This entry contains an excerpt from Book VI of Plato’s Republic, along with some brief reflections from my life.
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After completing my Master’s, I decided I wanted to spend this year going back to the classics and strengthening my philosophical foundations. This, of course, begins with re-reading Plato. The last time I read the Republic I was 17 years old, and so this time it felt completely different. Most notably, there was a section of Book VI which I found especially moving and interesting. In it, Plato, having already outlined much of what it means to be a philosopher, now takes the time to explain why there are so few philosophers. The reason for this is two-fold: the first part is that the qualities and abilities required to be a philosopher are rare, and the second is that, even when they do occur in someone, they are often corrupted. It is his idea of corruption which interests me.
I have always loved Truth and been unsatisfied with superficial answers, and for that reason, I have studied philosophy. I, like most who study philosophy, am often treated with skepticism and met with irritation by those around me. I always have reason to believe that I could be successful at any number of things — as I have been throughout my life — and that I could make more money or achieve more fame if I dedicated my energy to something like business or acting. Due to these facts, and perhaps general weaknesses of my resolve, I often doubt myself and question the time I spend on philosophy.
After reading this passage from the Republic, I felt as if Plato was talking about me. I see some of myself in the picture he paints, and I fear that I am at risk of corrupting my soul and hampering its ability to truly flourish.
I have taken an excerpt of the conversation that takes place between Socrates and Adeimantus (translated by C.D.C. Reeve), and I provide a few brief comments at the end. I hope it refreshes you to read some of Plato’s great work.
SOCRATES: Then let’s begin our dialogue by recalling the starting point of our description of the nature that someone must have if he is to become a fine and good person. First of all, if you remember, he was led by truth, and he had to follow it wholeheartedly and unequivocally, on pain of being a lying imposter with no share at all in true philosophy.
ADEIMANTUS: That’s what we said.
SOCRATES: Well, isn’t that fact alone completely contrary to the belief currently held about him?
ADEIMANTUS: It certainly is.
SOCRATES: So, won’t it be reasonable, then, for us to plead in his defense that a real lover of learning naturally strives for what is? He does not linger over each of the many things that are believed to be, but keeps on going, without losing or lessening his passion, until he grasps what the nature of each thing itself is with the part of his soul that is fitted to grasp a thing of that sort because of its kinship with it. Once he has drawn near to it, has intercourse with what really is, and has begotten understanding and truth, he knows, truly lives, is nourished, and—at that point, but not before—is relieved from his labor pains.
ADEIMANTUS: Nothing could be more reasonable.
SOCRATES: Well, then, will a person of that sort love falsehood or, in completely opposite fashion, will he hate it?
ADEIMANTUS: He will hate it.
SOCRATES: And if truth led the way, we would never say, I imagine, that a chorus of evils could follow it.
ADEIMANTUS: Of course not.
SOCRATES: On the contrary, it is followed by a healthy and just character, and the temperance that accompanies it.
ADEIMANTUS: That’s right.
SOCRATES: What need is there, then, to go back to the beginning and compel the rest of the philosophic nature’s chorus to line up all over again? You surely remember that courage, high-mindedness, ease in learning, and a good memory all belong to philosophers. Then you objected that anyone would be compelled to agree with what we are saying, but that if he left the arguments aside and looked at the very people the argument is about, he would say that some of those he saw were useless, while the majority of them were thoroughly bad. Trying to discover the reason for this slander, we have arrived now at this question: why are the majority of them bad? And that is why we have again taken up the nature of the true philosophers and defined what it necessarily has to be.
ADEIMANTUS: That’s right.
SOCRATES: What we now have to do is look at the ways this nature gets corrupted; how it gets completely destroyed in the majority of cases, while a small number escape—the very ones that are called useless, rather than bad. After that, we must next look at those who imitate this nature and adopt its pursuit. We must see what natures the souls have that enter into a pursuit that is too valuable and too high for them—souls that, by often striking false notes, give philosophy the reputation that you said it has with everyone everywhere.
ADEIMANTUS: What sorts of corruption do you mean?
SOCRATES: I will try to explain them to you if I can. I imagine that everyone would agree with us about this: the sort of nature that possesses all the qualities we prescribed just now for the person who is going to be a complete philosopher, is seldom found among human beings, and there will be few who possess it. Or don’t you think so? ADEIMANTUS: I most certainly do.
SOCRATES: Consider, then, how many great sources of destruction there are for these few.
ADEIMANTUS: What are they?
SOCRATES: The most surprising thing of all to hear is that each one of the things we praised in that nature tends to corrupt the soul that has it and drag it away from philosophy. I mean courage, temperance, and the other things we mentioned.
ADEIMANTUS: That does sound strange.
SOCRATES: Furthermore, in addition to those, all so-called good things also corrupt it and drag it away—beauty, wealth, physical strength, powerful family connections in the city, and all that goes along with these. You understand the general pattern of thing I mean?
ADEIMANTUS: I do, and I would be glad to acquire a more precise understanding of it.
SOCRATES: Grasp the general principle correctly and the matter will become clear to you, and what I said about it before won’t seem so strange.
ADEIMANTUS: What are you telling me to grasp?
SOCRATES: In the case of every seed or growing thing, whether plant or animal, we know that if it fails to get the food, climate, or location suitable for it, then the more vigorous it is, the more it is deficient in the qualities proper to it. For surely bad is more opposed to good than to not-good.
ADEIMANTUS: Of course.
SOCRATES: So, I suppose it is reasonable that the best nature comes off worse than an inferior one from unsuitable nurture.
ADEIMANTUS: It is.
SOCRATES: Well, then, Adeimantus, won’t we also say that if souls with the best natures get a bad education, they become exceptionally bad? Or do you think that great injustices and unalloyed evil originate in an inferior nature, rather than in a vigorous one that has been corrupted by its upbringing? Or that a weak nature is ever responsible for great good things or great bad ones?
ADEIMANTUS: No, you are right.
SOCRATES: Well, then, if the nature we proposed for the philosopher happens to receive the proper instruction, I imagine it will inevitably grow to attain every virtue. But if it is not sown, planted, and grown in a suitable environment, it will develop in entirely the opposite way, unless some god comes to its aid. Or do you too believe, as the masses do, that some young people are corrupted by sophists—that there are sophists, private individuals, who corrupt them to a significant extent? Isn’t it, rather, the very people who say this who are the greatest sophists of all, who educate most effectively and produce young and old men and women of just the sort they want?
ADEIMANTUS: When do they do that?
SOCRATES: When many of them sit together in assemblies, courts, theaters, army camps, or any other gathering of a majority in public and, with a loud uproar, object excessively to some of the things that are said or done, then approve excessively of others, shouting and clapping; and when, in addition to these people themselves, the rocks and the surrounding space itself echo and redouble the uproar of their praise or blame. In a situation like that, how do you think—as the saying goes—a young man’s heart is affected? How will whatever sort of private education he received hold up for him, and not get swept away by such praise and blame, and go be carried off by the flood wherever it goes, so that he will call the same things beautiful or ugly as these people, practice what they practice, and become like them?
ADEIMANTUS: The compulsion to do so will be enormous, Socrates.
SOCRATES: And yet we have not mentioned the greatest compulsion of all.
ADEIMANTUS: What is that?
SOCRATES: It is what these educators and sophists impose by their actions if their words fail to persuade. Or don’t you know that they punish anyone who is not persuaded, with disenfranchisement, fines, or death?
ADEIMANTUS: They most certainly do.
SOCRATES: What other sophist, then, or what sort of private conversations do you think will oppose these and prove stronger?
ADEIMANTUS: None, I imagine.
SOCRATES: No, indeed, even to try would be very foolish. You see, there is not now, never has been, nor ever will be, a character whose view of virtue goes contrary to the education these provide. I mean a human character, comrade—the divine, as the saying goes, is an exception to the rule. You may be sure that if anything is saved and turns out well in the political systems that exist now, you won’t be mistaken in saying that divine providence saved it.
ADEIMANTUS: That is what I think, too.
SOCRATES: Well, then, you should also agree to this.
ADEIMANTUS: What?
SOCRATES: Each of those private wage-earners—the ones these people call sophists and consider to be their rivals in craft—teaches anything other than the convictions the masses hold when they are assembled together, and this he calls wisdom. It is just as if someone were learning the passions and appetites of a huge, strong beast that he is rearing—how to approach and handle it, when it is most difficult to deal with or most docile and what makes it so, what sounds it utters in either condition, and what tones of voice soothe or anger it. Having learned all this through associating and spending time with the beast, he calls this wisdom, gathers his information together as if it were a craft, and starts to teach it. Knowing nothing in reality about which of these convictions or appetites is fine or shameful, good or bad, just or unjust, he uses all these terms in conformity with the great beast’s beliefs—calling the things it enjoys good and the things that anger it bad. He has no other account to give of them, but calls everything he is compelled to do just and fine, never having seen how much the natures of necessity and goodness really differ, and being unable to explain it to anyone. Don’t you think, by Zeus, that someone like that would make a strange educator?
ADEIMANTUS: I do, indeed.
SOCRATES: Then does this person seem any different from the one who believes that wisdom is understanding the passions and pleasures of the masses—multifarious people—assembled together, whether in regard to painting, music, or politics for that matter? For if a person associates with the masses and exhibits his poetry or some other piece of craftsmanship to them or his service to the city, and gives them mastery over him to any degree beyond what is unavoidable, he will be under Diomedean compulsion, as it is called, to produce the things of which they approve. But that such things are truly good and beautiful—have you ever heard anyone presenting an argument for that conclusion that was not absolutely ridiculous?
ADEIMANTUS: No, and I do not suppose I ever will.
SOCRATES: So then, bearing all that in mind, recall our earlier question: can the majority in any way tolerate or accept that the beautiful itself (as opposed to the many beautiful things), or each thing itself (as opposed to the corresponding many), exists?
ADEIMANTUS: Not in the least.
SOCRATES: It is impossible, then, for the majority to be philosophic.
ADEIMANTUS: It is impossible.
SOCRATES: And so, those who practice philosophy are inevitably disparaged by them?
ADEIMANTUS: Inevitably.
SOCRATES: And also by those private individuals who associate with the majority and want to please them.
ADEIMANTUS: Clearly.
SOCRATES: On the basis of these facts, then, do you see any way to preserve a philosophic nature and ensure that it will continue to practice philosophy and reach the end? Consider the question in light of what we said before. We agreed that ease in learning, a good memory, courage, and highmindedness belong to the philosophic nature.
ADEIMANTUS: Yes.
SOCRATES: Right from the start, then, won’t someone like that be first among the children in everything, especially if his body’s nature matches that of his soul?
ADEIMANTUS: Of course he will.
SOCRATES: So as he gets older, I imagine his family and fellow citizens will want to make use of him in connection with their own affairs.
ADEIMANTUS: Certainly.
SOCRATES: They will get down on their knees, begging favors from him and honoring him, flattering ahead of time the power that is going to be his, so as to secure it for themselves.
ADEIMANTUS: That’s usually what happens, at least.
SOCRATES: What do you think someone like that will do in such circumstances—especially if he happens to be from a great city where he is rich and noble, and if he is good-looking and tall as well? Won’t he be filled with an impractical expectation and think himself capable of managing the affairs, not only of the Greeks, but of the barbarians, too? And won’t he exalt himself to great heights, as a result, and be brimming with pretension and empty, senseless pride?
ADEIMANTUS: He certainly will.
SOCRATES: Now, suppose someone gently approaches a young man in that state of mind and tells him the truth: that he has no sense, although he needs it, and that it cannot be acquired unless he works like a slave to attain it. Do you think it will be easy for him to hear that message through the evils that surround him?
ADEIMANTUS: Far from it.
SOCRATES: And suppose that, because of his noble nature and his natural affinity for such arguments, he somehow sees the point and is turned around and drawn toward philosophy. What do we suppose those people will do if they believe that they are losing his services and companionship? Is there anything they won’t do or say in his regard to prevent him from being persuaded? Or anything they won’t do or say in regard to his persuader to prevent him from succeeding, whether it is in private plots or public court cases?
ADEIMANTUS: There certainly is not.
SOCRATES: Then is there any chance that such a person will practice philosophy?
ADEIMANTUS: None at all.
SOCRATES: Do you see, then, that we weren’t wrong to say that when a philosophic nature is badly brought up, its very components—together with the other so-called goods, such as wealth and every provision of that sort—are somehow the cause of its falling away from the pursuit?
ADEIMANTUS: No, we were not. What we said was right.
SOCRATES: There you are, then, you amazing fellow! That is the extent of the sort of destruction and corruption that the nature best suited for the noblest pursuit undergoes. And such a nature is a rare occurrence anyway, we claim. Moreover, men who possess it are the ones that do the worst things to cities and individuals, and also—if they happen to be swept that way by the current—the greatest good. For a petty nature never does anything great, either to a private individual or a city.
ADEIMANTUS: That’s very true.
SOCRATES: So when these men, for whom philosophy is most appropriate, fall away from her, they leave her desolate and unwed, and themselves lead a life that is inappropriate and untrue. Then others, who are unworthy of her, come to her as to an orphan bereft of kinsmen, and shame her. They are the ones responsible for the reproaches that you say are cast upon philosophy by her detractors—that some of her consorts are useless, while the majority deserve many evils.
ADEIMANTUS: Yes, that is what they say
Firstly, I don’t want to appear arrogant. I don’t mean that I perfectly map on to Plato’s philosopher archetype — but merely that I have been blessed in a number of ways, and that those blessings often do pull me away from philosophy. Often I am told I should “get into sales” or “be a lawyer” — or that I could “make so much more money doing something else”. Furthermore, my vanity about my physical fitness or achievements often distract me and, to my mind, corrupt my soul.
I believe in Philosophy, and as it stands I believe I have the right abilities and temperament to do philosophy. It is my great fear that somehow I will ruin this and fall greatly short of my potential. And stretching a bit beyond Plato’s concern, I fear that many others will allow their other gifts and the opinions of flattering opportunists to prevent them from engaging in the philosophic contemplation that is their human birthright.
-AW
MENTAL AXE 