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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator
+#21 in our series by Plato [This is almost certainly NOT Plato!!]
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+Alcibiades II
+
+by Platonic Imitator
+
+Translated by Benjamin Jowett
+
+March, 1999  [Etext #1677]
+
+
+The Project Gutenberg Etext of Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator
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+
+
+ALCIBIADES II
+
+by Platonic Imitator (see Appendix II)
+
+
+
+
+Translated by Benjamin Jowett
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX II.
+
+The two dialogues which are translated in the second appendix are not
+mentioned by Aristotle, or by any early authority, and have no claim to be
+ascribed to Plato.  They are examples of Platonic dialogues to be assigned
+probably to the second or third generation after Plato, when his writings
+were well known at Athens and Alexandria.  They exhibit considerable
+originality, and are remarkable for containing several thoughts of the sort
+which we suppose to be modern rather than ancient, and which therefore have
+a peculiar interest for us.  The Second Alcibiades shows that the
+difficulties about prayer which have perplexed Christian theologians were
+not unknown among the followers of Plato.  The Eryxias was doubted by the
+ancients themselves:  yet it may claim the distinction of being, among all
+Greek or Roman writings, the one which anticipates in the most striking
+manner the modern science of political economy and gives an abstract form
+to some of its principal doctrines.
+
+For the translation of these two dialogues I am indebted to my friend and
+secretary, Mr. Knight.
+
+That the Dialogue which goes by the name of the Second Alcibiades is a
+genuine writing of Plato will not be maintained by any modern critic, and
+was hardly believed by the ancients themselves.  The dialectic is poor and
+weak.  There is no power over language, or beauty of style; and there is a
+certain abruptness and agroikia in the conversation, which is very un-
+Platonic.  The best passage is probably that about the poets:--the remark
+that the poet, who is of a reserved disposition, is uncommonly difficult to
+understand, and the ridiculous interpretation of Homer, are entirely in the
+spirit of Plato (compare Protag; Ion; Apol.).  The characters are ill-
+drawn.  Socrates assumes the 'superior person' and preaches too much, while
+Alcibiades is stupid and heavy-in-hand.  There are traces of Stoic
+influence in the general tone and phraseology of the Dialogue (compare opos
+melesei tis...kaka:  oti pas aphron mainetai):  and the writer seems to
+have been acquainted with the 'Laws' of Plato (compare Laws).  An incident
+from the Symposium is rather clumsily introduced, and two somewhat
+hackneyed quotations (Symp., Gorg.) recur.  The reference to the death of
+Archelaus as having occurred 'quite lately' is only a fiction, probably
+suggested by the Gorgias, where the story of Archelaus is told, and a
+similar phrase occurs;--ta gar echthes kai proen gegonota tauta, k.t.l. 
+There are several passages which are either corrupt or extremely ill-
+expressed.  But there is a modern interest in the subject of the dialogue;
+and it is a good example of a short spurious work, which may be attributed
+to the second or third century before Christ.
+
+
+ALCIBIADES II
+
+by
+
+Platonic Imitator (see Appendix II above)
+
+Translated by Benjamin Jowett
+
+
+PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE:  Socrates and Alcibiades.
+
+
+SOCRATES:  Are you going, Alcibiades, to offer prayer to Zeus?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes, Socrates, I am.
+
+SOCRATES:  you seem to be troubled and to cast your eyes on the ground, as
+though you were thinking about something.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Of what do you suppose that I am thinking?
+
+SOCRATES:  Of the greatest of all things, as I believe.  Tell me, do you
+not suppose that the Gods sometimes partly grant and partly reject the
+requests which we make in public and private, and favour some persons and
+not others?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly.
+
+SOCRATES:  Do you not imagine, then, that a man ought to be very careful,
+lest perchance without knowing it he implore great evils for himself,
+deeming that he is asking for good, especially if the Gods are in the mood
+to grant whatever he may request?  There is the story of Oedipus, for
+instance, who prayed that his children might divide their inheritance
+between them by the sword:  he did not, as he might have done, beg that his
+present evils might be averted, but called down new ones.  And was not his
+prayer accomplished, and did not many and terrible evils thence arise, upon
+which I need not dilate?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes, Socrates, but you are speaking of a madman:  surely you
+do not think that any one in his senses would venture to make such a
+prayer?
+
+SOCRATES:  Madness, then, you consider to be the opposite of discretion?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Of course.
+
+SOCRATES:  And some men seem to you to be discreet, and others the
+contrary?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  They do.
+
+SOCRATES:  Well, then, let us discuss who these are.  We acknowledge that
+some are discreet, some foolish, and that some are mad?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  And again, there are some who are in health?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  There are.
+
+SOCRATES:  While others are ailing?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  And they are not the same?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly not.
+
+SOCRATES:  Nor are there any who are in neither state?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  No.
+
+SOCRATES:  A man must either be sick or be well?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  That is my opinion.
+
+SOCRATES:  Very good:  and do you think the same about discretion and want
+of discretion?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  How do you mean?
+
+SOCRATES:  Do you believe that a man must be either in or out of his
+senses; or is there some third or intermediate condition, in which he is
+neither one nor the other?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Decidedly not.
+
+SOCRATES:  He must be either sane or insane?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  So I suppose.
+
+SOCRATES:  Did you not acknowledge that madness was the opposite of
+discretion?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  And that there is no third or middle term between discretion and
+indiscretion?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  True.
+
+SOCRATES:  And there cannot be two opposites to one thing?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  There cannot.
+
+SOCRATES:  Then madness and want of sense are the same?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  That appears to be the case.
+
+SOCRATES:  We shall be in the right, therefore, Alcibiades, if we say that
+all who are senseless are mad.  For example, if among persons of your own
+age or older than yourself there are some who are senseless,--as there
+certainly are,--they are mad.  For tell me, by heaven, do you not think
+that in the city the wise are few, while the foolish, whom you call mad,
+are many?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I do.
+
+SOCRATES:  But how could we live in safety with so many crazy people? 
+Should we not long since have paid the penalty at their hands, and have
+been struck and beaten and endured every other form of ill-usage which
+madmen are wont to inflict?  Consider, my dear friend:  may it not be quite
+otherwise?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Why, Socrates, how is that possible?  I must have been
+mistaken.
+
+SOCRATES:  So it seems to me.  But perhaps we may consider the matter
+thus:--
+
+ALCIBIADES:  How?
+
+SOCRATES:  I will tell you.  We think that some are sick; do we not?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  And must every sick person either have the gout, or be in a
+fever, or suffer from ophthalmia?  Or do you believe that a man may labour
+under some other disease, even although he has none of these complaints? 
+Surely, they are not the only maladies which exist?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly not.
+
+SOCRATES:  And is every kind of ophthalmia a disease?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  And every disease ophthalmia?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Surely not.  But I scarcely understand what I mean myself.
+
+SOCRATES:  Perhaps, if you give me your best attention, 'two of us' looking
+together, we may find what we seek.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I am attending, Socrates, to the best of my power.
+
+SOCRATES:  We are agreed, then, that every form of ophthalmia is a disease,
+but not every disease ophthalmia?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  We are.
+
+SOCRATES:  And so far we seem to be right.  For every one who suffers from
+a fever is sick; but the sick, I conceive, do not all have fever or gout or
+ophthalmia, although each of these is a disease, which, according to those
+whom we call physicians, may require a different treatment.  They are not
+all alike, nor do they produce the same result, but each has its own
+effect, and yet they are all diseases.  May we not take an illustration
+from the artizans?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly.
+
+SOCRATES:  There are cobblers and carpenters and sculptors and others of
+all sorts and kinds, whom we need not stop to enumerate.  All have their
+distinct employments and all are workmen, although they are not all of them
+cobblers or carpenters or sculptors.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  No, indeed.
+
+SOCRATES:  And in like manner men differ in regard to want of sense.  Those
+who are most out of their wits we call 'madmen,' while we term those who
+are less far gone 'stupid' or 'idiotic,' or, if we prefer gentler language,
+describe them as 'romantic' or 'simple-minded,' or, again, as 'innocent' or
+'inexperienced' or 'foolish.'  You may even find other names, if you seek
+for them; but by all of them lack of sense is intended.  They only differ
+as one art appeared to us to differ from another or one disease from
+another.  Or what is your opinion?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I agree with you.
+
+SOCRATES:  Then let us return to the point at which we digressed.  We said
+at first that we should have to consider who were the wise and who the
+foolish.  For we acknowledged that there are these two classes?  Did we
+not?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  To be sure.
+
+SOCRATES:  And you regard those as sensible who know what ought to be done
+or said?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  The senseless are those who do not know this?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  True.
+
+SOCRATES:  The latter will say or do what they ought not without their own
+knowledge?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Exactly.
+
+SOCRATES:  Oedipus, as I was saying, Alcibiades, was a person of this sort. 
+And even now-a-days you will find many who (have offered inauspicious
+prayers), although, unlike him, they were not in anger nor thought that
+they were asking evil.  He neither sought, nor supposed that he sought for
+good, but others have had quite the contrary notion.  I believe that if the
+God whom you are about to consult should appear to you, and, in
+anticipation of your request, enquired whether you would be contented to
+become tyrant of Athens, and if this seemed in your eyes a small and mean
+thing, should add to it the dominion of all Hellas; and seeing that even
+then you would not be satisfied unless you were ruler of the whole of
+Europe, should promise, not only that, but, if you so desired, should
+proclaim to all mankind in one and the same day that Alcibiades, son of
+Cleinias, was tyrant:--in such a case, I imagine, you would depart full of
+joy, as one who had obtained the greatest of goods.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  And not only I, Socrates, but any one else who should meet
+with such luck.
+
+SOCRATES:  Yet you would not accept the dominion and lordship of all the
+Hellenes and all the barbarians in exchange for your life?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly not:  for then what use could I make of them?
+
+SOCRATES:  And would you accept them if you were likely to use them to a
+bad and mischievous end?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I would not.
+
+SOCRATES:  You see that it is not safe for a man either rashly to accept
+whatever is offered him, or himself to request a thing, if he is likely to
+suffer thereby or immediately to lose his life.  And yet we could tell of
+many who, having long desired and diligently laboured to obtain a tyranny,
+thinking that thus they would procure an advantage, have nevertheless
+fallen victims to designing enemies.  You must have heard of what happened
+only the other day, how Archelaus of Macedonia was slain by his beloved
+(compare Aristotle, Pol.), whose love for the tyranny was not less than
+that of Archelaus for him.  The tyrannicide expected by his crime to become
+tyrant and afterwards to have a happy life; but when he had held the
+tyranny three or four days, he was in his turn conspired against and slain.
+Or look at certain of our own citizens,--and of their actions we have been
+not hearers, but eyewitnesses,--who have desired to obtain military
+command:  of those who have gained their object, some are even to this day
+exiles from the city, while others have lost their lives.  And even they
+who seem to have fared best, have not only gone through many perils and
+terrors during their office, but after their return home they have been
+beset by informers worse than they once were by their foes, insomuch that
+several of them have wished that they had remained in a private station
+rather than have had the glories of command.  If, indeed, such perils and
+terrors were of profit to the commonwealth, there would be reason in
+undergoing them; but the very contrary is the case.  Again, you will find
+persons who have prayed for offspring, and when their prayers were heard,
+have fallen into the greatest pains and sufferings.  For some have begotten
+children who were utterly bad, and have therefore passed all their days in
+misery, while the parents of good children have undergone the misfortune of
+losing them, and have been so little happier than the others that they
+would have preferred never to have had children rather than to have had
+them and lost them.  And yet, although these and the like examples are
+manifest and known of all, it is rare to find any one who has refused what
+has been offered him, or, if he were likely to gain aught by prayer, has
+refrained from making his petition.  The mass of mankind would not decline
+to accept a tyranny, or the command of an army, or any of the numerous
+things which cause more harm than good:  but rather, if they had them not,
+would have prayed to obtain them.  And often in a short space of time they
+change their tone, and wish their old prayers unsaid.  Wherefore also I
+suspect that men are entirely wrong when they blame the gods as the authors
+of the ills which befall them (compare Republic):  'their own presumption,'
+or folly (whichever is the right word)--
+
+'Has brought these unmeasured woes upon them.'  (Homer. Odyss.)
+
+He must have been a wise poet, Alcibiades, who, seeing as I believe, his
+friends foolishly praying for and doing things which would not really
+profit them, offered up a common prayer in behalf of them all:--
+
+'King Zeus, grant us good whether prayed for or unsought by us;
+But that which we ask amiss, do thou avert.'  (The author of these lines,
+which are probably of Pythagorean origin, is unknown.  They are found also
+in the Anthology (Anth. Pal.).)
+
+In my opinion, I say, the poet spoke both well and prudently; but if you
+have anything to say in answer to him, speak out.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  It is difficult, Socrates, to oppose what has been well said. 
+And I perceive how many are the ills of which ignorance is the cause,
+since, as would appear, through ignorance we not only do, but what is
+worse, pray for the greatest evils.  No man would imagine that he would do
+so; he would rather suppose that he was quite capable of praying for what
+was best:  to call down evils seems more like a curse than a prayer.
+
+SOCRATES:  But perhaps, my good friend, some one who is wiser than either
+you or I will say that we have no right to blame ignorance thus rashly,
+unless we can add what ignorance we mean and of what, and also to whom and
+how it is respectively a good or an evil?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  How do you mean?  Can ignorance possibly be better than
+knowledge for any person in any conceivable case?
+
+SOCRATES:  So I believe:--you do not think so?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly not.
+
+SOCRATES:  And yet surely I may not suppose that you would ever wish to act
+towards your mother as they say that Orestes and Alcmeon and others have
+done towards their parent.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Good words, Socrates, prithee.
+
+SOCRATES:  You ought not to bid him use auspicious words, who says that you
+would not be willing to commit so horrible a deed, but rather him who
+affirms the contrary, if the act appear to you unfit even to be mentioned.
+Or do you think that Orestes, had he been in his senses and knew what was
+best for him to do, would ever have dared to venture on such a crime?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly not.
+
+SOCRATES:  Nor would any one else, I fancy?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  No.
+
+SOCRATES:  That ignorance is bad then, it would appear, which is of the
+best and does not know what is best?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  So I think, at least.
+
+SOCRATES:  And both to the person who is ignorant and everybody else?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  Let us take another case.  Suppose that you were suddenly to get
+into your head that it would be a good thing to kill Pericles, your kinsman
+and guardian, and were to seize a sword and, going to the doors of his
+house, were to enquire if he were at home, meaning to slay only him and no
+one else:--the servants reply, 'Yes':  (Mind, I do not mean that you would
+really do such a thing; but there is nothing, you think, to prevent a man
+who is ignorant of the best, having occasionally the whim that what is
+worst is best?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  No.)
+
+SOCRATES:--If, then, you went indoors, and seeing him, did not know him,
+but thought that he was some one else, would you venture to slay him?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Most decidedly not (it seems to me).  (These words are omitted
+in several MSS.)
+
+SOCRATES:  For you designed to kill, not the first who offered, but
+Pericles himself?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly.
+
+SOCRATES:  And if you made many attempts, and each time failed to recognize
+Pericles, you would never attack him?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Never.
+
+SOCRATES:  Well, but if Orestes in like manner had not known his mother, do
+you think that he would ever have laid hands upon her?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  No.
+
+SOCRATES:  He did not intend to slay the first woman he came across, nor
+any one else's mother, but only his own?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  True.
+
+SOCRATES:  Ignorance, then, is better for those who are in such a frame of
+mind, and have such ideas?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Obviously.
+
+SOCRATES:  You acknowledge that for some persons in certain cases the
+ignorance of some things is a good and not an evil, as you formerly
+supposed?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I do.
+
+SOCRATES:  And there is still another case which will also perhaps appear
+strange to you, if you will consider it?  (The reading is here uncertain.)
+
+ALCIBIADES:  What is that, Socrates?
+
+SOCRATES:  It may be, in short, that the possession of all the sciences, if
+unaccompanied by the knowledge of the best, will more often than not injure
+the possessor.  Consider the matter thus:--Must we not, when we intend
+either to do or say anything, suppose that we know or ought to know that
+which we propose so confidently to do or say?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes, in my opinion.
+
+SOCRATES:  We may take the orators for an example, who from time to time
+advise us about war and peace, or the building of walls and the
+construction of harbours, whether they understand the business in hand, or
+only think that they do.  Whatever the city, in a word, does to another
+city, or in the management of her own affairs, all happens by the counsel
+of the orators.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  True.
+
+SOCRATES:  But now see what follows, if I can (make it clear to you). 
+(Some words appear to have dropped out here.)  You would distinguish the
+wise from the foolish?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  The many are foolish, the few wise?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly.
+
+SOCRATES:  And you use both the terms, 'wise' and 'foolish,' in reference
+to something?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I do.
+
+SOCRATES:  Would you call a person wise who can give advice, but does not
+know whether or when it is better to carry out the advice?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Decidedly not.
+
+SOCRATES:  Nor again, I suppose, a person who knows the art of war, but
+does not know whether it is better to go to war or for how long?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  No.
+
+SOCRATES:  Nor, once more, a person who knows how to kill another or to
+take away his property or to drive him from his native land, but not when
+it is better to do so or for whom it is better?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Certainly not.
+
+SOCRATES:  But he who understands anything of the kind and has at the same
+time the knowledge of the best course of action:--and the best and the
+useful are surely the same?--
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:--Such an one, I say, we should call wise and a useful adviser
+both of himself and of the city.  What do you think?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I agree.
+
+SOCRATES:  And if any one knows how to ride or to shoot with the bow or to
+box or to wrestle, or to engage in any other sort of contest or to do
+anything whatever which is in the nature of an art,--what do you call him
+who knows what is best according to that art?  Do you not speak of one who
+knows what is best in riding as a good rider?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  And in a similar way you speak of a good boxer or a good flute-
+player or a good performer in any other art?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  True.
+
+SOCRATES:  But is it necessary that the man who is clever in any of these
+arts should be wise also in general?  Or is there a difference between the
+clever artist and the wise man?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  All the difference in the world.
+
+SOCRATES:  And what sort of a state do you think that would be which was
+composed of good archers and flute-players and athletes and masters in
+other arts, and besides them of those others about whom we spoke, who knew
+how to go to war and how to kill, as well as of orators puffed up with
+political pride, but in which not one of them all had this knowledge of the
+best, and there was no one who could tell when it was better to apply any
+of these arts or in regard to whom?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I should call such a state bad, Socrates.
+
+SOCRATES:  You certainly would when you saw each of them rivalling the
+other and esteeming that of the greatest importance in the state,
+
+'Wherein he himself most excelled.'  (Euripides, Antiope.)
+
+--I mean that which was best in any art, while he was entirely ignorant of
+what was best for himself and for the state, because, as I think, he trusts
+to opinion which is devoid of intelligence.  In such a case should we not
+be right if we said that the state would be full of anarchy and
+lawlessness?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Decidedly.
+
+SOCRATES:  But ought we not then, think you, either to fancy that we know
+or really to know, what we confidently propose to do or say?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  And if a person does that which he knows or supposes that he
+knows, and the result is beneficial, he will act advantageously both for
+himself and for the state?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  True.
+
+SOCRATES:  And if he do the contrary, both he and the state will suffer?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Yes.
+
+SOCRATES:  Well, and are you of the same mind, as before?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I am.
+
+SOCRATES:  But were you not saying that you would call the many unwise and
+the few wise?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I was.
+
+SOCRATES:  And have we not come back to our old assertion that the many
+fail to obtain the best because they trust to opinion which is devoid of
+intelligence?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  That is the case.
+
+SOCRATES:  It is good, then, for the many, if they particularly desire to
+do that which they know or suppose that they know, neither to know nor to
+suppose that they know, in cases where if they carry out their ideas in
+action they will be losers rather than gainers?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  What you say is very true.
+
+SOCRATES:  Do you not see that I was really speaking the truth when I
+affirmed that the possession of any other kind of knowledge was more likely
+to injure than to benefit the possessor, unless he had also the knowledge
+of the best?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I do now, if I did not before, Socrates.
+
+SOCRATES:  The state or the soul, therefore, which wishes to have a right
+existence must hold firmly to this knowledge, just as the sick man clings
+to the physician, or the passenger depends for safety on the pilot.  And if
+the soul does not set sail until she have obtained this she will be all the
+safer in the voyage through life.  But when she rushes in pursuit of wealth
+or bodily strength or anything else, not having the knowledge of the best,
+so much the more is she likely to meet with misfortune.  And he who has the
+love of learning (Or, reading polumatheian, 'abundant learning.'), and is
+skilful in many arts, and does not possess the knowledge of the best, but
+is under some other guidance, will make, as he deserves, a sorry voyage:--
+he will, I believe, hurry through the brief space of human life, pilotless
+in mid-ocean, and the words will apply to him in which the poet blamed his
+enemy:--
+
+'...Full many a thing he knew;
+But knew them all badly.'  (A fragment from the pseudo-Homeric poem,
+'Margites.')
+
+ALCIBIADES:  How in the world, Socrates, do the words of the poet apply to
+him?  They seem to me to have no bearing on the point whatever.
+
+SOCRATES:  Quite the contrary, my sweet friend:  only the poet is talking
+in riddles after the fashion of his tribe.  For all poetry has by nature an
+enigmatical character, and it is by no means everybody who can interpret
+it.  And if, moreover, the spirit of poetry happen to seize on a man who is
+of a begrudging temper and does not care to manifest his wisdom but keeps
+it to himself as far as he can, it does indeed require an almost superhuman
+wisdom to discover what the poet would be at.  You surely do not suppose
+that Homer, the wisest and most divine of poets, was unaware of the
+impossibility of knowing a thing badly:  for it was no less a person than
+he who said of Margites that 'he knew many things, but knew them all
+badly.'  The solution of the riddle is this, I imagine:--By 'badly' Homer
+meant 'bad' and 'knew' stands for 'to know.'  Put the words together;--the
+metre will suffer, but the poet's meaning is clear;--'Margites knew all
+these things, but it was bad for him to know them.'  And, obviously, if it
+was bad for him to know so many things, he must have been a good-for-
+nothing, unless the argument has played us false.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  But I do not think that it has, Socrates:  at least, if the
+argument is fallacious, it would be difficult for me to find another which
+I could trust.
+
+SOCRATES:  And you are right in thinking so.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Well, that is my opinion.
+
+SOCRATES:  But tell me, by Heaven:--you must see now the nature and
+greatness of the difficulty in which you, like others, have your part.  For
+you change about in all directions, and never come to rest anywhere:  what
+you once most strongly inclined to suppose, you put aside again and quite
+alter your mind.  If the God to whose shrine you are going should appear at
+this moment, and ask before you made your prayer, 'Whether you would desire
+to have one of the things which we mentioned at first, or whether he should
+leave you to make your own request:'--what in either case, think you, would
+be the best way to take advantage of the opportunity?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Indeed, Socrates, I could not answer you without
+consideration.  It seems to me to be a wild thing (The Homeric word margos
+is said to be here employed in allusion to the quotation from the
+'Margites' which Socrates has just made; but it is not used in the sense
+which it has in Homer.) to make such a request; a man must be very careful
+lest he pray for evil under the idea that he is asking for good, when
+shortly after he may have to recall his prayer, and, as you were saying,
+demand the opposite of what he at first requested.
+
+SOCRATES:  And was not the poet whose words I originally quoted wiser than
+we are, when he bade us (pray God) to defend us from evil even though we
+asked for it?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I believe that you are right.
+
+SOCRATES:  The Lacedaemonians, too, whether from admiration of the poet or
+because they have discovered the idea for themselves, are wont to offer the
+prayer alike in public and private, that the Gods will give unto them the
+beautiful as well as the good:--no one is likely to hear them make any
+further petition.  And yet up to the present time they have not been less
+fortunate than other men; or if they have sometimes met with misfortune,
+the fault has not been due to their prayer.  For surely, as I conceive, the
+Gods have power either to grant our requests, or to send us the contrary of
+what we ask.
+
+And now I will relate to you a story which I have heard from certain of our
+elders.  It chanced that when the Athenians and Lacedaemonians were at war,
+our city lost every battle by land and sea and never gained a victory.  The
+Athenians being annoyed and perplexed how to find a remedy for their
+troubles, decided to send and enquire at the shrine of Ammon.  Their envoys
+were also to ask, 'Why the Gods always granted the victory to the
+Lacedaemonians?'  'We,' (they were to say,) 'offer them more and finer
+sacrifices than any other Hellenic state, and adorn their temples with
+gifts, as nobody else does; moreover, we make the most solemn and costly
+processions to them every year, and spend more money in their service than
+all the rest of the Hellenes put together.  But the Lacedaemonians take no
+thought of such matters, and pay so little respect to the Gods that they
+have a habit of sacrificing blemished animals to them, and in various ways
+are less zealous than we are, although their wealth is quite equal to
+ours.'  When they had thus spoken, and had made their request to know what
+remedy they could find against the evils which troubled them, the prophet
+made no direct answer,--clearly because he was not allowed by the God to do
+so;--but he summoned them to him and said:  'Thus saith Ammon to the
+Athenians:  "The silent worship of the Lacedaemonians pleaseth me better
+than all the offerings of the other Hellenes."'  Such were the words of the
+God, and nothing more.  He seems to have meant by 'silent worship' the
+prayer of the Lacedaemonians, which is indeed widely different from the
+usual requests of the Hellenes.  For they either bring to the altar bulls
+with gilded horns or make offerings to the Gods, and beg at random for what
+they need, good or bad.  When, therefore, the Gods hear them using words of
+ill omen they reject these costly processions and sacrifices of theirs. 
+And we ought, I think, to be very careful and consider well what we should
+say and what leave unsaid.  Homer, too, will furnish us with similar
+stories.  For he tells us how the Trojans in making their encampment,
+
+'Offered up whole hecatombs to the immortals,'
+
+and how the 'sweet savour' was borne 'to the heavens by the winds;
+
+'But the blessed Gods were averse and received it not.
+For exceedingly did they hate the holy Ilium,
+Both Priam and the people of the spear-skilled king.'
+
+So that it was in vain for them to sacrifice and offer gifts, seeing that
+they were hateful to the Gods, who are not, like vile usurers, to be gained
+over by bribes.  And it is foolish for us to boast that we are superior to
+the Lacedaemonians by reason of our much worship.  The idea is
+inconceivable that the Gods have regard, not to the justice and purity of
+our souls, but to costly processions and sacrifices, which men may
+celebrate year after year, although they have committed innumerable crimes
+against the Gods or against their fellow-men or the state.  For the Gods,
+as Ammon and his prophet declare, are no receivers of gifts, and they scorn
+such unworthy service.  Wherefore also it would seem that wisdom and
+justice are especially honoured both by the Gods and by men of sense; and
+they are the wisest and most just who know how to speak and act towards
+Gods and men.  But I should like to hear what your opinion is about these
+matters.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I agree, Socrates, with you and with the God, whom, indeed, it
+would be unbecoming for me to oppose.
+
+SOCRATES:  Do you not remember saying that you were in great perplexity,
+lest perchance you should ask for evil, supposing that you were asking for
+good?
+
+ALCIBIADES:  I do.
+
+SOCRATES:  You see, then, that there is a risk in your approaching the God
+in prayer, lest haply he should refuse your sacrifice when he hears the
+blasphemy which you utter, and make you partake of other evils as well. 
+The wisest plan, therefore, seems to me that you should keep silence; for
+your 'highmindedness'--to use the mildest term which men apply to folly--
+will most likely prevent you from using the prayer of the Lacedaemonians. 
+You had better wait until we find out how we should behave towards the Gods
+and towards men.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  And how long must I wait, Socrates, and who will be my
+teacher?  I should be very glad to see the man.
+
+SOCRATES:  It is he who takes an especial interest in you.  But first of
+all, I think, the darkness must be taken away in which your soul is now
+enveloped, just as Athene in Homer removes the mist from the eyes of
+Diomede that
+
+'He may distinguish between God and mortal man.'
+
+Afterwards the means may be given to you whereby you may distinguish
+between good and evil.  At present, I fear, this is beyond your power.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  Only let my instructor take away the impediment, whether it
+pleases him to call it mist or anything else!  I care not who he is; but I
+am resolved to disobey none of his commands, if I am likely to be the
+better for them.
+
+SOCRATES:  And surely he has a wondrous care for you.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  It seems to be altogether advisable to put off the sacrifice
+until he is found.
+
+SOCRATES:  You are right:  that will be safer than running such a
+tremendous risk.
+
+ALCIBIADES:  But how shall we manage, Socrates?--At any rate I will set
+this crown of mine upon your head, as you have given me such excellent
+advice, and to the Gods we will offer crowns and perform the other
+customary rites when I see that day approaching:  nor will it be long
+hence, if they so will.
+
+SOCRATES:  I accept your gift, and shall be ready and willing to receive
+whatever else you may proffer.  Euripides makes Creon say in the play, when
+he beholds Teiresias with his crown and hears that he has gained it by his
+skill as the first-fruits of the spoil:--
+
+'An auspicious omen I deem thy victor's wreath:
+For well thou knowest that wave and storm oppress us.'
+
+And so I count your gift to be a token of good-fortune; for I am in no less
+stress than Creon, and would fain carry off the victory over your lovers.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator
+
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