Philebus

Pro. Very good.

Soc. So I will turn to them and try to explain them; for I do not in the least agree with those who say that all pleasures are merely surcease from pain, but, as I said, I use them as witnesses to prove that some pleasures are apparent, but not in any way real, and that there are others which appear to be both great and numerous, but are really mixed up with pains and with cessations of the greatest pains and distresses of body and soul.

Pro. But what pleasures, Socrates, may rightly be considered true?

Soc. Those arising from what are called beautiful colors, or from forms, most of those that arise from odors and sounds, in short all those the want of which is unfelt and painless, whereas the satisfaction furnished by them is felt by the senses, pleasant, and unmixed with pain.

Pro. Once more, Socrates, what do you mean by this?

Soc. My meaning is certainly not clear at the first glance, and I must try to make it so. For when I say beauty of form, I am trying to express, not what most people would understand by the words, such as the beauty of animals or of paintings, but I mean, says the argument, the straight line and the circle and the plane and solid figures formed from these by turning-lathes and rulers and patterns of angles; perhaps you understand. For I assert that the beauty of these is not relative, like that of other things, but they are always absolutely beautiful by nature and have peculiar pleasures in no way subject to comparison with the pleasures of scratching; and there are colors which possess beauty and pleasures of this character. Do you understand?

Pro. I am trying to do so, Socrates; and I hope you also will try to make your meaning still clearer.

Soc. I mean that those sounds which are smooth and clear and send forth a single pure note are beautiful, not relatively, but absolutely, and that there are pleasures which pertain to these by nature and result from them.

Pro. Yes, that also is true.

Soc. The pleasures of smell are a less divine class; but they have no necessary pains mixed with them, and wherever and in whatever we find this freedom from pain, I regard it always as a mark of similarity to those other pleasures. These, then, are two classes of the pleasures of which I am speaking. Do you understand me?

Pro. I understand.

Soc. And further let us add to these the pleasures of knowledge, if they appear to us not to have hunger for knowledge or pangs of such hunger as their source.

Pro. I agree to that.

Soc. Well, if men are full of knowledge and then lose it through forgetfulness, do you see any pains in the losses?

Pro. Not by their inherent nature, but sometimes there is pain in reflecting on the event, when a man who has lost knowledge is pained by the lack of it.

Soc. True, my dear fellow, but just at present we are recounting natural feelings only, not reflection.

Pro. Then you are right in saying that we feel no pain in the loss of knowledge.

Soc. Then we may say that these pleasures of knowledge are unmixed with pain and are felt not by the many but only by very few.

Pro. Yes, certainly.

Soc. And now that we have fairly well separated the pure pleasures and those which may be pretty correctly called impure, let us add the further statement that the intense pleasures are without measure and those of the opposite sort have measure; those which admit of greatness and intensity and are often or seldom great or intense we shall assign to the class of the infinite, which circulates more or less freely through the body and soul alike, and the others we shall assign to the class of the limited.

Pro. Quite right, Socrates.

Soc. There is still another question about them to be considered.

Pro. What is it?

Soc. What kind of thing is most closely related to truth? The pure and unadulterated, or the violent, the widespread, the great, and the sufficient?

Pro. What is your object, Socrates, in asking that question?

Soc. My object, Protarchus, is to leave no gap in my test of pleasure and knowledge, if some part of each of them is pure and some part impure, in order that each of them may offer itself for judgement in a condition of purity, and thus make the judgement easier for you and me and all our audience.

Pro. Quite right.

Soc. Very well, let us adopt that point of view towards all the classes which we call pure. First let us select one of them and examine it.

Pro. Which shall we select?

Soc. Let us first, if agreeable to you, consider whiteness.

Pro. By all means.

Soc. How can we have purity in whiteness, and what purity? Is it the greatest and most widespread, or the most unmixed, that in which there is no trace of any other color?

Pro. Clearly it is the most unadulterated.

Soc. Right. Shall we not, then, Protarchus, declare that this, and not the most numerous or the greatest, is both the truest and the most beautiful of all whitenesses?

Pro. Quite right.

Soc. Then we shall be perfectly right in saying that a little pure white is whiter and more beautiful and truer than a great deal of mixed white.

Pro. Perfectly right.

Soc. Well then, we shall have no need of many such examples in our discussion of pleasure; we see well enough from this one that any pleasure, however small or infrequent, if uncontaminated with pain, is pleasanter and more beautiful than a great or often repeated pleasure without purity.

Pro. Most certainly; and the example is sufficient.

Soc. Here is another point. Have we not often heard it said of pleasure that it is always a process or generation and that there is no state or existence of pleasure? There are some clever people who try to prove this theory to us, and we ought to be grateful to them.

Pro. Well, what then?

Soc. I will explain this whole matter, Protarchus, by asking questions.

Pro. Go on; ask your questions.

Soc. There are two parts of existence, the one self-existent, the other always desiring something else.

Pro. What do you mean? What are these two?

Soc. The one is by nature more imposing, the other inferior.

Pro. Speak still more plainly.

Soc. We have seen beloved boys who are fair and good, and brave lovers of them.

Pro. Yes, no doubt of it.

Soc. Try to find another pair like these in all the relations we are speaking of.

Pro. Must I say it a third time? Please tell your meaning more plainly, Socrates.

Soc. It is no riddle, Protarchus; the talk is merely jesting with us and means that one part of existences always exists for the sake of something, and the other part is that for the sake of which the former is always coming into being.

Pro. I can hardly understand after all your repetition.

Soc. Perhaps, my boy, you will understand better as the discussion proceeds.

Pro. I hope so.

Soc. Let us take another pair.

Pro. What are they?

Soc. One is the generation of all things (the process of coming into being), the other is existence or being.

Pro. I accept your two, generation and being.

Soc. Quite right. Now which of these shall we say is for the sake of the other, generation for the sake of being, or being for the sake of generation?

Pro. You are now asking whether that which is called being is what it is for the sake of generation?

Soc. Yes, plainly.

Pro. For Heaven’s sake, is this the kind of question you keep asking me, Tell me, Protarchus, whether you think shipbuilding is for the sake of ships, or ships for the sake of shipbuilding, and all that sort of thing?

Soc. Yes; that is just what I mean, Protarchus.

Pro. Then why did you not answer it yourself, Socrates?

Soc. There is no reason why I should not; but I want you to take part in the discussion.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. I say that drugs and all sorts of instruments and materials are always employed for the sake of production or generation, but that every instance of generation is for the sake of some being or other, and generation in general is for the sake of being in general.

Pro. That is very clear.

Soc. Then pleasure, if it is a form of generation, would be generated for the sake of some form of being.

Pro. Of course.

Soc. Now surely that for the sake of which anything is generated is in the class of the good, and that which is generated for the sake of something else, my friend, must be placed in another class.

Pro. Most undeniably.

Soc. Then if pleasure is a form of generation, we shall be right in placing it in a class other than that of the good, shall we not?

Pro. Quite right.

Soc. Then, as I said when we began to discuss this point, we ought to be grateful to him who pointed out that there is only a generation, but no existence, of pleasure; for he is clearly making a laughing-stock of those who assert that pleasure is a good.

Pro. Yes, most emphatically.

Soc. And he will also surely make a laughing-stock of all those who find their highest end in forms of generation.

Pro. How is that, and to whom do you refer?

Soc. To those who, when cured of hunger or thirst or any of the troubles which are cured by generation are pleased because of the generation, as if it were pleasure, and say that they would not wish to live without thirst and hunger and the like, if they could not experience the feelings which follow after them.

Pro. That seems to be their view.

Soc. We should all agree that the opposite of generation is destruction, should we not?

Pro. Inevitably.

Soc. And he who chooses as they do would be choosing destruction and generation, not that third life in which there was neither pleasure nor pain, but only the purest possible thought.

Pro. It is a great absurdity, as it appears, Socrates, to tell us that pleasure is a good.

Soc. Yes, a great absurdity, and let us go still further.

Pro. How?

Soc. Is it not absurd to say that there is nothing good in the body or many other things, but only in the soul, and that in the soul the only good is pleasure, and that courage and self-restraint and understanding and all the other good things of the soul are nothing of the sort; and beyond all this to be obliged to say that he who is not feeling pleasure, and is feeling pain, is bad when he feels pain, though he be the best of men, and that he who feels pleasure is, when he feels pleasure, the more excellent in virtue the greater the pleasure he feels?

Pro. All that, Socrates, is the height of absurdity.

Soc. Now let us not undertake to subject pleasure to every possible test and then be found to give mind and knowledge very gentle treatment. Let us rather strike them boldly everywhere to see if their metal rings unsound at any point; so we shall find out what is by nature purest in them, and then we can make use of the truest elements of these and of pleasure to form our judgement of both.

Pro. Right.

Soc. Well, then, one part of knowledge is productive, the other has to do with education and support. Is that true?

Pro. It is.

Soc. Let us first consider whether in the manual arts one part is more allied to knowledge, and the other less, and the one should be regarded as purest, the other as less pure.

Pro. Yes, we ought to consider that.

Soc. And should the ruling elements of each of them be separated and distinguished from the rest?

Pro. What are they, and how can they be separated?

Soc. For example, if arithmetic and the sciences of measurement and weighing were taken away from all arts, what was left of any of them would be, so to speak, pretty worthless.

Pro. Yes, pretty worthless.

Soc. All that would be left for us would be to conjecture and to drill the perceptions by practice and experience, with the additional use of the powers of guessing, which are commonly called arts and acquire their efficacy by practice and toil.

Pro. That is undeniable.

Soc. Take music first; it is full of this; it attains harmony by guesswork based on practice, not by measurement; and flute music throughout tries to find the pitch of each note as it is produced by guess, so that the amount of uncertainty mixed up in it is great, and the amount of certainty small.

Pro. Very true.

Soc. And we shall find that medicine and agriculture and piloting and generalship are all in the same case.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. But the art of building, I believe, employs the greatest number of measures and instruments which give it great accuracy and make it more scientific than most arts.

Pro. In what way?

Soc. In shipbuilding and house-building, and many other branches of wood-working. For the artisan uses a rule, I imagine, a lathe, compasses, a chalk-line, and an ingenious instrument called a vice.

Pro. Certainly, Socrates; you are right.

Soc. Let us, then, divide the arts, as they are called, into two kinds, those which resemble music, and have less accuracy in their works, and those which, like building, are more exact.

Pro. Agreed.

Soc. And of these the most exact are the arts which I just now mentioned first.

Pro. I think you mean arithmetic and the other arts you mentioned with it just now.

Soc. Certainly. But, Protarchus, ought not these to be divided into two kinds? What do you say?

Pro. What kinds?

Soc. Are there not two kinds of arithmetic, that of the people and that of philosophers?

Pro. How can one kind of arithmetic be distinguished from the other?

Soc. The distinction is no small one, Protarchus. For some arithmeticians reckon unequal units, for instance, two armies and two oxen and two very small or incomparably large units; whereas others refuse to agree with them unless each of countless units is declared to differ not at all from each and every other unit.

Pro. You are certainly quite right in saying that there is a great difference between the devotees of arithmetic, so it is reasonable to assume that it is of two kinds.

Soc. And how about the arts of reckoning and measuring as they are used in building and in trade when compared with philosophical geometry and elaborate computations—shall we speak of each of these as one or as two?

Pro. On the analogy of the previous example, I should say that each of them was two.

Soc. Right. But do you understand why I introduced this subject?

Pro. Perhaps; but I wish you would give the answer to your question.

Soc. This discussion of ours is now, I think, no less than when we began it, seeking a counterpart of pleasure, and therefore it has introduced the present subject and is considering whether there is one kind of knowledge purer than another, as one pleasure is purer than another.

Pro. That is very clear; it was evidently introduced with that object.

Soc. Well, had not the discussion already found in what preceded that the various arts had various purposes and various degrees of exactness?

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. And after having given an art a single name in what has preceded, thereby making us think that it was a single art, does not the discussion now assume that the same art is two and ask whether the art of the philosophers or that of the non-philosophers possesses the higher degree of clearness and purity?

Pro. Yes, I think that is just the question it asks.

Soc. Then what reply shall we make, Protarchus?

Pro. Socrates, we have found a marvelously great difference in the clearness of different kinds of knowledge.

Soc. That will make the reply easier, will it not?

Pro. Yes, to be sure; and let our reply be this, that the arithmetical and metrical arts far surpass the others and that of these the arts which are stirred by the impulse of the true philosophers are immeasurably superior in accuracy and truth about measures and numbers.

Soc. We accept that as our judgement, and relying upon you we make this confident reply to those who are clever in straining arguments—

Pro. What reply?

Soc. That there are two arts of arithmetic and two of measuring, and many other arts which, like these, are twofold in this way, but possess a single name in common.

Pro. Let us give this answer, Socrates, to those who you say are clever; I hope we shall have luck with it.

Soc. These, then, we say, are the most exact arts or sciences?

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. But the art of dialectic would spurn us, Protarchus, if we should judge that any other art is preferable to her.

Pro. But what is the art to which this name belongs?

Soc. Clearly anybody can recognize the art I mean; for I am confident that all men who have any intellect whatsoever believe that the knowledge which has to do with being, reality, and eternal immutability is the truest kind of knowledge. What do you think, Protarchus?

Pro. I have often heard Gorgias constantly maintain that the art of persuasion surpasses all others for this, he said, makes all things subject to itself, not by force, but by their free will, and is by far the best of all arts; so now I hardly like to oppose either him or you.

Soc. It seems to me that you wanted to speak and threw down your arms out of modesty.

Pro. Very well; have it as you like.

Soc. Is it my fault that you have misunderstood?

Pro. Misunderstood what?

Soc. My question, dear Protarchus, was not as yet what art or science surpasses all others by being the greatest and best and most useful to us: what I am trying to find out at present is which art, however little and of little use, has the greatest regard for clearness, exactness, and truth. See; you will not make Gorgias angry if you grant that his art is superior for the practical needs of men, but say that the study of which I spoke is superior in the matter of the most perfect truth, just as I said in speaking about the white that if it was small and pure it was superior to that which was great but impure. Now, therefore, with careful thought and due consideration, paying attention neither to the usefulness nor to the reputation of any arts or sciences, but to that faculty of our souls, if such there be, which by its nature loves the truth and does all things for the sake of the truth, let us examine this faculty and say whether it is most likely to possess mind and intelligence in the greatest purity, or we must look for some other faculty which has more valid claims.

Pro. I am considering, and I think it is difficult to concede that any other science or art cleaves more closely to truth than this.

Soc. In saying that, did you bear in mind that the arts in general, and the men who devote themselves to them, make use of opinion and persistently investigate things which have to do with opinion? And even if they think they are studying nature, they are spending their lives in the study of the things of this world, the manner of their production, their action, and the forces to which they are subjected. Is not that true?

Pro. Yes, it is.

Soc. Such thinkers, then, toil to discover, not eternal verities, but transient productions of the present, the future, or the past?

Pro. Perfectly true.

Soc. And can we say that any of these things becomes certain, if tested by the touchstone of strictest truth, since none of them ever was, will be, or is in the same state?

Pro. Of course not.

Soc. How can we gain anything fixed whatsoever about things which have no fixedness whatsoever?

Pro. In no way, as it seems to me.

Soc. Then no mind or science which is occupied with them possesses the most perfect truth.

Pro. No, it naturally does not.

Soc. Then we must dismiss the thought of you and me and Gorgias and Philebus, and make this solemn declaration on the part of our argument.

Pro. What is the solemn declaration?

Soc. That fixed and pure and true and what we call unalloyed knowledge has to do with the things which are eternally the same without change or mixture, or with that which is most akin to them; and all other things are to be regarded as secondary and inferior.

Pro. Very true.

Soc. And of the names applied to such matters, it would be fairest to give the finest names to the finest things, would it not?

Pro. That is reasonable.

Soc. Are not mind, then, and wisdom the names which we should honor most?

Pro. Yes.

Soc. Then these names are applied most accurately and correctly to cases of contemplation of true being.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. And these are precisely the names which I brought forward in the first place as parties to our suit.

Pro. Yes, of course they are, Socrates.

Soc. Very well. As to the mixture of wisdom and pleasure, if anyone were to say that we are like artisans, with the materials before us from which to create our work, the simile would be a good one.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. And is it, then, our next task to try to make the mixture?

Pro. Surely.

Soc. Would it not be better first to repeat certain things and recall them to our minds?

Pro. What things?

Soc. Those which we mentioned before. I think the proverb we ought to repeat twice and even three times that which is good is an excellent one.

Pro. Surely.

Soc. Well then, in God’s name; I think this is the gist of our discussion.

Pro. What is it?

Soc. Philebus says that pleasure is the true goal of every living being and that all ought to aim at it, and that therefore this is also the good for all, and the two designations good and pleasant are properly and essentially one; Socrates, however, says that they are not one, but two in fact as in name, that the good and the pleasant differ from one another in nature, and that wisdom’s share in the good is greater than pleasure’s. Is not and was not that what was said, Protarchus?

Pro. Yes, certainly.

Soc. And furthermore, is not and was not this a point of agreement among us?

Pro. What?

Soc. That the nature of the good differs from all else in this respect.

Pro. In what respect?

Soc. That whatever living being possesses the good always, altogether, and in all ways, has no further need of anything, but is perfectly sufficient. We agreed to that?

Pro. We did.

Soc. And then we tried in thought to separate each from the other and apply them to individual lives, pleasure unmixed with wisdom and likewise wisdom which had not the slightest alloy of pleasure?

Pro. Yes.

Soc. And did we think then that either of them would be sufficient for any one?

Pro. By no means.

Soc. And if we made any mistake at that time, let any one now take up the question again. Assuming that memory, wisdom, knowledge, and true opinion belong to the same class, let him ask whether anyone would wish to have or acquire anything whatsoever without these not to speak of pleasure, be it never so abundant or intense, if he could have no true opinion that he is pleased, no knowledge whatsoever of what he has felt, and not even the slightest memory of the feeling. And let him ask in the same way about wisdom, whether anyone would wish to have wisdom without any, even the slightest, pleasure rather than with some pleasures, or all pleasures without wisdom rather than with some wisdom.

Pro. That is impossible, Socrates; it is useless to ask the same question over and over again.

Soc. Then the perfect, that which is to be desired by all and is altogether good, is neither of these?

Pro. Certainly not.

Soc. We must, then, gain a clear conception of the good, or at least an outline of it, that we may, as we said, know to what the second place is to be assigned.

Pro. Quite right.

Soc. And have we not found a road which leads to the good?

Pro. What road?

Soc. If you were looking for a particular man and first found out correctly where he lived, you would have made great progress towards finding him whom you sought.

Pro. Yes, certainly.

Soc. And just now we received an indication, as we did in the beginning, that we must seek the good, not in the unmixed, but in the mixed life.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. Surely there is greater hope that the object of our search will be clearly present in the well mixed life than in the life which is not well mixed?

Pro. Far greater.

Soc. Let us make the mixture, Protarchus, with a prayer to the gods, to Dionysus or Hephaestus, or whoever he be who presides over the mixing.

Pro. By all means.

Soc. We are like wine-pourers, and beside us are fountains—that of pleasure may be likened to a fount of honey, and the sober, wineless fount of wisdom to one of pure, health-giving water—of which we must do our best to mix as well as possible.

Pro. Certainly we must.

Soc. Before we make the mixture, tell me: should we be most likely to succeed by mixing all pleasure with all wisdom?

Pro. Perhaps.

Soc. But that is not safe; and I think I can offer a plan by which we can make our mixture with less risk.

Pro. What is it?

Soc. We found, I believe, that one pleasure was greater than another and one art more exact than another?

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. And knowledge was of two kinds, one turning its eyes towards transitory things, the other towards things which neither come into being nor pass away, but are the same and immutable for ever. Considering them with a view to truth, we judged that the latter was truer than the former.

Pro. That is quite right.

Soc. Then what if we first mix the truest sections of each and see whether, when mixed together, they are capable of giving us the most adorable life, or whether we still need something more and different?

Pro. I think that is what we should do.

Soc. Let us assume, then, a man who possesses wisdom about the nature of justice itself, and reason in accordance with his wisdom, and has the same kind of knowledge of all other things.

Pro. Agreed.

Soc. Now will this man have sufficient knowledge, if he is master of the theory of the divine circle and sphere, but is ignorant of our human sphere and human circles, even when he uses these and other kinds of rules or patterns in building houses?

Pro. We call that a ridiculous state of intellect in a man, Socrates, which is concerned only with divine knowledge.

Soc. What? Do you mean to say that the uncertain and impure art of the false rule and circle is to be put into our mixture?

Pro. Yes, that is inevitable, if any man is ever to find his own way home.

Soc. And must we add music, which we said a little while ago was full of guesswork and imitation and lacked purity?

Pro. Yes, I think we must, if our life is to be life at all.

Soc. Shall I, then, like a doorkeeper who is pushed and hustled by a mob, give up, open the door, and let all the kinds of knowledge stream in, the impure mingling with the pure?

Pro. I do not know, Socrates, what harm it can do a man to take in all the other kinds of knowledge if he has the first.

Soc. Shall I, then, let them all flow into what Homer very poetically calls

the mingling of the vales?

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. They are let in; and now we must turn again to the spring of pleasure. For our original plan for making the mixture, by taking first the true parts, did not succeed; because of our love of knowledge, we let all kinds of knowledge in together before pleasure.

Pro. Very true.

Soc. So now it is time for us to consider about pleasures also, whether these, too, shall be all let loose together, or we shall let only the true ones loose at first.

Pro. It is much safer to let loose the true first.

Soc. We will let them loose, then. But what next? If there are any necessary pleasures, as there were kinds of knowledge, must we not mix them with the true?

Pro. Of course; the necessary pleasures must certainly be added.

Soc. And as we said it was harmless and useful to know all the arts throughout our life, if we now say the same of pleasures—that is, if it is advantageous and harmless for us to enjoy all pleasures throughout life—they must all form part of the mixture.

Pro. What shall we say about these pleasures, and what shall we do?

Soc. There is no use in asking us, Protarchus; we must ask the pleasures and the arts and sciences themselves about one another.

Pro. What shall we ask them?

Soc.Dear ones—whether you should be called pleasures or by any other name—would you choose to dwell with all wisdom, or with none at all? I think only one reply is possible.

Pro. What is it?

Soc. What we said before: For any class to be alone, solitary, and unalloyed is neither altogether possible nor is it profitable; but of all classes, comparing them one with another, we think the best to live with is the knowledge of all other things and, so far as is possible, the perfect knowledge of our individual selves.

Pro.Your reply is excellent, we shall tell them.

Soc. Right. And next we must turn to wisdom and mind, and question them. We shall ask them, Do you want any further pleasures in the mixture? And they might reply, What pleasures?

Pro. Quite likely.

Soc. Then we should go on to say: In addition to those true pleasures, do you want the greatest and most intense pleasures also to dwell with you? How can we want them, Socrates, they might perhaps say, since they contain countless hindrances for us, inasmuch as they disturb with maddening pleasures the souls of men in which we dwell, thereby preventing us from being born at all, and utterly destroying for the most part, through the carelessness and forgetfulness which they engender, those of our children which are born?

Soc.But the true and pure pleasures, of which you spoke, you must consider almost our own by nature, and also those which are united with health and self-restraint, and furthermore all those which are handmaids of virtue in general and follow everywhere in its train as if it were a god,—add these to the mixture; but as for the pleasures which follow after folly and all baseness, it would be very senseless for anyone who desires to discover the most beautiful and most restful mixture or compound, and to try to learn which of its elements is good in man and the universe, and what we should divine its nature to be, to mix these with mind. Shall we not say that this reply which mind has now made for itself and memory and right opinion is wise and reasonable?

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. But another addition is surely necessary, without which nothing whatsoever can ever come into being.

Pro. What is it?

Soc. That in which there is no admixture of truth can never truly come into being or exist.

Pro. No, of course not.

Soc. No. But if anything is still wanting in our mixture, you and Philebus must speak of it. For to me it seems that our argument is now completed, as it were an incorporeal order which shall rule nobly a living body.

Pro. And you may say, Socrates, that I am of the same opinion.

Soc. And if we were to say that we are now in the vestibule of the good and of the dwelling of the good, should we not be speaking the truth after a fashion?

Pro. I certainly think so.

Soc. What element, then, of the mixture would appear to us to be the most precious and also the chief cause why such a state is beloved of all? When we have discovered this, we will then consider whether it is more closely attached and more akin to pleasure or to mind in the universe.

Pro. Right; for that is most serviceable to us in forming our judgement.

Soc. And it is quite easy to see the cause which makes any mixture whatsoever either of the highest value or of none at all.

Pro. What do you mean?

Soc. Why, everybody knows that.

Pro. Knows what?

Soc. That any compound, however made, which lacks measure and proportion, must necessarily destroy its components and first of all itself; for it is in truth no compound, but an uncompounded jumble, and is always a misfortune to those who possess it.

Pro. Perfectly true.

Soc. So now the power of the good has taken refuge in the nature of the beautiful; for measure and proportion are everywhere identified with beauty and virtue.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. We said that truth also was mingled with them in the compound.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. Then if we cannot catch the good with the aid of one idea, let us run it down with three—beauty, proportion, and truth, and let us say that these, considered as one, may more properly than all other components of the mixture be regarded as the cause, and that through the goodness of these the mixture itself has been made good.

Pro. Quite right.

Soc. So now, Protarchus, any one would be able to judge about pleasure and wisdom, and to decide which of them is more akin to the highest good and of greater value among men and gods.

Pro. That is clear; but still it is better to carry on the discussion to the end.

Soc. Let us, then, judge each of the three separately in its relation to pleasure and mind; for it is our duty to see to which of the two we shall assign each of them as more akin.

Pro. You refer to beauty, truth, and measure?

Soc. Yes. Take truth first, Protarchus; take it and look at the three—mind, truth, and pleasure; take plenty of time, and answer to yourself whether pleasure or mind is more akin to truth.

Pro. Why take time? For the difference, to my mind, is great. For pleasure is the greatest of impostors, and the story goes that in the pleasures of love, which are said to be the greatest, perjury is even pardoned by the gods, as if the pleasures were like children, utterly devoid of all sense. But mind is either identical with truth or of all things most like it and truest.

Soc. Next, then, consider measure in the same way, and see whether pleasure possesses more of it than wisdom, or wisdom than pleasure.

Pro. That also is an easy thing to consider. For I think nothing in the world could be found more immoderate than pleasure and its transports, and nothing more in harmony with measure than mind and knowledge.

Soc. However, go on and tell about the third. Has mind or pleasure the greater share in beauty?

Pro. But Socrates, no one, either asleep or awake, ever saw or knew wisdom or mind to be or become unseemly at any time or in any way whatsoever.

Soc. Right.

Pro. But pleasures, and the greatest pleasures at that, when we see any one enjoying them and observe the ridiculous or utterly disgraceful element which accompanies them, fill us with a sense of shame; we put them out of sight and hide them, so far as possible; we confine everything of that sort to the night time, as unfit for the sight of day.

Soc. Then you will proclaim everywhere, Protarchus, by messengers to the absent and by speech to those present, that pleasure is not the first of possessions, nor even the second, but first the eternal nature has chosen measure, moderation, fitness, and all which is to be considered similar to these.

Pro. That appears to result from what has now been said.

Soc. Second, then, comes proportion, beauty, perfection, sufficiency, and all that belongs to that class.

Pro. Yes, so it appears.

Soc. And if you count mind and wisdom as the third, you will, I prophesy, not wander far from the truth.

Pro. That may be.

Soc. And will you not put those properties fourth which we said belonged especially to the soul—sciences, arts, and true opinions they are called— and say that these come after the first three, and are fourth, since they are more akin than pleasure to the good?

Pro. Perhaps.

Soc. And fifth, those pleasures which we separated and classed as painless, which we called pure pleasures of the soul itself, those which accompany knowledge and, sometimes, perceptions?

Pro. May be.

Soc.But with the sixth generation, says Orpheus, cease the rhythmic song. It seems that our discussion, too, is likely to cease with the sixth decision. So after this nothing remains for us but to give our discussion a sort of head.

Pro. Yes, that should be done.

Soc. Come then, let us for the third time call the same argument to witness before Zeus the saviour, and proceed.

Pro. What argument?

Soc. Philebus declared that pleasure was entirely and in all respects the good.

Pro. Apparently, Socrates, when you said the third time just now, you meant that we must take up our argument again from the beginning.

Soc. Yes; but let us hear what follows. For I, perceiving the truths which I have now been detailing, and annoyed by the theory held not only by Philebus but by many thousands of others, said that mind was a far better and more excellent thing for human life than pleasure.

Pro. True.

Soc. But suspecting that there were many other things to be considered, I said that if anything should be found better than these two, I should support mind against pleasure in the struggle for the second place, and even the second place would be lost by pleasure.

Pro. Yes, that is what you said.

Soc. And next it was most sufficiently proved that each of these two was insufficient.

Pro. Very true.

Soc. In this argument, then, both mind and pleasure were set aside; neither of them is the absolute good, since they are devoid of self-sufficiency, adequacy, and perfection?

Pro. Quite right.

Soc. And on the appearance of a third competitor, better than either of these, mind is now found to be ten thousand times more akin than pleasure to the victor.

Pro. Certainly.

Soc. Then, according to the judgement which has now been given by our discussion, the power of pleasure would be fifth.

Pro. So it seems.

Soc. But not first, even if all the cattle and horses and other beasts in the world, in their pursuit of enjoyment, so assert. Trusting in them, as augurs trust in birds, the many judge that pleasures are the greatest blessings in life, and they imagine that the lusts of beasts are better witnesses than are the aspirations and thoughts inspired by the philosophic muse.

Pro. Socrates, we all now declare that what you have said is perfectly true.

Soc. Then you will let me go?

Pro. There is still a little left, Socrates. I am sure you will not give up before we do, and I will remind you of what remains.