When Socrates had done speaking, the company applauded, and
Aristophanes[67] was beginning to say something in answer to the
allusion which Socrates had made to his own speech, when suddenly
there was a great knocking at the door of the house, as of revelers,
and the sound of a flute-girl was heard. Agathon told the attendants
to go and see who were the intruders. "If they are friends of ours,"
he said, "invite them in, but if not say that the drinking is over." A
little while afterward they heard the voice of Alcibiades resounding
in the court; he was in a great state of intoxication, and kept
roaring and shouting: "Where is Agathon? Lead me to Agathon," and at
length, supported by the flute-girl and some of his companions, he
found his way to them. "Hail, friends," he said, appearing at the door
crowned with a massive garland of ivy and wall-flowers, and having his
head flowing with ribbons. "Will you have a very drunken man as a
companion of your revels? Or shall I crown Agathon, as was my
intention in coming, and go my way? For I was unable to come
yesterday, and therefore I come to-day, carrying on my head three
ribbons, that taking them from my own head I may crown the head of
this fairest and wisest of men, as I may be allowed to call him. Will
you laugh at me because I am drunk? Yet I know very well that I am
speaking the truth, altho you may laugh. But first tell me whether I
shall come in on the understanding that I am drunk. Will you drink
with me or not?"
The company were vociferous in begging that he should take his place
among them, and Agathon specially invited him. Thereupon he was led in
by the people who were with him; and as he was being led he took the
crown and ribbons from his head, intending to crown Agathon, and had
them before his eyes; this prevented him from seeing Socrates, who
made way for him, and Alcibiades took the vacant place between Agathon
and Socrates, and in taking the place he embraced Agathon and crowned
him. "Take off his sandals," said Agathon, "and let him make a third
on the same couch."
"By all means; but who makes the third partner in our revels?" said
Alcibiades, turning round and starting up as he caught sight of
Socrates. "By Heracles," he said, "what is this? Here is Socrates
always lying in wait for me, and always, as his way is, coming out at
all sorts of unexpected places; and now, what have you to say for
yourself, and why are you lying here, where I perceive that you have
contrived to find a place, not by a professor or lover of jokes, like
Aristophanes, but by the fairest of the company?"
Socrates turned to Agathon and said: "I must ask you to protect me,
Agathon; for this passion of his has grown quite a serious matter.
Since I became his admirer I have never been allowed to speak to any
other fair one, or so much as to look at them. If I do he goes wild
with envy and jealousy, and not only abuses me, but can hardly keep
his hands off me, and at this moment he may do me some harm. Please
see to this, and either reconcile me to him or, if he attempt
violence, protect me, as I am in bodily fear of his mad and passionate
attempts."
"There can never be reconciliation between you and me," said
Alcibiades; "but for the present I will defer your chastisement. And I
must beg you, Agathon, to give me back some of the ribbons that I may
crown the marvelous head of this universal despot. I would not have
him complain of me for crowning you, and neglecting him, who in
conversation is the conqueror of all mankind; and this not once only,
as you were the day before yesterday, but always." Then taking some of
the ribbons, he crowned Socrates, and again reclined. When he had lain
down again, he said: "You seem, my friends, to be sober, which is a
thing not to be endured; you must drink for that was the agreement
which I made with you--and I elect myself master of the feast until
you are quite drunk. Let me have a large goblet, Agathon, or rather,"
he said, addressing the attendant, "bring me that wine-cooler." The
wine-cooler which caught his eye was a vessel holding more than two
quarts; this he filled and emptied, and bade the attendant fill it
again for Socrates. "Observe, my friends," said Alcibiades, "that my
ingenious device will have no effect on Socrates, for he can drink any
quantity of wine and not be at all nearer being drunk." Socrates drank
the cup which the attendant filled for him....
"I shall praise Socrates in a figure which will appear to him to be a
caricature, 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. You will not deny this, Socrates, that your face is
like that of a satyr. Aye, and there is a resemblance in other points
too. For example, you are a bully--that I am in a position to prove by
the evidence of witnesses if you will not confess. 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 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
absolutely 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. And if I were not afraid that you
think me drunk, I would have sworn to as well as spoken of the
influence which they have always and still have over me. For my heart
leaps within me more than that of any Corybantian[68] reveler, and my
eyes rain tears when I hear him. And I observe that many others are
affected in the same way. I have heard Pericles and other great
orators, but tho 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 Athenians; 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 can not 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 confest 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 wit's end.
"And this is what I and many others have suffered from the
flute-playing of this satyr. Yet hear me once more while I show you
how exact the image is, and how marvelous his power. For I am sure
that none of you know him; but I know him and will describe him, as I
have begun. See you how fond he is of the fair? He is always with them
and is always being smitten by them, and then again he knows nothing
and is ignorant of all things--that is the appearance which he puts
on. Is he not like a Silenus in this? Yes, surely; that is, his outer
mask, which is the carved head of the Silenus; but when he is opened,
what temperance there is, as I may say to you, O my companions in
drink, residing within. Know you that beauty and wealth and honor, at
which the many wonder, are of no account with him, and are utterly
despised by him; he regards not at all the persons who are gifted with
them; mankind are nothing to him; all his life is spent in mocking
and flouting at them. But when I opened him, and looked within at his
serious purpose, I saw in him divine and golden images of such
fascinating beauty that I was ready to do in a moment whatever
Socrates commanded (they may have escaped the observation of others,
but I saw them). Now I thought that he was seriously enamored of my
beauty, and this appeared to be a grand opportunity of hearing him
tell what he knew, for I had a wonderful opinion of the attractions of
my youth.
"In the prosecution of this design, when I next went to him, I sent
away the attendant who usually accompanied me (I will confess the
whole truth, and beg you to listen; and if I speak falsely, do you,
Socrates, expose the falsehood). Well, he and I were alone together,
and I thought that when there was nobody with us, I should hear him
speak the language of love as lovers do, and I was delighted. Not a
word; he conversed as usual, and spent the day with me and then went
away. Afterward I challenged him to the palestra; and he wrestled and
closed with me several times alone; I fancied that I might succeed in
this way. Not a bit; there was no use in that. Lastly, as I had failed
hitherto, I thought that I must use stronger measures and attack him
boldly, as I had begun, and not give him up until I saw how the matter
stood. So I invited him to supper, just as if he were a fair youth,
and I a designing lover. He was not easily persuaded to come; he did,
however, after a while, accept the invitation, and when he came the
first time, he wanted to go away at once as soon as supper was over,
and I had not the face to detain him....
"And yet I could not help wondering at his natural temperance and
self-restraint and courage. I never could have thought that I should
have met with a man like him in wisdom and endurance. Neither could I
be angry with him or renounce his company any more than I could hope
to win him. For I well knew that if Ajax could not be wounded by
steel, much less he by money; and I had failed in my only chance of
captivating him. So I wandered about and was at my wit's end; no one
was ever more hopelessly enslaved by another. All this, as I should
explain, happened before he and I went on the expedition to Potidæa;
there we messed together, and I had the opportunity of observing his
extraordinary power of sustaining fatigue and going without food when
our supplies were intercepted at any place, as will happen with an
army. In the faculty of endurance he was superior not only to me but
to everybody else; there was no one to be compared to him. Yet at a
festival he was the only person who had any real powers of enjoyment,
and tho not willing to drink, he could if compelled beat us all at
that, and the most wonderful thing of all was that no human being had
ever seen Socrates drunk; and that, if I am not mistaken, will soon be
tested. His endurance of cold was also surprizing. There was a severe
frost, for the winter in that region is really tremendous, and
everybody else either remained indoors, or if they went out had on no
end of clothing, and were well shod, and had their feet swathed in
felt and fleeces; in the midst of this, Socrates, with his bare feet
on the ice, and in his ordinary dress, marched better than any of the
other soldiers who had their shoes on, and they looked daggers at him
because he seemed to despise them.
"I have told you one tale, and now I must tell you another, which is
worth hearing, of the doings and sufferings of this enduring man while
he was on the expedition. One morning he was thinking about something
which he could not resolve; and he would not give up, but continued
thinking from early dawn until noon--there he stood fixt in thought;
and at noon attention was drawn to him, and the rumor ran through the
wondering crowd that Socrates had been standing and thinking about
something ever since the break of day. At last, in the evening after
supper, some Ionians out of curiosity (I should explain that this was
not in the winter but in summer) brought out their mats and slept in
the open air that they might watch him and see whether he would stand
all night. There he stood all night as well as all day and the
following morning; and with the return of light he offered up a prayer
to the sun, and went his way. I will also tell, if you please--and
indeed I am bound to tell--of his courage in battle; for who but he
saved my life? Now this was the engagement in which I received the
prize for valor; for I was wounded and he would not leave me, but he
rescued me and my arms; and he ought to have received the prize of
valor which the generals wanted to confer on me partly on account of
my rank, and I told them so (this Socrates will not impeach or deny),
but he was more eager than the generals that I and not he should have
the prize. There was another occasion on which he was very noticeable;
this was in the flight of the army after the battle of Delium, and I
had a better opportunity of seeing him than at Potidæa, as I was
myself on horseback, and therefore comparatively out of danger. He and
Laches were retreating as the troops were in flight, and I met them
and told them not to be discouraged, and promised to remain with them;
and there you might see him, Aristophanes, as you describe, just as he
is in the streets of Athens, stalking like a pelican, and rolling his
eyes, calmly contemplating enemies as well as friends, and making very
intelligible to anybody, even from a distance, that whoever attacks
him will be likely to meet with a stout resistance; and in this way he
and his companion escaped--for these are the sort of persons who are
never touched in war; they pursue only those who are running away
headlong. I particularly observed how superior he was to Laches in
presence of mind.
"Many are the wonders of Socrates which I might narrate in his praise;
most of his ways might perhaps be paralleled in others, but the most
astonishing thing of all is his absolute unlikeness to any other human
being that is or ever has been. You may imagine Brasidas and others to
have been like Achilles; or you may imagine Nestor and Antenor to have
been like Pericles; and the same may be said of other famous men, but
of this strange being you will never be able to find any likeness,
however remote, either among men who now are or who ever have been,
except that which I have already suggested of Silenus and the satyrs;
and this is an allegory not only of himself, but also of his words.
For, altho I forgot to mention this before, his words are ridiculous
when you first hear them; he clothes himself in language that is as
the skin of the wanton satyr--for his talk is of pack-asses and smiths
and cobblers and curriers, and he is always repeating the same things
in the same words, so that an ignorant man who did not know him might
feel disposed to laugh at him; but he, who pierces the mask and sees
what is within will find that they are the only words which have a
meaning in them, and also the most divine, abounding in fair examples
of virtue, and of the largest discourse, or rather extending to the
whole duty of a good and honorable man.
"This, friends, is my praise of Socrates. I have added my blame of him
for his ill treatment of me; and he has ill treated not only me, but
Charmides,[69] the son of Glaucon, and Euthydemus,[70] the son of
Diocles, and many others in the same way--beginning as their lover, he
has ended by making them pay their addresses to him. Wherefore I say
to you, Agathon, 'Be not deceived by him; learn from me and take
warning, and don't be a fool and learn by experience,' as the proverb
says."
When Alcibiades had done speaking, there was a laugh at his plainness
of speech, as he seemed to be still in love with Socrates. "You are
sober, Alcibiades," said Socrates, "or you would never have gone about
to hide the purpose of your satyr's praises, for all this long story
is only an ingenious circumlocution, the point of which comes in by
the way at the end; you want to get up a quarrel between me and
Agathon, and your notion is that I ought to love you and nobody else,
and that you and you only ought to love Agathon. But the plot of this
satyric or Selinic drama has been detected, and you must not allow
him, Agathon, to set us at variance."
"I believe you are right," said Agathon, "and I am disposed to think
that his intention in placing himself between you and me was only to
divide us; but he shall gain nothing by that move, as I will go and
lie in the couch next to you."
"Yes, yes," replied Socrates, "by all means come here and lie on the
couch below me."
"Alas," said Alcibiades, "how am I fooled by this man! He is
determined to get the better of me at every turn. I do beseech you,
allow Agathon to lie between us."
"Impossible," said Socrates, "as you praised me, and I ought to praise
my neighbor on the right, he will be out of order in praising me again
when he ought rather to be praised by me, and I must entreat you to
consent to this, and not be jealous, for I have a great desire to
praise the youth."
"Ha! ha!" cried Agathon; "I will rise instantly, that I may be praised
by Socrates."
"The usual way," said Alcibiades; "where Socrates is, no one else has
any chance with the fair, and now how readily has he invented a
specious reason for attracting Agathon to himself!"