Phaedo (89-90)

Phaedo. Echecrates, I have often wondered at Socrates, but never did I admire him more than then. That he had an answer ready was perhaps to be expected; but what astonished me more about him was, first, the pleasant, gentle, and respectful manner in which he listened to the young men’s criticisms, secondly, his quick sense of the effect their words had upon us, and lastly, the skill with which he cured us and, as it were, recalled us from our flight and defeat and made us face about and follow him and join in his examination of the argument.

Echecrates. How did he do it?

Phaedo. I will tell you. I was sitting at his right hand on a low stool beside his couch, and his seat was a good deal higher than mine. He stroked my head and gathered the hair on the back of my neck into his hand—he had a habit of playing with my hair on occasion—and said, Tomorrow, perhaps, Phaedo, you will cut off this beautiful hair. I suppose so, Socrates, said I. Not if you take my advice. What shall I do then? I asked. You will cut it off today, and I will cut mine, if our argument dies and we cannot bring it to life again. If I were you and the argument escaped me, I would take an oath, like the Argives, not to let my hair grow until I had renewed the fight and won a victory over the argument of Simmias and Cebes. But, I replied, they say that even Heracles is not a match for two. Well, said he, call me to help you, as your Iolaus, while there is still light. I call you to help, then, said I, not as Heracles calling Iolaus, but as Iolaus calling Heracles. That is all one, said he. But first let us guard against a danger. Of what sort? I asked. The danger of becoming misologists or haters of argument, said he, as people become misanthropists or haters of man; for no worse evil can happen to a man than to hate argument. Misology and misanthropy arise from similar causes. For misanthropy arises from trusting someone implicitly without sufficient knowledge. You think the man is perfectly true and sound and trustworthy, and afterwards you find him base and false. Then you have the same experience with another person. By the time this has happened to a man a good many times, especially if it happens among those whom he might regard as his nearest and dearest friends, he ends by being in continual quarrels and by hating everybody and thinking there is nothing sound in anyone at all. Have you not noticed this? Certainly, said I. Well, he went on, is it not disgraceful, and is it not plain that such a man undertakes to consort with men when he has no knowledge of human nature?

Phaedo.For if he had knowledge when he dealt with them, he would think that the good and the bad are both very few and those between the two are very many, for that is the case. What do you mean? I mean just what I might say about the large and small. Do you think there is anything more unusual than to find a very large or a very small man, or dog, or other creature, or again, one that is very quick or slow, very ugly or beautiful, very black or white? Have you not noticed that the extremes in all these instances are rare and few, and the examples between the extremes are very many? To be sure, said I. And don’t you think, said he, that if there were to be a competition in rascality, those who excelled would be very few in that also? Very likely, I replied. Yes, very likely, he said, But it is not in that respect that arguments are like men; I was merely following your lead in discussing that. The similarity lies in this: when a man without proper knowledge concerning arguments has confidence in the truth of an argument and afterwards thinks that it is false, whether it really is so or not, and this happens again and again; then you know, those men especially who have spent their time in disputation come to believe that they are the wisest of men and that they alone have discovered that there is nothing sound or sure in anything, whether argument or anything else, but all things go up and down, like the tide in the Euripus, and nothing is stable for any length of time. Certainly, I said, that is very true. Then, Phaedo, he said, if there is any system of argument which is true and sure and can be learned, it would be a sad thing if a man, because he has met with some of those arguments which seem to be sometimes true and sometimes false, should then not blame himself or his own lack of skill, but should end, in his vexation, by throwing the blame gladly upon the arguments and should hate and revile them all the rest of his life, and be deprived of the truth and knowledge of reality. Yes, by Zeus, I said, it would be sad. First, then, said he, let us be on our guard against this, and let us not admit into our souls the notion that there is no soundness in arguments at all. Let us far rather assume that we ourselves are not yet in sound condition and that we must strive manfully and eagerly to become so, you and the others for the sake of all your future life, and I because of my impending death; for I fear that I am not just now in a philosophical frame of mind as regards this particular question, but am contentious, like quite uncultured persons.