_Socr._ Don’t you understand, that at the beginning of a statesman’s
writing, the name of its supporter is written first.
_Phæ._ How?
_Socr._ “Approved,” I think the writing itself says, “by the council, or
the people, or both,” and he who proposed it, speaking very pompously of
and extolling himself, namely the composer, after this makes a speech so
as to display his own wisdom to his supporters, sometimes making a very
long composition. Does this appear to you to be any thing else than a
written speech?
_Phæ._ It does not to me.
88. _Socr._ If, then, it happens to be approved, the composer goes home
from the theatre delighted. But if it should be rubbed out, and he
debarred from writing speeches, and from the dignity of an author, both
he and his friends take it greatly to heart.
_Phæ._ Just so.
_Socr._ It is clear, then, that they do not despise this practice, but
admire it exceedingly.
_Phæ._ Certainly.
_Socr._ What then, when an orator or a king has proved himself competent
to assume the power of a Lycurgus, or a Solon, or a Darius, and to
become immortal as a speech-writer in a state, does he not deem himself
godlike, while he is yet alive, and do not posterity think the very same
of his writings?
_Phæ._ Just so.
89. _Socr._ Do you think then that any person of this sort, however
ill-disposed he may be towards Lysias, would upbraid him merely because
he is a writer?
_Phæ._ It does not seem probable from what you say; for in that case, as
it appears, he would upbraid his own passion.
_Socr._ This, then, must be clear to every one, that the mere writing of
speeches is not disgraceful.
_Phæ._ Why should it be?
_Socr._ But this I think now is disgraceful, not to express and write
them well, but shamefully and ill.
_Phæ._ Clearly so.
_Socr._ What then is the method of writing well or ill? Have we not
occasion, Phædrus, to enquire about this from Lysias or some one else,
who has at some time or other written or means to write, either a
political or private composition, in metre as a poet, or without metre
as a prose-writer?
_Phæ._ Do you ask, if we have occasion? For what purpose in the world
should any one live, but for the sake of pleasures of this kind? Not,
surely, for those which cannot even be enjoyed unless they are preceded
by pain, which is the case with nearly all the pleasures connected with
the body; on which account they are justly called servile.
90. _Socr._ We have leisure, however, as it seems: and moreover the
grasshoppers, while, as is their wont in the heat of the day, they are
singing over our heads and talking with one another, appear to me to be
looking down upon us. If, then, they should see us too, like most men,
not conversing at mid-day, but falling asleep and lulled by them,
through indolence of mind, they would justly laugh us to scorn, thinking
that some slaves or other had come to them in this retreat, in order
like sheep to take a mid-day sleep by the side of the fountain. But if
they see us conversing, and sailing by them, as if they were Syrens
unenchanted, the boon which they have from the gods to confer upon men,
they will perhaps out of admiration bestow upon us.
_Phæ._ But what is this that they have? For I happen not to have heard
of it, as it seems.
_Socr._ Yet it is not proper that a lover of the Muses should not have
heard of things of this kind. It is said, then, that these grasshoppers
were men before the Muses were born; but that when the Muses were born,
and song appeared, some of the men of that time were so overcome by
pleasure, that through singing they neglected to eat and drink, until
they died unawares. 91. From these the race of grasshoppers afterwards
sprung, having received this boon from the Muses, that they should need
no nourishment from the time of their birth, but should continue singing
without food and without drink till they died, and that after that they
should go to the Muses and inform them who of those here honoured each
of them. Therefore by informing Terpsichore of those who honour her in
the dance they make them dearer to her; and Erato they inform of her
votaries in love; and so all the rest in a similar manner, according to
the kind of honour belonging to each. But the eldest, Calliope, and next
to her Urania, they tell of those who pass their lives in philosophy,
and honour their music; and these most of all the Muses, being
conversant with heaven, and discourse both divine and human, pour forth
the most beautiful strains. For many reasons, therefore, we should
converse and not sleep at mid-day.
_Phæ._ We should converse, indeed.
_Socr._ Therefore, as we lately proposed to consider, we should enquire
in what consists a correct method of speaking and writing, and in what
not.
_Phæ._ Evidently.
92. _Socr._ Is it not, then, essential, in order to a good and beautiful
speech being made, that the mind of the speaker should know the truth of
the subject on which he is about to speak?
_Phæ._ I have heard say on this subject, my dear Socrates, that it is
not necessary for one who purposes to be an orator to learn what is
really just, but what would appear so to the multitude, who will have to
judge; nor what is really good or beautiful, but what will appear so:
for that persuasion proceeds from these, and not from truth.
_Socr._ We ought not to reject a saying[128], which wise men utter, but
should consider whether they say any thing worth attending to. Wherefore
we must not pass by what you have now said.
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Footnote 128:
An expression taken from Homer, Iliad, iii. 65.
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