“In the same manner,” he replied, “as with things very little and very
large. Do you think that any thing is more rare than to find a very
large or a very little man, or dog, or any thing else? and again swift
or slow, beautiful or ugly, white or black? Do you not perceive that of
all such things the extremes are rare and few, but that the intermediate
are abundant and numerous?”
“Certainly,” I replied.
“Do you not think, then,” he continued, “that if a contest in wickedness
were proposed, even here very few would be found pre-eminent?”
“It is probable,” I said.
“It is so,” he said; “but in this respect reasonings do not resemble
men, for I was just now following you as my leader, but in this they do
resemble them, when any one believes in any argument as true without
being skilled in the art of reasoning, and then shortly afterwards it
appears to him to be false, at one time being so and at another time
not, and so on with one after another[34]; and especially they who
devote themselves to controversial arguments, you are aware at length
think they have become very wise, and have alone discovered that there
is nothing sound and stable either in things or reasonings, but that all
things that exist, as is the case with the Euripus, are in a constant
state of flux and reflux, and never continue in any one condition for
any length of time.”
-----
Footnote 34:
καὶ αὖθις ἕτερος καὶ ἕτερος, that is, “with one argument after
another.” Though Cousin translates it _et successivement tout
différent de lui-mâne_, and Ast, _et rursus alia atque alia_, which
may be taken in either sense, yet it appears to me to mean that, when
a man repeatedly discovers the fallacy of arguments which he before
believed to be true, he distrusts reasoning altogether, just as one
who meets with friend after friend who proves unfaithful, becomes a
misanthrope.
-----
“You speak perfectly true,” I said.
90. “Would it not then, Phædo,” he said, “be a sad thing if, when there
is a true and sound reasoning, and such as one can understand, one
should then, through lighting upon such arguments as appear to be at one
time true, and at another false, not blame one’s-self and one’s own want
of skill, but at length through grief should anxiously transfer the
blame from one’s-self to the arguments, and thereupon pass the rest of
one’s life in hating and reviling arguments, and so be deprived of the
truth and knowledge of things that exist?”
“By Jupiter,” I said, “it would be sad indeed.”
“In the first place, then,” he said, “let us beware of this, and let us
not admit into our souls the notion, that there appears to be nothing
sound in reasoning, but much rather that we are not yet in a sound
condition, and that we ought vigorously and strenuously to endeavour to
become sound, you and the others, on account of your whole future life,
but I, on account of my death, since I am in danger at the present time,
of not behaving as becomes a philosopher, with respect to this very
subject, but as a wrangler like those who are utterly uninformed. 91.
For they, when they dispute about any thing, care nothing at all for the
subject about which the discussion is, but are anxious about this, that
what they have themselves advanced shall appear true to the persons
present. And I seem to myself on the present occasion to differ from
them only in this respect; for I shall not be anxious to make what I say
appear true to those who are present, except that may happen by the way,
but that it may appear certainly to be so to myself. For I thus reason,
my dear friend, and observe how interestedly, if what I say be true, it
is well to be persuaded of it: but if nothing remains to one that is
dead, I shall at least during the interval before death, be less
disagreeable to those present by my lamentations. But this ignorance of
mine will not continue long, for that would be bad, but will shortly be
put an end to. Thus prepared then, Simmias and Cebes,” he continued, “I
now proceed to my argument. Do you however, if you will be persuaded by
me, pay little attention to Socrates, but much more to the truth, and if
I appear to you to say any thing true, assent to it, but if not, oppose
me with all your might, taking good care that in my zeal I do not
deceive both myself and you, and like a bee depart leaving my sting
behind.”
92. “But let us proceed,” he said; “first of all, remind me of what you
said, if I should appear to have forgotten it. For Simmias, as I think,
is in doubt and fears lest the soul, though more divine and beautiful
than the body, should perish before it, as being a species of harmony.
But Cebes appeared to me to grant me this, that the soul is more durable
than the body, but he argued that it is uncertain to every one, whether
when the soul has worn out many bodies, and that repeatedly, it does
not, on leaving the last body, itself also perish, so that this very
thing is death, the destruction of the soul, since the body never ceases
decaying. Are not these the things, Simmias and Cebes, which we have to
enquire into?”
They both agreed that they were.
“Whether, then,” he continued, “do you reject all our former arguments,
or some of them only, and not others?”
“Some we do,” they replied, “and others not.”
“What then,” he proceeded, “do you say about that argument, in which we
asserted that knowledge is reminiscence, and that, this being the case,
our soul must necessarily have existed somewhere before it was enclosed
in the body?”
93. “I, indeed,” replied Cebes, “was both then wonderfully persuaded by
it, and now persist in it, as in no other argument.”
“And I too,” said Simmias, “am of the same mind, and should very much
wonder if I should ever think otherwise on that point.”
“Then,” Socrates said, “you must needs think otherwise, my Theban
friend, if this opinion holds good, that harmony is something
compounded, and that the soul is a kind of harmony that results from the
parts compacted together in the body. For surely you will not allow
yourself to say that harmony was composed prior to the things from which
it required to be composed. Would you allow this?”
“By no means Socrates,” he replied.
“Do you perceive then,” he said, “that this results from what you say,
when you assert that the soul existed before it came into a human form
and body, but that it was composed from things that did not yet exist?
For harmony is not such as that to which you compare it; but first the
lyre, and the chords, and the sounds yet unharmonized, exist, and last
of all harmony is produced, and first perishes. How then will this
argument accord with that?”
“Not at all,” said Simmias.
94. “And yet,” he said, “if in any argument, there ought to be an
accordance in one respecting harmony.”
“There ought,” said Simmias.
“This of yours however,” he said, “is not in accordance. Consider then,
which of these two statements do you prefer, that knowledge is
reminiscence, or the soul harmony?”
“The former, by far, Socrates,” he replied, “for the latter occurred to
me without demonstration, through a certain probability and speciousness
whence most men derive their opinions. But I am well aware that
arguments which draw their demonstrations from probabilities are idle;
and unless one is on one’s guard against them, they are very deceptive,
both in geometry and all other subjects. But the argument respecting
reminiscence and knowledge may be said to have been demonstrated by a
satisfactory hypothesis. For in this way it was said that our soul
existed before it came into the body, because the essence that bears the
appellation of ‘that which is,’ belongs to it. But of this, as I
persuade myself, I am fully and rightly convinced. It is therefore
necessary, as it seems, that I should neither allow myself nor any one
else to maintain that the soul is harmony.”
95. “But what, Simmias,” said he, “if you consider it thus? Does it
appear to you to appertain to harmony, or to any other composition, to
subsist in any other way than the very things do of which it is
composed?”
“By no means.”
“And indeed, as I think, neither to do any thing, nor suffer any thing
else, besides what they do or suffer.”
He agreed.
“It does not, therefore, appertain to harmony to take the lead of the
things of which it is composed, but to follow them.”
He assented.
“It is then far from being the case that harmony is moved or sends forth
sounds contrariwise, or is in any other respect opposed to its parts?”
“Far indeed,” he said.
“What then? is not every harmony naturally harmony, so far as it has
been made to accord?”
“I do not understand you,” he replied.
“Whether,” he said, “if it should be in a greater degree and more fully
made to accord, supposing that were possible, would the harmony be
greater and more full, but if in a less degree and less fully, then
would it be inferior and less full?”
“Certainly.”
“Is this then the case with the soul, that, even in the smallest extent,
one soul is more fully and in a greater degree, or less fully and in a
less degree this very thing, a soul, than another?”
“In no respect whatever,” he replied.
96. “Well then,” he said, “by Jupiter, is one soul said to possess
intelligence and virtue, and to be good, and another folly and vice, and
to be bad? and is this said with truth?”
“With truth, certainly.”
“Of those, then, who maintain that the soul is harmony, what will any
one say that these things are in the soul, virtue and vice? Will he call
them another kind of harmony and discord? and say that the one, the good
soul, is harmonized, and, being harmony, contains within itself another
harmony, but that the other is discordant, and does not contain within
itself another harmony?”
“I am unable to say,” replied Simmias, “but it is clear that he who
maintains that opinion would say something of the kind.”
“But it has been already granted,” said he, “that one soul is not more
or less a soul than another; and this is an admission that one harmony
is not to a greater degree or more fully, or to a less degree or less
fully, a harmony, than another: is it not so?”
“Certainly.”
“And that that which is neither more nor less harmony, is neither more
nor less harmonized: is it so?”
“It is.”
“But does that which is neither more nor less harmonized partake of more
or less harmony, or an equal amount?”
“An equal amount.”
97. “A soul, therefore, since it is not more or less this very thing, a
soul, than another, is not more or less harmonized?”
“Even so.”
“Such then being its condition, it cannot partake of a greater degree of
discord or harmony?”
“Certainly not.”
“And again, such being its condition, can one soul partake of a greater
degree of vice or virtue than another, if vice be discord, and virtue
harmony?”
“It cannot.”
“Or rather, surely, Simmias, according to right reason, no soul will
partake of vice, if it is harmony: for doubtless harmony, which is
perfectly such, can never partake of discord?”
“Certainly not.”
“Neither, therefore, can a soul, which is perfectly a soul, partake of
vice.”
“How can it, from what has been already said?”
“From this reasoning, then, all souls of all animals will be equally
good, if at least they are by nature equally this very thing, souls?”
“It appears so to me, Socrates,” he said.
“And does it appear to you,” he said, “to have been thus rightly argued,
and that the argument would lead to this result, if the hypothesis were
correct, that the soul is harmony?”