Symposium (174-175)

He said that he met with Socrates fresh from the bath and wearing his best pair of slippers—quite rare events with him—and asked him whither he was bound in such fine trim. To dinner at Agathon’s, he answered. I evaded him and his celebrations yesterday, fearing the crowd; but I agreed to be present today. So I got myself up in this handsome style in order to be a match for my handsome host. Now tell me, said he, do you feel in the mood for going unasked to dinner? For anything, he said he replied, that you may bid me do. Come along then, he said; let us corrupt the proverb with a new version:

What if they go of their own accord,

The good men to our Goodman’s [*] board?

Though indeed Homer [*] may be said to have not merely corrupted the adage, but debauched it: for after setting forth Agamemnon as a man eminently good at warfare, and Menelaus as only

a spearman spiritless,

[*] he makes the latter come unbidden to the banquet of the former, who was offering sacrifice and holding a feast; so the worse man was the guest of the better. To this my friend’s answer, as he told me, was: I am afraid mine, most likely, is a case that fits not your version, Socrates, but Homer’s—a dolt coming unbidden to the banquet of a scholar. Be sure, then, to have your excuse quite ready when you bring me; for I shall not own to coming unasked, but only on your invitation.

If two go along together,

he remarked,

there’s one before another

[*] in devising what we are to say. Well, off we go. After some such conversation, he told me, they started off. Then Socrates, becoming absorbed in his own thoughts by the way, fell behind him as they went; and when my friend began to wait for him he bade him go on ahead. So he came to Agathon’s house, and found the door open; where he found himself in a rather ridiculous position. For he was met immediately by a servant from within, who took him where the company was reclining, and he found them just about to dine. However, as soon as Agathon saw him Ha, Aristodemus, he cried, right welcome to a place at table with us! If you came on some other errand, put it off to another time: only yesterday I went round to invite you, but failed to see you. But how is it you do not bring us Socrates? At that I turned back for Socrates, he said, but saw no sign of him coming after me: so I told them how I myself had come along with Socrates, since he had asked me to dine with them. Very good of you to come, he said, but where is the man?

He was coming in just now behind me: I am wondering myself where he can be. Go at once, said Agathon to the servant, and see if you can fetch in Socrates. You, Aristodemus, take a place by Eryximachus. So the attendant washed him and made him ready for reclining, when another of the servants came in with the news that our good Socrates had retreated into their neighbors’ porch; there he was standing, and when bidden to come in, he refused. How strange! said Agathon, you must go on bidding him, and by no means let him go. But this Aristodemus forbade: No, said he, let him alone; it is a habit he has. Occasionally he turns aside, anywhere at random, and there he stands. He will be here presently, I expect. So do not disturb him; let him be. Very well then, said Agathon, as you judge best. Come, boys, he called to the servants, serve the feast for the rest of us. You are to set on just whatever you please, now that you have no one to direct you (a method I have never tried before). [*] Today you are to imagine that I and all the company here have come on your invitation so look after us, and earn our compliments. Thereupon, he said, they all began dinner, but Socrates did not arrive; and though Agathon ever and anon gave orders that they should go and fetch him, my friend would not allow it. When he did come, it was after what, for him, was no great delay, as they were only about halfway through dinner. Then Agathon, who happened to be sitting alone in the lowest place, said: Here, Socrates, come sit by me, so that by contact with you I may have some benefit from that piece of wisdom that occurred to you there in the porch. Clearly you have made the discovery and got hold of it for you would not have come away before. Then Socrates sat down, and How fine it would be, Agathon, he said, if wisdom were a sort of thing that could flow out of the one of us who is fuller into him who is emptier, by our mere contact with each other, as water will flow through wool from the fuller cup into the emptier. If such is indeed the case with wisdom, I set a great value on my sitting next to you: I look to be filled with excellent wisdom drawn in abundance out of you. My own is but meagre, as disputable as a dream; but yours is bright and expansive, as the other day we saw it shining forth from your youth, strong and splendid, in the eyes of more than thirty thousand Greeks. You rude mocker, Socrates! said Agathon. A little later on you and I shall go to law on this matter of our wisdom, and Dionysus shall be our judge. For the present, let the dinner be your first concern.