aright, according to his intel-
lectual view of ethics, we learn to do well. God alone possesses
wisdom; but it is man's duty to struggle to attain to knowledge,
and therewith virtue. For virtue is knowledge, and sin is the fruit
of ignorance. Voluntary evil on the part of one who knows what
is good, is inconceivable.
In his search for knowledge, Socrates found that it was imperative
to get clear conceptions of general notions. These he attained by
the process of induction.
"Going once, too, into the workshop of Cleito the statuary, and beginning
to converse with him, he said, 'I see and understand, Cleito, that you make
figures of various kinds, runners and wrestlers, pugilists and pancratiasts; but
how do you put into your statues that which most wins the minds of the
beholders through the eye-the lifelike appearance? As Cleito hesitated, and
did not immediately answer, Socrates proceeded to ask, 'Do you make your
statues appear more lifelike by assimilating your work to the figures of the
living? (Certainly,' said he. 'Do you not then make your figures appear
more like reality, and more striking, by imitating the parts of the body that
are drawn up or drawn down, compressed or spread out, stretched or relaxed,
by the gesture? Undoubtedly,' said Cleito. And the representation of
the passions of men engaged in any act, does it not excite a certain pleasure
in the spectators? ' 'It is natural, at least, that it should be so,' said he.


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13630
SOCRATES
'Must you not, then, copy the menacing looks of combatants? And must you
not imitate the countenance of conquerors, as they look joyful? > (Assuredly.
said he. A statuary, therefore,' concluded Socrates, must express the work-
ings of the mind by the form. » (Xenophon, in the 'Memorabilia. ')
There is no deadlier weapon than the terrible cut-and-thrust pro-
cess of cross-examination by which the great questioner could reduce
his interlocutor to the confession of false knowledge. Sometimes, we
must confess, Socrates seems to have altogether too easy a time of
it, as he wraps his victim closer and closer in his toils. If we tire
of the men of straw who are set up against him, and our fingers
itch to take a hand in the fight, we cannot but realize that the process
destructive of error is a necessary preliminary to the constructive
process by which positive truth is established.
If Greek thought was saved from the germs of disintegration
by Socrates's recognition of the certainty of moral distinctions, it is
his incomparable method of teaching that entitles him to our chief
regard. He elicited curiosity, which is the beginning of wisdom;
he had no stereotyped system of philosophy to set forth,- he only
opened up vistas of truth; he stimulated, he did not complete, inves-
tigation. Hence he created, not a school, but scholars; who, despite
the wide diversity of their beliefs, drew their inspiration from a com-
mon source.
If his fertility of resource, his wit and humor, his geniality, his
illustrations drawn from common life, his well-nigh universal sympa-
thy, charmed many, the significance of his moral teachings inspired
the chosen few. Those who could recover from the shock of discov-
ering that their knowledge was after all only ignorance, were spurred
by his obstinate questionings to a better life. He delivered their
minds of the truths that had unconsciously lain in them.
With his wonted art, Plato has made the most dissolute of Socra-
tes's temporary followers the chief witness to his captivating elo-
quence. In the Banquet,' Alcibiades says:-
(
----
"I shall praise Socrates in a figure which will appear to him to be a cari-
cature; and yet I do not mean to laugh at him, but only to speak the truth.
I say, then, that he is exactly like the masks of Silenus, which may be seen
sitting in the statuaries' shops, having pipes and flutes in their mouths; and
they are made to open in the middle, and there are images of gods inside
them. I say also that he is like Marsyas the satyr.
"And are you not a flute-player? That you are; and a far more wonderful
performer than Marsyas. For he indeed with instruments charmed the souls
of men by the power of his breath, as the performers of his music do still;
for the melodies of Olympus are derived from the teaching of Marsyas, and
these whether they are played by a great master or by a miserable flute-
girl have a power which no others have. - they alone possess the soul and


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SOCRATES
13631
reveal the wants of those who have need of gods and mysteries, because they
are inspired. But you produce the same effect with the voice only, and do
not require the flute; that is the difference between you and him. When
we hear any other speaker,-even a very good one,- his words produce abso
lutely no effect upon us in comparison; whereas the very fragments of you
and your words, even at second-hand, and however imperfectly repeated,
amaze and possess the souls of every man, woman, and child who comes
within hearing of them.
"I have heard Pericles and other great orators: but though I thought that
they spoke well, I never had any similar feeling; my soul was not stirred
by them, nor was I angry at the thought of my own slavish state. But this
Marsyas has often brought me to such a pass, that I have felt as if I could
hardly endure the life which I am leading (this, Socrates, you admit); and I
am conscious that if I did not shut my ears against him, and fly from the
voice of the siren, he would detain me until I grew old sitting at his feet.
For he makes me confess that I ought not to live as I do,— neglecting the
wants of my own soul, and busying myself with the concerns of the Athen-
ians; therefore I hold my ears and tear myself away from him. And he is
the only person who ever made me ashamed,- which you might think not to
be in my nature; and there is no one else who does the same. For I know
that I cannot answer him, or say that I ought not to do as he bids; but
when I leave his presence the love of popularity gets the better of me. And
therefore I run away and fly from him, and when I see him I am ashamed
of what I have confessed to him. And many a time I wish that he were
dead, and yet I know that I should be much more sorry than glad if he
were to die: so that I am at my wits' end. "
Socrates must have seemed in very truth a satyr to the large body
of Athenians careless of his mission. How could they, who had been
taught that the "good is fair" and that the "fair is good," believe
that good should issue from those thick, sensual lips; or realize that
within that misshapen body, with its staring eyes and upturned nose
with outspread nostrils, there resided a soul disparate to its covering?
Surely this rude creature of the world of Pan could not speak the
words of Divine wisdom! Then too his eccentricities. Like Luther,
he combined common-sense with mysticism. He would remain as
if in a trance for hours, brooding over some problem of the true or
good. As early as 423, Aristophanes made him the scapegoat for
his detestation of the natural philosophers and of the Sophists, who
were unsettling all traditional belief.
Strepsiades — But who hangs dangling in the basket yonder?
Student-
HIMSELF.
-
Strepsiades-
Student-
And who's Himself?
Why, Socrates.
Strepsiades-Ho, Socrates! Call him, you fellow-call loud.
Student- Call him yourself - I've got no time for calling.
[Exit in-doors.


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13632
SOCRATES
Strepsiades - Ho, Socrates! Sweet, darling Socrates!
Socrates- Why callest thou me, poor creature of a day?
Strepsiades-First tell me, pray, what are you doing up there?
Socrates- I walk in air, and contemplate the sun.
Strepsiades -Oh, that's the way that you look down on the gods-
You get so near them on your perch there - eh?
I never could have found out things divine,
Had I not hung my mind up thus, and mixed
My subtle intellect with its kindred air.
Socrates-
The ethical inquirer here is pilloried by the caricaturist for the very
tendency against which his whole life was a protest. -When in 399
Socrates was brought to trial, he confesses that the chief obstacle
in the way of proving his innocence is those calumnies of his "old
accusers"; for even if Aristophanes was able to distinguish between
Socrates and the Sophists, he did not, and the common people could
not.
The indictment put forward by Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon, who
were merely the mouthpieces of hostile public opinion, read as fol-
lows:-
-
"Socrates offends against the laws in not paying respect to those
gods whom the city respects, and introducing other new deities; he
also offends against the laws in corrupting the youth. "
It is not difficult to see why Socrates provoked a host of enemies.
Those who, like Anytus, felt that he inflamed their sons to revolt
against parental authority; those who regarded the infamous life and
treason of Alcibiades, and the tyranny of Critias, as the direct result
of their master's teachings; those who thought him the gadfly of the
market-place, and who had suffered under his merciless exposure of
their sham knowledge; those who saw in his objection to the choice
of public officers by lot, a menace to the established constitution,—
all these felt that by his death alone could the city be rid of his pes-
tilential disputatiousness.
For his defense, Socrates made no special preparation. "My whole
life," said he, "has been passed with my brief in view. I have
shunned evil all my life;- that I think is the most honorable way in
which a man can bestow attention upon his own defense:" words
that anticipate those spoken on a still more memorable occasion,-
"But when they shall deliver you up, take no thought how or what
ye shall speak. "
If the accusations were false, the trial was legal. Against the
count of the indictment on the score of impiety, Socrates could set
his reverence for the gods. His daimonion was no new deity, and
it had spoken to him from his youth up. He had discharged the
religious duties required by the State; he even believed in the


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SOCRATES
13633
manifestations of the gods through signs and oracles when human
judgment was at fault, and this at a time when the "enlightened"
viewed such faith with contempt. He recognized with gratitude the
intelligent purpose of the gods in creating a world of beauty. "No
one," says Xenophon, "ever knew of his doing or saying anything
profane or unholy. " He was temperate, brave, upright, endowed with
a high sense of honor. Though he preserved the independence of
his judgment, he had been loyal to the existing government. A less
unbending assertion of this independence, and a conciliatory attitude
toward his judges, would have saved Socrates from death. But he
seems to have courted a verdict that would mark him as the "first
martyr of philosophy. "
[NOTE. The chief ancient authorities for the life and teaching of
Socrates are Xenophon's 'Memorabilia,' or Memoirs of the philosopher,
and his Symposium'; Plato's 'Apology,' 'Crito,' and parts of the
'Phædo. ' Such dialogues as the 'Lysis,' 'Charmides,' 'Laches,' 'Pro-
tagoras,' 'Euthyphro,' deal with the master's conception of the unity
of virtue and knowledge; and are called "Socratic" because they are
free from the intrusion of features that are specifically Platonic, such
as the doctrine of the Ideas, and the tripartite division of the soul.
The 'Apology' included among the writings of Xenophon is probably
spurious. The 'Life' by Diogenes Laertius is an ill-assorted and un-
critical compilation, filled with trivial gossip. ]
Herbert Wei Seryth
-
SOCRATES REFUSES TO ESCAPE FROM PRISON
From Plato's 'Crito'
-
OCRATES
SOCK
Then we ought not to retaliate or render evil for
evil to any one, whatever evil we may have suffered from
him. But I would have you consider, Crito, whether you
really mean what you are saying. For this opinion has never
been held, and never will be held, by any considerable number of
persons; and those who are agreed and those who are not agreed
upon this point have no common ground, and can only despise
one another when they see how widely they differ.
Tell me,
then, whether you agree with and assent to my first principle,
that neither injury nor retaliation nor warding off evil by evil is
ever right. And shall that be the premise of our argument? Or
XXIII-853


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13634
SOCRATES
do you decline and dissent from this? For this has been of old
and is still my opinion; but if you are of another opinion, let
me hear what you have to say. If, however, you remain of the
same mind as formerly, I will proceed to the next step.
Crito-You may proceed, for I have not changed my mind.
Socrates-Then I will proceed to the next step, which may
be put in the form of a question: Ought a man to do what he
admits to be right, or ought he to betray the right?
Crito-He ought to do what he thinks right.
Socrates-But if this is true, what is the application? In leav-
ing the prison against the will of the Athenians, do I wrong
any? or rather do I wrong those whom I ought least to wrong?
Do I not desert the principles which were acknowledged by us
to be just? What do you say?
Crito-I cannot tell, Socrates; for I do not know.
Socrates-Then consider the matter in this way: Imagine
that I am about to play truant (you may call the proceeding by
any name which you like), and the laws and the government come
and interrogate me: "Tell us, Socrates," they say,
what are
you about? are you going by an act of yours to overturn us—
the laws and the whole State-as far as in you lies? Do you
imagine that a State can subsist and not be overthrown, in which
the decisions of law have no power, but are set aside and over-
thrown by individuals? What will be our answer, Crito, to these
and the like words? Any one, and especially a clever rhetorician,
will have a good deal to urge about the evil of setting aside the
law which requires a sentence to be carried out; and we might
reply, "Yes; but the State has injured us and given an unjust
sentence. " Suppose I say that?
>>>
Crito-Very good, Socrates.
Socrates-"And was that our agreement with you? " the law
would say; «< or were you to abide by the sentence of the State? "
And if I were to express astonishment at their saying this, the
law would probably add: "Answer, Socrates, instead of opening
your eyes: you are in the habit of asking and answering ques
tions. Tell us what complaint you have to make against us which
justifies you in attempting to destroy us and the State? In the
first place, did we not bring you into existence? Your father
married your mother by our aid and begat you. Say whether
you have any objection to urge against those of us who regulate
marriage? " None, I should reply. "Or against those of us who


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SOCRATES
13635
regulate the system of nurture and education of children in which
you were trained? Were not the laws which have the charge of
this, right in commanding your father to train you in music and
gymnastics? " Right, I should reply. "Well then, since you were
brought into the world and nurtured and educated by us, can you
deny in the first place that you are our child and slave, as your
fathers were before you? And if this is true, you are not on
equal terms with us; nor can you think that you have a right to
do to us what we are doing to you. Would you have any right
to strike or revile or do any other evil to a father or to your
master, if you had one, when you have been struck or reviled
by him, or received some other evil at his hands? You would
not say this. And because we think right to destroy you, do you
think that you have any right to destroy us in return, and your
country as far as in you lies? And will you, O professor of true
virtue, say that you are justified in this? Has a philosopher like
you failed to discover that our country is more to be valued, and
higher and holier far, than mother or father or any ancestor,
and more to be regarded in the eyes of the gods and of men
of understanding? also to be soothed and gently and reverently
entreated when angry, even more than a father, and if not per-
suaded, obeyed? And when we are punished by her, whether
with imprisonment or stripes, the punishment is to be endured in
silence; and if she lead us to wounds or death in battle, thither
we follow as is right; neither may any one yield or retreat or
leave his rank, but whether in battle or in a court of law, or in
any other place, he must do what his city and his country order
him, or he must change their view of what is just: and if he
may do no violence to his father or mother, much less may he
do violence to his country. " What answer shall we make to this,
Crito? Do the laws speak truly, or do they not?
Crito I think that they do.
Socrates-Then the laws will say: "Consider, Socrates, if this
is true, that in your present attempt you are going to do us
wrong. For after having brought you into the world, and nur-
tured and educated you, and given you and every other citizen a
share in every good that we had to give, we further proclaim
and give the right to every Athenian, that if he does not like
us when he has come of age and has seen the ways of the city,
and made our acquaintance, he may go where he pleases and
take his goods with him; and none of us laws will forbid him or


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13636
SOCRATES
interfere with him. Any of you who does not like us and
the city, and who wants to go to a colony or to any other city,
may go where he likes, and take his goods with him. But he
who has experience of the manner in which we order justice and
administer the State, and still remains, has entered into an
implied contract that he will do as we command him.
And he
who disobeys us is, as we maintain, thrice wrong: first, because
in disobeying us he is disobeying his parents; secondly, because
we are the authors of his education; thirdly, because he has made
an agreement with us that he will obey our commands; and he
neither obeys them nor convinces us that our commands are
wrong; and we do not rudely impose them, but give him the
alternative of obeying or convincing us; - that is what we offer,
and he does neither. These are the sort of accusations to which,
as we were saying, you, Socrates, will be exposed if you accom-
plish your intentions; you, above all other Athenians. " Suppose
I ask, Why is this? they will justly retort upon me that I above
all other men have acknowledged the agreement. "There is clear
proof," they will say, "Socrates, that we and the city were not
displeasing to you. Of all Athenians you have been the most
constant resident in the city; which, as you never leave, you may
be supposed to love. For you never went out of the city either
to see the games,-except once when you went to the Isthmus,
or to any other place unless when you were on military serv-
ice; nor did you travel as other men do. Nor had you any curi-
osity to know other States or their laws: your affections did not
go beyond us and our State; we were your special favorites, and
you acquiesced in our government of you; and this is the State
in which you begat your children, which is a proof of your satis-
faction. Moreover, you might if you had liked have fixed the
penalty at banishment in the course of the trial: the State which
refuses to let you go now would have let you go then. But you
pretended that you preferred death to exile, and that you were
not grieved at death. And now you have forgotten these fine
sentiments, and pay no respect to us the laws, of whom you are
the destroyer; and are doing what only a miserable slave would
do,- running away and turning your back upon the compacts and
agreements which you made as a citizen. "
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13637
༥་
SOCRATES AND EUTHYDEMUS
From Xenophon's 'Memorabilia ›
S
OCRATES, having made the letters as he proposed, asked, "Does
falsehood then exist among mankind? " "It does assuredly,"
replied he. "Under which head shall we place it? " "Un-
der injustice, certainly. "—"Does deceit also exist? " "Unques-
tionably. "—"Under which head shall we place that? " "Evidently
under injustice. "-"Does mischievousness exist? " "Undoubt-
edly. " "And the enslaving of men? " "That too prevails. "—
"And shall neither of these things be placed by us under justice,
Euthydemus? " "It would be strange if they should be," said
he. "But," said Socrates, "if a man, being chosen to lead an
army, should reduce to slavery an unjust and hostile people,
should we say that he committed injustice? " "No, certainly,"
replied he. "Should we not rather say that he acted justly? "
Indisputably. "—"And if, in the course of the war with them,
he should practice deceit ? " "That also would be just," said he.
-"And if he should steal and carry off their property, would he
not do what was just? " "Certainly," said Euthydemus; "but I
thought at first that you asked these questions only with reference
to our friends. " "Then," said Socrates, "all that we have placed
under the head of injustice, we must also place under that of just-
ice? " "It seems so," replied Euthydemus. "Do you agree, then,"
continued Socrates, "that having so placed them, we should make
a new distinction,- that it is just to do such things with regard
to enemies, but unjust to do them with regard to friends, and
that towards his friends our general should be as guileless as
possible? " "By all means," replied Euthydemus.
"Well, then," said Socrates, "if a general, seeing his army.
dispirited, should tell them, inventing a falsehood, that auxiliaries
were coming, and should by that invention check the despond-
ency of his troops, under which head should we place such an
act of deceit? " "It appears to me," said Euthydemus, “that
we must place it under justice. "—"And if a father, when his son
requires medicine and refuses to take it, should deceive him, and
give him the medicine as ordinary food, and by adopting such
deception should restore him to health, under which head must
we place such an act of deceit ? » "It appears to me that we
must put it under the same head. "-"And if a person, when his
friend was in despondency, should, through fear that he might
--


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13638
SOCRATES
kill himself, steal or take away his sword, or any other weapon,
under which head must we place that act? " "That, assuredly,
we must place under justice. "-"You say, then," said Socrates,
"that not even towards our friends must we act on all occasions
without deceit ? " "We must not indeed," said he; "for I retract
what I said before, if I may be permitted to do so. " "It is
indeed much better that you should be permitted," said Socrates,
"than that you should not place actions on the right side. But
of those who deceive their friends in order to injure them (that
we may not leave even this point unconsidered), which of the
two is the more unjust,- he who does so intentionally or he
who does so involuntarily? " "Indeed, Socrates," said Euthyde-
mus, "I no longer put confidence in the answers which I give;
for all that I said before appears to me now to be quite different
from what I then thought: however, let me venture to say that
he who deceives intentionally is more unjust than he who deceives
involuntarily? "
"Does it appear to you, then, that there is a way of learning
and knowing what is just, as there is of learning and knowing
how to read and write ? " "I think there is. "-"And which
should you consider the better scholar, him who should purposely
write or read incorrectly, or him who should do so unawares ? »
"Him who should do so purposely; for whenever he pleased,
he would be able to do both correctly. "-"He therefore that
purposely writes incorrectly may be a good scholar, but he who
does so involuntarily is destitute of scholarship? " "How can it
be otherwise? "-"And whether does he who lies and deceives
intentionally know what is just, or he who does so unawares? "
"Doubtless he who does so intentionally. " "You therefore say
that he who knows how to write and read is a better scholar
than he who does not know? " "Yes. " — "And that he who
knows what is just is more just than he who does not know? "
"I seem to say so; but I appear to myself to say this I know
not how. "-"But what would you think of the man who, wish-
ing to tell the truth, should never give the same account of the
same thing, but in speaking of the same road, should say at one
time that it led towards the east, and at another towards the
west, and in stating the result of the same calculation, should
sometimes assert it to be greater and sometimes less,-what, I
say, would you think of such a man? " "It would be quite clear
that he knew nothing of what he thought he knew. "
---


## p. 13639 (#457) ##########################################

SOCRATES
13639
"I do. "
-
"Do you know any persons called slave-like ? »
"Whether for their knowledge or their ignorance ? » "For their
ignorance, certainly. "—"Is it then for their ignorance of working
in brass that they receive this appellation? " "Not at all. " — " Is
it for their ignorance of the art of building? " "Nor for that. ”—
"Or for their ignorance of shoemaking? " "Not on any one of
these accounts; for the contrary is the case, as most of those who
know such trades are servile. "—"Is this, then, an appellation of
those who are ignorant of what is honorable, and good, and
just? " "It appears so to me. " "It therefore becomes us to
exert ourselves in every way to avoid being like slaves. "
by the gods, Socrates," rejoined Euthydemus, "I firmly believed
that I was pursuing that course of study by which I should, as
I expected, be made fully acquainted with all that was proper
to be known by a man striving after honor and virtue; but
now, how dispirited must you think I feel, when I see that with
all my previous labor, I am not even able to answer a question
about what I ought most of all to know, and am acquainted with
no other course which I may pursue to become better! "
"But,
-
DUTY OF POLITICIANS TO QUALIFY THEMSELVES
From Xenophon's 'Memorabilia ›
.
“IT
T IS plain, Glaucon, that if you wish to be honored, you must
benefit the State. " "Certainly," replied Glaucon. "Then,"
. said Socrates,
"inform us with what pro-
ceeding you will begin to benefit the State?
As, if you
wished to aggrandize the family of a friend, you would endeavor
to make it richer, tell me whether you will in like manner also
endeavor to make the State richer? " "Assuredly," said he. -
"Would it then be richer if its revenues were increased? "—" That
is at least probable," said Glaucon. "Tell me then," proceeded
Socrates, "from what the revenues of the State arise, and what
is their amount; for you have doubtless considered, in order that
if any of them fall short, you may make up the deficiency, and
that if any of them fail, you may procure fresh supplies. " "These
matters, by Jupiter," replied Glaucon, "I have not considered. "
"Well then," said Socrates,
"tell me at least the annual
expenditure of the State; for you undoubtedly mean to retrench
whatever is superfluous in it. " "Indeed," replied Glaucon, "I
have not yet had time to turn my attention to that subject. "
•
•
-


## p. 13640 (#458) ##########################################

13640
SOCRATES
"Then," said Socrates, "we will put off making our State richer
for the present; for how is it possible for him who is ignorant
of its expenditure and its income to manage those matters ?
Tell us the strength of the country by land and sea, and next that
of our enemies. " "But, by Jupiter," exclaimed Glaucon, "I should
not be able to tell you on the moment, and at a word. "
« Well
then, if you have it written down," said Socrates, "bring it; for
I should be extremely glad to hear what it is. "
"But to say
the truth," replied Glaucon, "I have not yet written it down. ”
"We will therefore put off considering about war for the pres-
ent," said Socrates.
"You propose a vast field for me,"
observed Glaucon, "if it will be necessary for me to attend to
such subjects. " "Nevertheless," proceeded Socrates, "a man can-
not order his house properly, unless he ascertains all that it
requires, and takes care to supply it with everything necessary;
but since the city consists of more than ten thousand houses,
and it is difficult to provide for so many at once, how is it that
you have not tried to aid one first of all? -say that of your
uncle, for it stands in need of help. "
"But I would im-
prove my uncle's house," said Glaucon, "if he would only be per-
suaded by me. " "Then," resumed Socrates, "when you cannot
persuade your uncle, do you expect to make all the Athenians,
together with your uncle, yield to your arguments? . . . Do
you not see how dangerous it is for a person to speak of, or
undertake, what he does not understand? .
If therefore you
desire to gain esteem and reputation in your country, endeavor
to succeed in gaining a knowledge of what you wish to do. "
BEFORE THE TRIAL
From Xenophon's Memorabilia ›
ERMOGENES SON of Hipponicus
H
said that after Meletus
had laid the accusation against him, he heard him speaking
on any subject rather than that of his trial, and remarked
to him that he ought to consider what defense he should make;
but that he said at first, "Do I not appear to you to have passed
my whole life meditating on that subject? " and then, when he
asked him "How so? " he said "he had gone through life doing
nothing but considering what was just and what unjust, doing
the just and abstaining from the unjust; which he conceived
to be the best meditation for his defense. " Hermogenes said


## p. 13641 (#459) ##########################################

SOCRATES
13641
again, "But do you not see, Socrates, that the judges at Athens
have already put to death many innocent persons, on account of
being offended at their language, and have allowed many that
were guilty to escape? " "But, by Jupiter, Hermogenes," replied
he, "when I was proceeding, awhile ago, to study my address to
the judges, the dæmon testified disapprobation. " "You say what
is strange," rejoined Hermogenes. "And do you think it
strange," inquired Socrates, "that it should seem better to the
divinity that I should now close my life? Do you not know that
down to the present time, I would not admit to any man that he
has lived either better or with more pleasure than myself? for I
consider that those live best who study best to become as good.
as possible; and that those live with most pleasure who feel the
most assurance that they are daily growing better and better.
This assurance I have felt, to the present day, to be the case
with respect to myself; and associating with other men, and
comparing myself with others, I have always retained this opinion
respecting myself: and not only I, but my friends also, main-
tain a similar feeling with regard to me; not because they love
me (for those who love others may be thus affected towards
the objects of their love), but because they think that while they
associated with me they became greatly advanced in virtue. If I
shall live a longer period, perhaps I shall be destined to sustain
the evils of old age, to find my sight and hearing weakened, to
feel my intellect impaired, to become less apt to learn and more
forgetful, and in fine, to grow inferior to others in all those
qualities in which I was once superior to them. If I should be
insensible to this deterioration, life would not be worth retaining;
and if I should feel it, how could I live otherwise than with less
profit, and with less comfort? If I am to die unjustly, my death
will be a disgrace to those who unjustly kill me; for if injustice.
is a disgrace, must it not be a disgrace to do anything unjustly?
But what disgrace will it be to me, that others could not decide
or act justly with regard to me? Of the men who have lived
before me, I see that the estimation left among posterity with
regard to such as have done wrong, and such as have suffered
wrong, is by no means similar; and I know that I also, if I now
die, shall obtain from mankind far different consideration from
that which they will pay to those who take my life: for I know
they will always bear witness to me that I have never wronged
any man, or rendered any man less virtuous, but that I have
always endeavored to make those better who conversed with me. "


## p. 13642 (#460) ##########################################

13642
SOLON
(638-559? B. C. )
OETRY is older than prose. Familiar as this assertion is, it yet
rings like a paradox, and is still often received with incre-
dulity. Indeed, it needs exposition, if not qualification. Of
course the rude beginnings of human speech-whatever their origin
were not rhythmical in any high artistic sense. But as soon as
men invoked the aid of "Memory, mother of the Muses," when they
wished to fix firmly, in the mind of the individual or of the clan, some
basic principle of justice, some heroic exploit, some tragic incident,-
then a regular recurrent movement of lan-
guage, effectively accompanied by drum or
foot beat, would almost instinctively be
sought and found. Hence the early and
all-but universal rise of the popular bal-
lad, the "folk-song. "

SOLON
That two great masses of hexameter
verse, and naught else, crossed successfully
the gulf into which the Homeric civiliza-
tion fell, is not perhaps so strange. Simi-
larly a Nibelungenlied, the Sagas, the Lays
of the Troubadours, float to us, bringing
almost the only distinct tidings from phases
of life else utterly sunken and forgotten.
But when the grave practical problems of civic organization and
foreign war were first effectively debated in the Athens of Solon, it
does strike us with surprise, that even the great lawgiver habitually
"recited a poem. " The dominant influence of Homeric epic doubt-
less aided largely here also. There are few loftier or stronger ora-
tions left us, even by the ten orators of the canon, than the speeches
in which Achilles justifies his withdrawal from the war, or Priam
pleads for mercy toward Hector dead. Then too, even this ruder
early Athenian folk can have been no ordinary race of tradesmen
or farmers. Many generations of artistic growth must have preceded
Eschylus and Phidias. Their language itself is sufficient evidence
of a shaping and molding instinct pervading a whole people. Indeed,
that language is already the plastic material waiting for the poet;
just as the melodious Italian speech performs beforehand for the
improvisator more than half his task.


## p. 13643 (#461) ##########################################

SOLON
13643
Moreover, even the prose of Demosthenes and his rivals is itself
no less truly rhythmical. It is subject to euphonic law which it
easily obeys, and of which-like great poetry-it makes a glorious
ornament instead of a fetter.
Solon's elegies, then, are poetical in form, largely because artistic
prose was not yet invented, and because Solon wished his memora-
ble words to be preserved in the memory of his Athenians. They
are not creative and imaginative poetry at all. Full of sound ethical
teaching, shot through by occasional graces of phrase and fancy,
warming to enthusiasm on the themes of patriotism and piety, they
still remain at best in that borderland where a rhymed satire by Dr.
Johnson or a versified essay of Pope must also abide. Nearly every-
thing they offer us could have been as well and effectively said out-
side the forms of verse. This is the just and final test of the poet's
gold, but how much, even of what we prize, would bear that test
without appreciable loss?
Among creators of constitutions, Solon deservedly holds a very
high-perhaps the highest-place. His first public proposal, indeed,
was one to which he could hope to rally the support of all classes:
the reconquest of the lovely island of Salamis, lying close to the
Attic shores, and destined to give its name to the proudest day in
Athenian annals. With Spartan help it was actually wrested again
from Megara.
This success hastened the selection of Solon as mediator between
the bitterly hostile factions of a people on the verge of civil war.
By the desperate remedy of a depreciated coinage the debtor class
was relieved. Imprisonment or enslavement of innocent debtors was
abolished. Solon's political reforms left the fulcrum of power, at
least temporarily, among the wealthier and landed classes; and tended
at any rate to educate the common people to wield wisely that civic
supremacy which he may have foreseen to be inevitably theirs in
subsequent generations.
The story of Solon's prolonged voluntary exile-in order to cut off
any proposals for further change while his institutions endured the
test of years
may be pure invention. Certainly his famous meet-
ing with Croesus of Lydia, at the height of that monarch's power,
must be given up. Solon died before Croesus can have become lord
of Western Asia. On the other hand, his fearless disapproval of his
young kinsman, the "tyrant" Pisistratus, is at least probable. His
answer when asked what made him thus fearless: -"Old age! ” —
reminds us of Socrates. Solon's larger measures outlived the too
aggressive protectorate of Pisistratus, and remained the permanent
basis of the Athenian constitution. The tolerant, genial, self-forgetful,
and fearless character of the man was a legacy hardly less precious
to his countrymen; and they were nowise ungrateful to his memory.
―


## p. 13644 (#462) ##########################################

13644
SOLON
Solon's poetry comes to us almost wholly in the elegiac couplet.
This variation on the hexameter was the first invented form of
stanza, and appears to have been hit upon in the seventh century
B. C. It had for a time almost as many-sided currency as our own
heroic couplet or rhymed pentameter; but was soon displaced in
great degree by the iambic trimeter, which, like our "blank verse,"
was extremely close to the average movement of a colloquial prose
sentence. This latter rhythm (which is also used by Solon) became
the favorite form, in particular, for the dialogue of Attic drama.
Hence, even in the fifth century, both hexameter proper and the ele-
giac had already come to be somewhat archaic and artificial. This
is still truer of such verse in Latin; though Ovid wears the bonds
of elegiac with consummate ease and grace. In modern speech it is
all-but impossible. Longfellow composed, in his later years, clever
renderings from several of Ovid's 'Tristia'; but the best isolated ex-
amples are Clough's preludes to the 'Amours de Voyage,' especially
the verses on the undying charm of Rome:-
"Is it illusion or not that attracteth the pilgrim transalpine,
Brings him a dullard and dunce hither to pry and to stare?
Is it illusion or not that allures the barbarian stranger,
Brings him with gold to the shrine, brings him in arms to the gate? »
But he would be a bold adventurer who would attempt to make
our Anglo-Saxon speech dance in this measure, while fast bound to
the practical prosaic ideas of Solon's political harangues!
There is no satisfactory annotation or translation of Solon's frag-
ments. They have been somewhat increased by citations in the
recently discovered Aristotelian Constitution of Athens'; and would
make a fruitful subject for a monograph, in which poetical taste,
knowledge of history, and philological acumen, might all work in
harmony.
[NOTE. The essentially prosaic character of Solon's thought makes him
doubly ineffective in translation. He seems to be hardly represented at all
in English versions. Neither of the experiments here appended satisfies the
translator himself. Solon's iambics are not quite so slow and prose-like as our
"blank verse. >> On the other hand, the Omar-like quatrain into which Mr.
Newcomer has fallen is both swifter and more ornate than the unapproachable
elegiac couplet of the Greeks. ]
DEFENSE OF HIS DICTATORSHIP
Y WITNESS in the court of Time shall be
The mighty mother of Olympian gods,
The dusky Earth,- grateful that I plucked up
The boundary stones that were so thickly set;
M


## p. 13645 (#463) ##########################################

SOLON
13645
So she, enslaved before, is now made free.
To Athens, too, their god-built native town,
Many have I restored that had been sold,
Some justly, some unfairly; some again
Perforce through death in exile. They no more
Could speak our language, wanderers so long.
Others, who shameful slavery here at home
Endured, in terror at their lords' caprice,
I rendered free again.
This in my might
I did, uniting right and violence;
And what I had promised, so I brought to pass.
For base and noble equal laws I made,
Securing justice promptly for them both. -
Another one than I, thus whip in hand,
An avaricious evil-minded man,
Would not have checked the folk, nor left his post
Till he had stolen the rich cream away!