initial commit of ebook 1591HEADmain

2 files changed, 3135 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/old/prtgs10.txt b/old/prtgs10.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f75e0ac
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/prtgs10.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,3135 @@
+******The Project Gutenberg Etext of Protagoras, by Plato******
+#7 in our series by Plato
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check
+the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!!
+
+Please take a look at the important information in this header.
+We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an
+electronic path open for the next readers.  Do not remove this.
+
+**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
+
+**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
+
+*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations*
+
+Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and
+further information is included below.  We need your donations.
+
+Protagoras
+
+by Plato, translated by B. Jowett.
+
+January, 1999  [Etext #1591]
+
+******The Project Gutenberg Etext of Protagoras, by Plato******
+******This file should be named prtgs10.txt or prtgs10.zip*****
+
+Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, prtgs11.txt
+VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, prtgs10a.txt
+
+This etext was prepared by Sue Asscher <asschers@aia.net.au>
+
+Project Gutenberg Etexts are usually created from multiple editions,
+all of which are in the Public Domain in the United States, unless a
+copyright notice is included.  Therefore, we do NOT keep these books
+in compliance with any particular paper edition, usually otherwise.
+
+We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance
+of the official release dates, for time for better editing.
+
+Please note:  neither this list nor its contents are final till
+midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement.
+The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at
+Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month.  A
+preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment
+and editing by those who wish to do so.  To be sure you have an
+up to date first edition [xxxxx10x.xxx] please check file sizes
+in the first week of the next month.  Since our ftp program has
+a bug in it that scrambles the date [tried to fix and failed] a
+look at the file size will have to do, but we will try to see a
+new copy has at least one byte more or less.
+
+Information about Project Gutenberg (one page)
+
+We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work.  The
+fifty hours is one conservative estimate for how long it we take
+to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright
+searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc.  This
+projected audience is one hundred million readers.  If our value
+per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2
+million dollars per hour this year as we release thirty-two text
+files per month, or xx more Etexts in 1999 for a total of xx
+If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the
+total should reach over 150 billion Etexts given away.
+
+The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext
+Files by the December 31, 2001.  [10,000 x 100,000,000=Trillion]
+This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers,
+which is only 10% of the present number of computer users.  2001
+should have at least twice as many computer users as that, so it
+will require us reaching less than 5% of the users in 2001.
+
+We need your donations more than ever!
+
+All donations should be made to "Project Gutenberg/CMU": and are
+tax deductible to the extent allowable by law.  (CMU = Carnegie-
+Mellon University).
+
+For these and other matters, please mail to:
+
+Project Gutenberg
+P. O. Box  2782
+Champaign, IL 61825
+
+When all other email fails try our Executive Director:
+Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com>
+
+We would prefer to send you this information by email
+(Internet, Bitnet, Compuserve, ATTMAIL or MCImail).
+
+******
+If you have an FTP program (or emulator), please
+FTP directly to the Project Gutenberg archives:
+[Mac users, do NOT point and click. . .type]
+
+ftp uiarchive.cso.uiuc.edu
+login:  anonymous
+password:  your@login
+cd etext/etext90 through /etext96
+or cd etext/articles [get suggest gut for more information]
+dir [to see files]
+get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files]
+GET INDEX?00.GUT
+for a list of books
+and
+GET NEW GUT for general information
+and
+MGET GUT* for newsletters.
+
+**Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor**
+(Three Pages)
+
+***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START***
+Why is this "Small Print!" statement here?  You know: lawyers.
+They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with
+your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from
+someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our
+fault.  So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement
+disclaims most of our liability to you.  It also tells you how
+you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to.
+
+*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT
+By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm
+etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept
+this "Small Print!" statement.  If you do not, you can receive
+a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by
+sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person
+you got it from.  If you received this etext on a physical
+medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request.
+
+ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS
+This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-
+tm etexts, is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor
+Michael S. Hart through the Project Gutenberg Association at
+Carnegie-Mellon University (the "Project").  Among other
+things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright
+on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and
+distribute it in the United States without permission and
+without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules, set forth
+below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext
+under the Project's "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark.
+
+To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable
+efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain
+works.  Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any
+medium they may be on may contain "Defects".  Among other
+things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
+intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged
+disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer
+codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment.
+
+LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES
+But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below,
+[1] the Project (and any other party you may receive this
+etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including
+legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR
+UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT,
+INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE
+OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE
+POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
+
+If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of
+receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any)
+you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that
+time to the person you received it from.  If you received it
+on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and
+such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement
+copy.  If you received it electronically, such person may
+choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to
+receive it electronically.
+
+THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS".  NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS
+TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT
+LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A
+PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
+
+Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or
+the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the
+above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you
+may have other legal rights.
+
+INDEMNITY
+You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors,
+officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost
+and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or
+indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause:
+[1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification,
+or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect.
+
+DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm"
+You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by
+disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this
+"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg,
+or:
+
+[1]  Only give exact copies of it.  Among other things, this
+     requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the
+     etext or this "small print!" statement.  You may however,
+     if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable
+     binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form,
+     including any form resulting from conversion by word pro-
+     cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as
+     *EITHER*:
+
+     [*]  The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and
+          does *not* contain characters other than those
+          intended by the author of the work, although tilde
+          (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may
+          be used to convey punctuation intended by the
+          author, and additional characters may be used to
+          indicate hypertext links; OR
+
+     [*]  The etext may be readily converted by the reader at
+          no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent
+          form by the program that displays the etext (as is
+          the case, for instance, with most word processors);
+          OR
+
+     [*]  You provide, or agree to also provide on request at
+          no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the
+          etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC
+          or other equivalent proprietary form).
+
+[2]  Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this
+     "Small Print!" statement.
+
+[3]  Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the
+     net profits you derive calculated using the method you
+     already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  If you
+     don't derive profits, no royalty is due.  Royalties are
+     payable to "Project Gutenberg Association/Carnegie-Mellon
+     University" within the 60 days following each
+     date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare)
+     your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return.
+
+WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO?
+The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time,
+scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty
+free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution
+you can think of.  Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg
+Association / Carnegie-Mellon University".
+
+*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*
+
+
+
+
+
+This etext was prepared by Sue Asscher <asschers@aia.net.au>
+
+
+
+
+
+PROTAGORAS
+
+by Plato
+
+
+
+Translated by Benjamin Jowett
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION.
+
+The Protagoras, like several of the Dialogues of Plato, is put into the
+mouth of Socrates, who describes a conversation which had taken place
+between himself and the great Sophist at the house of Callias--'the man who
+had spent more upon the Sophists than all the rest of the world'--and in
+which the learned Hippias and the grammarian Prodicus had also shared, as
+well as Alcibiades and Critias, both of whom said a few words--in the
+presence of a distinguished company consisting of disciples of Protagoras
+and of leading Athenians belonging to the Socratic circle.  The dialogue
+commences with a request on the part of Hippocrates that Socrates would
+introduce him to the celebrated teacher.  He has come before the dawn had
+risen--so fervid is his zeal.  Socrates moderates his excitement and
+advises him to find out 'what Protagoras will make of him,' before he
+becomes his pupil.
+
+They go together to the house of Callias; and Socrates, after explaining
+the purpose of their visit to Protagoras, asks the question, 'What he will
+make of Hippocrates.'  Protagoras answers, 'That he will make him a better
+and a wiser man.'  'But in what will he be better?'--Socrates desires to
+have a more precise answer.  Protagoras replies, 'That he will teach him
+prudence in affairs private and public; in short, the science or knowledge
+of human life.'
+
+This, as Socrates admits, is a noble profession; but he is or rather would
+have been doubtful, whether such knowledge can be taught, if Protagoras had
+not assured him of the fact, for two reasons:  (1) Because the Athenian
+people, who recognize in their assemblies the distinction between the
+skilled and the unskilled in the arts, do not distinguish between the
+trained politician and the untrained; (2) Because the wisest and best
+Athenian citizens do not teach their sons political virtue.  Will
+Protagoras answer these objections?
+
+Protagoras explains his views in the form of an apologue, in which, after
+Prometheus had given men the arts, Zeus is represented as sending Hermes to
+them, bearing with him Justice and Reverence.  These are not, like the
+arts, to be imparted to a few only, but all men are to be partakers of
+them.  Therefore the Athenian people are right in distinguishing between
+the skilled and unskilled in the arts, and not between skilled and
+unskilled politicians. (1) For all men have the political virtues to a
+certain degree, and are obliged to say that they have them, whether they
+have them or not.  A man would be thought a madman who professed an art
+which he did not know; but he would be equally thought a madman if he did
+not profess a virtue which he had not.  (2) And that the political virtues
+can be taught and acquired, in the opinion of the Athenians, is proved by
+the fact that they punish evil-doers, with a view to prevention, of course
+--mere retribution is for beasts, and not for men.  (3) Again, would
+parents who teach her sons lesser matters leave them ignorant of the common
+duty of citizens?  To the doubt of Socrates the best answer is the fact,
+that the education of youth in virtue begins almost as soon as they can
+speak, and is continued by the state when they pass out of the parental
+control.  (4) Nor need we wonder that wise and good fathers sometimes have
+foolish and worthless sons.  Virtue, as we were saying, is not the private
+possession of any man, but is shared by all, only however to the extent of
+which each individual is by nature capable.  And, as a matter of fact, even
+the worst of civilized mankind will appear virtuous and just, if we compare
+them with savages.  (5) The error of Socrates lies in supposing that there
+are no teachers of virtue, whereas all men are teachers in a degree.  Some,
+like Protagoras, are better than others, and with this result we ought to
+be satisfied.
+
+Socrates is highly delighted with the explanation of Protagoras.  But he
+has still a doubt lingering in his mind.  Protagoras has spoken of the
+virtues:  are they many, or one? are they parts of a whole, or different
+names of the same thing?  Protagoras replies that they are parts, like the
+parts of a face, which have their several functions, and no one part is
+like any other part.  This admission, which has been somewhat hastily made,
+is now taken up and cross-examined by Socrates:--
+
+'Is justice just, and is holiness holy?  And are justice and holiness
+opposed to one another?'--'Then justice is unholy.'  Protagoras would
+rather say that justice is different from holiness, and yet in a certain
+point of view nearly the same.  He does not, however, escape in this way
+from the cunning of Socrates, who inveigles him into an admission that
+everything has but one opposite.  Folly, for example, is opposed to wisdom;
+and folly is also opposed to temperance; and therefore temperance and
+wisdom are the same.  And holiness has been already admitted to be nearly
+the same as justice.  Temperance, therefore, has now to be compared with
+justice.
+
+Protagoras, whose temper begins to get a little ruffled at the process to
+which he has been subjected, is aware that he will soon be compelled by the
+dialectics of Socrates to admit that the temperate is the just.  He
+therefore defends himself with his favourite weapon; that is to say, he
+makes a long speech not much to the point, which elicits the applause of
+the audience.
+
+Here occurs a sort of interlude, which commences with a declaration on the
+part of Socrates that he cannot follow a long speech, and therefore he must
+beg Protagoras to speak shorter.  As Protagoras declines to accommodate
+him, he rises to depart, but is detained by Callias, who thinks him
+unreasonable in not allowing Protagoras the liberty which he takes himself
+of speaking as he likes.  But Alcibiades answers that the two cases are not
+parallel.  For Socrates admits his inability to speak long; will Protagoras
+in like manner acknowledge his inability to speak short?
+
+Counsels of moderation are urged first in a few words by Critias, and then
+by Prodicus in balanced and sententious language:  and Hippias proposes an
+umpire.  But who is to be the umpire? rejoins Socrates; he would rather
+suggest as a compromise that Protagoras shall ask and he will answer, and
+that when Protagoras is tired of asking he himself will ask and Protagoras
+shall answer.  To this the latter yields a reluctant assent.
+
+Protagoras selects as his thesis a poem of Simonides of Ceos, in which he
+professes to find a contradiction.  First the poet says,
+
+'Hard is it to become good,'
+
+and then reproaches Pittacus for having said, 'Hard is it to be good.'  How
+is this to be reconciled?  Socrates, who is familiar with the poem, is
+embarrassed at first, and invokes the aid of Prodicus, the countryman of
+Simonides, but apparently only with the intention of flattering him into
+absurdities.  First a distinction is drawn between (Greek) to be, and
+(Greek) to become:  to become good is difficult; to be good is easy.  Then
+the word difficult or hard is explained to mean 'evil' in the Cean dialect. 
+To all this Prodicus assents; but when Protagoras reclaims, Socrates slily
+withdraws Prodicus from the fray, under the pretence that his assent was
+only intended to test the wits of his adversary.  He then proceeds to give
+another and more elaborate explanation of the whole passage.  The
+explanation is as follows:--
+
+The Lacedaemonians are great philosophers (although this is a fact which is
+not generally known); and the soul of their philosophy is brevity, which
+was also the style of primitive antiquity and of the seven sages.  Now
+Pittacus had a saying, 'Hard is it to be good:'  and Simonides, who was
+jealous of the fame of this saying, wrote a poem which was designed to
+controvert it.  No, says he, Pittacus; not 'hard to be good,' but 'hard to
+become good.'  Socrates proceeds to argue in a highly impressive manner
+that the whole composition is intended as an attack upon Pittacus.  This,
+though manifestly absurd, is accepted by the company, and meets with the
+special approval of Hippias, who has however a favourite interpretation of
+his own, which he is requested by Alcibiades to defer.
+
+The argument is now resumed, not without some disdainful remarks of
+Socrates on the practice of introducing the poets, who ought not to be
+allowed, any more than flute-girls, to come into good society.  Men's own
+thoughts should supply them with the materials for discussion.  A few
+soothing flatteries are addressed to Protagoras by Callias and Socrates,
+and then the old question is repeated, 'Whether the virtues are one or
+many?'  To which Protagoras is now disposed to reply, that four out of the
+five virtues are in some degree similar; but he still contends that the
+fifth, courage, is unlike the rest.  Socrates proceeds to undermine the
+last stronghold of the adversary, first obtaining from him the admission
+that all virtue is in the highest degree good:--
+
+The courageous are the confident; and the confident are those who know
+their business or profession:  those who have no such knowledge and are
+still confident are madmen.  This is admitted.  Then, says Socrates,
+courage is knowledge--an inference which Protagoras evades by drawing a
+futile distinction between the courageous and the confident in a fluent
+speech.
+
+Socrates renews the attack from another side:  he would like to know
+whether pleasure is not the only good, and pain the only evil?  Protagoras
+seems to doubt the morality or propriety of assenting to this; he would
+rather say that 'some pleasures are good, some pains are evil,' which is
+also the opinion of the generality of mankind.  What does he think of
+knowledge?  Does he agree with the common opinion that knowledge is
+overcome by passion? or does he hold that knowledge is power?  Protagoras
+agrees that knowledge is certainly a governing power.
+
+This, however, is not the doctrine of men in general, who maintain that
+many who know what is best, act contrary to their knowledge under the
+influence of pleasure.  But this opposition of good and evil is really the
+opposition of a greater or lesser amount of pleasure.  Pleasures are evils
+because they end in pain, and pains are goods because they end in
+pleasures.  Thus pleasure is seen to be the only good; and the only evil is
+the preference of the lesser pleasure to the greater.  But then comes in
+the illusion of distance.  Some art of mensuration is required in order to
+show us pleasures and pains in their true proportion.  This art of
+mensuration is a kind of knowledge, and knowledge is thus proved once more
+to be the governing principle of human life, and ignorance the origin of
+all evil:  for no one prefers the less pleasure to the greater, or the
+greater pain to the less, except from ignorance.  The argument is drawn out
+in an imaginary 'dialogue within a dialogue,' conducted by Socrates and
+Protagoras on the one part, and the rest of the world on the other. 
+Hippias and Prodicus, as well as Protagoras, admit the soundness of the
+conclusion.
+
+Socrates then applies this new conclusion to the case of courage--the only
+virtue which still holds out against the assaults of the Socratic
+dialectic.  No one chooses the evil or refuses the good except through
+ignorance.  This explains why cowards refuse to go to war:--because they
+form a wrong estimate of good, and honour, and pleasure.  And why are the
+courageous willing to go to war?--because they form a right estimate of
+pleasures and pains, of things terrible and not terrible.  Courage then is
+knowledge, and cowardice is ignorance.  And the five virtues, which were
+originally maintained to have five different natures, after having been
+easily reduced to two only, at last coalesce in one.  The assent of
+Protagoras to this last position is extracted with great difficulty.
+
+Socrates concludes by professing his disinterested love of the truth, and
+remarks on the singular manner in which he and his adversary had changed
+sides.  Protagoras began by asserting, and Socrates by denying, the
+teachableness of virtue, and now the latter ends by affirming that virtue
+is knowledge, which is the most teachable of all things, while Protagoras
+has been striving to show that virtue is not knowledge, and this is almost
+equivalent to saying that virtue cannot be taught.  He is not satisfied
+with the result, and would like to renew the enquiry with the help of
+Protagoras in a different order, asking (1) What virtue is, and (2) Whether
+virtue can be taught.  Protagoras declines this offer, but commends
+Socrates' earnestness and his style of discussion.
+
+The Protagoras is often supposed to be full of difficulties.  These are
+partly imaginary and partly real.  The imaginary ones are (1)
+Chronological,--which were pointed out in ancient times by Athenaeus, and
+are noticed by Schleiermacher and others, and relate to the impossibility
+of all the persons in the Dialogue meeting at any one time, whether in the
+year 425 B.C., or in any other.  But Plato, like all writers of fiction,
+aims only at the probable, and shows in many Dialogues (e.g. the Symposium
+and Republic, and already in the Laches) an extreme disregard of the
+historical accuracy which is sometimes demanded of him.  (2) The exact
+place of the Protagoras among the Dialogues, and the date of composition,
+have also been much disputed.  But there are no criteria which afford any
+real grounds for determining the date of composition; and the affinities of
+the Dialogues, when they are not indicated by Plato himself, must always to
+a great extent remain uncertain.  (3) There is another class of
+difficulties, which may be ascribed to preconceived notions of
+commentators, who imagine that Protagoras the Sophist ought always to be in
+the wrong, and his adversary Socrates in the right; or that in this or that
+passage--e.g. in the explanation of good as pleasure--Plato is inconsistent
+with himself; or that the Dialogue fails in unity, and has not a proper
+beginning, middle, and ending.  They seem to forget that Plato is a
+dramatic writer who throws his thoughts into both sides of the argument,
+and certainly does not aim at any unity which is inconsistent with freedom,
+and with a natural or even wild manner of treating his subject; also that
+his mode of revealing the truth is by lights and shadows, and far-off and
+opposing points of view, and not by dogmatic statements or definite
+results.
+
+The real difficulties arise out of the extreme subtlety of the work, which,
+as Socrates says of the poem of Simonides, is a most perfect piece of art.
+There are dramatic contrasts and interests, threads of philosophy broken
+and resumed, satirical reflections on mankind, veils thrown over truths
+which are lightly suggested, and all woven together in a single design, and
+moving towards one end.
+
+In the introductory scene Plato raises the expectation that a 'great
+personage' is about to appear on the stage; perhaps with a further view of
+showing that he is destined to be overthrown by a greater still, who makes
+no pretensions.  Before introducing Hippocrates to him, Socrates thinks
+proper to warn the youth against the dangers of 'influence,' of which the
+invidious nature is recognized by Protagoras himself.  Hippocrates readily
+adopts the suggestion of Socrates that he shall learn of Protagoras only
+the accomplishments which befit an Athenian gentleman, and let alone his
+'sophistry.'  There is nothing however in the introduction which leads to
+the inference that Plato intended to blacken the character of the Sophists;
+he only makes a little merry at their expense.
+
+The 'great personage' is somewhat ostentatious, but frank and honest.  He
+is introduced on a stage which is worthy of him--at the house of the rich
+Callias, in which are congregated the noblest and wisest of the Athenians.
+He considers openness to be the best policy, and particularly mentions his
+own liberal mode of dealing with his pupils, as if in answer to the
+favourite accusation of the Sophists that they received pay.  He is
+remarkable for the good temper which he exhibits throughout the discussion
+under the trying and often sophistical cross-examination of Socrates. 
+Although once or twice ruffled, and reluctant to continue the discussion,
+he parts company on perfectly good terms, and appears to be, as he says of
+himself, the 'least jealous of mankind.'
+
+Nor is there anything in the sentiments of Protagoras which impairs this
+pleasing impression of the grave and weighty old man.  His real defect is
+that he is inferior to Socrates in dialectics.  The opposition between him
+and Socrates is not the opposition of good and bad, true and false, but of
+the old art of rhetoric and the new science of interrogation and argument;
+also of the irony of Socrates and the self-assertion of the Sophists. 
+There is quite as much truth on the side of Protagoras as of Socrates; but
+the truth of Protagoras is based on common sense and common maxims of
+morality, while that of Socrates is paradoxical or transcendental, and
+though full of meaning and insight, hardly intelligible to the rest of
+mankind.  Here as elsewhere is the usual contrast between the Sophists
+representing average public opinion and Socrates seeking for increased
+clearness and unity of ideas.  But to a great extent Protagoras has the
+best of the argument and represents the better mind of man.
+
+For example:  (1) one of the noblest statements to be found in antiquity
+about the preventive nature of punishment is put into his mouth; (2) he is
+clearly right also in maintaining that virtue can be taught (which Socrates
+himself, at the end of the Dialogue, is disposed to concede); and also (3)
+in his explanation of the phenomenon that good fathers have bad sons; (4)
+he is right also in observing that the virtues are not like the arts, gifts
+or attainments of special individuals, but the common property of all: 
+this, which in all ages has been the strength and weakness of ethics and
+politics, is deeply seated in human nature; (5) there is a sort of half-
+truth in the notion that all civilized men are teachers of virtue; and more
+than a half-truth (6) in ascribing to man, who in his outward conditions is
+more helpless than the other animals, the power of self-improvement; (7)
+the religious allegory should be noticed, in which the arts are said to be
+given by Prometheus (who stole them), whereas justice and reverence and the
+political virtues could only be imparted by Zeus; (8) in the latter part of
+the Dialogue, when Socrates is arguing that 'pleasure is the only good,'
+Protagoras deems it more in accordance with his character to maintain that
+'some pleasures only are good;' and admits that 'he, above all other men,
+is bound to say "that wisdom and knowledge are the highest of human
+things."'
+
+There is no reason to suppose that in all this Plato is depicting an
+imaginary Protagoras; he seems to be showing us the teaching of the
+Sophists under the milder aspect under which he once regarded them.  Nor is
+there any reason to doubt that Socrates is equally an historical character,
+paradoxical, ironical, tiresome, but seeking for the unity of virtue and
+knowledge as for a precious treasure; willing to rest this even on a
+calculation of pleasure, and irresistible here, as everywhere in Plato, in
+his intellectual superiority.
+
+The aim of Socrates, and of the Dialogue, is to show the unity of virtue. 
+In the determination of this question the identity of virtue and knowledge
+is found to be involved.  But if virtue and knowledge are one, then virtue
+can be taught; the end of the Dialogue returns to the beginning.  Had
+Protagoras been allowed by Plato to make the Aristotelian distinction, and
+say that virtue is not knowledge, but is accompanied with knowledge; or to
+point out with Aristotle that the same quality may have more than one
+opposite; or with Plato himself in the Phaedo to deny that good is a mere
+exchange of a greater pleasure for a less--the unity of virtue and the
+identity of virtue and knowledge would have required to be proved by other
+arguments.
+
+The victory of Socrates over Protagoras is in every way complete when their
+minds are fairly brought together.  Protagoras falls before him after two
+or three blows.  Socrates partially gains his object in the first part of
+the Dialogue, and completely in the second.  Nor does he appear at any
+disadvantage when subjected to 'the question' by Protagoras.  He succeeds
+in making his two 'friends,' Prodicus and Hippias, ludicrous by the way; he
+also makes a long speech in defence of the poem of Simonides, after the
+manner of the Sophists, showing, as Alcibiades says, that he is only
+pretending to have a bad memory, and that he and not Protagoras is really a
+master in the two styles of speaking; and that he can undertake, not one
+side of the argument only, but both, when Protagoras begins to break down.
+Against the authority of the poets with whom Protagoras has ingeniously
+identified himself at the commencement of the Dialogue, Socrates sets up
+the proverbial philosophers and those masters of brevity the
+Lacedaemonians.  The poets, the Laconizers, and Protagoras are satirized at
+the same time.
+
+Not having the whole of this poem before us, it is impossible for us to
+answer certainly the question of Protagoras, how the two passages of
+Simonides are to be reconciled.  We can only follow the indications given
+by Plato himself.  But it seems likely that the reconcilement offered by
+Socrates is a caricature of the methods of interpretation which were
+practised by the Sophists--for the following reasons:  (1) The transparent
+irony of the previous interpretations given by Socrates.  (2) The ludicrous
+opening of the speech in which the Lacedaemonians are described as the true
+philosophers, and Laconic brevity as the true form of philosophy, evidently
+with an allusion to Protagoras' long speeches.  (3) The manifest futility
+and absurdity of the explanation of (Greek), which is hardly consistent
+with the rational interpretation of the rest of the poem.  The opposition
+of (Greek) and (Greek) seems also intended to express the rival doctrines
+of Socrates and Protagoras, and is a facetious commentary on their
+differences.  (4) The general treatment in Plato both of the Poets and the
+Sophists, who are their interpreters, and whom he delights to identify with
+them.  (5) The depreciating spirit in which Socrates speaks of the
+introduction of the poets as a substitute for original conversation, which
+is intended to contrast with Protagoras' exaltation of the study of them--
+this again is hardly consistent with the serious defence of Simonides.  (6)
+the marked approval of Hippias, who is supposed at once to catch the
+familiar sound, just as in the previous conversation Prodicus is
+represented as ready to accept any distinctions of language however absurd. 
+At the same time Hippias is desirous of substituting a new interpretation
+of his own; as if the words might really be made to mean anything, and were
+only to be regarded as affording a field for the ingenuity of the
+interpreter.
+
+This curious passage is, therefore, to be regarded as Plato's satire on the
+tedious and hypercritical arts of interpretation which prevailed in his own
+day, and may be compared with his condemnation of the same arts when
+applied to mythology in the Phaedrus, and with his other parodies, e.g.
+with the two first speeches in the Phaedrus and with the Menexenus. 
+Several lesser touches of satire may be observed, such as the claim of
+philosophy advanced for the Lacedaemonians, which is a parody of the claims
+advanced for the Poets by Protagoras; the mistake of the Laconizing set in
+supposing that the Lacedaemonians are a great nation because they bruise
+their ears; the far-fetched notion, which is 'really too bad,' that
+Simonides uses the Lesbian (?) word, (Greek), because he is addressing a
+Lesbian.  The whole may also be considered as a satire on those who spin
+pompous theories out of nothing.  As in the arguments of the Euthydemus and
+of the Cratylus, the veil of irony is never withdrawn; and we are left in
+doubt at last how far in this interpretation of Simonides Socrates is
+'fooling,' how far he is in earnest.
+
+All the interests and contrasts of character in a great dramatic work like
+the Protagoras are not easily exhausted.  The impressiveness of the scene
+should not be lost upon us, or the gradual substitution of Socrates in the
+second part for Protagoras in the first.  The characters to whom we are
+introduced at the beginning of the Dialogue all play a part more or less
+conspicuous towards the end.  There is Alcibiades, who is compelled by the
+necessity of his nature to be a partisan, lending effectual aid to
+Socrates; there is Critias assuming the tone of impartiality; Callias, here
+as always inclining to the Sophists, but eager for any intellectual repast;
+Prodicus, who finds an opportunity for displaying his distinctions of
+language, which are valueless and pedantic, because they are not based on
+dialectic; Hippias, who has previously exhibited his superficial knowledge
+of natural philosophy, to which, as in both the Dialogues called by his
+name, he now adds the profession of an interpreter of the Poets.  The two
+latter personages have been already damaged by the mock heroic description
+of them in the introduction.  It may be remarked that Protagoras is
+consistently presented to us throughout as the teacher of moral and
+political virtue; there is no allusion to the theories of sensation which
+are attributed to him in the Theaetetus and elsewhere, or to his denial of
+the existence of the gods in a well-known fragment ascribed to him; he is
+the religious rather than the irreligious teacher in this Dialogue.  Also
+it may be observed that Socrates shows him as much respect as is consistent
+with his own ironical character; he admits that the dialectic which has
+overthrown Protagoras has carried himself round to a conclusion opposed to
+his first thesis.  The force of argument, therefore, and not Socrates or
+Protagoras, has won the day.
+
+But is Socrates serious in maintaining (1) that virtue cannot be taught;
+(2) that the virtues are one; (3) that virtue is the knowledge of pleasures
+and pains present and future?  These propositions to us have an appearance
+of paradox--they are really moments or aspects of the truth by the help of
+which we pass from the old conventional morality to a higher conception of
+virtue and knowledge.  That virtue cannot be taught is a paradox of the
+same sort as the profession of Socrates that he knew nothing.  Plato means
+to say that virtue is not brought to a man, but must be drawn out of him;
+and cannot be taught by rhetorical discourses or citations from the poets.
+The second question, whether the virtues are one or many, though at first
+sight distinct, is really a part of the same subject; for if the virtues
+are to be taught, they must be reducible to a common principle; and this
+common principle is found to be knowledge.  Here, as Aristotle remarks,
+Socrates and Plato outstep the truth--they make a part of virtue into the
+whole.  Further, the nature of this knowledge, which is assumed to be a
+knowledge of pleasures and pains, appears to us too superficial and at
+variance with the spirit of Plato himself.  Yet, in this, Plato is only
+following the historical Socrates as he is depicted to us in Xenophon's
+Memorabilia.  Like Socrates, he finds on the surface of human life one
+common bond by which the virtues are united,--their tendency to produce
+happiness,--though such a principle is afterwards repudiated by him.
+
+It remains to be considered in what relation the Protagoras stands to the
+other Dialogues of Plato.  That it is one of the earlier or purely Socratic
+works--perhaps the last, as it is certainly the greatest of them--is
+indicated by the absence of any allusion to the doctrine of reminiscence;
+and also by the different attitude assumed towards the teaching and persons
+of the Sophists in some of the later Dialogues.  The Charmides, Laches,
+Lysis, all touch on the question of the relation of knowledge to virtue,
+and may be regarded, if not as preliminary studies or sketches of the more
+important work, at any rate as closely connected with it.  The Io and the
+lesser Hippias contain discussions of the Poets, which offer a parallel to
+the ironical criticism of Simonides, and are conceived in a similar spirit.
+The affinity of the Protagoras to the Meno is more doubtful.  For there,
+although the same question is discussed, 'whether virtue can be taught,'
+and the relation of Meno to the Sophists is much the same as that of
+Hippocrates, the answer to the question is supplied out of the doctrine of
+ideas; the real Socrates is already passing into the Platonic one.  At a
+later stage of the Platonic philosophy we shall find that both the paradox
+and the solution of it appear to have been retracted.  The Phaedo, the
+Gorgias, and the Philebus offer further corrections of the teaching of the
+Protagoras; in all of them the doctrine that virtue is pleasure, or that
+pleasure is the chief or only good, is distinctly renounced.
+
+Thus after many preparations and oppositions, both of the characters of men
+and aspects of the truth, especially of the popular and philosophical
+aspect; and after many interruptions and detentions by the way, which, as
+Theodorus says in the Theaetetus, are quite as agreeable as the argument,
+we arrive at the great Socratic thesis that virtue is knowledge.  This is
+an aspect of the truth which was lost almost as soon as it was found; and
+yet has to be recovered by every one for himself who would pass the limits
+of proverbial and popular philosophy.  The moral and intellectual are
+always dividing, yet they must be reunited, and in the highest conception
+of them are inseparable.  The thesis of Socrates is not merely a hasty
+assumption, but may be also deemed an anticipation of some 'metaphysic of
+the future,' in which the divided elements of human nature are reconciled.
+
+
+PROTAGORAS
+
+by
+
+Plato
+
+Translated by Benjamin Jowett.
+
+
+PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE:
+Socrates, who is the narrator of the Dialogue to his Companion.
+Hippocrates, Alcibiades and Critias.
+Protagoras, Hippias and Prodicus (Sophists).
+Callias, a wealthy Athenian.
+
+SCENE:  The House of Callias.
+
+
+COMPANION:  Where do you come from, Socrates?  And yet I need hardly ask
+the question, for I know that you have been in chase of the fair
+Alcibiades.  I saw him the day before yesterday; and he had got a beard
+like a man,--and he is a man, as I may tell you in your ear.  But I thought
+that he was still very charming.
+
+SOCRATES:  What of his beard?  Are you not of Homer's opinion, who says
+
+'Youth is most charming when the beard first appears'?
+
+And that is now the charm of Alcibiades.
+
+COMPANION:  Well, and how do matters proceed?  Have you been visiting him,
+and was he gracious to you?
+
+SOCRATES:  Yes, I thought that he was very gracious; and especially to-day,
+for I have just come from him, and he has been helping me in an argument. 
+But shall I tell you a strange thing?  I paid no attention to him, and
+several times I quite forgot that he was present.
+
+COMPANION:  What is the meaning of this?  Has anything happened between you
+and him?  For surely you cannot have discovered a fairer love than he is;
+certainly not in this city of Athens.
+
+SOCRATES:  Yes, much fairer.
+
+COMPANION:  What do you mean--a citizen or a foreigner?
+
+SOCRATES:  A foreigner.
+
+COMPANION:  Of what country?
+
+SOCRATES:  Of Abdera.
+
+COMPANION:  And is this stranger really in your opinion a fairer love than
+the son of Cleinias?
+
+SOCRATES:  And is not the wiser always the fairer, sweet friend?
+
+COMPANION:  But have you really met, Socrates, with some wise one?
+
+SOCRATES:  Say rather, with the wisest of all living men, if you are
+willing to accord that title to Protagoras.
+
+COMPANION:  What!  Is Protagoras in Athens?
+
+SOCRATES:  Yes; he has been here two days.
+
+COMPANION:  And do you just come from an interview with him?
+
+SOCRATES:  Yes; and I have heard and said many things.
+
+COMPANION:  Then, if you have no engagement, suppose that you sit down and
+tell me what passed, and my attendant here shall give up his place to you.
+
+SOCRATES:  To be sure; and I shall be grateful to you for listening.
+
+COMPANION:  Thank you, too, for telling us.
+
+SOCRATES:  That is thank you twice over.  Listen then:--
+
+Last night, or rather very early this morning, Hippocrates, the son of
+Apollodorus and the brother of Phason, gave a tremendous thump with his
+staff at my door; some one opened to him, and he came rushing in and bawled
+out:  Socrates, are you awake or asleep?
+
+I knew his voice, and said:  Hippocrates, is that you? and do you bring any
+news?
+
+Good news, he said; nothing but good.
+
+Delightful, I said; but what is the news? and why have you come hither at
+this unearthly hour?
+
+He drew nearer to me and said:  Protagoras is come.
+
+Yes, I replied; he came two days ago:  have you only just heard of his
+arrival?
+
+Yes, by the gods, he said; but not until yesterday evening.
+
+At the same time he felt for the truckle-bed, and sat down at my feet, and
+then he said:  Yesterday quite late in the evening, on my return from Oenoe
+whither I had gone in pursuit of my runaway slave Satyrus, as I meant to
+have told you, if some other matter had not come in the way;--on my return,
+when we had done supper and were about to retire to rest, my brother said
+to me:  Protagoras is come.  I was going to you at once, and then I thought
+that the night was far spent.  But the moment sleep left me after my
+fatigue, I got up and came hither direct.
+
+I, who knew the very courageous madness of the man, said:  What is the
+matter?  Has Protagoras robbed you of anything?
+
+He replied, laughing:  Yes, indeed he has, Socrates, of the wisdom which he
+keeps from me.
+
+But, surely, I said, if you give him money, and make friends with him, he
+will make you as wise as he is himself.
+
+Would to heaven, he replied, that this were the case!  He might take all
+that I have, and all that my friends have, if he pleased.  But that is why
+I have come to you now, in order that you may speak to him on my behalf;
+for I am young, and also I have never seen nor heard him; (when he visited
+Athens before I was but a child;) and all men praise him, Socrates; he is
+reputed to be the most accomplished of speakers.  There is no reason why we
+should not go to him at once, and then we shall find him at home.  He
+lodges, as I hear, with Callias the son of Hipponicus:  let us start.
+
+I replied:  Not yet, my good friend; the hour is too early.  But let us
+rise and take a turn in the court and wait about there until day-break;
+when the day breaks, then we will go.  For Protagoras is generally at home,
+and we shall be sure to find him; never fear.
+
+Upon this we got up and walked about in the court, and I thought that I
+would make trial of the strength of his resolution.  So I examined him and
+put questions to him.  Tell me, Hippocrates, I said, as you are going to
+Protagoras, and will be paying your money to him, what is he to whom you
+are going? and what will he make of you?  If, for example, you had thought
+of going to Hippocrates of Cos, the Asclepiad, and were about to give him
+your money, and some one had said to you:  You are paying money to your
+namesake Hippocrates, O Hippocrates; tell me, what is he that you give him
+money? how would you have answered?
+
+I should say, he replied, that I gave money to him as a physician.
+
+And what will he make of you?
+
+A physician, he said.
+
+And if you were resolved to go to Polycleitus the Argive, or Pheidias the
+Athenian, and were intending to give them money, and some one had asked
+you:  What are Polycleitus and Pheidias? and why do you give them this
+money?--how would you have answered?
+
+I should have answered, that they were statuaries.
+
+And what will they make of you?
+
+A statuary, of course.
+
+Well now, I said, you and I are going to Protagoras, and we are ready to
+pay him money on your behalf.  If our own means are sufficient, and we can
+gain him with these, we shall be only too glad; but if not, then we are to
+spend the money of your friends as well.  Now suppose, that while we are
+thus enthusiastically pursuing our object some one were to say to us:  Tell
+me, Socrates, and you Hippocrates, what is Protagoras, and why are you
+going to pay him money,--how should we answer?  I know that Pheidias is a
+sculptor, and that Homer is a poet; but what appellation is given to
+Protagoras? how is he designated?
+
+They call him a Sophist, Socrates, he replied.
+
+Then we are going to pay our money to him in the character of a Sophist?
+
+Certainly.
+
+But suppose a person were to ask this further question:  And how about
+yourself?  What will Protagoras make of you, if you go to see him?
+
+He answered, with a blush upon his face (for the day was just beginning to
+dawn, so that I could see him):  Unless this differs in some way from the
+former instances, I suppose that he will make a Sophist of me.
+
+By the gods, I said, and are you not ashamed at having to appear before the
+Hellenes in the character of a Sophist?
+
+Indeed, Socrates, to confess the truth, I am.
+
+But you should not assume, Hippocrates, that the instruction of Protagoras
+is of this nature:  may you not learn of him in the same way that you
+learned the arts of the grammarian, or musician, or trainer, not with the
+view of making any of them a profession, but only as a part of education,
+and because a private gentleman and freeman ought to know them?
+
+Just so, he said; and that, in my opinion, is a far truer account of the
+teaching of Protagoras.
+
+I said:  I wonder whether you know what you are doing?
+
+And what am I doing?
+
+You are going to commit your soul to the care of a man whom you call a
+Sophist.  And yet I hardly think that you know what a Sophist is; and if
+not, then you do not even know to whom you are committing your soul and
+whether the thing to which you commit yourself be good or evil.
+
+I certainly think that I do know, he replied.
+
+Then tell me, what do you imagine that he is?
+
+I take him to be one who knows wise things, he replied, as his name
+implies.
+
+And might you not, I said, affirm this of the painter and of the carpenter
+also:  Do not they, too, know wise things?  But suppose a person were to
+ask us:  In what are the painters wise?  We should answer:  In what relates
+to the making of likenesses, and similarly of other things.  And if he were
+further to ask:  What is the wisdom of the Sophist, and what is the
+manufacture over which he presides?--how should we answer him?
+
+How should we answer him, Socrates?  What other answer could there be but
+that he presides over the art which makes men eloquent?
+
+Yes, I replied, that is very likely true, but not enough; for in the answer
+a further question is involved:  Of what does the Sophist make a man talk
+eloquently?  The player on the lyre may be supposed to make a man talk
+eloquently about that which he makes him understand, that is about playing
+the lyre.  Is not that true?
+
+Yes.
+
+Then about what does the Sophist make him eloquent?  Must not he make him
+eloquent in that which he understands?
+
+Yes, that may be assumed.
+
+And what is that which the Sophist knows and makes his disciple know?
+
+Indeed, he said, I cannot tell.
+
+Then I proceeded to say:  Well, but are you aware of the danger which you
+are incurring?  If you were going to commit your body to some one, who
+might do good or harm to it, would you not carefully consider and ask the
+opinion of your friends and kindred, and deliberate many days as to whether
+you should give him the care of your body?  But when the soul is in
+question, which you hold to be of far more value than the body, and upon
+the good or evil of which depends the well-being of your all,--about this
+you never consulted either with your father or with your brother or with
+any one of us who are your companions.  But no sooner does this foreigner
+appear, than you instantly commit your soul to his keeping.  In the
+evening, as you say, you hear of him, and in the morning you go to him,
+never deliberating or taking the opinion of any one as to whether you ought
+to intrust yourself to him or not;--you have quite made up your mind that
+you will at all hazards be a pupil of Protagoras, and are prepared to
+expend all the property of yourself and of your friends in carrying out at
+any price this determination, although, as you admit, you do not know him,
+and have never spoken with him:  and you call him a Sophist, but are
+manifestly ignorant of what a Sophist is; and yet you are going to commit
+yourself to his keeping.
+
+When he heard me say this, he replied:  No other inference, Socrates, can
+be drawn from your words.
+
+I proceeded:  Is not a Sophist, Hippocrates, one who deals wholesale or
+retail in the food of the soul?  To me that appears to be his nature.
+
+And what, Socrates, is the food of the soul?
+
+Surely, I said, knowledge is the food of the soul; and we must take care,
+my friend, that the Sophist does not deceive us when he praises what he
+sells, like the dealers wholesale or retail who sell the food of the body;
+for they praise indiscriminately all their goods, without knowing what are
+really beneficial or hurtful:  neither do their customers know, with the
+exception of any trainer or physician who may happen to buy of them.  In
+like manner those who carry about the wares of knowledge, and make the
+round of the cities, and sell or retail them to any customer who is in want
+of them, praise them all alike; though I should not wonder, O my friend, if
+many of them were really ignorant of their effect upon the soul; and their
+customers equally ignorant, unless he who buys of them happens to be a
+physician of the soul.  If, therefore, you have understanding of what is
+good and evil, you may safely buy knowledge of Protagoras or of any one;
+but if not, then, O my friend, pause, and do not hazard your dearest
+interests at a game of chance.  For there is far greater peril in buying
+knowledge than in buying meat and drink:  the one you purchase of the
+wholesale or retail dealer, and carry them away in other vessels, and
+before you receive them into the body as food, you may deposit them at home
+and call in any experienced friend who knows what is good to be eaten or
+drunken, and what not, and how much, and when; and then the danger of
+purchasing them is not so great.  But you cannot buy the wares of knowledge
+and carry them away in another vessel; when you have paid for them you must
+receive them into the soul and go your way, either greatly harmed or
+greatly benefited; and therefore we should deliberate and take counsel with
+our elders; for we are still young--too young to determine such a matter. 
+And now let us go, as we were intending, and hear Protagoras; and when we
+have heard what he has to say, we may take counsel of others; for not only
+is Protagoras at the house of Callias, but there is Hippias of Elis, and,
+if I am not mistaken, Prodicus of Ceos, and several other wise men.
+
+To this we agreed, and proceeded on our way until we reached the vestibule
+of the house; and there we stopped in order to conclude a discussion which
+had arisen between us as we were going along; and we stood talking in the
+vestibule until we had finished and come to an understanding.  And I think
+that the door-keeper, who was a eunuch, and who was probably annoyed at the
+great inroad of the Sophists, must have heard us talking.  At any rate,
+when we knocked at the door, and he opened and saw us, he grumbled:  They
+are Sophists--he is not at home; and instantly gave the door a hearty bang
+with both his hands.  Again we knocked, and he answered without opening: 
+Did you not hear me say that he is not at home, fellows?  But, my friend, I
+said, you need not be alarmed; for we are not Sophists, and we are not come
+to see Callias, but we want to see Protagoras; and I must request you to
+announce us.  At last, after a good deal of difficulty, the man was
+persuaded to open the door.
+
+When we entered, we found Protagoras taking a walk in the cloister; and
+next to him, on one side, were walking Callias, the son of Hipponicus, and
+Paralus, the son of Pericles, who, by the mother's side, is his half-
+brother, and Charmides, the son of Glaucon.  On the other side of him were
+Xanthippus, the other son of Pericles, Philippides, the son of Philomelus;
+also Antimoerus of Mende, who of all the disciples of Protagoras is the
+most famous, and intends to make sophistry his profession.  A train of
+listeners followed him; the greater part of them appeared to be foreigners,
+whom Protagoras had brought with him out of the various cities visited by
+him in his journeys, he, like Orpheus, attracting them his voice, and they
+following (Compare Rep.).  I should mention also that there were some
+Athenians in the company.  Nothing delighted me more than the precision of
+their movements:  they never got into his way at all; but when he and those
+who were with him turned back, then the band of listeners parted regularly
+on either side; he was always in front, and they wheeled round and took
+their places behind him in perfect order.
+
+After him, as Homer says (Od.), 'I lifted up my eyes and saw' Hippias the
+Elean sitting in the opposite cloister on a chair of state, and around him
+were seated on benches Eryximachus, the son of Acumenus, and Phaedrus the
+Myrrhinusian, and Andron the son of Androtion, and there were strangers
+whom he had brought with him from his native city of Elis, and some others: 
+they were putting to Hippias certain physical and astronomical questions,
+and he, ex cathedra, was determining their several questions to them, and
+discoursing of them.
+
+Also, 'my eyes beheld Tantalus (Od.);' for Prodicus the Cean was at Athens: 
+he had been lodged in a room which, in the days of Hipponicus, was a
+storehouse; but, as the house was full, Callias had cleared this out and
+made the room into a guest-chamber.  Now Prodicus was still in bed, wrapped
+up in sheepskins and bedclothes, of which there seemed to be a great heap;
+and there was sitting by him on the couches near, Pausanias of the deme of
+Cerameis, and with Pausanias was a youth quite young, who is certainly
+remarkable for his good looks, and, if I am not mistaken, is also of a fair
+and gentle nature.  I thought that I heard him called Agathon, and my
+suspicion is that he is the beloved of Pausanias.  There was this youth,
+and also there were the two Adeimantuses, one the son of Cepis, and the
+other of Leucolophides, and some others.  I was very anxious to hear what
+Prodicus was saying, for he seems to me to be an all-wise and inspired man;
+but I was not able to get into the inner circle, and his fine deep voice
+made an echo in the room which rendered his words inaudible.
+
+No sooner had we entered than there followed us Alcibiades the beautiful,
+as you say, and I believe you; and also Critias the son of Callaeschrus.
+
+On entering we stopped a little, in order to look about us, and then walked
+up to Protagoras, and I said:  Protagoras, my friend Hippocrates and I have
+come to see you.
+
+Do you wish, he said, to speak with me alone, or in the presence of the
+company?
+
+Whichever you please, I said; you shall determine when you have heard the
+purpose of our visit.
+
+And what is your purpose? he said.
+
+I must explain, I said, that my friend Hippocrates is a native Athenian; he
+is the son of Apollodorus, and of a great and prosperous house, and he is
+himself in natural ability quite a match for anybody of his own age.  I
+believe that he aspires to political eminence; and this he thinks that
+conversation with you is most likely to procure for him.  And now you can
+determine whether you would wish to speak to him of your teaching alone or
+in the presence of the company.
+
+Thank you, Socrates, for your consideration of me.  For certainly a
+stranger finding his way into great cities, and persuading the flower of
+the youth in them to leave company of their kinsmen or any other
+acquaintances, old or young, and live with him, under the idea that they
+will be improved by his conversation, ought to be very cautious; great
+jealousies are aroused by his proceedings, and he is the subject of many
+enmities and conspiracies.  Now the art of the Sophist is, as I believe, of
+great antiquity; but in ancient times those who practised it, fearing this
+odium, veiled and disguised themselves under various names, some under that
+of poets, as Homer, Hesiod, and Simonides, some, of hierophants and
+prophets, as Orpheus and Musaeus, and some, as I observe, even under the
+name of gymnastic-masters, like Iccus of Tarentum, or the more recently
+celebrated Herodicus, now of Selymbria and formerly of Megara, who is a
+first-rate Sophist.  Your own Agathocles pretended to be a musician, but
+was really an eminent Sophist; also Pythocleides the Cean; and there were
+many others; and all of them, as I was saying, adopted these arts as veils
+or disguises because they were afraid of the odium which they would incur. 
+But that is not my way, for I do not believe that they effected their
+purpose, which was to deceive the government, who were not blinded by them;
+and as to the people, they have no understanding, and only repeat what
+their rulers are pleased to tell them.  Now to run away, and to be caught
+in running away, is the very height of folly, and also greatly increases
+the exasperation of mankind; for they regard him who runs away as a rogue,
+in addition to any other objections which they have to him; and therefore I
+take an entirely opposite course, and acknowledge myself to be a Sophist
+and instructor of mankind; such an open acknowledgement appears to me to be
+a better sort of caution than concealment.  Nor do I neglect other
+precautions, and therefore I hope, as I may say, by the favour of heaven
+that no harm will come of the acknowledgment that I am a Sophist.  And I
+have been now many years in the profession--for all my years when added up
+are many:  there is no one here present of whom I might not be the father. 
+Wherefore I should much prefer conversing with you, if you want to speak
+with me, in the presence of the company.
+
+As I suspected that he would like to have a little display and
+glorification in the presence of Prodicus and Hippias, and would gladly
+show us to them in the light of his admirers, I said:  But why should we
+not summon Prodicus and Hippias and their friends to hear us?
+
+Very good, he said.
+
+Suppose, said Callias, that we hold a council in which you may sit and
+discuss.--This was agreed upon, and great delight was felt at the prospect
+of hearing wise men talk; we ourselves took the chairs and benches, and
+arranged them by Hippias, where the other benches had been already placed. 
+Meanwhile Callias and Alcibiades got Prodicus out of bed and brought in him
+and his companions.
+
+When we were all seated, Protagoras said:  Now that the company are
+assembled, Socrates, tell me about the young man of whom you were just now
+speaking.
+
+I replied:  I will begin again at the same point, Protagoras, and tell you
+once more the purport of my visit:  this is my friend Hippocrates, who is
+desirous of making your acquaintance; he would like to know what will
+happen to him if he associates with you.  I have no more to say.
+
+Protagoras answered:  Young man, if you associate with me, on the very
+first day you will return home a better man than you came, and better on
+the second day than on the first, and better every day than you were on the
+day before.
+
+When I heard this, I said:  Protagoras, I do not at all wonder at hearing
+you say this; even at your age, and with all your wisdom, if any one were
+to teach you what you did not know before, you would become better no
+doubt:  but please to answer in a different way--I will explain how by an
+example.  Let me suppose that Hippocrates, instead of desiring your
+acquaintance, wished to become acquainted with the young man Zeuxippus of
+Heraclea, who has lately been in Athens, and he had come to him as he has
+come to you, and had heard him say, as he has heard you say, that every day
+he would grow and become better if he associated with him:  and then
+suppose that he were to ask him, 'In what shall I become better, and in
+what shall I grow?'--Zeuxippus would answer, 'In painting.'  And suppose
+that he went to Orthagoras the Theban, and heard him say the same thing,
+and asked him, 'In what shall I become better day by day?' he would reply,
+'In flute-playing.'  Now I want you to make the same sort of answer to this
+young man and to me, who am asking questions on his account.  When you say
+that on the first day on which he associates with you he will return home a
+better man, and on every day will grow in like manner,--in what,
+Protagoras, will he be better? and about what?
+
+When Protagoras heard me say this, he replied:  You ask questions fairly,
+and I like to answer a question which is fairly put.  If Hippocrates comes
+to me he will not experience the sort of drudgery with which other Sophists
+are in the habit of insulting their pupils; who, when they have just
+escaped from the arts, are taken and driven back into them by these
+teachers, and made to learn calculation, and astronomy, and geometry, and
+music (he gave a look at Hippias as he said this); but if he comes to me,
+he will learn that which he comes to learn.  And this is prudence in
+affairs private as well as public; he will learn to order his own house in
+the best manner, and he will be able to speak and act for the best in the
+affairs of the state.
+
+Do I understand you, I said; and is your meaning that you teach the art of
+politics, and that you promise to make men good citizens?
+
+That, Socrates, is exactly the profession which I make.
+
+Then, I said, you do indeed possess a noble art, if there is no mistake
+about this; for I will freely confess to you, Protagoras, that I have a
+doubt whether this art is capable of being taught, and yet I know not how
+to disbelieve your assertion.  And I ought to tell you why I am of opinion
+that this art cannot be taught or communicated by man to man.  I say that
+the Athenians are an understanding people, and indeed they are esteemed to
+be such by the other Hellenes.  Now I observe that when we are met together
+in the assembly, and the matter in hand relates to building, the builders
+are summoned as advisers; when the question is one of ship-building, then
+the ship-wrights; and the like of other arts which they think capable of
+being taught and learned.  And if some person offers to give them advice
+who is not supposed by them to have any skill in the art, even though he be
+good-looking, and rich, and noble, they will not listen to him, but laugh
+and hoot at him, until either he is clamoured down and retires of himself;
+or if he persist, he is dragged away or put out by the constables at the
+command of the prytanes.  This is their way of behaving about professors of
+the arts.  But when the question is an affair of state, then everybody is
+free to have a say--carpenter, tinker, cobbler, sailor, passenger; rich and
+poor, high and low--any one who likes gets up, and no one reproaches him,
+as in the former case, with not having learned, and having no teacher, and
+yet giving advice; evidently because they are under the impression that
+this sort of knowledge cannot be taught.  And not only is this true of the
+state, but of individuals; the best and wisest of our citizens are unable
+to impart their political wisdom to others:  as for example, Pericles, the
+father of these young men, who gave them excellent instruction in all that
+could be learned from masters, in his own department of politics neither
+taught them, nor gave them teachers; but they were allowed to wander at
+their own free will in a sort of hope that they would light upon virtue of
+their own accord.  Or take another example:  there was Cleinias the younger
+brother of our friend Alcibiades, of whom this very same Pericles was the
+guardian; and he being in fact under the apprehension that Cleinias would
+be corrupted by Alcibiades, took him away, and placed him in the house of
+Ariphron to be educated; but before six months had elapsed, Ariphron sent
+him back, not knowing what to do with him.  And I could mention numberless
+other instances of persons who were good themselves, and never yet made any
+one else good, whether friend or stranger.  Now I, Protagoras, having these
+examples before me, am inclined to think that virtue cannot be taught.  But
+then again, when I listen to your words, I waver; and am disposed to think
+that there must be something in what you say, because I know that you have
+great experience, and learning, and invention.  And I wish that you would,
+if possible, show me a little more clearly that virtue can be taught.  Will
+you be so good?
+
+That I will, Socrates, and gladly.  But what would you like?  Shall I, as
+an elder, speak to you as younger men in an apologue or myth, or shall I
+argue out the question?
+
+To this several of the company answered that he should choose for himself.
+
+Well, then, he said, I think that the myth will be more interesting.
+
+Once upon a time there were gods only, and no mortal creatures.  But when
+the time came that these also should be created, the gods fashioned them
+out of earth and fire and various mixtures of both elements in the interior
+of the earth; and when they were about to bring them into the light of day,
+they ordered Prometheus and Epimetheus to equip them, and to distribute to
+them severally their proper qualities.  Epimetheus said to Prometheus: 
+'Let me distribute, and do you inspect.'  This was agreed, and Epimetheus
+made the distribution.  There were some to whom he gave strength without
+swiftness, while he equipped the weaker with swiftness; some he armed, and
+others he left unarmed; and devised for the latter some other means of
+preservation, making some large, and having their size as a protection, and
+others small, whose nature was to fly in the air or burrow in the ground;
+this was to be their way of escape.  Thus did he compensate them with the
+view of preventing any race from becoming extinct.  And when he had
+provided against their destruction by one another, he contrived also a
+means of protecting them against the seasons of heaven; clothing them with
+close hair and thick skins sufficient to defend them against the winter
+cold and able to resist the summer heat, so that they might have a natural
+bed of their own when they wanted to rest; also he furnished them with
+hoofs and hair and hard and callous skins under their feet.  Then he gave
+them varieties of food,--herb of the soil to some, to others fruits of
+trees, and to others roots, and to some again he gave other animals as
+food.  And some he made to have few young ones, while those who were their
+prey were very prolific; and in this manner the race was preserved.  Thus
+did Epimetheus, who, not being very wise, forgot that he had distributed
+among the brute animals all the qualities which he had to give,--and when
+he came to man, who was still unprovided, he was terribly perplexed.  Now
+while he was in this perplexity, Prometheus came to inspect the
+distribution, and he found that the other animals were suitably furnished,
+but that man alone was naked and shoeless, and had neither bed nor arms of
+defence.  The appointed hour was approaching when man in his turn was to go
+forth into the light of day; and Prometheus, not knowing how he could
+devise his salvation, stole the mechanical arts of Hephaestus and Athene,
+and fire with them (they could neither have been acquired nor used without
+fire), and gave them to man.  Thus man had the wisdom necessary to the
+support of life, but political wisdom he had not; for that was in the
+keeping of Zeus, and the power of Prometheus did not extend to entering
+into the citadel of heaven, where Zeus dwelt, who moreover had terrible
+sentinels; but he did enter by stealth into the common workshop of Athene
+and Hephaestus, in which they used to practise their favourite arts, and
+carried off Hephaestus' art of working by fire, and also the art of Athene,
+and gave them to man.  And in this way man was supplied with the means of
+life.  But Prometheus is said to have been afterwards prosecuted for theft,
+owing to the blunder of Epimetheus.
+
+Now man, having a share of the divine attributes, was at first the only one
+of the animals who had any gods, because he alone was of their kindred; and
+he would raise altars and images of them.  He was not long in inventing
+articulate speech and names; and he also constructed houses and clothes and
+shoes and beds, and drew sustenance from the earth.  Thus provided, mankind
+at first lived dispersed, and there were no cities.  But the consequence
+was that they were destroyed by the wild beasts, for they were utterly weak
+in comparison of them, and their art was only sufficient to provide them
+with the means of life, and did not enable them to carry on war against the
+animals:  food they had, but not as yet the art of government, of which the
+art of war is a part.  After a while the desire of self-preservation
+gathered them into cities; but when they were gathered together, having no
+art of government, they evil intreated one another, and were again in
+process of dispersion and destruction.  Zeus feared that the entire race
+would be exterminated, and so he sent Hermes to them, bearing reverence and
+justice to be the ordering principles of cities and the bonds of friendship
+and conciliation.  Hermes asked Zeus how he should impart justice and
+reverence among men:--Should he distribute them as the arts are
+distributed; that is to say, to a favoured few only, one skilled individual
+having enough of medicine or of any other art for many unskilled ones? 
+'Shall this be the manner in which I am to distribute justice and reverence
+among men, or shall I give them to all?'  'To all,' said Zeus; 'I should
+like them all to have a share; for cities cannot exist, if a few only share
+in the virtues, as in the arts.  And further, make a law by my order, that
+he who has no part in reverence and justice shall be put to death, for he
+is a plague of the state.'
+
+And this is the reason, Socrates, why the Athenians and mankind in general,
+when the question relates to carpentering or any other mechanical art,
+allow but a few to share in their deliberations; and when any one else
+interferes, then, as you say, they object, if he be not of the favoured
+few; which, as I reply, is very natural.  But when they meet to deliberate
+about political virtue, which proceeds only by way of justice and wisdom,
+they are patient enough of any man who speaks of them, as is also natural,
+because they think that every man ought to share in this sort of virtue,
+and that states could not exist if this were otherwise.  I have explained
+to you, Socrates, the reason of this phenomenon.
+
+And that you may not suppose yourself to be deceived in thinking that all
+men regard every man as having a share of justice or honesty and of every
+other political virtue, let me give you a further proof, which is this.  In
+other cases, as you are aware, if a man says that he is a good flute-
+player, or skilful in any other art in which he has no skill, people either
+laugh at him or are angry with him, and his relations think that he is mad
+and go and admonish him; but when honesty is in question, or some other
+political virtue, even if they know that he is dishonest, yet, if the man
+comes publicly forward and tells the truth about his dishonesty, then, what
+in the other case was held by them to be good sense, they now deem to be
+madness.  They say that all men ought to profess honesty whether they are
+honest or not, and that a man is out of his mind who says anything else. 
+Their notion is, that a man must have some degree of honesty; and that if
+he has none at all he ought not to be in the world.
+
+I have been showing that they are right in admitting every man as a
+counsellor about this sort of virtue, as they are of opinion that every man
+is a partaker of it.  And I will now endeavour to show further that they do
+not conceive this virtue to be given by nature, or to grow spontaneously,
+but to be a thing which may be taught; and which comes to a man by taking
+pains.  No one would instruct, no one would rebuke, or be angry with those
+whose calamities they suppose to be due to nature or chance; they do not
+try to punish or to prevent them from being what they are; they do but pity
+them.  Who is so foolish as to chastise or instruct the ugly, or the
+diminutive, or the feeble?  And for this reason.  Because he knows that
+good and evil of this kind is the work of nature and of chance; whereas if
+a man is wanting in those good qualities which are attained by study and
+exercise and teaching, and has only the contrary evil qualities, other men
+are angry with him, and punish and reprove him--of these evil qualities one
+is impiety, another injustice, and they may be described generally as the
+very opposite of political virtue.  In such cases any man will be angry
+with another, and reprimand him,--clearly because he thinks that by study
+and learning, the virtue in which the other is deficient may be acquired. 
+If you will think, Socrates, of the nature of punishment, you will see at
+once that in the opinion of mankind virtue may be acquired; no one punishes
+the evil-doer under the notion, or for the reason, that he has done wrong,
+--only the unreasonable fury of a beast acts in that manner.  But he who
+desires to inflict rational punishment does not retaliate for a past wrong
+which cannot be undone; he has regard to the future, and is desirous that
+the man who is punished, and he who sees him punished, may be deterred from
+doing wrong again.  He punishes for the sake of prevention, thereby clearly
+implying that virtue is capable of being taught.  This is the notion of all
+who retaliate upon others either privately or publicly.  And the Athenians,
+too, your own citizens, like other men, punish and take vengeance on all
+whom they regard as evil doers; and hence, we may infer them to be of the
+number of those who think that virtue may be acquired and taught.  Thus
+far, Socrates, I have shown you clearly enough, if I am not mistaken, that
+your countrymen are right in admitting the tinker and the cobbler to advise
+about politics, and also that they deem virtue to be capable of being
+taught and acquired.
+
+There yet remains one difficulty which has been raised by you about the
+sons of good men.  What is the reason why good men teach their sons the
+knowledge which is gained from teachers, and make them wise in that, but do
+nothing towards improving them in the virtues which distinguish themselves? 
+And here, Socrates, I will leave the apologue and resume the argument. 
+Please to consider:  Is there or is there not some one quality of which all
+the citizens must be partakers, if there is to be a city at all?  In the
+answer to this question is contained the only solution of your difficulty;
+there is no other.  For if there be any such quality, and this quality or
+unity is not the art of the carpenter, or the smith, or the potter, but
+justice and temperance and holiness and, in a word, manly virtue--if this
+is the quality of which all men must be partakers, and which is the very
+condition of their learning or doing anything else, and if he who is
+wanting in this, whether he be a child only or a grown-up man or woman,
+must be taught and punished, until by punishment he becomes better, and he
+who rebels against instruction and punishment is either exiled or condemned
+to death under the idea that he is incurable--if what I am saying be true,
+good men have their sons taught other things and not this, do consider how
+extraordinary their conduct would appear to be.  For we have shown that
+they think virtue capable of being taught and cultivated both in private
+and public; and, notwithstanding, they have their sons taught lesser
+matters, ignorance of which does not involve the punishment of death:  but
+greater things, of which the ignorance may cause death and exile to those
+who have no training or knowledge of them--aye, and confiscation as well as
+death, and, in a word, may be the ruin of families--those things, I say,
+they are supposed not to teach them,--not to take the utmost care that they
+should learn.  How improbable is this, Socrates!
+
+Education and admonition commence in the first years of childhood, and last
+to the very end of life.  Mother and nurse and father and tutor are vying
+with one another about the improvement of the child as soon as ever he is
+able to understand what is being said to him:  he cannot say or do anything
+without their setting forth to him that this is just and that is unjust;
+this is honourable, that is dishonourable; this is holy, that is unholy; do
+this and abstain from that.  And if he obeys, well and good; if not, he is
+straightened by threats and blows, like a piece of bent or warped wood.  At
+a later stage they send him to teachers, and enjoin them to see to his
+manners even more than to his reading and music; and the teachers do as
+they are desired.  And when the boy has learned his letters and is
+beginning to understand what is written, as before he understood only what
+was spoken, they put into his hands the works of great poets, which he
+reads sitting on a bench at school; in these are contained many
+admonitions, and many tales, and praises, and encomia of ancient famous
+men, which he is required to learn by heart, in order that he may imitate
+or emulate them and desire to become like them.  Then, again, the teachers
+of the lyre take similar care that their young disciple is temperate and
+gets into no mischief; and when they have taught him the use of the lyre,
+they introduce him to the poems of other excellent poets, who are the lyric
+poets; and these they set to music, and make their harmonies and rhythms
+quite familiar to the children's souls, in order that they may learn to be
+more gentle, and harmonious, and rhythmical, and so more fitted for speech
+and action; for the life of man in every part has need of harmony and
+rhythm.  Then they send them to the master of gymnastic, in order that
+their bodies may better minister to the virtuous mind, and that they may
+not be compelled through bodily weakness to play the coward in war or on
+any other occasion.  This is what is done by those who have the means, and
+those who have the means are the rich; their children begin to go to school
+soonest and leave off latest.  When they have done with masters, the state
+again compels them to learn the laws, and live after the pattern which they
+furnish, and not after their own fancies; and just as in learning to write,
+the writing-master first draws lines with a style for the use of the young
+beginner, and gives him the tablet and makes him follow the lines, so the
+city draws the laws, which were the invention of good lawgivers living in
+the olden time; these are given to the young man, in order to guide him in
+his conduct whether he is commanding or obeying; and he who transgresses
+them is to be corrected, or, in other words, called to account, which is a
+term used not only in your country, but also in many others, seeing that
+justice calls men to account.  Now when there is all this care about virtue
+private and public, why, Socrates, do you still wonder and doubt whether
+virtue can be taught?  Cease to wonder, for the opposite would be far more
+surprising.
+
+But why then do the sons of good fathers often turn out ill?  There is
+nothing very wonderful in this; for, as I have been saying, the existence
+of a state implies that virtue is not any man's private possession.  If so
+--and nothing can be truer--then I will further ask you to imagine, as an
+illustration, some other pursuit or branch of knowledge which may be
+assumed equally to be the condition of the existence of a state.  Suppose
+that there could be no state unless we were all flute-players, as far as
+each had the capacity, and everybody was freely teaching everybody the art,
+both in private and public, and reproving the bad player as freely and
+openly as every man now teaches justice and the laws, not concealing them
+as he would conceal the other arts, but imparting them--for all of us have
+a mutual interest in the justice and virtue of one another, and this is the
+reason why every one is so ready to teach justice and the laws;--suppose, I
+say, that there were the same readiness and liberality among us in teaching
+one another flute-playing, do you imagine, Socrates, that the sons of good
+flute-players would be more likely to be good than the sons of bad ones?  I
+think not.  Would not their sons grow up to be distinguished or
+undistinguished according to their own natural capacities as flute-players,
+and the son of a good player would often turn out to be a bad one, and the
+son of a bad player to be a good one, all flute-players would be good
+enough in comparison of those who were ignorant and unacquainted with the
+art of flute-playing?  In like manner I would have you consider that he who
+appears to you to be the worst of those who have been brought up in laws
+and humanities, would appear to be a just man and a master of justice if he
+were to be compared with men who had no education, or courts of justice, or
+laws, or any restraints upon them which compelled them to practise virtue--
+with the savages, for example, whom the poet Pherecrates exhibited on the
+stage at the last year's Lenaean festival.  If you were living among men
+such as the man-haters in his Chorus, you would be only too glad to meet
+with Eurybates and Phrynondas, and you would sorrowfully long to revisit
+the rascality of this part of the world.  You, Socrates, are discontented,
+and why?  Because all men are teachers of virtue, each one according to his
+ability; and you say Where are the teachers?  You might as well ask, Who
+teaches Greek?  For of that too there will not be any teachers found.  Or
+you might ask, Who is to teach the sons of our artisans this same art which
+they have learned of their fathers?  He and his fellow-workmen have taught
+them to the best of their ability,--but who will carry them further in
+their arts?  And you would certainly have a difficulty, Socrates, in
+finding a teacher of them; but there would be no difficulty in finding a
+teacher of those who are wholly ignorant.  And this is true of virtue or of
+anything else; if a man is better able than we are to promote virtue ever
+so little, we must be content with the result.  A teacher of this sort I
+believe myself to be, and above all other men to have the knowledge which
+makes a man noble and good; and I give my pupils their money's-worth, and
+even more, as they themselves confess.  And therefore I have introduced the
+following mode of payment:--When a man has been my pupil, if he likes he
+pays my price, but there is no compulsion; and if he does not like, he has
+only to go into a temple and take an oath of the value of the instructions,
+and he pays no more than he declares to be their value.
+
+Such is my Apologue, Socrates, and such is the argument by which I
+endeavour to show that virtue may be taught, and that this is the opinion
+of the Athenians.  And I have also attempted to show that you are not to
+wonder at good fathers having bad sons, or at good sons having bad fathers,
+of which the sons of Polycleitus afford an example, who are the companions
+of our friends here, Paralus and Xanthippus, but are nothing in comparison
+with their father; and this is true of the sons of many other artists.  As
+yet I ought not to say the same of Paralus and Xanthippus themselves, for
+they are young and there is still hope of them.
+
+Protagoras ended, and in my ear
+
+'So charming left his voice, that I the while
+Thought him still speaking; still stood fixed to hear (Borrowed by Milton,
+"Paradise Lost".).'
+
+At length, when the truth dawned upon me, that he had really finished, not
+without difficulty I began to collect myself, and looking at Hippocrates, I
+said to him:  O son of Apollodorus, how deeply grateful I am to you for
+having brought me hither; I would not have missed the speech of Protagoras
+for a great deal.  For I used to imagine that no human care could make men
+good; but I know better now.  Yet I have still one very small difficulty
+which I am sure that Protagoras will easily explain, as he has already
+explained so much.  If a man were to go and consult Pericles or any of our
+great speakers about these matters, he might perhaps hear as fine a
+discourse; but then when one has a question to ask of any of them, like
+books, they can neither answer nor ask; and if any one challenges the least
+particular of their speech, they go ringing on in a long harangue, like
+brazen pots, which when they are struck continue to sound unless some one
+puts his hand upon them; whereas our friend Protagoras can not only make a
+good speech, as he has already shown, but when he is asked a question he
+can answer briefly; and when he asks he will wait and hear the answer; and
+this is a very rare gift.  Now I, Protagoras, want to ask of you a little
+question, which if you will only answer, I shall be quite satisfied.  You
+were saying that virtue can be taught;--that I will take upon your
+authority, and there is no one to whom I am more ready to trust.  But I
+marvel at one thing about which I should like to have my mind set at rest. 
+You were speaking of Zeus sending justice and reverence to men; and several
+times while you were speaking, justice, and temperance, and holiness, and
+all these qualities, were described by you as if together they made up
+virtue.  Now I want you to tell me truly whether virtue is one whole, of
+which justice and temperance and holiness are parts; or whether all these
+are only the names of one and the same thing:  that is the doubt which
+still lingers in my mind.
+
+There is no difficulty, Socrates, in answering that the qualities of which
+you are speaking are the parts of virtue which is one.
+
+And are they parts, I said, in the same sense in which mouth, nose, and
+eyes, and ears, are the parts of a face; or are they like the parts of
+gold, which differ from the whole and from one another only in being larger
+or smaller?
+
+I should say that they differed, Socrates, in the first way; they are
+related to one another as the parts of a face are related to the whole
+face.
+
+And do men have some one part and some another part of virtue?  Or if a man
+has one part, must he also have all the others?
+
+By no means, he said; for many a man is brave and not just, or just and not
+wise.
+
+You would not deny, then, that courage and wisdom are also parts of virtue?
+
+Most undoubtedly they are, he answered; and wisdom is the noblest of the
+parts.
+
+And they are all different from one another? I said.
+
+Yes.
+
+And has each of them a distinct function like the parts of the face;--the
+eye, for example, is not like the ear, and has not the same functions; and
+the other parts are none of them like one another, either in their
+functions, or in any other way?  I want to know whether the comparison
+holds concerning the parts of virtue.  Do they also differ from one another
+in themselves and in their functions?  For that is clearly what the simile
+would imply.
+
+Yes, Socrates, you are right in supposing that they differ.
+
+Then, I said, no other part of virtue is like knowledge, or like justice,
+or like courage, or like temperance, or like holiness?
+
+No, he answered.
+
+Well then, I said, suppose that you and I enquire into their natures.  And
+first, you would agree with me that justice is of the nature of a thing,
+would you not?  That is my opinion:  would it not be yours also?
+
+Mine also, he said.
+
+And suppose that some one were to ask us, saying, 'O Protagoras, and you,
+Socrates, what about this thing which you were calling justice, is it just
+or unjust?'--and I were to answer, just:  would you vote with me or against
+me?
+
+With you, he said.
+
+Thereupon I should answer to him who asked me, that justice is of the
+nature of the just:  would not you?
+
+Yes, he said.
+
+And suppose that he went on to say:  'Well now, is there also such a thing
+as holiness?'--we should answer, 'Yes,' if I am not mistaken?
+
+Yes, he said.
+
+Which you would also acknowledge to be a thing--should we not say so?
+
+He assented.
+
+'And is this a sort of thing which is of the nature of the holy, or of the
+nature of the unholy?'  I should be angry at his putting such a question,
+and should say, 'Peace, man; nothing can be holy if holiness is not holy.' 
+What would you say?  Would you not answer in the same way?
+
+Certainly, he said.
+
+And then after this suppose that he came and asked us, 'What were you
+saying just now?  Perhaps I may not have heard you rightly, but you seemed
+to me to be saying that the parts of virtue were not the same as one
+another.'  I should reply, 'You certainly heard that said, but not, as you
+imagine, by me; for I only asked the question; Protagoras gave the answer.' 
+And suppose that he turned to you and said, 'Is this true, Protagoras? and
+do you maintain that one part of virtue is unlike another, and is this your
+position?'--how would you answer him?
+
+I could not help acknowledging the truth of what he said, Socrates.
+
+Well then, Protagoras, we will assume this; and now supposing that he
+proceeded to say further, 'Then holiness is not of the nature of justice,
+nor justice of the nature of holiness, but of the nature of unholiness; and
+holiness is of the nature of the not just, and therefore of the unjust, and
+the unjust is the unholy':  how shall we answer him?  I should certainly
+answer him on my own behalf that justice is holy, and that holiness is
+just; and I would say in like manner on your behalf also, if you would
+allow me, that justice is either the same with holiness, or very nearly the
+same; and above all I would assert that justice is like holiness and
+holiness is like justice; and I wish that you would tell me whether I may
+be permitted to give this answer on your behalf, and whether you would
+agree with me.
+
+He replied, I cannot simply agree, Socrates, to the proposition that
+justice is holy and that holiness is just, for there appears to me to be a
+difference between them.  But what matter? if you please I please; and let
+us assume, if you will I, that justice is holy, and that holiness is just.
+
+Pardon me, I replied; I do not want this 'if you wish' or 'if you will'
+sort of conclusion to be proven, but I want you and me to be proven:  I
+mean to say that the conclusion will be best proven if there be no 'if.'
+
+Well, he said, I admit that justice bears a resemblance to holiness, for
+there is always some point of view in which everything is like every other
+thing; white is in a certain way like black, and hard is like soft, and the
+most extreme opposites have some qualities in common; even the parts of the
+face which, as we were saying before, are distinct and have different
+functions, are still in a certain point of view similar, and one of them is
+like another of them.  And you may prove that they are like one another on
+the same principle that all things are like one another; and yet things
+which are like in some particular ought not to be called alike, nor things
+which are unlike in some particular, however slight, unlike.
+
+And do you think, I said in a tone of surprise, that justice and holiness
+have but a small degree of likeness?
+
+Certainly not; any more than I agree with what I understand to be your
+view.
+
+Well, I said, as you appear to have a difficulty about this, let us take
+another of the examples which you mentioned instead.  Do you admit the
+existence of folly?
+
+I do.
+
+And is not wisdom the very opposite of folly?
+
+That is true, he said.
+
+And when men act rightly and advantageously they seem to you to be
+temperate?
+
+Yes, he said.
+
+And temperance makes them temperate?
+
+Certainly.
+
+And they who do not act rightly act foolishly, and in acting thus are not
+temperate?
+
+I agree, he said.
+
+Then to act foolishly is the opposite of acting temperately?
+
+He assented.
+
+And foolish actions are done by folly, and temperate actions by temperance?
+
+He agreed.
+
+And that is done strongly which is done by strength, and that which is
+weakly done, by weakness?
+
+He assented.
+
+And that which is done with swiftness is done swiftly, and that which is
+done with slowness, slowly?
+
+He assented again.
+
+And that which is done in the same manner, is done by the same; and that
+which is done in an opposite manner by the opposite?
+
+He agreed.
+
+Once more, I said, is there anything beautiful?
+
+Yes.
+
+To which the only opposite is the ugly?
+
+There is no other.
+
+And is there anything good?
+
+There is.
+
+To which the only opposite is the evil?
+
+There is no other.
+
+And there is the acute in sound?
+
+True.
+
+To which the only opposite is the grave?
+
+There is no other, he said, but that.
+
+Then every opposite has one opposite only and no more?
+
+He assented.
+
+Then now, I said, let us recapitulate our admissions.  First of all we
+admitted that everything has one opposite and not more than one?
+
+We did so.
+
+And we admitted also that what was done in opposite ways was done by
+opposites?
+
+Yes.
+
+And that which was done foolishly, as we further admitted, was done in the
+opposite way to that which was done temperately?
+
+Yes.
+
+And that which was done temperately was done by temperance, and that which
+was done foolishly by folly?
+
+He agreed.
+
+And that which is done in opposite ways is done by opposites?
+
+Yes.
+
+And one thing is done by temperance, and quite another thing by folly?
+
+Yes.
+
+And in opposite ways?
+
+Certainly.
+
+And therefore by opposites:--then folly is the opposite of temperance?
+
+Clearly.
+
+And do you remember that folly has already been acknowledged by us to be
+the opposite of wisdom?
+
+He assented.
+
+And we said that everything has only one opposite?
+
+Yes.
+
+Then, Protagoras, which of the two assertions shall we renounce?  One says
+that everything has but one opposite; the other that wisdom is distinct
+from temperance, and that both of them are parts of virtue; and that they
+are not only distinct, but dissimilar, both in themselves and in their
+functions, like the parts of a face.  Which of these two assertions shall
+we renounce?  For both of them together are certainly not in harmony; they
+do not accord or agree:  for how can they be said to agree if everything is
+assumed to have only one opposite and not more than one, and yet folly,
+which is one, has clearly the two opposites--wisdom and temperance?  Is not
+that true, Protagoras?  What else would you say?
+
+He assented, but with great reluctance.
+
+Then temperance and wisdom are the same, as before justice and holiness
+appeared to us to be nearly the same.  And now, Protagoras, I said, we must
+finish the enquiry, and not faint.  Do you think that an unjust man can be
+temperate in his injustice?
+
+I should be ashamed, Socrates, he said, to acknowledge this, which
+nevertheless many may be found to assert.
+
+And shall I argue with them or with you? I replied.
+
+I would rather, he said, that you should argue with the many first, if you
+will.
+
+Whichever you please, if you will only answer me and say whether you are of
+their opinion or not.  My object is to test the validity of the argument;
+and yet the result may be that I who ask and you who answer may both be put
+on our trial.
+
+Protagoras at first made a show of refusing, as he said that the argument
+was not encouraging; at length, he consented to answer.
+
+Now then, I said, begin at the beginning and answer me.  You think that
+some men are temperate, and yet unjust?
+
+Yes, he said; let that be admitted.
+
+And temperance is good sense?
+
+Yes.
+
+And good sense is good counsel in doing injustice?
+
+Granted.
+
+If they succeed, I said, or if they do not succeed?
+
+If they succeed.
+
+And you would admit the existence of goods?
+
+Yes.
+
+And is the good that which is expedient for man?
+
+Yes, indeed, he said:  and there are some things which may be inexpedient,
+and yet I call them good.
+
+I thought that Protagoras was getting ruffled and excited; he seemed to be
+setting himself in an attitude of war.  Seeing this, I minded my business,
+and gently said:--
+
+When you say, Protagoras, that things inexpedient are good, do you mean
+inexpedient for man only, or inexpedient altogether? and do you call the
+latter good?
+
+Certainly not the last, he replied; for I know of many things--meats,
+drinks, medicines, and ten thousand other things, which are inexpedient for
+man, and some which are expedient; and some which are neither expedient nor
+inexpedient for man, but only for horses; and some for oxen only, and some
+for dogs; and some for no animals, but only for trees; and some for the
+roots of trees and not for their branches, as for example, manure, which is
+a good thing when laid about the roots of a tree, but utterly destructive
+if thrown upon the shoots and young branches; or I may instance olive oil,
+which is mischievous to all plants, and generally most injurious to the
+hair of every animal with the exception of man, but beneficial to human
+hair and to the human body generally; and even in this application (so
+various and changeable is the nature of the benefit), that which is the
+greatest good to the outward parts of a man, is a very great evil to his
+inward parts:  and for this reason physicians always forbid their patients
+the use of oil in their food, except in very small quantities, just enough
+to extinguish the disagreeable sensation of smell in meats and sauces.
+
+When he had given this answer, the company cheered him.  And I said: 
+Protagoras, I have a wretched memory, and when any one makes a long speech
+to me I never remember what he is talking about.  As then, if I had been
+deaf, and you were going to converse with me, you would have had to raise
+your voice; so now, having such a bad memory, I will ask you to cut your
+answers shorter, if you would take me with you.
+
+What do you mean? he said:  how am I to shorten my answers? shall I make
+them too short?
+
+Certainly not, I said.
+
+But short enough?
+
+Yes, I said.
+
+Shall I answer what appears to me to be short enough, or what appears to
+you to be short enough?
+
+I have heard, I said, that you can speak and teach others to speak about
+the same things at such length that words never seemed to fail, or with
+such brevity that no one could use fewer of them.  Please therefore, if you
+talk with me, to adopt the latter or more compendious method.
+
+Socrates, he replied, many a battle of words have I fought, and if I had
+followed the method of disputation which my adversaries desired, as you
+want me to do, I should have been no better than another, and the name of
+Protagoras would have been nowhere.
+
+I saw that he was not satisfied with his previous answers, and that he
+would not play the part of answerer any more if he could help; and I
+considered that there was no call upon me to continue the conversation; so
+I said:  Protagoras, I do not wish to force the conversation upon you if
+you had rather not, but when you are willing to argue with me in such a way
+that I can follow you, then I will argue with you.  Now you, as is said of
+you by others and as you say of yourself, are able to have discussions in
+shorter forms of speech as well as in longer, for you are a master of
+wisdom; but I cannot manage these long speeches:  I only wish that I could. 
+You, on the other hand, who are capable of either, ought to speak shorter
+as I beg you, and then we might converse.  But I see that you are
+disinclined, and as I have an engagement which will prevent my staying to
+hear you at greater length (for I have to be in another place), I will
+depart; although I should have liked to have heard you.
+
+Thus I spoke, and was rising from my seat, when Callias seized me by the
+right hand, and in his left hand caught hold of this old cloak of mine.  He
+said:  We cannot let you go, Socrates, for if you leave us there will be an
+end of our discussions:  I must therefore beg you to remain, as there is
+nothing in the world that I should like better than to hear you and
+Protagoras discourse.  Do not deny the company this pleasure.
+
+Now I had got up, and was in the act of departure.  Son of Hipponicus, I
+replied, I have always admired, and do now heartily applaud and love your
+philosophical spirit, and I would gladly comply with your request, if I
+could.  But the truth is that I cannot.  And what you ask is as great an
+impossibility to me, as if you bade me run a race with Crison of Himera,
+when in his prime, or with some one of the long or day course runners.  To
+such a request I should reply that I would fain ask the same of my own
+legs; but they refuse to comply.  And therefore if you want to see Crison
+and me in the same stadium, you must bid him slacken his speed to mine, for
+I cannot run quickly, and he can run slowly.  And in like manner if you
+want to hear me and Protagoras discoursing, you must ask him to shorten his
+answers, and keep to the point, as he did at first; if not, how can there
+be any discussion?  For discussion is one thing, and making an oration is
+quite another, in my humble opinion.
+
+But you see, Socrates, said Callias, that Protagoras may fairly claim to
+speak in his own way, just as you claim to speak in yours.
+
+Here Alcibiades interposed, and said:  That, Callias, is not a true
+statement of the case.  For our friend Socrates admits that he cannot make
+a speech--in this he yields the palm to Protagoras:  but I should be
+greatly surprised if he yielded to any living man in the power of holding
+and apprehending an argument.  Now if Protagoras will make a similar
+admission, and confess that he is inferior to Socrates in argumentative
+skill, that is enough for Socrates; but if he claims a superiority in
+argument as well, let him ask and answer--not, when a question is asked,
+slipping away from the point, and instead of answering, making a speech at
+such length that most of his hearers forget the question at issue (not that
+Socrates is likely to forget--I will be bound for that, although he may
+pretend in fun that he has a bad memory).  And Socrates appears to me to be
+more in the right than Protagoras; that is my view, and every man ought to
+say what he thinks.
+
+When Alcibiades had done speaking, some one--Critias, I believe--went on to
+say:  O Prodicus and Hippias, Callias appears to me to be a partisan of
+Protagoras:  and this led Alcibiades, who loves opposition, to take the
+other side.  But we should not be partisans either of Socrates or of
+Protagoras; let us rather unite in entreating both of them not to break up
+the discussion.
+
+Prodicus added:  That, Critias, seems to me to be well said, for those who
+are present at such discussions ought to be impartial hearers of both the
+speakers; remembering, however, that impartiality is not the same as
+equality, for both sides should be impartially heard, and yet an equal meed
+should not be assigned to both of them; but to the wiser a higher meed
+should be given, and a lower to the less wise.  And I as well as Critias
+would beg you, Protagoras and Socrates, to grant our request, which is,
+that you will argue with one another and not wrangle; for friends argue
+with friends out of good-will, but only adversaries and enemies wrangle. 
+And then our meeting will be delightful; for in this way you, who are the
+speakers, will be most likely to win esteem, and not praise only, among us
+who are your audience; for esteem is a sincere conviction of the hearers'
+souls, but praise is often an insincere expression of men uttering
+falsehoods contrary to their conviction.  And thus we who are the hearers
+will be gratified and not pleased; for gratification is of the mind when
+receiving wisdom and knowledge, but pleasure is of the body when eating or
+experiencing some other bodily delight.  Thus spoke Prodicus, and many of
+the company applauded his words.
+
+Hippias the sage spoke next.  He said:  All of you who are here present I
+reckon to be kinsmen and friends and fellow-citizens, by nature and not by
+law; for by nature like is akin to like, whereas law is the tyrant of
+mankind, and often compels us to do many things which are against nature. 
+How great would be the disgrace then, if we, who know the nature of things,
+and are the wisest of the Hellenes, and as such are met together in this
+city, which is the metropolis of wisdom, and in the greatest and most
+glorious house of this city, should have nothing to show worthy of this
+height of dignity, but should only quarrel with one another like the
+meanest of mankind!  I do pray and advise you, Protagoras, and you,
+Socrates, to agree upon a compromise.  Let us be your peacemakers.  And do
+not you, Socrates, aim at this precise and extreme brevity in discourse, if
+Protagoras objects, but loosen and let go the reins of speech, that your
+words may be grander and more becoming to you.  Neither do you, Protagoras,
+go forth on the gale with every sail set out of sight of land into an ocean
+of words, but let there be a mean observed by both of you.  Do as I say. 
+And let me also persuade you to choose an arbiter or overseer or president;
+he will keep watch over your words and will prescribe their proper length.
+
+This proposal was received by the company with universal approval; Callias
+said that he would not let me off, and they begged me to choose an arbiter. 
+But I said that to choose an umpire of discourse would be unseemly; for if
+the person chosen was inferior, then the inferior or worse ought not to
+preside over the better; or if he was equal, neither would that be well;
+for he who is our equal will do as we do, and what will be the use of
+choosing him?  And if you say, 'Let us have a better then,'--to that I
+answer that you cannot have any one who is wiser than Protagoras.  And if
+you choose another who is not really better, and whom you only say is
+better, to put another over him as though he were an inferior person would
+be an unworthy reflection on him; not that, as far as I am concerned, any
+reflection is of much consequence to me.  Let me tell you then what I will
+do in order that the conversation and discussion may go on as you desire. 
+If Protagoras is not disposed to answer, let him ask and I will answer; and
+I will endeavour to show at the same time how, as I maintain, he ought to
+answer:  and when I have answered as many questions as he likes to ask, let
+him in like manner answer me; and if he seems to be not very ready at
+answering the precise question asked of him, you and I will unite in
+entreating him, as you entreated me, not to spoil the discussion.  And this
+will require no special arbiter--all of you shall be arbiters.
+
+This was generally approved, and Protagoras, though very much against his
+will, was obliged to agree that he would ask questions; and when he had put
+a sufficient number of them, that he would answer in his turn those which
+he was asked in short replies.  He began to put his questions as follows:--
+
+I am of opinion, Socrates, he said, that skill in poetry is the principal
+part of education; and this I conceive to be the power of knowing what
+compositions of the poets are correct, and what are not, and how they are
+to be distinguished, and of explaining when asked the reason of the
+difference.  And I propose to transfer the question which you and I have
+been discussing to the domain of poetry; we will speak as before of virtue,
+but in reference to a passage of a poet.  Now Simonides says to Scopas the
+son of Creon the Thessalian:
+
+'Hardly on the one hand can a man become truly good, built four-square in
+hands and feet and mind, a work without a flaw.'
+
+Do you know the poem? or shall I repeat the whole?
+
+There is no need, I said; for I am perfectly well acquainted with the ode,
+--I have made a careful study of it.
+
+Very well, he said.  And do you think that the ode is a good composition,
+and true?
+
+Yes, I said, both good and true.
+
+But if there is a contradiction, can the composition be good or true?
+
+No, not in that case, I replied.
+
+And is there not a contradiction? he asked.  Reflect.
+
+Well, my friend, I have reflected.
+
+And does not the poet proceed to say, 'I do not agree with the word of
+Pittacus, albeit the utterance of a wise man:  Hardly can a man be good'? 
+Now you will observe that this is said by the same poet.
+
+I know it.
+
+And do you think, he said, that the two sayings are consistent?
+
+Yes, I said, I think so (at the same time I could not help fearing that
+there might be something in what he said).  And you think otherwise?
+
+Why, he said, how can he be consistent in both?  First of all, premising as
+his own thought, 'Hardly can a man become truly good'; and then a little
+further on in the poem, forgetting, and blaming Pittacus and refusing to
+agree with him, when he says, 'Hardly can a man be good,' which is the very
+same thing.  And yet when he blames him who says the same with himself, he
+blames himself; so that he must be wrong either in his first or his second
+assertion.
+
+Many of the audience cheered and applauded this.  And I felt at first giddy
+and faint, as if I had received a blow from the hand of an expert boxer,
+when I heard his words and the sound of the cheering; and to confess the
+truth, I wanted to get time to think what the meaning of the poet really
+was.  So I turned to Prodicus and called him.  Prodicus, I said, Simonides
+is a countryman of yours, and you ought to come to his aid.  I must appeal
+to you, like the river Scamander in Homer, who, when beleaguered by
+Achilles, summons the Simois to aid him, saying:
+
+'Brother dear, let us both together stay the force of the hero (Il.).'
+
+And I summon you, for I am afraid that Protagoras will make an end of
+Simonides.  Now is the time to rehabilitate Simonides, by the application
+of your philosophy of synonyms, which enables you to distinguish 'will' and
+'wish,' and make other charming distinctions like those which you drew just
+now.  And I should like to know whether you would agree with me; for I am
+of opinion that there is no contradiction in the words of Simonides.  And
+first of all I wish that you would say whether, in your opinion, Prodicus,
+'being' is the same as 'becoming.'
+
+Not the same, certainly, replied Prodicus.
+
+Did not Simonides first set forth, as his own view, that 'Hardly can a man
+become truly good'?
+
+Quite right, said Prodicus.
+
+And then he blames Pittacus, not, as Protagoras imagines, for repeating
+that which he says himself, but for saying something different from
+himself.  Pittacus does not say as Simonides says, that hardly can a man
+become good, but hardly can a man be good:  and our friend Prodicus would
+maintain that being, Protagoras, is not the same as becoming; and if they
+are not the same, then Simonides is not inconsistent with himself.  I dare
+say that Prodicus and many others would say, as Hesiod says,
+
+'On the one hand, hardly can a man become good,
+For the gods have made virtue the reward of toil,
+But on the other hand, when you have climbed the height,
+Then, to retain virtue, however difficult the acquisition, is easy (Works
+and Days).'
+
+Prodicus heard and approved; but Protagoras said:  Your correction,
+Socrates, involves a greater error than is contained in the sentence which
+you are correcting.
+
+Alas! I said, Protagoras; then I am a sorry physician, and do but aggravate
+a disorder which I am seeking to cure.
+
+Such is the fact, he said.
+
+How so? I asked.
+
+The poet, he replied, could never have made such a mistake as to say that
+virtue, which in the opinion of all men is the hardest of all things, can
+be easily retained.
+
+Well, I said, and how fortunate are we in having Prodicus among us, at the
+right moment; for he has a wisdom, Protagoras, which, as I imagine, is more
+than human and of very ancient date, and may be as old as Simonides or even
+older.  Learned as you are in many things, you appear to know nothing of
+this; but I know, for I am a disciple of his.  And now, if I am not
+mistaken, you do not understand the word 'hard' (chalepon) in the sense
+which Simonides intended; and I must correct you, as Prodicus corrects me
+when I use the word 'awful' (deinon) as a term of praise.  If I say that
+Protagoras or any one else is an 'awfully' wise man, he asks me if I am not
+ashamed of calling that which is good 'awful'; and then he explains to me
+that the term 'awful' is always taken in a bad sense, and that no one
+speaks of being 'awfully' healthy or wealthy, or of 'awful' peace, but of
+'awful' disease, 'awful' war, 'awful' poverty, meaning by the term 'awful,'
+evil.  And I think that Simonides and his countrymen the Ceans, when they
+spoke of 'hard' meant 'evil,' or something which you do not understand. 
+Let us ask Prodicus, for he ought to be able to answer questions about the
+dialect of Simonides.  What did he mean, Prodicus, by the term 'hard'?
+
+Evil, said Prodicus.
+
+And therefore, I said, Prodicus, he blames Pittacus for saying, 'Hard is
+the good,' just as if that were equivalent to saying, Evil is the good.
+
+Yes, he said, that was certainly his meaning; and he is twitting Pittacus
+with ignorance of the use of terms, which in a Lesbian, who has been
+accustomed to speak a barbarous language, is natural.
+
+Do you hear, Protagoras, I asked, what our friend Prodicus is saying?  And
+have you an answer for him?
+
+You are entirely mistaken, Prodicus, said Protagoras; and I know very well
+that Simonides in using the word 'hard' meant what all of us mean, not
+evil, but that which is not easy--that which takes a great deal of trouble: 
+of this I am positive.
+
+I said:  I also incline to believe, Protagoras, that this was the meaning
+of Simonides, of which our friend Prodicus was very well aware, but he
+thought that he would make fun, and try if you could maintain your thesis;
+for that Simonides could never have meant the other is clearly proved by
+the context, in which he says that God only has this gift.  Now he cannot
+surely mean to say that to be good is evil, when he afterwards proceeds to
+say that God only has this gift, and that this is the attribute of him and
+of no other.  For if this be his meaning, Prodicus would impute to
+Simonides a character of recklessness which is very unlike his countrymen. 
+And I should like to tell you, I said, what I imagine to be the real
+meaning of Simonides in this poem, if you will test what, in your way of
+speaking, would be called my skill in poetry; or if you would rather, I
+will be the listener.
+
+To this proposal Protagoras replied:  As you please;--and Hippias,
+Prodicus, and the others told me by all means to do as I proposed.
+
+Then now, I said, I will endeavour to explain to you my opinion about this
+poem of Simonides.  There is a very ancient philosophy which is more
+cultivated in Crete and Lacedaemon than in any other part of Hellas, and
+there are more philosophers in those countries than anywhere else in the
+world.  This, however, is a secret which the Lacedaemonians deny; and they
+pretend to be ignorant, just because they do not wish to have it thought
+that they rule the world by wisdom, like the Sophists of whom Protagoras
+was speaking, and not by valour of arms; considering that if the reason of
+their superiority were disclosed, all men would be practising their wisdom. 
+And this secret of theirs has never been discovered by the imitators of
+Lacedaemonian fashions in other cities, who go about with their ears
+bruised in imitation of them, and have the caestus bound on their arms, and
+are always in training, and wear short cloaks; for they imagine that these
+are the practices which have enabled the Lacedaemonians to conquer the
+other Hellenes.  Now when the Lacedaemonians want to unbend and hold free
+conversation with their wise men, and are no longer satisfied with mere
+secret intercourse, they drive out all these laconizers, and any other
+foreigners who may happen to be in their country, and they hold a
+philosophical seance unknown to strangers; and they themselves forbid their
+young men to go out into other cities--in this they are like the Cretans--
+in order that they may not unlearn the lessons which they have taught them. 
+And in Lacedaemon and Crete not only men but also women have a pride in
+their high cultivation.  And hereby you may know that I am right in
+attributing to the Lacedaemonians this excellence in philosophy and
+speculation:  If a man converses with the most ordinary Lacedaemonian, he
+will find him seldom good for much in general conversation, but at any
+point in the discourse he will be darting out some notable saying, terse
+and full of meaning, with unerring aim; and the person with whom he is
+talking seems to be like a child in his hands.  And many of our own age and
+of former ages have noted that the true Lacedaemonian type of character has
+the love of philosophy even stronger than the love of gymnastics; they are
+conscious that only a perfectly educated man is capable of uttering such
+expressions.  Such were Thales of Miletus, and Pittacus of Mitylene, and
+Bias of Priene, and our own Solon, and Cleobulus the Lindian, and Myson the
+Chenian; and seventh in the catalogue of wise men was the Lacedaemonian
+Chilo.  All these were lovers and emulators and disciples of the culture of
+the Lacedaemonians, and any one may perceive that their wisdom was of this
+character; consisting of short memorable sentences, which they severally
+uttered.  And they met together and dedicated in the temple of Apollo at
+Delphi, as the first-fruits of their wisdom, the far-famed inscriptions,
+which are in all men's mouths--'Know thyself,' and 'Nothing too much.'
+
+Why do I say all this?  I am explaining that this Lacedaemonian brevity was
+the style of primitive philosophy.  Now there was a saying of Pittacus
+which was privately circulated and received the approbation of the wise,
+'Hard is it to be good.'  And Simonides, who was ambitious of the fame of
+wisdom, was aware that if he could overthrow this saying, then, as if he
+had won a victory over some famous athlete, he would carry off the palm
+among his contemporaries.  And if I am not mistaken, he composed the entire
+poem with the secret intention of damaging Pittacus and his saying.
+
+Let us all unite in examining his words, and see whether I am speaking the
+truth.  Simonides must have been a lunatic, if, in the very first words of
+the poem, wanting to say only that to become good is hard, he inserted
+(Greek) 'on the one hand' ('on the one hand to become good is hard'); there
+would be no reason for the introduction of (Greek), unless you suppose him
+to speak with a hostile reference to the words of Pittacus.  Pittacus is
+saying 'Hard is it to be good,' and he, in refutation of this thesis,
+rejoins that the truly hard thing, Pittacus, is to become good, not joining
+'truly' with 'good,' but with 'hard.'  Not, that the hard thing is to be
+truly good, as though there were some truly good men, and there were others
+who were good but not truly good (this would be a very simple observation,
+and quite unworthy of Simonides); but you must suppose him to make a
+trajection of the word 'truly' (Greek), construing the saying of Pittacus
+thus (and let us imagine Pittacus to be speaking and Simonides answering
+him):  'O my friends,' says Pittacus, 'hard is it to be good,' and
+Simonides answers, 'In that, Pittacus, you are mistaken; the difficulty is
+not to be good, but on the one hand, to become good, four-square in hands
+and feet and mind, without a flaw--that is hard truly.'  This way of
+reading the passage accounts for the insertion of (Greek) 'on the one
+hand,' and for the position at the end of the clause of the word 'truly,'
+and all that follows shows this to be the meaning.  A great deal might be
+said in praise of the details of the poem, which is a charming piece of
+workmanship, and very finished, but such minutiae would be tedious.  I
+should like, however, to point out the general intention of the poem, which
+is certainly designed in every part to be a refutation of the saying of
+Pittacus.  For he speaks in what follows a little further on as if he meant
+to argue that although there is a difficulty in becoming good, yet this is
+possible for a time, and only for a time.  But having become good, to
+remain in a good state and be good, as you, Pittacus, affirm, is not
+possible, and is not granted to man; God only has this blessing; 'but man
+cannot help being bad when the force of circumstances overpowers him.'  Now
+whom does the force of circumstance overpower in the command of a vessel?--
+not the private individual, for he is always overpowered; and as one who is
+already prostrate cannot be overthrown, and only he who is standing upright
+but not he who is prostrate can be laid prostrate, so the force of
+circumstances can only overpower him who, at some time or other, has
+resources, and not him who is at all times helpless.  The descent of a
+great storm may make the pilot helpless, or the severity of the season the
+husbandman or the physician; for the good may become bad, as another poet
+witnesses:--
+
+'The good are sometimes good and sometimes bad.'
+
+But the bad does not become bad; he is always bad.  So that when the force
+of circumstances overpowers the man of resources and skill and virtue, then
+he cannot help being bad.  And you, Pittacus, are saying, 'Hard is it to be
+good.'  Now there is a difficulty in becoming good; and yet this is
+possible:  but to be good is an impossibility--
+
+'For he who does well is the good man, and he who does ill is the bad.'
+
+But what sort of doing is good in letters? and what sort of doing makes a
+man good in letters?  Clearly the knowing of them.  And what sort of well-
+doing makes a man a good physician?  Clearly the knowledge of the art of
+healing the sick.  'But he who does ill is the bad.'  Now who becomes a bad
+physician?  Clearly he who is in the first place a physician, and in the
+second place a good physician; for he may become a bad one also:  but none
+of us unskilled individuals can by any amount of doing ill become
+physicians, any more than we can become carpenters or anything of that
+sort; and he who by doing ill cannot become a physician at all, clearly
+cannot become a bad physician.  In like manner the good may become
+deteriorated by time, or toil, or disease, or other accident (the only real
+doing ill is to be deprived of knowledge), but the bad man will never
+become bad, for he is always bad; and if he were to become bad, he must
+previously have been good.  Thus the words of the poem tend to show that on
+the one hand a man cannot be continuously good, but that he may become good
+and may also become bad; and again that
+
+'They are the best for the longest time whom the gods love.'
+
+All this relates to Pittacus, as is further proved by the sequel.  For he
+adds:--
+
+'Therefore I will not throw away my span of life to no purpose in searching
+after the impossible, hoping in vain to find a perfectly faultless man
+among those who partake of the fruit of the broad-bosomed earth:  if I find
+him, I will send you word.'
+
+(this is the vehement way in which he pursues his attack upon Pittacus
+throughout the whole poem):
+
+'But him who does no evil, voluntarily I praise and love;--not even the
+gods war against necessity.'
+
+All this has a similar drift, for Simonides was not so ignorant as to say
+that he praised those who did no evil voluntarily, as though there were
+some who did evil voluntarily.  For no wise man, as I believe, will allow
+that any human being errs voluntarily, or voluntarily does evil and
+dishonourable actions; but they are very well aware that all who do evil
+and dishonourable things do them against their will.  And Simonides never
+says that he praises him who does no evil voluntarily; the word
+'voluntarily' applies to himself.  For he was under the impression that a
+good man might often compel himself to love and praise another, and to be
+the friend and approver of another; and that there might be an involuntary
+love, such as a man might feel to an unnatural father or mother, or
+country, or the like.  Now bad men, when their parents or country have any
+defects, look on them with malignant joy, and find fault with them and
+expose and denounce them to others, under the idea that the rest of mankind
+will be less likely to take themselves to task and accuse them of neglect;
+and they blame their defects far more than they deserve, in order that the
+odium which is necessarily incurred by them may be increased:  but the good
+man dissembles his feelings, and constrains himself to praise them; and if
+they have wronged him and he is angry, he pacifies his anger and is
+reconciled, and compels himself to love and praise his own flesh and blood. 
+And Simonides, as is probable, considered that he himself had often had to
+praise and magnify a tyrant or the like, much against his will, and he also
+wishes to imply to Pittacus that he does not censure him because he is
+censorious.
+
+'For I am satisfied' he says, 'when a man is neither bad nor very stupid;
+and when he knows justice (which is the health of states), and is of sound
+mind, I will find no fault with him, for I am not given to finding fault,
+and there are innumerable fools'
+
+(implying that if he delighted in censure he might have abundant
+opportunity of finding fault).
+
+'All things are good with which evil is unmingled.'
+
+In these latter words he does not mean to say that all things are good
+which have no evil in them, as you might say 'All things are white which
+have no black in them,' for that would be ridiculous; but he means to say
+that he accepts and finds no fault with the moderate or intermediate state. 
+
+('I do not hope' he says, 'to find a perfectly blameless man among those
+who partake of the fruits of the broad-bosomed earth (if I find him, I will
+send you word); in this sense I praise no man.  But he who is moderately
+good, and does no evil, is good enough for me, who love and approve every
+one')
+
+(and here observe that he uses a Lesbian word, epainemi (approve), because
+he is addressing Pittacus,
+
+'Who love and APPROVE every one VOLUNTARILY, who does no evil:'
+
+and that the stop should be put after 'voluntarily'); 'but there are some
+whom I involuntarily praise and love.  And you, Pittacus, I would never
+have blamed, if you had spoken what was moderately good and true; but I do
+blame you because, putting on the appearance of truth, you are speaking
+falsely about the highest matters.'--And this, I said, Prodicus and
+Protagoras, I take to be the meaning of Simonides in this poem.
+
+Hippias said:  I think, Socrates, that you have given a very good
+explanation of the poem; but I have also an excellent interpretation of my
+own which I will propound to you, if you will allow me.
+
+Nay, Hippias, said Alcibiades; not now, but at some other time.  At present
+we must abide by the compact which was made between Socrates and
+Protagoras, to the effect that as long as Protagoras is willing to ask,
+Socrates should answer; or that if he would rather answer, then that
+Socrates should ask.
+
+I said:  I wish Protagoras either to ask or answer as he is inclined; but I
+would rather have done with poems and odes, if he does not object, and come
+back to the question about which I was asking you at first, Protagoras, and
+by your help make an end of that.  The talk about the poets seems to me
+like a commonplace entertainment to which a vulgar company have recourse;
+who, because they are not able to converse or amuse one another, while they
+are drinking, with the sound of their own voices and conversation, by
+reason of their stupidity, raise the price of flute-girls in the market,
+hiring for a great sum the voice of a flute instead of their own breath, to
+be the medium of intercourse among them:  but where the company are real
+gentlemen and men of education, you will see no flute-girls, nor dancing-
+girls, nor harp-girls; and they have no nonsense or games, but are
+contented with one another's conversation, of which their own voices are
+the medium, and which they carry on by turns and in an orderly manner, even
+though they are very liberal in their potations.  And a company like this
+of ours, and men such as we profess to be, do not require the help of
+another's voice, or of the poets whom you cannot interrogate about the
+meaning of what they are saying; people who cite them declaring, some that
+the poet has one meaning, and others that he has another, and the point
+which is in dispute can never be decided.  This sort of entertainment they
+decline, and prefer to talk with one another, and put one another to the
+proof in conversation.  And these are the models which I desire that you
+and I should imitate.  Leaving the poets, and keeping to ourselves, let us
+try the mettle of one another and make proof of the truth in conversation. 
+If you have a mind to ask, I am ready to answer; or if you would rather, do
+you answer, and give me the opportunity of resuming and completing our
+unfinished argument.
+
+I made these and some similar observations; but Protagoras would not
+distinctly say which he would do.  Thereupon Alcibiades turned to Callias,
+and said:--Do you think, Callias, that Protagoras is fair in refusing to
+say whether he will or will not answer? for I certainly think that he is
+unfair; he ought either to proceed with the argument, or distinctly refuse
+to proceed, that we may know his intention; and then Socrates will be able
+to discourse with some one else, and the rest of the company will be free
+to talk with one another.
+
+I think that Protagoras was really made ashamed by these words of
+Alcibiades, and when the prayers of Callias and the company were
+superadded, he was at last induced to argue, and said that I might ask and
+he would answer.
+
+So I said:  Do not imagine, Protagoras, that I have any other interest in
+asking questions of you but that of clearing up my own difficulties.  For I
+think that Homer was very right in saying that
+
+'When two go together, one sees before the other (Il.),'
+
+for all men who have a companion are readier in deed, word, or thought; but
+if a man
+
+'Sees a thing when he is alone,'
+
+he goes about straightway seeking until he finds some one to whom he may
+show his discoveries, and who may confirm him in them.  And I would rather
+hold discourse with you than with any one, because I think that no man has
+a better understanding of most things which a good man may be expected to
+understand, and in particular of virtue.  For who is there, but you?--who
+not only claim to be a good man and a gentleman, for many are this, and yet
+have not the power of making others good--whereas you are not only good
+yourself, but also the cause of goodness in others.  Moreover such
+confidence have you in yourself, that although other Sophists conceal their
+profession, you proclaim in the face of Hellas that you are a Sophist or
+teacher of virtue and education, and are the first who demanded pay in
+return.  How then can I do otherwise than invite you to the examination of
+these subjects, and ask questions and consult with you?  I must, indeed.
+And I should like once more to have my memory refreshed by you about the
+questions which I was asking you at first, and also to have your help in
+considering them.  If I am not mistaken the question was this:  Are wisdom
+and temperance and courage and justice and holiness five names of the same
+thing? or has each of the names a separate underlying essence and
+corresponding thing having a peculiar function, no one of them being like
+any other of them?  And you replied that the five names were not the names
+of the same thing, but that each of them had a separate object, and that
+all these objects were parts of virtue, not in the same way that the parts
+of gold are like each other and the whole of which they are parts, but as
+the parts of the face are unlike the whole of which they are parts and one
+another, and have each of them a distinct function.  I should like to know
+whether this is still your opinion; or if not, I will ask you to define
+your meaning, and I shall not take you to task if you now make a different
+statement.  For I dare say that you may have said what you did only in
+order to make trial of me.
+
+I answer, Socrates, he said, that all these qualities are parts of virtue,
+and that four out of the five are to some extent similar, and that the
+fifth of them, which is courage, is very different from the other four, as
+I prove in this way:  You may observe that many men are utterly
+unrighteous, unholy, intemperate, ignorant, who are nevertheless remarkable
+for their courage.
+
+Stop, I said; I should like to think about that.  When you speak of brave
+men, do you mean the confident, or another sort of nature?
+
+Yes, he said; I mean the impetuous, ready to go at that which others are
+afraid to approach.
+
+In the next place, you would affirm virtue to be a good thing, of which
+good thing you assert yourself to be a teacher.
+
+Yes, he said; I should say the best of all things, if I am in my right
+mind.
+
+And is it partly good and partly bad, I said, or wholly good?
+
+Wholly good, and in the highest degree.
+
+Tell me then; who are they who have confidence when diving into a well?
+
+I should say, the divers.
+
+And the reason of this is that they have knowledge?
+
+Yes, that is the reason.
+
+And who have confidence when fighting on horseback--the skilled horseman or
+the unskilled?
+
+The skilled.
+
+And who when fighting with light shields--the peltasts or the nonpeltasts?
+
+The peltasts.  And that is true of all other things, he said, if that is
+your point:  those who have knowledge are more confident than those who
+have no knowledge, and they are more confident after they have learned than
+before.
+
+And have you not seen persons utterly ignorant, I said, of these things,
+and yet confident about them?
+
+Yes, he said, I have seen such persons far too confident.
+
+And are not these confident persons also courageous?
+
+In that case, he replied, courage would be a base thing, for the men of
+whom we are speaking are surely madmen.
+
+Then who are the courageous?  Are they not the confident?
+
+Yes, he said; to that statement I adhere.
+
+And those, I said, who are thus confident without knowledge are really not
+courageous, but mad; and in that case the wisest are also the most
+confident, and being the most confident are also the bravest, and upon that
+view again wisdom will be courage.
+
+Nay, Socrates, he replied, you are mistaken in your remembrance of what was
+said by me.  When you asked me, I certainly did say that the courageous are
+the confident; but I was never asked whether the confident are the
+courageous; if you had asked me, I should have answered 'Not all of them': 
+and what I did answer you have not proved to be false, although you
+proceeded to show that those who have knowledge are more courageous than
+they were before they had knowledge, and more courageous than others who
+have no knowledge, and were then led on to think that courage is the same
+as wisdom.  But in this way of arguing you might come to imagine that
+strength is wisdom.  You might begin by asking whether the strong are able,
+and I should say 'Yes'; and then whether those who know how to wrestle are
+not more able to wrestle than those who do not know how to wrestle, and
+more able after than before they had learned, and I should assent.  And
+when I had admitted this, you might use my admissions in such a way as to
+prove that upon my view wisdom is strength; whereas in that case I should
+not have admitted, any more than in the other, that the able are strong,
+although I have admitted that the strong are able.  For there is a
+difference between ability and strength; the former is given by knowledge
+as well as by madness or rage, but strength comes from nature and a healthy
+state of the body.  And in like manner I say of confidence and courage,
+that they are not the same; and I argue that the courageous are confident,
+but not all the confident courageous.  For confidence may be given to men
+by art, and also, like ability, by madness and rage; but courage comes to
+them from nature and the healthy state of the soul.
+
+I said:  You would admit, Protagoras, that some men live well and others
+ill?
+
+He assented.
+
+And do you think that a man lives well who lives in pain and grief?
+
+He does not.
+
+But if he lives pleasantly to the end of his life, will he not in that case
+have lived well?
+
+He will.
+
+Then to live pleasantly is a good, and to live unpleasantly an evil?
+
+Yes, he said, if the pleasure be good and honourable.
+
+And do you, Protagoras, like the rest of the world, call some pleasant
+things evil and some painful things good?--for I am rather disposed to say
+that things are good in as far as they are pleasant, if they have no
+consequences of another sort, and in as far as they are painful they are
+bad.
+
+I do not know, Socrates, he said, whether I can venture to assert in that
+unqualified manner that the pleasant is the good and the painful the evil. 
+Having regard not only to my present answer, but also to the whole of my
+life, I shall be safer, if I am not mistaken, in saying that there are some
+pleasant things which are not good, and that there are some painful things
+which are good, and some which are not good, and that there are some which
+are neither good nor evil.
+
+And you would call pleasant, I said, the things which participate in
+pleasure or create pleasure?
+
+Certainly, he said.
+
+Then my meaning is, that in as far as they are pleasant they are good; and
+my question would imply that pleasure is a good in itself.
+
+According to your favourite mode of speech, Socrates, 'Let us reflect about
+this,' he said; and if the reflection is to the point, and the result
+proves that pleasure and good are really the same, then we will agree; but
+if not, then we will argue.
+
+And would you wish to begin the enquiry? I said; or shall I begin?
+
+You ought to take the lead, he said; for you are the author of the
+discussion.
+
+May I employ an illustration? I said.  Suppose some one who is enquiring
+into the health or some other bodily quality of another:--he looks at his
+face and at the tips of his fingers, and then he says, Uncover your chest
+and back to me that I may have a better view:--that is the sort of thing
+which I desire in this speculation.  Having seen what your opinion is about
+good and pleasure, I am minded to say to you:  Uncover your mind to me,
+Protagoras, and reveal your opinion about knowledge, that I may know
+whether you agree with the rest of the world.  Now the rest of the world
+are of opinion that knowledge is a principle not of strength, or of rule,
+or of command:  their notion is that a man may have knowledge, and yet that
+the knowledge which is in him may be overmastered by anger, or pleasure, or
+pain, or love, or perhaps by fear,--just as if knowledge were a slave, and
+might be dragged about anyhow.  Now is that your view? or do you think that
+knowledge is a noble and commanding thing, which cannot be overcome, and
+will not allow a man, if he only knows the difference of good and evil, to
+do anything which is contrary to knowledge, but that wisdom will have
+strength to help him?
+
+I agree with you, Socrates, said Protagoras; and not only so, but I, above
+all other men, am bound to say that wisdom and knowledge are the highest of
+human things.
+
+Good, I said, and true.  But are you aware that the majority of the world
+are of another mind; and that men are commonly supposed to know the things
+which are best, and not to do them when they might?  And most persons whom
+I have asked the reason of this have said that when men act contrary to
+knowledge they are overcome by pain, or pleasure, or some of those
+affections which I was just now mentioning.
+
+Yes, Socrates, he replied; and that is not the only point about which
+mankind are in error.
+
+Suppose, then, that you and I endeavour to instruct and inform them what is
+the nature of this affection which they call 'being overcome by pleasure,'
+and which they affirm to be the reason why they do not always do what is
+best.  When we say to them:  Friends, you are mistaken, and are saying what
+is not true, they would probably reply:  Socrates and Protagoras, if this
+affection of the soul is not to be called 'being overcome by pleasure,'
+pray, what is it, and by what name would you describe it?
+
+But why, Socrates, should we trouble ourselves about the opinion of the
+many, who just say anything that happens to occur to them?
+
+I believe, I said, that they may be of use in helping us to discover how
+courage is related to the other parts of virtue.  If you are disposed to
+abide by our agreement, that I should show the way in which, as I think,
+our recent difficulty is most likely to be cleared up, do you follow; but
+if not, never mind.
+
+You are quite right, he said; and I would have you proceed as you have
+begun.
+
+Well then, I said, let me suppose that they repeat their question, What
+account do you give of that which, in our way of speaking, is termed being
+overcome by pleasure?  I should answer thus:  Listen, and Protagoras and I
+will endeavour to show you.  When men are overcome by eating and drinking
+and other sensual desires which are pleasant, and they, knowing them to be
+evil, nevertheless indulge in them, would you not say that they were
+overcome by pleasure?  They will not deny this.  And suppose that you and I
+were to go on and ask them again:  'In what way do you say that they are
+evil,--in that they are pleasant and give pleasure at the moment, or
+because they cause disease and poverty and other like evils in the future? 
+Would they still be evil, if they had no attendant evil consequences,
+simply because they give the consciousness of pleasure of whatever
+nature?'--Would they not answer that they are not evil on account of the
+pleasure which is immediately given by them, but on account of the after
+consequences--diseases and the like?
+
+I believe, said Protagoras, that the world in general would answer as you
+do.
+
+And in causing diseases do they not cause pain? and in causing poverty do
+they not cause pain;--they would agree to that also, if I am not mistaken?
+
+Protagoras assented.
+
+Then I should say to them, in my name and yours:  Do you think them evil
+for any other reason, except because they end in pain and rob us of other
+pleasures:--there again they would agree?
+
+We both of us thought that they would.
+
+And then I should take the question from the opposite point of view, and
+say:  'Friends, when you speak of goods being painful, do you not mean
+remedial goods, such as gymnastic exercises, and military service, and the
+physician's use of burning, cutting, drugging, and starving?  Are these the
+things which are good but painful?'--they would assent to me?
+
+He agreed.
+
+'And do you call them good because they occasion the greatest immediate
+suffering and pain; or because, afterwards, they bring health and
+improvement of the bodily condition and the salvation of states and power
+over others and wealth?'--they would agree to the latter alternative, if I
+am not mistaken?
+
+He assented.
+
+'Are these things good for any other reason except that they end in
+pleasure, and get rid of and avert pain?  Are you looking to any other
+standard but pleasure and pain when you call them good?'--they would
+acknowledge that they were not?
+
+I think so, said Protagoras.
+
+'And do you not pursue after pleasure as a good, and avoid pain as an
+evil?'
+
+He assented.
+
+'Then you think that pain is an evil and pleasure is a good:  and even
+pleasure you deem an evil, when it robs you of greater pleasures than it
+gives, or causes pains greater than the pleasure.  If, however, you call
+pleasure an evil in relation to some other end or standard, you will be
+able to show us that standard.  But you have none to show.'
+
+I do not think that they have, said Protagoras.
+
+'And have you not a similar way of speaking about pain?  You call pain a
+good when it takes away greater pains than those which it has, or gives
+pleasures greater than the pains:  then if you have some standard other
+than pleasure and pain to which you refer when you call actual pain a good,
+you can show what that is.  But you cannot.'
+
+True, said Protagoras.
+
+Suppose again, I said, that the world says to me:  'Why do you spend many
+words and speak in many ways on this subject?'  Excuse me, friends, I
+should reply; but in the first place there is a difficulty in explaining
+the meaning of the expression 'overcome by pleasure'; and the whole
+argument turns upon this.  And even now, if you see any possible way in
+which evil can be explained as other than pain, or good as other than
+pleasure, you may still retract.  Are you satisfied, then, at having a life
+of pleasure which is without pain?  If you are, and if you are unable to
+show any good or evil which does not end in pleasure and pain, hear the
+consequences:--If what you say is true, then the argument is absurd which
+affirms that a man often does evil knowingly, when he might abstain,
+because he is seduced and overpowered by pleasure; or again, when you say
+that a man knowingly refuses to do what is good because he is overcome at
+the moment by pleasure.  And that this is ridiculous will be evident if
+only we give up the use of various names, such as pleasant and painful, and
+good and evil.  As there are two things, let us call them by two names--
+first, good and evil, and then pleasant and painful.  Assuming this, let us
+go on to say that a man does evil knowing that he does evil.  But some one
+will ask, Why?  Because he is overcome, is the first answer.  And by what
+is he overcome? the enquirer will proceed to ask.  And we shall not be able
+to reply 'By pleasure,' for the name of pleasure has been exchanged for
+that of good.  In our answer, then, we shall only say that he is overcome. 
+'By what?' he will reiterate.  By the good, we shall have to reply; indeed
+we shall.  Nay, but our questioner will rejoin with a laugh, if he be one
+of the swaggering sort, 'That is too ridiculous, that a man should do what
+he knows to be evil when he ought not, because he is overcome by good.  Is
+that, he will ask, because the good was worthy or not worthy of conquering
+the evil'?  And in answer to that we shall clearly reply, Because it was
+not worthy; for if it had been worthy, then he who, as we say, was overcome
+by pleasure, would not have been wrong.  'But how,' he will reply, 'can the
+good be unworthy of the evil, or the evil of the good'?  Is not the real
+explanation that they are out of proportion to one another, either as
+greater and smaller, or more and fewer?  This we cannot deny.  And when you
+speak of being overcome--'what do you mean,' he will say, 'but that you
+choose the greater evil in exchange for the lesser good?'  Admitted.  And
+now substitute the names of pleasure and pain for good and evil, and say,
+not as before, that a man does what is evil knowingly, but that he does
+what is painful knowingly, and because he is overcome by pleasure, which is
+unworthy to overcome.  What measure is there of the relations of pleasure
+to pain other than excess and defect, which means that they become greater
+and smaller, and more and fewer, and differ in degree?  For if any one
+says:  'Yes, Socrates, but immediate pleasure differs widely from future
+pleasure and pain'--To that I should reply:  And do they differ in anything
+but in pleasure and pain?  There can be no other measure of them.  And do
+you, like a skilful weigher, put into the balance the pleasures and the
+pains, and their nearness and distance, and weigh them, and then say which
+outweighs the other.  If you weigh pleasures against pleasures, you of
+course take the more and greater; or if you weigh pains against pains, you
+take the fewer and the less; or if pleasures against pains, then you choose
+that course of action in which the painful is exceeded by the pleasant,
+whether the distant by the near or the near by the distant; and you avoid
+that course of action in which the pleasant is exceeded by the painful. 
+Would you not admit, my friends, that this is true?  I am confident that
+they cannot deny this.
+
+He agreed with me.
+
+Well then, I shall say, if you agree so far, be so good as to answer me a
+question:  Do not the same magnitudes appear larger to your sight when
+near, and smaller when at a distance?  They will acknowledge that.  And the
+same holds of thickness and number; also sounds, which are in themselves
+equal, are greater when near, and lesser when at a distance.  They will
+grant that also.  Now suppose happiness to consist in doing or choosing the
+greater, and in not doing or in avoiding the less, what would be the saving
+principle of human life?  Would not the art of measuring be the saving
+principle; or would the power of appearance?  Is not the latter that
+deceiving art which makes us wander up and down and take the things at one
+time of which we repent at another, both in our actions and in our choice
+of things great and small?  But the art of measurement would do away with
+the effect of appearances, and, showing the truth, would fain teach the
+soul at last to find rest in the truth, and would thus save our life. 
+Would not mankind generally acknowledge that the art which accomplishes
+this result is the art of measurement?
+
+Yes, he said, the art of measurement.
+
+Suppose, again, the salvation of human life to depend on the choice of odd
+and even, and on the knowledge of when a man ought to choose the greater or
+less, either in reference to themselves or to each other, and whether near
+or at a distance; what would be the saving principle of our lives?  Would
+not knowledge?--a knowledge of measuring, when the question is one of
+excess and defect, and a knowledge of number, when the question is of odd
+and even?  The world will assent, will they not?
+
+Protagoras himself thought that they would.
+
+Well then, my friends, I say to them; seeing that the salvation of human
+life has been found to consist in the right choice of pleasures and pains,
+--in the choice of the more and the fewer, and the greater and the less,
+and the nearer and remoter, must not this measuring be a consideration of
+their excess and defect and equality in relation to each other?
+
+This is undeniably true.
+
+And this, as possessing measure, must undeniably also be an art and
+science?
+
+They will agree, he said.
+
+The nature of that art or science will be a matter of future consideration;
+but the existence of such a science furnishes a demonstrative answer to the
+question which you asked of me and Protagoras.  At the time when you asked
+the question, if you remember, both of us were agreeing that there was
+nothing mightier than knowledge, and that knowledge, in whatever existing,
+must have the advantage over pleasure and all other things; and then you
+said that pleasure often got the advantage even over a man who has
+knowledge; and we refused to allow this, and you rejoined:  O Protagoras
+and Socrates, what is the meaning of being overcome by pleasure if not
+this?--tell us what you call such a state:--if we had immediately and at
+the time answered 'Ignorance,' you would have laughed at us.  But now, in
+laughing at us, you will be laughing at yourselves:  for you also admitted
+that men err in their choice of pleasures and pains; that is, in their
+choice of good and evil, from defect of knowledge; and you admitted
+further, that they err, not only from defect of knowledge in general, but
+of that particular knowledge which is called measuring.  And you are also
+aware that the erring act which is done without knowledge is done in
+ignorance.  This, therefore, is the meaning of being overcome by pleasure;
+--ignorance, and that the greatest.  And our friends Protagoras and
+Prodicus and Hippias declare that they are the physicians of ignorance; but
+you, who are under the mistaken impression that ignorance is not the cause,
+and that the art of which I am speaking cannot be taught, neither go
+yourselves, nor send your children, to the Sophists, who are the teachers
+of these things--you take care of your money and give them none; and the
+result is, that you are the worse off both in public and private life:--Let
+us suppose this to be our answer to the world in general:  And now I should
+like to ask you, Hippias, and you, Prodicus, as well as Protagoras (for the
+argument is to be yours as well as ours), whether you think that I am
+speaking the truth or not?
+
+They all thought that what I said was entirely true.
+
+Then you agree, I said, that the pleasant is the good, and the painful
+evil.  And here I would beg my friend Prodicus not to introduce his
+distinction of names, whether he is disposed to say pleasurable,
+delightful, joyful.  However, by whatever name he prefers to call them, I
+will ask you, most excellent Prodicus, to answer in my sense of the words.
+
+Prodicus laughed and assented, as did the others.
+
+Then, my friends, what do you say to this?  Are not all actions honourable
+and useful, of which the tendency is to make life painless and pleasant? 
+The honourable work is also useful and good?
+
+This was admitted.
+
+Then, I said, if the pleasant is the good, nobody does anything under the
+idea or conviction that some other thing would be better and is also
+attainable, when he might do the better.  And this inferiority of a man to
+himself is merely ignorance, as the superiority of a man to himself is
+wisdom.
+
+They all assented.
+
+And is not ignorance the having a false opinion and being deceived about
+important matters?
+
+To this also they unanimously assented.
+
+Then, I said, no man voluntarily pursues evil, or that which he thinks to
+be evil.  To prefer evil to good is not in human nature; and when a man is
+compelled to choose one of two evils, no one will choose the greater when
+he may have the less.
+
+All of us agreed to every word of this.
+
+Well, I said, there is a certain thing called fear or terror; and here,
+Prodicus, I should particularly like to know whether you would agree with
+me in defining this fear or terror as expectation of evil.
+
+Protagoras and Hippias agreed, but Prodicus said that this was fear and not
+terror.
+
+Never mind, Prodicus, I said; but let me ask whether, if our former
+assertions are true, a man will pursue that which he fears when he is not
+compelled?  Would not this be in flat contradiction to the admission which
+has been already made, that he thinks the things which he fears to be evil;
+and no one will pursue or voluntarily accept that which he thinks to be
+evil?
+
+That also was universally admitted.
+
+Then, I said, these, Hippias and Prodicus, are our premisses; and I would
+beg Protagoras to explain to us how he can be right in what he said at
+first.  I do not mean in what he said quite at first, for his first
+statement, as you may remember, was that whereas there were five parts of
+virtue none of them was like any other of them; each of them had a separate
+function.  To this, however, I am not referring, but to the assertion which
+he afterwards made that of the five virtues four were nearly akin to each
+other, but that the fifth, which was courage, differed greatly from the
+others.  And of this he gave me the following proof.  He said:  You will
+find, Socrates, that some of the most impious, and unrighteous, and
+intemperate, and ignorant of men are among the most courageous; which
+proves that courage is very different from the other parts of virtue.  I
+was surprised at his saying this at the time, and I am still more surprised
+now that I have discussed the matter with you.  So I asked him whether by
+the brave he meant the confident.  Yes, he replied, and the impetuous or
+goers.  (You may remember, Protagoras, that this was your answer.)
+
+He assented.
+
+Well then, I said, tell us against what are the courageous ready to go--
+against the same dangers as the cowards?
+
+No, he answered.
+
+Then against something different?
+
+Yes, he said.
+
+Then do cowards go where there is safety, and the courageous where there is
+danger?
+
+Yes, Socrates, so men say.
+
+Very true, I said.  But I want to know against what do you say that the
+courageous are ready to go--against dangers, believing them to be dangers,
+or not against dangers?
+
+No, said he; the former case has been proved by you in the previous
+argument to be impossible.
+
+That, again, I replied, is quite true.  And if this has been rightly
+proven, then no one goes to meet what he thinks to be dangers, since the
+want of self-control, which makes men rush into dangers, has been shown to
+be ignorance.
+
+He assented.
+
+And yet the courageous man and the coward alike go to meet that about which
+they are confident; so that, in this point of view, the cowardly and the
+courageous go to meet the same things.
+
+And yet, Socrates, said Protagoras, that to which the coward goes is the
+opposite of that to which the courageous goes; the one, for example, is
+ready to go to battle, and the other is not ready.
+
+And is going to battle honourable or disgraceful? I said.
+
+Honourable, he replied.
+
+And if honourable, then already admitted by us to be good; for all
+honourable actions we have admitted to be good.
+
+That is true; and to that opinion I shall always adhere.
+
+True, I said.  But which of the two are they who, as you say, are unwilling
+to go to war, which is a good and honourable thing?
+
+The cowards, he replied.
+
+And what is good and honourable, I said, is also pleasant?
+
+It has certainly been acknowledged to be so, he replied.
+
+And do the cowards knowingly refuse to go to the nobler, and pleasanter,
+and better?
+
+The admission of that, he replied, would belie our former admissions.
+
+But does not the courageous man also go to meet the better, and pleasanter,
+and nobler?
+
+That must be admitted.
+
+And the courageous man has no base fear or base confidence?
+
+True, he replied.
+
+And if not base, then honourable?
+
+He admitted this.
+
+And if honourable, then good?
+
+Yes.
+
+But the fear and confidence of the coward or foolhardy or madman, on the
+contrary, are base?
+
+He assented.
+
+And these base fears and confidences originate in ignorance and
+uninstructedness?
+
+True, he said.
+
+Then as to the motive from which the cowards act, do you call it cowardice
+or courage?
+
+I should say cowardice, he replied.
+
+And have they not been shown to be cowards through their ignorance of
+dangers?
+
+Assuredly, he said.
+
+And because of that ignorance they are cowards?
+
+He assented.
+
+And the reason why they are cowards is admitted by you to be cowardice?
+
+He again assented.
+
+Then the ignorance of what is and is not dangerous is cowardice?
+
+He nodded assent.
+
+But surely courage, I said, is opposed to cowardice?
+
+Yes.
+
+Then the wisdom which knows what are and are not dangers is opposed to the
+ignorance of them?
+
+To that again he nodded assent.
+
+And the ignorance of them is cowardice?
+
+To that he very reluctantly nodded assent.
+
+And the knowledge of that which is and is not dangerous is courage, and is
+opposed to the ignorance of these things?
+
+At this point he would no longer nod assent, but was silent.
+
+And why, I said, do you neither assent nor dissent, Protagoras?
+
+Finish the argument by yourself, he said.
+
+I only want to ask one more question, I said.  I want to know whether you
+still think that there are men who are most ignorant and yet most
+courageous?
+
+You seem to have a great ambition to make me answer, Socrates, and
+therefore I will gratify you, and say, that this appears to me to be
+impossible consistently with the argument.
+
+My only object, I said, in continuing the discussion, has been the desire
+to ascertain the nature and relations of virtue; for if this were clear, I
+am very sure that the other controversy which has been carried on at great
+length by both of us--you affirming and I denying that virtue can be
+taught--would also become clear.  The result of our discussion appears to
+me to be singular.  For if the argument had a human voice, that voice would
+be heard laughing at us and saying:  'Protagoras and Socrates, you are
+strange beings; there are you, Socrates, who were saying that virtue cannot
+be taught, contradicting yourself now by your attempt to prove that all
+things are knowledge, including justice, and temperance, and courage,--
+which tends to show that virtue can certainly be taught; for if virtue were
+other than knowledge, as Protagoras attempted to prove, then clearly virtue
+cannot be taught; but if virtue is entirely knowledge, as you are seeking
+to show, then I cannot but suppose that virtue is capable of being taught. 
+Protagoras, on the other hand, who started by saying that it might be
+taught, is now eager to prove it to be anything rather than knowledge; and
+if this is true, it must be quite incapable of being taught.'  Now I,
+Protagoras, perceiving this terrible confusion of our ideas, have a great
+desire that they should be cleared up.  And I should like to carry on the
+discussion until we ascertain what virtue is, whether capable of being
+taught or not, lest haply Epimetheus should trip us up and deceive us in
+the argument, as he forgot us in the story; I prefer your Prometheus to
+your Epimetheus, for of him I make use, whenever I am busy about these
+questions, in Promethean care of my own life.  And if you have no 
+objection, as I said at first, I should like to have your help in the
+enquiry.
+
+Protagoras replied:  Socrates, I am not of a base nature, and I am the last
+man in the world to be envious.  I cannot but applaud your energy and your
+conduct of an argument.  As I have often said, I admire you above all men
+whom I know, and far above all men of your age; and I believe that you will
+become very eminent in philosophy.  Let us come back to the subject at some
+future time; at present we had better turn to something else.
+
+By all means, I said, if that is your wish; for I too ought long since to
+have kept the engagement of which I spoke before, and only tarried because
+I could not refuse the request of the noble Callias.  So the conversation
+ended, and we went our way.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Protagoras, by Plato
+
diff --git a/old/prtgs10.zip b/old/prtgs10.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..43681eb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/prtgs10.zip