After we had discussed these clubs a little longer, and I had given
them the full speech I would have made in Hootsville, Lysis said: ‘And
is it true, Socrates, that the lecture-tour of Alcibiades also was not
well received?’
‘It is true,’ I answered.
‘Yet is he not most brilliant and accomplished, and are not his brains,
as he says, first-class?’
‘Assuredly,’ I answered. ‘But his manner was high-spirited, and he did
not apply himself to win the favour of the Americans as though they
had been the populace of Athens. He broke also, and that in a most
shameless manner, the law which is the dearest to them of all their
laws. He violated the Volstead Act.’
At this Agathon leaned forward and said: ‘You must beware, O Lysis and
Phaelon, of the Socratic irony, which has been the subject of a great
deal of comment, and of which you are the victims at this moment. For
it is well known that the Volstead Act is not dear to the Americans at
all and that Alcibiades did nothing uncommon or scandalous in violating
it.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Phaelon, ‘we should first understand clearly what this
Volstead Act is.’
‘Why,’ I said, ‘it is the law by which the Americans imposed upon
themselves a most heavy sacrifice, and denied themselves in a loud
voice that great pleasure of human life, wine.’
‘Truly a heavy sacrifice,’ exclaimed both Lysis and Phaelon, and Lysis
added the obvious question whether any reason could be found for such
amazing conduct, for the folly natural to barbarians seemed wholly
inadequate to account for it.
‘It is indeed,’ I answered, ‘a hard knot that we have to untangle,
and one that will puzzle future generations. Many and various are the
explanations put forward. Thus some philosophers point out that the
sacrifice is being made in a time of great prosperity, and believe that
it is intended to avert the jealousy of the gods. And there is much
truth in that. For the Americans found themselves grown extremely rich,
and, believing nothing to be so desirable as material prosperity, they
feared lest the whole company of Olympus, both gods and goddesses,
should resolve to become American citizens, and should achieve their
ends by cunning or magic, despite the immigration Authorities. The
Americans did not at all desire their company, partly through fear
of the intensified and unscrupulous competition which it is the
wont of the gods to indulge in, but chiefly because they consider
that the gods, with the uncertain exception of Zeus himself, are not
of Anglo-Saxon stock. To abate the edge of envy, they resolved to
involve themselves in calamity and, by inserting privation into their
Constitution, to create such a drawback to their country that not the
divinities only but ordinary mortals also, should have no desire to
share their life. You have heard how the maidens of Leucris, to protect
their honour, slit off their noses and went undesired of the invading
hordes. So also the Americans deemed it prudent to show to the world a
mutilated life. They also believed that their own gods would be touched
by the sight of such suffering and would augment the number of their
other possessions, and they were strengthened in this view when they
sent to consult their national oracle at Detroit. For the oracle said:――
In driest land,
’Neath steadiest hand,
The iron steed
Will fastest breed.
which they understood to mean that if they gave up all their potations
there would be more cars. And this was decisive, for they think that
everything, even life itself, is worthily sacrificed to increase the
number of these cars. They believed furthermore that this sacrifice
would increase the quantity of other things at their command.’
‘I have heard a different reason,’ here put in Agathon, and seeing us
nod to him to go on, he unfolded what follows:
‘The Americans,’ he said ‘are a shrewd people, and know that men easily
become lovers of ease unless there is necessity or some great future
delight to spur them on to exertion. How, they asked themselves, can
the mechanics and other workers be kept from the desire for ease and
the abandonment of intense daily toil. For a long time the desire to
possess a car could be trusted to spur them on, but cars have grown
cheap, and it is found beside that such objects tend by contrast to
make men love real ease more than ever before. What was needed was to
restore the right conception of wealth as something ardently to be
longed for, for invention had too greatly levelled the lives of rich
and poor. The poor man had motion and music and print and divorce and
patent food and cremation, and everything that was once the privilege
of the rich. Nature had made men equal in the chief goods like health
and affection, thus seeming herself to render vain the end for which,
as they thought, men had been created, the production of wealth. And
they discovered that the devout worship of Progress, the very process
of creating wealth, made the prize of private gain relatively less
valuable, thus threatening the springs of energy itself. As extreme
wealth gave men the pleasures of successful propaganda so must ordinary
wealth have some special privilege attached. And therefore did their
chief men resolve to prohibit by law one of life’s greatest amenities,
for if a thing is forbidden by the law, only the rich will enjoy it.
For wealth everywhere lifts a man above the laws and nowhere more than
in the United States.’
‘Is it perhaps possible,’ asked Phaelon, ‘that it was done from a noble
desire to help the Europeans?’
‘How, dear Phaelon?’ I said.
‘Why,’ he said, ‘it is a great advantage to the Spartans to make their
Helots drunk that the young Spartans may have before them the spectacle
of drunkenness and be warned and seek temperance. It is surely an equal
advantage for Europeans to have at hand a nation of teetotallers (I
believe that is the word for such people) lest they should be tempted
to err in the opposite direction to the Spartans. For I have read
many notices about the great charity of America towards Europe and I
wondered if it was this self-denial of which you speak.’
‘That is not badly conceived, Phaelon,’ said I, ‘but I am afraid we
cannot take it as an explanation. In the first place the nations of
Europe do not at all need to be warned, by example or otherwise against
teetotalism, and, secondly, the Americans are not at all a nation of
teetotallers.’
‘You mean,’ he said, ‘that the rich can drink and do.’
‘Not the rich only, but all who will take a little trouble,’ I answered.
‘Then,’ said he, ‘is it possible that this law has been imposed not to
make teetotallers, but for the sake of the bribes of those who wish to
break it?’
‘Not so,’ I answered, ‘for it costs the Americans a great deal of
money to make this change in the way men drink. They employ many more
policemen than before and if there is a bribe it is these men who keep
it and not the State, and though the State gains something from the
fines it imposes, yet it loses a great deal more by not being able to
tax wine and the other drinks.’
Hereupon Lysis exclaimed: ‘Then what is the real reason for such
strange goings on. For my part, I believe they prohibit drinks by
law in order to give an added flavour or zest to their drinking. For
forbidden fruit is sweet to taste.’
‘For the same reason, in fact,’ said Agathon, ‘that they mix different
drinks together, to get more stimulus. So that we may say that
Prohibition and cocktails spring from the same source.’
‘That explanation and the others, my worthy friends,’ I said, ‘may help
us to understand why so many are resigned to the privation. But very
different is the true cause why they have poured out so vast a libation
to Efficiency.’
‘Explain it, then,’ said they all.
‘Did we not agree earlier,’ I answered, ‘that in America the State does
many things that are not for its own good, and that are not done in the
interests of the State itself, but that rich and energetic minorities
could use the machinery of representative government to make their own
will appear as the will of the State?’
‘Indeed, yes,’ they said. ‘And truly,’ said Agathon, ‘and when he said
earlier that the combination of the manufacturers and the preachers
could never be resisted, I thought at once of this Prohibition.’
‘It seemed to the interests of those two classes and the women,’ I
said, ‘and they brought it about. But such men commonly cannot judge
what is to their own advantage. For the preachers are men who have
chosen for themselves the task of moral leadership, and have commonly
great earnestness and little else. You know, Lysis, that the preachers
are those who have separated themselves from the priests and the old
religious traditions? Indeed it was largely by such preachers and their
close followers that the first colonies were founded in America.’
‘The priests themselves,’ said Lysis, ‘are surely not enemies to drink.’
‘By Hercules, no,’ I said.
‘That means much,’ said Agathon.
‘The priests,’ I continued, ‘took to Aristotle generations ago, and
have held by his teachings in a most striking manner. For Aristotle’s
mind is much like a corkscrew, being tortuous but powerful, and opening
up worthy things for our satisfaction. His reputation has surprised
me somewhat, seeing how often he is wrong. For he is in general
too easily satisfied, and thinks that because a thing exists it is
therefore justified. But what he has written about preserving the mean
of temperance is excellent, and to that the priests have adhered. The
United States, however, is a preachers’ country. Now the preachers
are opposed by their natures to the humane and easy enjoyment of life
and would sacrifice temperance to avoid excess. For they rightly hold
drunkenness to be a degrading thing, but wrongly suppose abstinence
to be superior to moderation or temperance. Now while they preached
against drunkenness they did no harm, but they made in my opinion a
great mistake when they stirred up the women to tamper with the laws.’
‘Is that what they did?’ asked Lysis.
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘though the women did not want much persuading, for
it seemed obvious to them that money spent by men in obtaining the
enjoyment that friends gain by drinking together was wasted money
while the same money spent in adorning the women themselves or their
offspring was money profitably spent. For they were eager to believe
such things.’
A great look of understanding came into the eyes of both Lysis and
Phaelon, and Lysis said:――
‘Prohibition then is in large measure a part of that tyranny of the
women of which you spoke a little while back?’
‘Why, yes,’ I replied, ‘they were strong enough both by the votes that
they enjoyed in many States and by their ascendency over their men to
pass this law. For it was a strong alliance. The manufacturers also
had great influence with the men, for they kept repeating that all the
other trades would share more money if the wine trade was forbidden by
the law, and in each man the trading part of the soul fought with the
reasonable part, and with many of the Americans it conquered. And each
man thought that he could himself evade the law.’
‘Did many say that, Socrates?’ asked Lysis.
‘No,’ I answered; ‘they use other words. They say that such a law is
a good thing for the country, by which they mean that it is helping
their business without changing their private habits. While others
again, both men and women, are of the nobler sort, and will gladly make
a personal sacrifice, in the belief that it will help the poor. There
are many rich women who regard the poor as their family, and seek their
good as a mother seeks that of her children. Such are called Social
Reformers.’
‘But are not the poor grown up?’ asked Phaelon.
‘Of course,’ I answered; ‘but the rich have different ideas from
theirs, especially if the poor are from south Europe. So the rich busy
themselves to change the character of the poor. When they are doing
that they call themselves by a high-sounding title, and say they are
Practical Idealists.’
‘I understand,’ said Lysis, ‘for the rich are the manufacturers, or
share the outlook of manufacturers, and when they are considering the
character of the poor, they will identify being a good man with being
a good worker, and will give no praise at all to such a one as you
yourself, Socrates, forever sitting about in the public places and
busying yourself with subjects with which manufacturers have nothing to
do.’
‘You have understood perfectly, O excellent Lysis,’ I exclaimed, ‘and
you well describe what happens in America to-day, and among other
things why the manufacturers have abolished, as far as they could, the
drinking of the poor. For it is perhaps better for a workman to be a
teetotaller if you consider him merely in his function as a workman,
and as a machine to be treated in a certain way, but it is quite a
different story if you consider him as a man. For teetotalism makes a
worker more a worker but a man less a man. And drunkenness makes him
also less a man, but instead of becoming more of a workman he ceases to
be a workman at all.’
‘But teetotalism,’ said Agathon, ‘is the more dangerous extreme. For
only a very exceptional man can keep really drunk for long periods
whereas many teetotallers stay teetotallers for months together.’
‘Many months,’ I agreed.
‘And even years in some cases, Socrates,’ he went on, ‘if what I hear
is true.’
‘Why, yes,’ I said, ‘I’m afraid we cannot deny it: there are men in
Kansas who have repressed their thirst for upwards of forty years.’
‘Surely,’ said Lysis, ‘we would pay more to see them exhibited here
than the Americans would pay to see the Parthenon? Let us give the
Parthenon to that American who approached you this morning, Agathon,
and let us have some Kansans.’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘such a group of voluntary Tantaluses would be a
spectacle of much interest to the young, who are commonly insensible
to the griefs of others, and who would not think it base to let their
eyes have their fill of the dreadful sight. But I confess my heart was
touched, for the state of these Kansans is like that of the ponies
that are kept in coal pits, who by long habituation to the dark become
blind. And to their children these people show imaginary pictures of
the inside of the human body and the effects of alcohol, for so they
love to call all fermented beverages, so that these children shall
believe they are being saved from a most terrible dragon. Nor is it
till they visit Europe that they learn that the poison of alcohol is
not always fatal.’
‘It is a good thing for the Americans that so many of them visit
Europe,’ said Lysis gravely.
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘for I met a man in Kansas who had never been out of
Kansas and who refused to believe that I was a human being at all.
For he said that Science had shown that alcohol was a poison, and as
the Europeans were known from history books to have made a habit of
consuming large quantities of this poison, it followed that they were
all dead. And he declared that the present peoples in Europe were
nothing but a race of apes pretending to be the same creatures that
Science showed alcohol to have destroyed. He said the apes were doing
it to win the affection that the Americans would show to other human
beings, however, degraded, but not to apes.’
‘Truly a striking view,’ exclaimed Lysis.
‘It was one that explained everything to my friend,’ I answered. ‘He
declared the pretence could not last, and that the apes had accordingly
begun to spread a story round that all men, even the Americans, were
kinsfolk to the apes. But with this, he said, he and all good hundred
per cent Americans would have nothing whatever to do, and he added
they were prepared if necessary to disprove it by an amendment to the
Constitution. He claimed, moreover, that this view of his gave by far
the best explanation of the chattering and quarrelling that was forever
going on over in Europe. And he added that my appearance corroborated
his theory.’
‘Well, Socrates,’ said Agathon, ‘you must allow us to excuse him there.’
‘So did I excuse him,’ I answered, ‘for I knew that that man was
intoxicated, not indeed by wine, but by statistics, for the Americans
find in statistics a drug more powerful than alcohol, the women
shamelessly revealing their craving and attending lectures, and crying
out for facts, but meaning these numbers. For all large numbers and all
numbers arranged in patterns have a magical power over them. And they
will eagerly deny their own personal experience if it seems to upset
what the statistics say.’
‘Truly a pitiable servitude,’ murmured Lysis.
‘Pitiable indeed,’ I agreed, ‘but they wear these chains of numbers
proudly, for in general the numbers are large. And they have no notion
that these numbers must be used with care, but will let themselves be
led into any error by any cunning piper luring them to destruction,
provided only that he can pipe the proper magic ciphers and talk to
them of percentages. For these statisticians have more power to make
great crowds follow them than ever Orpheus had. But I expect that in
the end they will most of them meet with the fate of Orpheus and be
torn to pieces by angry women, filled with a different kind of madness.’
‘Well,’ said Agathon, ‘there is one thing very hopeful for them and of
excellent augury.’
‘Which?’ I asked.
‘Why,’ he said, ‘when they consider the number of their crimes and how
much blood is shed and treasure seized each year, do you not think they
will be greatly impressed and will realize that their chief trouble is
that the laws are not kept and that obedience is not enforced?’
‘I do,’ I agreed.
‘And are they not an active people and one ready to make experiment,
even to experiment with European usages?’
‘I believe so.’
‘Well,’ he said, ‘will they not be forced to realize that they were the
very last people in the world who should have attempted Prohibition,
for they cannot even protect human life well. For if they had been a
very poor people, fighting for a share in the commerce of nations,
and endowed with a tradition of law observance, then they might have
attempted this further discipline. But the Americans were not poor,
nor were they desperately in need of such efficiency. Indeed no people
could better afford to drink.’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘and their laws were the last laws that could stand the
strain. For they have never been well kept, and there has always been
corruption. So that they did not do well when they outlawed a permanent
human appetite and made another enemy to the law.’
‘Did you keep the law yourself, Socrates?’ said Lysis, ‘for you always
say that even a bad law should be obeyed because it is the law.’
‘Why,’ I answered, ‘thinking as I do, and being the guest of the
Americans, I would take no step to avoid the abstinence that the law
imposed. Yet I must confess that there was no city in which I went
unrefreshed.’
‘A great thing is friendship,’ exclaimed Lysis.
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘my friends and hosts everywhere insisted, not all of
them everywhere, but some in every place, who sought me out, knowing
that I was from the Mediterranean.’
‘And when these drinks were offered to you, Socrates,’ demanded Lysis,
looking me straight in the face and fixing his eyes on mine, ‘did
you still tell them that all laws should be obeyed until they can be
altered?’
‘Assuredly.’
‘What did they answer?’
‘That I was to drink my fill, and not be at all uneasy lest I was
breaking any law, because it was lawful to drink the wine that you
possessed in your cellar before the law was made. It seems it was
always such wine that I was drinking. Nor did they seem to fear that
they would ever exhaust those cellars of theirs.’
‘Happy Socrates,’ they said.
‘They urged moreover, when they were not too busy to discuss the
point, that a law among them is not at all the same as a law among
the Athenians. They said that perhaps in Athens, which was small,
the people made the law knowing what they did, but that in America
thousands and thousands of laws were made every year. America
was equally the paradise of her who would make a law and him who
would break one, and in proportion as the existing laws were not
kept was there a clamour for fresh laws. But there is no sense of
responsibility, either in the making or the breaking. And we would do
well, my wonderful friends, to give this advice to the Americans that
they should treat a law as a great luxury, to be cherished as Helen
herself was cherished. Then when they find they are observing all, or
some part at least, of the laws they have, they may reward themselves
by a new law. Do those who juggle and balance plates seek to add
another plate to the row standing edgeways on their noses or foreheads
before they can balance those they already have?’
‘Indeed, no, Socrates,’ they replied.
‘And if they did,’ I continued, ‘would they not break all their plates
and not receive any plaudits from the spectators?’
‘Such,’ said Lysis, ‘would be their deserved misfortune.’
‘And should we not call such jugglers presumptuous fools and men
unskilled in their art?’
‘What else, indeed, O Socrates?’
‘And yet is their case any different from that of these Americans who
before they can well keep ten laws will make fifty more? So that the
law ceases to hold authority among them and they are careless who makes
it and who breaks it. For there can be no more grievous ill done to
any state than that its citizens should not think rightly about the
laws, and should forget that a good law is the expression of Justice,
allotting to each man what is his, and is deserving of all reverence,
while a bad law destroys the life of the state and ought by all means
to be abolished as soon as possible.’
‘We agree,’ they said.