“But I will ask him,” I replied. “Answer me, then, Menexenus, what I
shall ask you; for from my childhood I happen to have had a desire for a
certain thing, as another person may have of something else: for one
desires to possess horses, another dogs, another gold, and another
honours; but I, for my part, am indifferent about these things, but have
a fond desire for the possession of friends, and I had rather have a
good friend than the best quail or cock in the world; and, by Jupiter,
than the best horse or dog, and I think, by the dog, that I should much
rather prefer the possession of an intimate, than the gold of Darius, or
even than Darius himself, so fond am I of intimate friends. Seeing you,
therefore, and Lysis, I was amazed, and pronounced you happy, because,
young as you are, you have been able so quickly and easily to acquire
this possession, and you have so quickly and sincerely acquired him for
your friend, and again he you. But I am so far from making this
acquisition, that I do not even know in what way one man becomes the
friend of another; but I wish to ask this very thing of you, as being an
experienced person. 21. Tell me, then, when any one loves another, which
of the two becomes a friend, the lover of the beloved, or the beloved of
the lover? or is there no difference?”
“It appears to me,” said he, “that there is no difference.”
“How say you?” I replied, “Do both then become friends of each other, if
one alone loves the other?”
“To me it appears so,” said he.
“But what? Is it not possible for one who loves not to be loved in turn
by the object of his love?”
“It is.”
“But what? is it not possible, then, for one who loves ever to be hated?
as lovers surely sometimes seem to be treated by their favourites: for
though they love most ardently, some of them think that they are not
loved in turn, and some even that they are hated. Does not this appear
to you to be true?”
“Quite true,” said he.
“In such a case, then,” said I, “does one love, and is the other loved?”
“Yes.”
“Which then of these is the friend of the other? the lover of the
beloved, whether he is loved in turn, or even if he is hated, or the
beloved of the lover? or again, in such a case, is neither the friend of
neither, unless both love each other?”
“It seems indeed to be so.”
22. “Now, then, it appears to us otherwise than it appeared before. For
then if one loved, both appeared to be friends; but now, unless both
love neither is a friend.”
“It appears so,” said he.
“Nothing, therefore, is a friend to that which loves unless it loves in
turn.”
“It seems not.”
“Neither, then, are they friends of horses, whom horses do not love in
turn, nor friends of quails, nor again friends of dogs, and friends of
wine, and friends of gymnastics, and of wisdom, unless wisdom loves them
in turn: or do they severally love these things although they are not
friends, and does the poet speak falsely who says, ‘Happy the man who
has boys for his friends, and solid-hoofed horses, and hunting dogs, and
a foreign guest?’”
“It does not seem so to me,” he replied.
“But does he appear to you to speak the truth?”
“Yes.”
“The beloved, then, is a friend to that which loves, as it seems,
Menexenus, whether it loves or whether it hates; just as children newly
born, who partly do not yet love, and partly even hate, when they are
punished by their mother or their father, nevertheless, at the very time
when they hate, are in the highest degree beloved by their parents.
“It appears to me,” said he, “that this is the case.”
23. “The lover, therefore, from this reasoning, is not the friend, but
the beloved.”
“It seems so.”
“And he who is hated, therefore, is an enemy, but not he who hates.”
“So it appears.”
“Many, therefore, are beloved by their enemies and hated by their
friends; and are friends to their enemies, but enemies to their friends,
if the beloved is a friend, and not the lover. Though it is very absurd,
my dear friend, or rather, I think, impossible, to be an enemy to a
friend, and a friend to an enemy.”
“You seem to speak truly, Socrates,” said he.
“If, therefore, this is impossible, the lover will be a friend of the
beloved.”
“So it appears.”
“Again, therefore, that which hates must be the enemy of that which is
hated.”
“Necessarily so.”
“Therefore, the result will be that we must of necessity admit the very
things that we did before, that a man is often a friend of that which is
not a friend, and often even of that which is an enemy, when either any
one loves that which does not love, or even loves that which hates, and
is often an enemy of that which is not an enemy, or is even a friend,
when either any one loves that which does not hate, or even hates that
which loves.”
“It appears so,” said he.
“What shall we do, then,” said I, “if neither those who love are to be
friends, nor those who are loved, nor yet those who both love and are
loved? Shall we say that some others besides these become friends to
each other?”
“By Jupiter, Socrates,” said he, “I don’t well know what answer to
make.”
24. “Have we not, then, Menexenus,” said I, “conducted our enquiries
altogether right?”
“To me it appears not, Socrates,” said Lysis; and as he said this he
blushed: for his remark appeared to me to escape from him involuntarily
through his earnest attention to the conversation: and he was plainly
most attentive while he was listening.
I then, wishing that Menexenus should cease speaking, and being
delighted with the other’s love of wisdom, accordingly turned round and
directed my discourse to Lysis, and said, “Lysis, you seem to me to say
truly, that if we had conducted our enquiries properly, we should never
have wandered in this manner. But let us proceed no longer in this way,
(for the investigation appears to me to be difficult as if it were a
road,) but it seems to me that we should proceed by the road to which we
turned aside, and conduct our enquiries after the poets; for they are to
us, as it were, fathers of wisdom and guides. They speak however, I
imagine, so as not to give a mean account of such as happen to be
friends, but they say that God himself makes them friends, by conducting
them to each other. They express themselves as I think somehow as
follows: ‘God ever conducts like to like[173],’ and makes them known;
have you not met with this verse?”
-----
Footnote 173:
Homer, Odyss. xvii. 218.
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“I have,” said he.
25. “Have you not met, too, with the writings of the wisest of men that
say the very same things, that like must ever needs be friendly to like?
But these are they who discourse and write about nature and the
universe.”
“You say truly,” he replied.
“Whether, then,” said I, “do they say well?”
“Perhaps so,” said he.
“Perhaps,” said I, “the half is true, and perhaps the whole, but we do
not understand it: for the wicked man, by how much nearer he approaches,
and is more intimate with a wicked man, seems to us to become so much
the more hostile to him; for he injures him; but, surely, it is
impossible for those who injure and are injured to be friends: is it not
so?”
“Yes,” he replied.
“Thus, then, the half of this saying will not be true, since the wicked
are like each other?”
“You say true.”
“But they seem to me to say that the good are like each other and
friends, but that the bad, as it is said of them, are never alike even
to themselves, but are inconstant and unstable. But that which is unlike
and at variance with itself, can scarcely be like or friendly to
another; does it not seem so to you too?”
“To me it does,” said he.
26. “They intimate this, then, my friend, as it seems to me, when they
say that like is friendly to like, that the good man only is a friend to
the good man only, but that the bad man never arrives at true
friendship, either with a good or a bad man: does it seem so to you
also?”
He nodded assent.
“We have now discovered, then, who are friends, for our argument shews
that it must be those who are good.”
“It certainly seems so,” said he.
“And I think so too,” said I. “Nevertheless, I find some difficulty in
it. Come then, by Jupiter, let us see what it is I suspect. The like, in
so far as he is like, is a friend to the like, and such an one is useful
to such an one: or rather thus: can any thing that is like confer any
benefit on or do any harm to any thing that is like, which it cannot
also do to itself; or suffer any thing which it cannot also suffer from
itself? But how can such things be held in regard by each other when
they are unable to afford any assistance to each other? is it possible?”
“It is not possible.”
“But how can that which is not held in regard be a friend?”
“In no way.”
“The like, then, is not a friend to the like: but will the good be a
friend to the good, so far as he is good, and not so far as he is like?”
“Perhaps so.”
27. “But what? Will not the good man, so far as he is good, be
sufficient for himself?”
“Yes.”
“But he who is sufficient stands in need of nothing, so far as
sufficiency is concerned?”
“How can it be otherwise?”
“And he who stands in need of nothing will not regard any thing?”
“He will not.”
“But he who does not feel a regard cannot love?”
“Surely not.”
“How, then, will the good be in any respect friends to the good, who
neither when absent regret each other, for they are sufficient for
themselves when apart, nor when present stand in need of each other? By
what contrivance can such persons value each other very highly?”
“By none at all,” said he.
“But they will not be friends who do not value each other very highly?”
“True.”
“Observe then, Lysis, how we are deceived. Are we, then, deceived in the
whole?”
“How so?” said he.
“I once heard a person say, and I just now call it to mind, that like is
most hostile to like, and the good to the good. And moreover, he adduced
Hesiod[174] as a witness, saying that ‘potter is angry with potter, bard
with bard, and beggar with beggar.’ And so, he said, with regard to all
other things, that as a matter of absolute necessity, things most like
each other are most full of envy, strife, and hatred; but such as are
most unlike, of friendship; 28. for that the poor man is compelled to be
a friend to the rich, and the weak to the strong, for the sake of
assistance, and the sick man to the physician; and that every one who is
ignorant must regard and love him that has knowledge. Moreover, he
carried on the subject in a more lofty style, saying that the like is so
far from being friendly to the like, that the very contrary to this
takes place. For that the most contrary is in the highest degree
friendly to the most contrary; for every thing desires its contrary, and
not its like. Thus the dry desires the moist, the cold heat, the bitter
sweet, the sharp blunt, the empty fulness, and the full emptiness; and
all other things in the same way. For the contrary is food to the
contrary, but the like can derive no enjoyment from the like. And
indeed, my friend, he who said this seemed to be an accomplished man,
for he spoke well. But how does he seem to you to speak?” I asked.
-----
Footnote 174:
Op. et Di., v. 25.
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