^^ ^ i'RE THE ARGUMENT 
 
 ^ 
 
 PRICF. ONR FJORrM 
 
763 
 
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WHERE 
 THE ARGUMENT LED 
 
 A COMPANION TO THE REPUBLIC OF PLATO. 
 
 For the Use of Adult Schools. 
 
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Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive 
 
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WHERE 
 THE ARGUMENT 
 
 LED 
 
 BEING 
 AN ALTERNATIVE, BRIEFER, AND MUCH MORE PROBABLE 
 
 ACCOUNT ^ 
 
 OF THE CONTROVERSIAL PART^ OF 
 THE DIALOGUE PURPORTED TO BE RECORDED IN 
 
 THE REPUBLIC OF PLATO 
 
 WITH SOME FURTHER CONVERSATION 
 
 BETWEEN SOKRATES AND OTHERS, 
 
 RELATED BY 
 
 GLAUKOiN, 
 
 BROTHER OF PLATO. 
 
 JOHN KIRKBY, 
 
 II, WESTMORELAND STREET, PIMLICO, 
 
 LONDON. 
 
 S.W.l. 
 
 1919. 
 
9/'B</sS' 
 
If I were 
 
 the 
 
 Autkor, 
 
 this should be 
 
 the 
 
 ©cMcation. 
 
 TO 
 
 THE MEMORY OF 
 
 MY BIG Brother 
 
 CHARLIE 
 
 AND 
 MY LITTLE BROTHER 
 
 Ef^WIN 
 
 THE CAREER OF THE FORMER 
 
 AND THE REFLECTIONS OF THE LATTER 
 
 HAVING HAD NO SMALL SHARE 
 
 IN DIRECTING THE ARGUMENT 
 
 TO THE POINT WHERE I LEAVE IT. 
 
 791306 
 
MARGINAL FIGURES, 
 The " Books" of the Republic are indicated by Roman 
 numerals ; the Arabic figures which follow havijig reference 
 to the '* marginal pages *' of Plato's collected works. 
 
jERRATA. ^ 
 
 P. xii. Line 26. For " apprension," read " apprehension." 
 
 P. 34, Margin, 2nd note. For " beg-inning," read be-^ 
 ginning." 
 
 P. 61. Line 3 of text— For "common sensible," read 
 " commonsensible " ; line 9— semicolon should be colon ; 
 line II — semicolon after "State." 
 
PUBLISHER'S PREFACE. 
 
 THIS book supplies a want that has been severely 
 felt for the last two thousand two hundred 
 years. 
 That want has perhaps been supplied before : it 
 will certainly have to be supplied again ; because the 
 wanters are Poor Peter Peebleses of philosophy, and 
 the simplifying efforts of successive Alan Fairfords 
 are always quickly followed by ingenious prolixities 
 from the counsel whom Peter's opponents fee heavily 
 (with praise and attention) to reintroduce all the 
 dubieties which the Alan of the moment had removed. 
 That the Republic of Plato will flourish for ages after 
 the present work has been remaindered and forgotten, 
 only illustrates what Bacon said : " Time, like a 
 river, bringing down to us things which are lighter or 
 more inflated, lets what is more weighty and solid 
 sink." Great is truth; but great also is error — its 
 corky bulk makes a fine show on the top of the tide, 
 where it is a familiar object : the solid weight of 
 
 (ix.) 
 
X. PREFACE. 
 
 truth takes it immediately to the bottoms of wells 
 and rivers ; and, though in the latter position it has 
 important effects on the course of the stream, it is 
 only to be reached by a dredging process that disturbs 
 the long sleep of many dead dogs, in a way unpleas- 
 ing to the popular nose. Such a dredging is any re- 
 examination of the method whereby Plato, in the 
 Republic, established the absolute nature of Right 
 Conduct, or Justice. That it was there firmly estab- 
 lished, once for all, is still the assumption of that 
 large class described by the American dream- investi- 
 gator as "respectable people, theological students, 
 and others " ; whose respectability would be scand- 
 alized if anybody w^ere to pursue, in a modern debate, 
 the unscrupulous methods of Plato's Sokrates. There 
 is often a vein of Jesuitry in the Good Person ; he is 
 thankful that certain things have been done, though it 
 makes him uneasy to contemplate the means by which 
 they had to be done. Also, many people, led by de- 
 cent instinct, are believing where they have not read ; 
 for " even diligent scholars ", says Professor Mahaffy, 
 " find it a task to read a dialogue of Plato honestly 
 through." Not because of obscurity. Unintelligible 
 Hegel is a favourite study compared with Plato — 
 though I glean from the works of those who have the 
 art of comprehending unintelligibility that he means 
 the same thing. 
 
 For, beyond most variously marking time, only 
 one monotonous job is left to philosophy, since logic 
 and science and theology were carved out of it. 
 There is a vague notion in the minds of the class 
 
PREFACE. xi. 
 
 already alluded to, that philosophy is a matter of co- 
 operation : allegorizable (say) as a great Temple ; to 
 which this Greek contributed the foundation, that 
 Arabian a window, yon Spaniard and yonder Moor a 
 turret apiece, some German a pinnacle, some other 
 German a necessary buttress, and so on. No view 
 could be falser. Plato is practically the beginning, 
 and Hegel is the culmination, of a line of controver- 
 sialists who maintain one thesis, and who constantly 
 have to devise means of repelling the onslaughts and 
 outwitting the strategy of another line : supposed to 
 begin (with anything like complete articulateness) at 
 Aristotle, and to culminate in Nietzsche.'-*' Plato 
 established the famous Order of the Absolute Essen- 
 tial Bed. Hegel, I glean in the way before-men- 
 tioned, will not allow us to derive our several minds 
 from the universe, but insists on deriving the universe 
 from our minds. As there is only one universe, which 
 can pursue only one course and have only one set of 
 laws, the Hegelian metaphysic leaves us only one mind 
 among us — i.e., a general (though perhaps not always 
 fully conscious) agreement as to what must be done ; 
 which is just the Order of the Bed under another name. 
 The innumerable tomes that have been written for the 
 philosophic library, all the queer words and fearsome 
 paradoxes invented by Germans for the use of the 
 
 * Though, following a plan of his own for detecting the 
 Sokratic element, Nietzsche was able to pose as a disciple of 
 Plato ; while he sneered at Aristotle's innocence (not a bit 
 more egregious than Plato's) in regard to morals— forgetting 
 it was the agelong development of Aristotelian method that 
 had made the Nietzschean outlocfk possible. 
 
xii. PREFACE. 
 
 learned world, are either metronomes or pieces for the 
 
 regimental band, or eke the dug-outs and weapons 
 
 used in the long fight over one question, put in many 
 
 forms, but always amounting to this : Is there, or is 
 
 there not, an absolute standard of right and wrong ? 
 
 It may be magnificent; but it is war, not architecture. 
 
 Plato came of an aristocratic family ; and in his 
 
 time the Athenian State was a sort of Democracy — 
 
 that is to say : if you were a freeman and not a slave, 
 
 you were as good as anybody else who couldn't knock 
 
 VI 406- you down. Plato naturally hated this sort of thing, 
 
 VII. 557 - and he did a good deal of travelling to get away from 
 
 ,, * ^ it. His mind (partly by wav of natural reaction, and 
 11.375-376; \f J J . 
 
 V. 473- partly no doubt led by earlier dreamers) pictured a 
 ^'^^' reconstructed world where everybody would look up 
 
 to him. He felt that, on the very top, he would be 
 the right man in the right place : which immediately 
 suggested the idea that every other man had his right 
 place ; that evil originated when people began coming 
 out of their places ; that, when a physician began car- 
 pentering and a carpenter began physicking, we were 
 face-to-face with a threatened dissolution of the com- 
 monwealth — ** Larkinism, and all that sort of thing **, 
 as Mr. Chesterton's nobleman expressed it."'-- He elabor- 
 ated this into a philosophy, based on some dim 
 apprension of Determinism. He imagined that, up 
 486,493,501, in Heaven, there was what he called an Essential 
 505.507-509; Form, a pattern, of everything as it ought to be ; and 
 526 ;IX. 592, that Justice on earth was the best copy we could 
 make of the heavenly pattern -room — by means of a 
 ♦ It would be Bolshevism no-w. 
 
PREFACE. xiii. 
 
 peculiar power, never explained; residing in the vi49o;VII. 
 
 reasoning part of the soul in the case of Individual 5i8 ; see 
 
 Justice ; residing in the ruling class in the case of IX. 590. 
 
 State Justice. He believed that, not by experiment- y. 477-478; 
 
 ine: or bv any other use of the senses (which he VI. 484, 
 
 493 - 494 ; 
 despised as instruments for discerning Reality), but 508-511; 
 
 by a gassing process which he called Dialectic, the best Y ^ ^^?' 
 
 people would be able to rise to a knowledge of all 
 
 those same heavenly patterns, and be able to put 
 
 everybody and everything upon its only proper basis. 
 
 If it occasionally struck him that a full knowledge 
 
 of this ideal might be claimed by anybody, and VIII. 557- 
 
 that conflict of vision might leave matters to be settled 
 
 in the interest of the stronger — that only made him as 
 
 scornful as he was when Glaukon asked him to explain VII. 533. 
 
 Dialectic: for of course the " Sokrates " of the 
 
 dialogue, of whom Glaukon inquired, was mostly 
 
 Plato himself, and not the actual Sokrates who drank 
 
 the hemlock. Here is the kernel of his system, as dis- ^ 
 
 played in the Republic : 
 
 SOKRATES— Whether it was that God did not choose to 
 make more than one bed, or that by a species of ne- 
 cessity he was precluded from making more than one 
 in the universe, he has at any rate made only one, which 
 is the absolute essential Bed. But two, or more than 
 two, such beds, have not been created by God, and 
 never will be. 
 
 GLAUKON— How so? 
 
 SOKRATES— Because, if God had made only two, a single 
 bed would again have made its appearance, whose 
 Form would enter into the other two in their turn ; 
 and this would be the absolute essential Bed, and not 
 the two. 
 
 GLAUKON— You are right. 
 
 SOKRATES — Knowing this, I should suppose, and wishing 
 
xiv. PREFACE. 
 
 to be the real maker of the really existing bed, and not 
 a certain indefinite manufacturer of a certain indefinite 
 bed, God created a single such bed. 
 
 This, the most barefaced " realization of an abstrac- 
 tion " ever committed, enables us to see why it would 
 never do for the physician to be a carpenter as well. 
 If, by some diabolical trick, he succeeded, he would 
 mess all God's arrangements up. The pattern -room 
 would get overstocked — unless every physician could 
 become a carpenter, or every carpenter a physician, 
 and so on. 
 
 Full of wisdom of this sort, Plato heard from a 
 kinsman called Dion, resident at the court of Sura- 
 kosai (commonly called Sire Accuse) : that the elder 
 Dionysius, tyrant of that place, was dead ; that 
 Dionysius the Younger seemed a fit object for educa- 
 tion in statecraft, and would Plato kindly call and 
 indoctrinate him ? Certainly ! Nothing would give 
 Plato greater pleasure ! He packed his trunk, and 
 left by the next trireme. 
 
 But alas ! this is an imperfect world ; and it 
 refuses to become perfect even when perfection is 
 revealed by those who, ascending on their own gas or 
 hot air, have been up to Heaven and photographed it. 
 Dionysius listened to Plato for a while ; perhaps he 
 found him amusing. Then he got bored, and grew 
 so angry with Dion for having introduced the bore 
 that he gave him the sack. Plato also went home ; 
 his admirers at the Academy fitted out a filibustering 
 expedition in the interest of the Essential Forms, and 
 drove Dionysius from the throne : the final result be- 
 ing than Dion was assassinated and Surakosai plunged 
 
PREFACE. XV. 
 
 into anarchy. At any rate, that is one version of a 
 tale doubtful in all its forms. Something like this 
 was Plato's experience of practical politics, or else 
 he had none. No wonder he afterwards made 
 " Sokrates " ask, in the spirit of the Editor of Pickwick 
 when treating of the sportsmanship of Mr. Winkle : 
 " Will our theory suffer at all in your good opinion, if 
 we cannot'^ prove that it is possible for a city to be v. 4.72. 
 organized in the manner proposed ? " 
 
 fully and justifiably assured of Adeimantus's "Cer- 
 tainly not!" . . Plato remained gassing in Athens, 
 until, more than eighty years old, he gassed himself 
 into that Heaven of which he was so fond and of "^ 
 
 which he already knew so much. 
 
 Such was the demolisher of the Sophists ; and his 
 famous demolition, the Republic^ is acclaimed to this 
 day, by enlightened University Professors, as a master- 
 piece of argument. The timely discovery of Glaukon's 
 manuscript ■'•• has resulted in confirming a suspicion I 
 had long entertained : that the reason why Thrasy- 
 machus is represented in the Republic as shifting his 
 ground so often and making so many weak-kneed 
 admissions, is that the real Thrasymachus, and the 
 other opponents of Plato for whom the Thrasymachus 
 of the Republic stands, were very imperfectly com- 
 prehended by the author of the Republic, who was 
 therefore unable to give the character proper veri- 
 similitude. Evidently he could not bring himself to 1. 337; VI. 
 believe that the Sophists were in earnest in practically ^^^' 
 denying the existence of abstract Justice : he thought 
 
 *Lost again. 
 
xvi. PREFACE. 
 
 they must be arguing disingenuously, to obtain money 
 I- 351 -352 and influence ; and that, if a man did not bind him- 
 self down to abstract Justice, he must be absolutely 
 unprincipled — incapable of honesty with himself, even. 
 When a man had cut the cable that bound him to 
 Essential Forms (the modern name for this bondage 
 is Being In Tune With The Infinite), Plato deemed 
 
 1.352; IX. jjjj^ from that moment without rudder or compass, 
 
 572-573. ^ * 
 
 unable to do anything at all, except when accidentally 
 
 or momentarily untrue to his profession of unbelief. 
 So, honestly convinced of the truth of his own doc- 
 trine, and at the same time despairing of the efficacy 
 of fair methods when dealing with the wicked, he 
 made Thrasymachus needlessly abandon his first and 
 soundest position, and absurdly maintain that In- 
 justice pays better than Justice : an utterly meaning- 
 less doctrine in the mouth of a man who sees no 
 difference between what is called Justice and what is 
 called Injustice, except that the balance of power is 
 for the time being in favour of the actions grouped 
 under the former head. " Justice ", of course, on the 
 whole pays those who make and administer it, better 
 than "Injustice" ; while carefully-executed" Injustice" 
 pays those to whom "Justice" is promulgated and 
 administered, better than "Justice" does. The class 
 of actions dealt w'ith by Plato in the first book of the 
 Republic under the name of "Injustice" do not ne- 
 cessarily imply any diminution in the general stock of 
 happiness. " Injustice ", for him, meant any course 
 of action tending to destroy the resemblance between 
 the arrangements of the State and the eternal arrange 
 
 1. 343 & 348 
 
PREFACE. xvii. 
 
 ments of Heaven — sometimes, as in the case of a 
 tyranny, involving a decrease in the general stock of 
 happiness; sometimes, as in a democracy, involving no 
 such decrease but perhaps even a temporary increase. 
 So that Plato's " Injustice ", if it means anything, 
 comes practically to the same thing as judicious self- 
 aggrandizement, by those who are, luckily or by crafty 
 organization or plotting, able to aggrandize them- 
 selves. Bearing that in mind, read this paragraph 
 from an Introduction to the Republic of Plato, by 
 William Boyd, M.A., B.Sc. (Swan Sonnenschein, 1904) : 
 
 " The whole discussion labours under the disadvantage ^ 
 
 of a false start. Plato's opponents, arguing from a 
 Hedonistic point of view, had asserted that the unjust 
 life is most pleasant, and Plato meets them on their own 
 ground with the counter-assertion. But the question 
 whether justice or injustice is the more pleasant really j^ i;8i-';82 
 admits of no answer. If Plato says that the man of reason 
 prefers his own pleasures in spite of his experience of 
 other forms of pleasure, and that therefore they are 
 .superior to those of the sensual man or of the honour- 
 seeker, it is open to an opponent to argue that the ex- 
 periences of the wise man are distorted by his wisdom, 
 and that for each man his own manner of living is best 
 and most pleasant. Strictly speaking, if pleasure be 
 made the test by which to decide the case, there ceases 
 to be any criterion of conduct." 
 
 Of course. But who wants a criterion of conduct 
 — except for other people ? In any great crisis, who 
 is governed by a criterion of conduct ? — Almost no- 
 body, even among lunatics. In ordinary affairs of life, 
 who are governed by criteria of conduct ? — Common 
 people ; not the most alive or the most magnetic. 
 Or, if these latter are governed in any circumstances 
 by any criterion, it is briefly comprehended in this 
 saying: "As matters stand, what must I do to be 
 saved ?" 
 
XVIU, 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 Where the Argument Led ought to'save us ofjthis 
 generation a lot of bother. Many a reader of the 
 Republic has felt that Plato's case could be smashed 
 by anybody who did not mind a little drudgery — 
 cleverness was hardly required. Now we find that 
 Plato's younger brother Glaukon has saved us this 
 trouble. A person of the class that reverences with- 
 out too much reading might take Glaukon's first two 
 chapters for a burlesque of Plato's " Book I.". On a 
 careful comparison, I find in Glaukon no parody of 
 the arguments in Plato. So far as they cover the 
 same ground, Glaukon is a faithful condensation of 
 Plato — of course on the understanding that Plato's 
 " Sokrates " is a mixture of Plato himself and his un- 
 humorous conception of the real Sokrates. Or rather, 
 Plato is a padding-out of Glaukon. Prodigious volu- 
 bility is Plato's first characteristic : it is usually reck- 
 oned a fault by his admirers ; but in my opinion his 
 long-windedness Avas intentional. He evidently be- 
 lieved in a wearing-down policy ; he tried confusions, in 
 the manner of Launcelot Gobbo. Like a stage magi- 
 cian, he used patter in large quantites to conceal the 
 exact moment and nature of his prestidigitation. 
 So crowded with miscellaneous furniture is his 
 cave, that the candle-light of a "judicious" 
 summary but assists the magician by throwing 
 shadows. A terse independent account of the 
 evening and night at Kephalus's was wanted, to 
 throw a searchlight upon his doings : in the light 
 of Glaukon's account we see how it was done, 
 and laugh at ourselves for having been so easily 
 
PREFACE xix. 
 
 imposed upon for a moment or two — if we ivere 
 imposed upon, that is. 
 
 As to anachronisms : I confess to a certain freedom 
 in the translation. There [are anachronisms, I under- 
 stand, in the Republic. 
 
 You ought to remember, by the way, that a Greek 
 manuscript of the fourth^century B.C. was, like the un- 
 pedantic journalism of our own time, " enriched '* 
 (as Hegelians would say) with frequent ambiguities 
 by the omission of merely utilitarian stops. 
 
 PETROLEUM CHAMBER, 
 
 TURPENTINE LANE, 
 PIMLICO. 
 
 April, 1919. 
 
WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED 
 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 A masterpiece of sustained argument. 
 
 •Professor Gilbert Murray's -r^ 
 
 Greek Literature. 
 
 YESTERDAY we had the greatest lark that 
 ever was. Sokrates enjoyed it, anyway. 
 Of Thrasymachus I am not so sure; he 
 is too serious. You would never have guessed, 
 from his appearance yesterday morning, as he 
 slowly paced ahead of us on the road to the 
 Piraeus, that he owned a full share in his pro- 
 fession's reputation for levity. He took no 
 notice of the prospect of broken walls or of 
 the passers-by, until I hailed him; when he 
 turned, and stood smiling like a big child while 
 we came up. Honest old fellow ! he can never 
 remember that all the world isn't as straight- 
 forward as himself. 
 
 (I 
 
2 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 ** No procession without Sokrates!** he 
 said, by way of greeting to my companion. 
 ** But have you any further business out this 
 way ? " 
 
 ''No/' said Sokrates. ** I simply follow 
 my nose like a learned pig, confident that it 
 will turn up something." 
 
 '* I have a ring in mine," said Thrasy- 
 machus. '* I go to the priest's : Kephalus's. 
 Your brother is to be there, Glaukon " — 
 turning to me — ** I don't mean Adeimantus, 
 though he's to be there too. I mean the one 
 I haven't seen yet : Aristokles." 
 
 *' You mean Plato, *^" said Sokrates. '' Do 
 you know that that young man has taken me 
 for his favourite ? He has a phrase about 
 ' ^^^ following the argument wherever it leads; con- 
 sequently, he follows me. My nose, which 
 I follow, takes some pleasure in avoiding him : 
 he has an air of waiting for my sandals. So 
 I will not go with you : farewell I ' ' We left 
 the giant to his solitary progress. 
 
 But it so happened that, as we were return- 
 ing toward Athens in the afternoon, young 
 
 * I hope the reader will not pronounce this as if it were the 
 name of the latest thing in metal polishes. Nor would I have 
 him call Sokrates " Sock-rat-ease". 
 
A GOOD OLD MAN. 3 
 
 Polemarchus and his servant caught us both 
 by the skirts, and in a manner forced us to 
 his father's house. There we found the old 
 priest sitting stiffly in the midst of fine com- 
 pany; of whom his two elder sons chatted 
 with Thrasymachus in one corner, while in the 
 opposite one sat my thin-lipped supercilious 
 brother Plato with his eternal notebook. 
 Surely his nickname is not more descriptive 
 of the breadth of his shoulders than of the 
 obtuseness of his skull ! 
 
 *' Well,'' said Sokrates to our host, ** grow- 
 ing old, Kephalus, eh? We all do; but we 
 have not all your consolation, Money." 
 
 ** Aye, aye ! " said the old man, fretfully, in his j, 330. 
 queer provincial dialect. " All very well; but 
 there's not much comfort in it now, Sokrates.' 
 
 *' Well, it has lifted you above temptation, 
 anyhow." 
 
 *' Yes, that's something. If I'd a-bin a poor 
 man, now^ I might ha' thieved, and that would 
 have made things black for me when I came to 
 die. Thank God, I've always had the means 
 to be respectable and to do right ! ' ' 
 
 *' But what is this Doing Right, now, i. 331. 
 Kephalus? Eather a puzzle, when you come 
 to think it over! " 
 
4 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 ** Don't you begin botherin' me wi' your 
 silly questions, Sokrates. I've got my work to 
 do. Polemarchus will no doubt be glad of 
 you an' your puzzles — he brought the lot o' 
 ye here. I'm goin'." 
 
 *' Oh," said Sokrates, taken aback by this 
 frankness, but covering his surprise with a 
 jest ; * * so Polemarchus inherits the argu- 
 ment ? " 
 
 '* He'll inherit that, and bequeath more 
 arguments than real property," retorted 
 Kephalus. ** I'll leave ye to it. I have a 
 service to hold, and no time to waste list'nin' 
 to a pack o' rubbish." 
 
 And out he pottered, not without a certain 
 air of having the best of it. 
 
 Sokrates lost no time in pulling the situation 
 together. *' Come, now, heir to the discus- 
 sion," said he; and Polemarchus (a knowing 
 imp) stood up with his hands behind his back, 
 like a school-child about to be catechized. 
 '' What mean you by this word Right? " 
 
 '' Simonides saith," replied the boy, ** that 
 it means speaking the truth and yielding to 
 every man his due." 
 
 *'To know the truth," said Sokrates, '* is 
 certainly Right; but, whether it be always 
 
MYSTERY OF THE UNDUE DUE. 5 
 
 right to tell it seems to depend on the second 
 half of the definition. So we will consider 
 what things are due.'" 
 
 '' What do you mean by Due ? '' inquired 
 Thrasymachus ; but Plato, who goes in for 
 decorum, said '*Hush!" Sokrates turned a 
 reproving eye upon the interrupter, and then 
 (Plato not being in its field of vision) 
 winked it. 
 
 ** Now,'' he went on; *' is a borrowed 
 weapon due to the owner, Polemarchus ? ^ 
 
 *' Hobviously," said the boy, who had often 
 heard that answer given in the Athenian 
 market-place. 
 
 ' ' But supposing the owner to go mad ; 
 would it then be right to hand him back the 
 weapon ? " 
 
 *' It would depend on who made him mad, 
 
 ** Answer * No ' ! " whispered Plato im- 
 patiently ; and Sokrates proceeded as if the 
 boy had said it. 
 
 ** It would not be right. Yet a man always 
 has a right to what is his due, and his due 
 a weapon borrowed from him certainly is. 
 What do you call such a piece of reasoning 
 as this ? " 
 
 I.33J. 
 
6 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 '' Tommyrot/' said the catechumen. 
 
 ' * No, a Paradox ! ' ' exclaimed Plato in a 
 pained whisper. 
 
 ' ' A Paradox — ^true ! ' ' pursued the cate- 
 chizer, staring over Thrasymachus's head. 
 '* And is not a Paradox the best weapon to 
 borrow when you want to paralyze brains 
 in danger of being infected with crass 
 materialism ? " 
 
 The boy, taking a long breath and looking 
 at the ceiling, said, " So I should be disposed 
 to imagine." 
 
 Sokrates proceeded: ** To return to 
 Simonides and his definition : — If a man is a 
 physician, a skipper, a shoemaker, or what- 
 not; does the yielding of dues make him better 
 at the doctoring, seafaring, shoemaking, or 
 whatever it is ? '* 
 
 Polemarchus said he didn't think the man 
 would be a skipper very long if he neglected 
 to pay the dues; but Sokrates, with Plato's 
 evident approval, waved this aside as a 
 puerility. 
 
 '' The answer I'm groping for," said he, 
 
 *' may be thus extracted : Will you not admit 
 
 1. 383. that physic or navigation or any other art may 
 
 be as well performed by the most unrighteous 
 
SOKRATES REASONS FOR PLATO. 7 
 
 blackguard as by a good man like me ? " 
 
 "Certainly I will." 
 
 " My preferability would only appear when 
 the question was of whom to trust with a loan, 
 would it not ? " 
 
 Polemarchus measured his words : ' ' It 
 would not appear until then, Sokrates." 
 
 ' * Good boy ! You may lend me a trifle 
 presently. But — while I have your money or 
 anything else you may lend me, you can't use ^ 
 it; and, in so far as I use it up, I shall be, 
 qua borrower, unable to exercise my honesty 
 and righteousness in regard to it ? " 
 
 '*Too true! " 
 
 '* Therefore Eight, on your Simonidetic 
 definition, is a thoroughly useless thing ? '' 
 
 '* If you. like to put it that way." 
 
 '* Moreover, my dear child, a man skilful 1-334. 
 in the practice of giving people their dues 
 will be necessarily as well acquainted with the 
 practice of withholding the same. For instance, 
 an expert in guarding treasure would ipso facto 
 be an expert in stealing treasure. Every expert 
 labours in the field of his expertness ; therefore 
 a righteous, or honest, man, is a sort of a kind 
 of a thief. What do you make of that ? " 
 
8 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 '*I can't tell you offhand, but I think it's 
 going to be called the Fallacy of the Undistri- 
 buted Middle Term." 
 
 Sokrates, conveniently deaf, took up his 
 parable again: *' I'm afraid Simonides was 
 a bit of a poet, and a tarradiddler. Now, if, 
 instead of Due (which implies a previous 
 borrowing), he had said Appropriate " 
 
 Plato emitted a vocal breath of approbation. 
 
 ** As you say, Hah! But we will go one 
 step farther. Shall we err greatly if we 
 asseverate that conferring benefits is appro- 
 priate when dealing with our friends; and 
 conferring injuries, when deaHng with our 
 enemies ? " 
 
 *' Not much.'' 
 
 ** Now, is anything or anybody made better 
 by being injured ? " 
 
 Polemarchus looked wistfullv at Plato, and 
 at length said ''No." 
 
 *' No," assented Sokrates, ''the effect is 
 uniformly worsening. Is it right to improve 
 people and things, and wrong to make them 
 worse ? " 
 
 " Thus I have been taught to believe." 
 
 " Then it is wrong to injure our enemies, 
 though we have already said it was right ? '' 
 
A NASTY RUDE MAN. 9 
 
 ** Another paradox, I presume." 
 
 *' I believe you, my boy! Paradoxically, 
 Simonides may be what the Athenians call 
 quite-all-right; but, for mere ordinary every- 
 day purposes of comprehension, he seems to 
 have landed us in a hole." 
 
 Thrasymachus suddenly towered. 1.336. 
 
 '* You bally old jackdaw! " he shouted. 
 *' Will you stop trying to corrupt that child's 
 mind ? Fooling of this kind is villainy, a 
 scoffing at true thought. Do a little thinking, 
 for his benefit and ours, and tell us how you 
 would define Right — without any question- 
 begging tautologies about the Fit, the Appro- 
 priate, and so on! " 
 
 The shocked expression on my elder 
 brother's face was comic. He has the thin 
 jocularity that goes down with the crowd, but 
 no real sense of humour. However, his angry 
 flush was quickly replaced by a sour smile; 
 and I knew he believed Thrasymachus to have 
 given himself away — for, like all dullards, he 
 regards calmness as the sure mark of wisdom. 
 He is not the only person who thinks philo- 
 sophy means good form. He has a stagnant 
 mind, and his ideal of human behaviour is 
 based on that of a marble statue. He immedi- 
 
10 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 ately posed for Pheidias : roll of parchment 
 in left hand; chin resting on right, supported 
 by corresponding elbow and knee. 
 
 i^^^ ** Easy, my dear chap!" said Sokrates, 
 
 more in earnest than usual: '* If you, or any 
 man, can give me a sound account of Right 
 and Wrong, I shall be proud to listen and learn. 
 You talk of question-begging; but can any 
 other kind of answer be given, for instance, to 
 the question, * What is twelve ? ' ? ' Three and 
 nine ' or * twice six,' or something equally 
 tautologous, is the only possible answer." 
 
 ** Yes/' eaid Thrasymachus ; *' that's the 
 way with universal abstractions. But Eight, 
 in the sense in which you have been taking it, 
 is a much more definite thing : it means a 
 whole class of actions; as distinguished from 
 another class of actions, called Wrong." 
 
 " True," said Sokrates, '' we are not con- 
 cerned at present with the Right that is merely 
 the Apposite, the apprehension corresponding 
 to the fact. But tell us now what this other 
 Eight, the standard of Eight Conduct, is." 
 
 All the company, except Plato, echoed, 
 •'Tell us!" 
 
 I- 333- *'The revelation I am about to make,'* 
 
 declaimed Thrasymachus with mock pomposity, 
 
PLATO BORED BY SOPHISTRY. H 
 
 '' is worth a stiff fee, but you shall have it 
 gratis. Eight in this sense, or Justice — which, 
 as a universal abstraction, merely denotes what 
 is fitting, proper, expedient (for some purpose 
 not specified) — means, in civic life, simply the 
 fluctuating interest of the stronger party. If 
 you are not satisfied with that, and want a 
 definition which is both definite and constant, 
 you jnust first be able to say exactly what is 
 the goal of universal life. How can you so 
 much as guess at what is universally fitting, 
 if you are ignorant of the universal aim to be 
 achieved ? If the end be my happiness, I may 
 with more or less certainty say what is right 
 or proper to be done to gain it; but it is quite 
 supposable that the universal purpose demands, 
 not only my misery and destruction, but the 
 downfall of Athens, and of Greece itself." 
 
 Very early in the period occupied by this 
 speech, Plato was yawning ostentatiously 
 behind his hand. 
 
 ''Do you mean," asked Sokrates, ''that 
 there is no reason or motive behind State 
 Justice, except the stronger party's interest;? " 
 
 '* Yes," said Thrasymachus ; and all of a 
 sudden my elder brother coughed. All turned 
 to him. 
 
 en. 
 
12 WHERE THE\\RGUMENT LED. 
 
 '*It will be granted, Sokrates," said Plato, 
 1-339 disdaining to address Thrasymachus, "that 
 governments sometimes make mistakes ? " 
 
 '' Granted," said Sokrates attentively. 
 
 *'And therefore, whatever their motive, 
 must sometimes give orders against their own 
 interest ? " 
 
 "H'mh'm!'' 
 
 ** And the people are bound, if they be law- 
 abiding and just, to obey these mistaken com- 
 mands, and so to act against the interest of 
 the government ? " 
 
 *' Without question," said Sokrates — 
 drowsily, as if entranced. 
 
 ** Wherefore," said Plato, booking 
 triumphantly round the room, * ' Justice or 
 Civil Right cannot be merely the will or interest 
 of the stronger! '* 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 '* The sophistical fabric . . . demolished." 
 
 Jowett's Introdadlion to the Republic. 
 
 k N awestruck silence followed, and Sokrates 
 IX arose. " 0, son of Ariston! " cried he 
 in trumpet voice, '* thou hast spoken! 
 Some people babble, others talk, a few argue; 
 but of one or two others it may be said that 
 their words are as the banging of the door on 
 hostile sophistry. Some men by painful 
 searching catch a glimpse of Truth; but unto 
 thee it cometh suddenly, as the splendid morn- 
 ing sun. The glory thereof is on thy massive 
 brow, rendering all opponents invisible, and 
 announcing that thy fame shall live as long 
 as he burneth in the sky. Let me embrace 
 thee, offspring of the gods, and assure my own 
 immortality! " 
 
 (13) 
 
 ^ 
 
14 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 And he did embrace Plato, looking first over 
 his left shoulder and then over his right — 
 whereat Polemarchus tittered, but Sokrates 
 froze him with a scowL 
 
 1.340. ''Of course," said Thrasymachus, looking 
 at Plato with some wonder, *' it is understood 
 that a governor, or any practitioner of any art, 
 in so far as he makes mistakes, does not 
 practice his art, and is not an artist therein. 
 A consistent practice of such mistakes as that 
 indicated would involve the government in 
 destruction, thus showing that they are not an 
 exercise of its proper function. " 
 
 ** It's too late to say that now, Thrasy- 
 machus," said Polemarchus, smiling sadly. 
 
 ** Speak for me, Plato," Sokrates entreated. 
 
 Addressing himself to the whole company 
 this time, to avoid contamination by direct 
 contact with the Chalkedonian, Plato inquired, 
 
 1. 341. * ' Will our excellent friend (who seems anxious 
 to change his ground) agree that the arts have 
 another purpose than their own highest per- 
 fection ? " 
 
 ** What the blazes is he talking about 
 now!" muttered Thrasymachus ; and, as 
 there was a general appearance of mystifica- 
 tion, Plato, curling his lip in scorn of Thrasy- 
 
SUCH LANGUAGE ! 15 
 
 machus's vulgarity, amplified: — "The healing 1.342. 
 art : has it for object the perfection of the 
 body, not merely the perfection of the healing 
 art and its professors? So of horsemanship. 
 And the commander of a ship : does he work 
 merely in the interest of his commanderhood ? 
 does he not also consider, and consider first of 
 all, the interest of the ship's company placed 
 under his command ? If I am right in con- 
 cluding that each art has thus some object 
 external to itself, then the motive of the ruler 
 of a State cannot be merely the ruler's own 
 interest, but must be the interest of the State, 
 must it not ? " 
 
 " Is there a nurse handy, to wipe this child's I-343- 
 nose ?" asked Thrasymachus in a disgusted 
 growl. '* I don't know what Polemarchus 
 meant by the felicity of unstipulated mealtimes, 
 but this argument is just like the one he gave 
 a name like that to. Because a genuine art 
 confers benefits on outside things or people, 
 ai-e we to conclude that everything you choose 
 to call an art is beneficial to outsiders? There 
 is robbery — that certainly has another object 
 than its own perfection : shall I be told that 
 it is therefore an art which benefits those on 
 whom it is practised ? The shepherd minds 
 
l(^ WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED 
 
 the sheep — temporarily, so long as consorts 
 with his own profit. Even the physician 
 demands a fee; the practice of his healing art 
 is, for him, only an inducement to his patients 
 to pay him fees." 
 
 *' Calling robbery an art,'* said Plato, "is 
 ridiculous, and I shall take no notice of that 
 point. The practice of the healing art benefits 
 the physician's patients and not himself; 
 therefore they pay him fees. A ruler is like- 
 wise remunerated, not by his ruling, but by 
 wages or salary; THEREFORE government 
 benefits the people ruled. Else they would not 
 pay for it." Plato folded his hands, and 
 closed his eyes, as if he had just dined. 
 
 Polemarchus then spoke : ' ' The victim's 
 appreciation of the injuries he receives by being 
 robbed may be measured by the unwillingness 
 with which he hands his purse to the robber. 
 We may therefore judge that benefits are 
 showered on peoples by their rulers, from the 
 fact that taxes are paid with punctuality and 
 enthusiasm by everybody." 
 
 '* Of course I" said Plato, in perfect good 
 faith. And he put the tips of his fingers 
 together and pursed his lips for an instant, as 
 if he wei e about to whistle. 
 
TAKE NO NOTICE OF HIM ! 17 
 
 Thrasymachus seemed anxious to leave, but 
 he made some random observations while 
 preparing to depart : * ' All this talk about 
 the happiness of the righteous and the ^-344- 
 wretchedness of the wicked is balderdash. 
 . . . Burglars and footpads — they've 
 wretched mostly, but that's because it's pretty 
 easy to find them out; the great advantage 
 of robbery by government is that there's little 
 likelihood of discovery "^if you're thoroughly 
 corrupt. By cunning laws you can arrange 
 the principles on which property may be 
 acquired and transmitted; so that it flows in 
 a constant stream, as it is produced, into what- 
 ever channels you think most suitable 
 And it all comes about so smoothly that people 
 think it's done by natural law and can't 
 naturally be otherwise — so that, even while it 
 hurts them, they think it's proper and ' right ' ; 
 and so that anv effort to establish another state 
 of things more comfortable to themselves 
 seems unnatural and ' wrong.' For them, 
 Right means That Which Is Unpleasant. For 
 the top dog (and he is the wise one), Right 
 means That Which Is Pleasant For Me . . . 
 And that's the only Right I'll acknowledge — 
 the highest happiness for Me ! . . . Even 
 
18 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 Aristides had his competence and fame; while 
 Themistokles — he suffered because he was 
 found out ! That profession of happiness m 
 a Right which is sheer renunciation : that sub- 
 mission to forces which are also Rioht in callincj 
 on me to renounce in their favour, is cowardly- 
 acquiescence in slavery, or else a mean toady- 
 ing pretence with ulterior motives. Its 
 panegyrists always end with some such induce- 
 ment as * he that humbleth himself shall be 
 exalted ' — thereby confessing that law-abiding 
 humility is misery, and successful pride 
 happiness I * ' 
 
 A good deal of this was lost by the company, 
 there being undertone duologues and whisper- 
 ing; indeed, I should not have particularly 
 attended to the tirade, but for observing that 
 every impatient motion of the speaker — the 
 plucking at sandal-thongs, the hitching of the 
 cloak over shoulders, and so on — was being 
 gravely watched by Sokrates. 
 
 ** Thrasymachus," he said quietly, *' don't 
 
 go- 
 
 '' No, old chap! don't go! " said everybody 
 
 — except Plato; and even he, who regarded 
 his rival as utterly crushed, appeared willing 
 that the vanquished foe should stay and be 
 
DECENT ORDER RESTORED. 19 
 
 improved. It was Plato who resumed the talk 
 after all had settled down again. 
 
 In many well-chosen words, my wonderful 11.358. IX. 
 brother persuaded us to admit — indeed, pre- 
 tended that Adeimantus and I had persuaded 
 him — that Doing Right is very well 
 remunerated, either here or hereafter : 
 thereby, I thought, estabhshing Thrasymachus's 
 case. He at length flatly denied that the 
 wickedness of the wicked paid them; and, 
 indeed, according to the description he had 
 given of the unjust, it seemed rash to predicate 
 anything whatever about them, for he described 
 a total impossibility — in fact, he denied the 
 possibility of a thoroughly unjust person 
 existing; as such a one, he said, would be 
 incapable both of co-operation (even for his 1.352- 
 own ends) with his fellow- villains, and of 
 consistency in his own actions from moment 
 to moment. Having reached this point by 
 the aid of complaisant answers from the com- 
 pany, he surprised us by announcing his n. 368. 
 intention of now proceeding to inquire what 
 Right or Justice was. It appeared topsy-turvy 
 to me : first disproving a statement about a 
 thing, incidentally denying the very epstence 
 
20 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 of its natural opposite (except as a kind of 
 shadow), and then beginning to settle what it 
 was he was talking about. Sokrates, however, 
 whispered to me in explanation, that it was 
 the most valuable qual"l;y of the poHcy of 
 following the argument blindly wherever it led, 
 that it enabled you to dispose of all objections 
 before you were even aware of the nature of 
 your subject : which course saved time ; since 
 everybody would have forgotten what the force 
 of the objections was, by the time you had given 
 your definition. Moreover, even if somebody 
 remembered an objection and brought it 
 forward then, the expounder of the definition 
 would be in order in refusing to reconsider 
 it. I saw the funny side of the affair; but 
 at the same time I was conscious of an alarmed 
 concern for Truth, when I thought what a 
 backing Plato's kind of argumentation must 
 be destined to receive from folk who, before 
 following the argument, had settled in their 
 own minds which way it was going to lead. 
 
 Meanwhile, in his search for Justice, Plato 
 was building up a model city. It was a strange 
 Republic that he constructed. I thought it 
 more like a re-creation of the universe than 
 a piece of statecraft; for, to my less philo- 
 
BROAD VIEWS. M 
 
 sophic mind, it had laws at war with all the 
 laws of nature that I knew. Yet he had not 
 quite the courage of a creator; for, whereas 
 he seemed at times to be despondent about 
 the prospects of his Eepublic's establishment 
 (or even the establishment of anything nearly 
 resembling it), he was candid in assuring us 
 that, if ever established, it could endure but 
 for a limited time. And that Eight, of which 
 he was so sure he had the patent : it was, upon 
 my honour, the most rickety thing in the world, 
 and needed every conceivable kind of shoring- 
 up with materials not usually held to be akin 
 to it. Lies, for instance, were a valuable 
 medicine or drug, to be retained in the hands 
 of the magistracy, and used whenever the 
 body-politic showed symptoms that demanded 
 drugging. I entirely agreed with Plato that 
 this need would occur and recur under his 
 system. He is a writer, and will probably 
 write for publication a selection from his 
 remarks ; but I cannot refrain from quoting 
 a passage in the conversation, which he may 
 not fully record,^ and his part in which seems 
 to me peculiarly Platonic. As follows : — 
 
 * Glaukon's prophetic soul was right, Plato didn't. 
 Only a few lines of the dialogue with Adeimantus that follows 
 are given in the Republic. 
 
22 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 III. 414. PLATO — Can we contrive any ingenious mode 
 of bringing into play a few of those seasonable 
 falsehoods of which we lately spoke ; so that, 
 propounding one or two spirited fictions, we 
 may bring even the rulers themselves, if poss- 
 ible, to believe such, or, if not them, the rest 
 of the city ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— What kind of fictions ? 
 
 PLATO — Some, of a standardized permanent 
 kind (I have one in my mind from Phoenicia, 
 which I'll tell you later); and some made to 
 special prescription for an emergency. 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— As how ? 
 
 PLATO — Suppose, for instance, our city to 
 be at war with an enemy so powerful that we 
 were obliged to seek the aid of other cities. 
 And suppose that, notwithstanding their aid, 
 there was a possibility of our city being taken 
 and destroyed, and that it was therefore most 
 desirable that our soldiers should fight as 
 desperately as if we stood alone — whereas many 
 of them were inclined to deem the enemy 
 already beaten, as it were, because of the many 
 cities arrayed against him. 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— I got you ! 
 
THE CONTEMPTIBLES. 23 
 
 PLATO— Well, then, how would this do ? 
 Somebody gets up in the market-place and says 
 he has just escaped from the enemy's camp, and 
 that while he was there he heard somebody say 
 that the king (of the city making war upon us), 
 in a letter to his captains concerning the cam- 
 paigns against the various cities, had mentioned 
 our city and our soldiers in terms of special 
 contempt, and had commanded that the captains 
 should fir^t of all trample us down — as if that 
 were an easy preliminary. Would not such an 
 account as this inflame our soldiers ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— You bet ! 
 
 PLATO — And now suppose this to become a 
 common report as of known fact; suppose that 
 our rulers, who have agents and spies in all 
 cities, have no report from any agent or spy 
 touching any such letter; suppose that, having 
 inquired into the matier, our rulers and their 
 counsellors can obtain no confirmation of the 
 story; and suppose that the king of our enemies 
 sends messengers everyhere to declare that he 
 never said or wrote anything of the kind : are 
 our rulers therefore under any obligation to tell 
 the citizens that the story is, so far as they 
 know, unfounded ? 
 
24 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— Not much! 
 
 PLATO — If our rulers should cast any doubts 
 upon the story told by the man in the market- 
 place (not to say go the length of calling him a 
 liar), would they not, in view of the danger of 
 which I have spoken, be guilty of treason to the 
 city ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— Nottawf ! 
 
 PLATO— And after all, in view of the 
 approach of our enemies against so many cities 
 at once, is it not obvious that, even if the words 
 alleged were never uttered by the king, anyway 
 he thought them, and that's just as bad ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— rent Ve rumbled it! 
 
 PLATO — And shall our conduct herein be all 
 the more praiseworthy if we indignantly resent 
 aU the lies which our enemies publish about us ? 
 and will it not be our duty to the State, and 
 therefore our highest duty, to inculcate in our 
 citizens that lying is a peculiar property of the 
 citizens of the hostile city and practically 
 unknown in ours ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— You talk like a blinkin' 
 encylopaedia ! 
 
NO CRASS MATERIALISM HERE. 25 
 
 PLATO — If we defeat the enemy eventually, 
 will not such a story, even if it should turn out 
 to be utterly untrue, have proved a valuable aid 
 to success : by reinforcing the physical strength 
 of our soldiers ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— It will that ! 
 
 PLATO — It will not, however, be an addition 
 to our physical force : it will not, that is to 
 say, give us a single additional soldier, sword, 
 or spear, or bow ; it will not better one of these 
 in actual strength? It will merely help us, as 
 it were, to extract the last morsel of physical 
 strength which each of these contains, by the 
 indignation which it excites in the breasts of the 
 men ?^ 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— Righto ! 
 
 PLATO— Now, suppose we had a name for all 
 forces that, while not physical themselves, re- 
 inforce our physical abilities, or rather draw 
 them out more completely than they could be 
 drawn out without such aid ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— Wot are you gittin' at 
 now ? 
 
 * For a curious modern instance of something like this, sec 
 Nelson's History of the War, by John Buchan, vol. I. p. 163. 
 
26 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 PLATO — Suppose we had, for these non- 
 physical means, a collective name ? suppose we 
 called them Moral Forces ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— Well, wot abaht it ? 
 
 PLATO — Then : Such a useful and even 
 necessarv Lie as we have been discussini^ — 
 should we not be obliged (however reluctantly, 
 and after making proper sacrifices to the gods 
 for any possible sin it may contain,) to classify 
 it as a Moral Force ? 
 
 ADEIMANTUS— Alas, yes! (You damned 
 sanctimonious humbug !) 
 
 The last words were inaudible to all but 
 myself. 
 
 It would take a big book to describe the 
 dance this argument led Plato, or Plato led 
 the argument, encouraged by Sokrates, through 
 the whole summer night. He deprecated most 
 of the things men delight in, and excluded 
 many of them from his commonwealth. 
 Thrasjrmachus stayed, but stayed silent : it 
 was evident that Plato thought him lucky in 
 hearing more wisdom at one sitting than he 
 had gathered in his whole life hitherto : the 
 Platonic voice became more thrasonical at 
 
A PIRi^AN NIGHT. 27 
 
 every ''Yes," "To be sure/' "Neatly put," 
 or "Entirely so" — Sokrates excelled himself 
 in the art of constructing eulogistic variants; 
 nobody was so ill-mannered as to raise the least 
 objection to the most monstrous assumptions; 
 it went on till supper, during supper, and after 
 that without a break till cock-crow, when it 
 ceased on account rather of the congregation's 
 inability to continue iterating Amen (if I may 
 use a Hebraism) than of any exhaustion on the 
 part 6f the preacher. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 "These old ideas take their place in all the freshness of 
 youth, side by side with the most recent." 
 
 — Honston CUamberUin's remarks on Plato, in Foundations of the 
 Nineteenth Century. 
 
 THRASYMACHUS came with us to the city; 
 Sokrates talking to him all the way. 
 Sokrates went home with me to my house 
 in the Asty, where we both slept imtil well 
 into the afternoon. Thrasybulus's visiting me 
 (he having heard where Sokrates was) caused 
 us to get up earlier than we should have risen 
 otherwise; and to him Sokrates imparted some 
 particulars of our intellectual debauch. 
 
 '* You remember, Glaukon/' said he, '* the 
 ' Ho ! ho ! ' with which Plato discovered his 
 Justice, hidden away in his model State ? " 
 
 *'Yes,'' said I, rather ashamed — not so 
 much, this time, of my brother's crookedness, 
 
 28) 
 
PARABLE OF THE DUMPLING. 29 
 
 as of the badness of his acting, which reached 
 its culmination in the * * Ho ! ho ! " 
 
 *'What point was that?" asked Thrasy- 
 bulus. 
 
 ** Why," said Sokrates, ** Plato surmised 
 
 that the weakness of our mental vision, 
 
 evidenced by our difficulty over the discovery 
 
 of Eight or Justice in individuals, might be 
 
 overcome by the help of a magnifying glass — " 
 
 *' No — larger writing! " said I. 
 
 . . . ".368, 
 
 *' Was it larger writing ? Oh, yes, so it 
 
 was ! This larger writing was to be found in 
 the Justice of States; so Plato built up his 
 State, carefully examined it, discovered Justice, iv. 432. 
 and said * Ho ! ho ! ' . . . I was going to 
 tell you a story it reminded me of. — In ancient 
 times there was a very foolish king, who 
 brought great disaster on the State he ruled; 
 and, being foolish in his youth, in his old age 
 he went mad. His physicians had him well 
 looked after; and he seemed to enjoy his food, 
 though he seldom spoke. He showed a fond- 
 ness for apple-dumplings : so they gave him 
 apple-dumplings pretty often with his dinner. 
 One day^, while he was eating one, he seemed 
 struck with an idea and with a wish to impart 
 it. A servant drew near; to whom he said, 
 
30 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 very slowly, ' It is a thing I can never under- 
 stand : how the apple gets inside the 
 dumpling!' " ^ 
 
 We waited, expecting more; but nothing 
 further came, except chuckles. 
 
 ** Your anecdote is not very apposite, 
 Sokrates,'' said Thrasybulus. 
 
 "Perhaps it vms an idle thought," said 
 Sokrates : still smiling at his story, however. 
 '' Yet I happened to think of it; and it also 
 struck me that the silly old king had some 
 excuse for wondering, for he had no hand 
 in making the dumpling." 
 
 ''We were all to blame there!" said I. 
 '* We allowed Plato to put in all his prejudices, 
 and to call it a just State. You, Sokrates, were 
 worst of all." 
 
 Sokrates, unabashed, fell into one of his fits 
 of silent chucklement. 
 
 *'Tell us about it, Sokrates! " said Thrasy- 
 bulus. "Summarize it!" 
 
 " Well, to strengthen my own memory, I 
 will try — with Glaukon's permission," said 
 Sokrates. 
 
 I assented. Sokrates began : 
 
 * Readers may be surprised to find this story so old. 
 
THE SICK CARPENTER. 31 
 
 *' The discussion was started by Thrasy- 
 machus, in the way I've mentioned. His sense 
 of humour is not equal to his sense of honour 
 — honour among thieves, I suppose Plato would 
 call it. I couldn't help embracing Plato after 
 his demonstration that Justice was not the 
 interest of the stronger : if I hadn't shouted 
 and thrown mv arms about, I should have ^one 
 into convulsions and hurt my inside. And I 
 could not resist the temptation to argue his 
 case for him on his own plane — for a while. 
 But he soon took it out of my hands, and 
 became dull, very dull. . . . Polemarchus's 
 point about patriotic joy in the payment of 
 taxes was a good one, though ! 
 
 '* But it is a curious thing," continued 
 Sokrates, "that Plato, after having instanced 
 the physician as being admittedly an artist 
 whose art is wholly for the benefit of its sub- 
 jects, later on said that 'when a carpenter is ill. 406. 
 Mil ... , he expects to receive a draught 
 
 * from his doctor, that will expel the disease 
 
 * by vomiting or purging, or else to get rid of 
 
 * it by cauterizing, or a surgical operation; but 
 
 * if anyone were to prescribe for him a long 
 
 * course of diet, and to order bandages for his 
 
32 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 * head, with other treatment to correspond, 
 
 * he would soon tell such a medical adviser 
 
 * that he had no time to be ill, and that it 
 
 * was not worth his while to live in this way, 
 ' devoting his mind to his malady, and 
 ' neglecting his proper occupation : and then, 
 
 * wishing the physician a good morning, he 
 
 * would enter upon his usual course of life, 
 
 * and either regain his health and live in the 
 
 * performance of his business, or, should his 
 ' constitution prove unable to bear up, death 
 
 * puts an end to his troubles.' And then, 
 Glaukon, you concurred; and, when Plato 
 asked whether the carpenter had a work to 
 do, which, if he failed to perform, it was not 
 worth his while to live, — ^you said * Mani- 
 festly ! '" 
 
 ^'I did.'' 
 
 ** So you see," Sokrates observed, ** that, 
 in the Republic founded on Plato's Justice, 
 even the benefit of the healing art is not 
 primarily for the subject or patient; but is for 
 the organized community, the State — to which 
 the carpenter is, in Plato's estimation, about 
 as important as a week's growth of toe-nail 
 is to an individual. 
 
 ** But," asked Thrasybulus a plain-minded 
 
SOKRATES GOES STEP BY STEP. 33 
 
 man, a member of the democratic party), 
 ** what, then, did Plato finally define Right to 
 be ?'' 
 
 '' In effect," said Sokrates, ** that which is 
 approved by Plato." 
 
 ** Surely, surely, Sokrates ! " cried I, in 
 brotherly expostulation. 
 
 ** I have merely followed the argument, 
 Glaukon," said he. ** Let me proceed in 
 Plato's own style. Did he not, after con- 
 structing his Just State out of materials 
 selected by himself and arranged according to 
 his own taste (for the alleged purpose of 
 discovering an absolute Right which he found 
 it difficult to isolate and discover in the indi- 
 vidual man) — did he not, after building up this 
 fabric, profess to discover that Right merely 
 means everybody minding his own business?" 
 
 '' He did." 
 
 *' But did he not (perhaps having in mind 
 Thrasymachus's caution against question- 
 begging, and perceiving that his definition 
 amounted to no more than saying that Right 
 means everybody doing Right), further explain 
 that * everybody minding his own business ' 
 means each man minding one business only and 
 never going outside it?" 
 
 IV. 433. 
 
34 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 '' He did. I remember his asking me if 
 there were not an essential difference between 
 the nature of a carpenter and the nature of 
 a doctor." 
 
 ' ' And you said ' Most decidedly ! ' — and, 
 
 V. 454. 
 
 happening then to catch my eye, you stared 
 at me without winking while I counted seven. 
 By which I saw that you perceived (what Plato 
 is resolved not to perceive) that there are 
 versatile men who can carpenter and doctor 
 with equal skill. Plato, believing that such 
 cases are apparent only, went on to tell us 
 how in such cases to decide which job is really 
 the job the man was intended for, did he not ? ' ' 
 
 " I do not remember." 
 
 *' Let me refresh your memory. Did he not 
 tell us that, of everything which our senses 
 apprehend with their inherent imperfectness of 
 apprehension (which he endeavoured to express 
 VII. (beg- by a laborious parable about a cave), there is 
 of).^'"^ a perfect pattern laid up in Heaven ? and did 
 he not postulate that, whether the thing in 
 question be something tangible like a Bed or 
 something intangible like Velocity, its Eight- 
 ness is in proportion to its conformity with 
 its heavenly pattern? " 
 
 '- I remember the Bed especially. But it 
 
 X. 597. 
 
 VII. 529. 
 
THAT BED. 35 
 
 was your illustration : I remember your supply- 
 ing him with that Bed. I thought you very 
 cruel." 
 
 ** Yes, I confess the Bed. It was dangerous, 
 but he swallowed the Bed. . . . Well. 
 Did he not make his statement so wide that we ^l-,5°7-509. 
 
 Also, III. 
 
 are clear as to his concluding that there exist 
 in Heaven — that is, in the unchangeable 
 appointment of the gods — a pattern physician 
 and a pattern carpenter : Essential Forms, 
 distinct and unmixable : and that no man can 
 conform to both patterns? " 
 
 *' That would seem to follow clearly from 
 his teaching." 
 
 *'And did he give us to understand that a 
 knowledge of these patterns is imparted by 
 a process which he called Dialectic; which 
 knowledge would of course enable the skilled 
 dialectician (and nobody else) to tell, in cases 
 of apparently dual nature, whether any parti- 
 cular man is really a doctor or really h 
 carpenter, despite his deceptive appearance of 
 being both ? " 
 
 ** He made the pronouncement you allege, 
 and your application of the principle seems to 
 be such as he would concur in." 
 
 '* Well, then, Glaukon! Did you thefenpon, 
 
36 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 in order to possess yourself of this ability to 
 distinguish the true doctor or carpenter from 
 the false ditto : this, the only criterion of Eight 
 and Wrong :— did you not ask Plato to explain 
 the method of Dialectic ? " 
 
 **I did/' 
 
 *' And what was Plato's answer ? '* 
 VII. 533- '*He said, *I should be only too pleased 
 
 to tell you, but you wouldn't understand me.' " 
 
 ** Implying his possession of the desired 
 knowledge. Then, does it not follow that if 
 you, or Thrasybulus here, want to know the 
 Right and the Wrong about anything, you will 
 be obliged to ask Plato every time '? ' ' 
 
 '' Not necessarily Plato." 
 
 *' Whom else? If another should profess to 
 employ this Dialectic, w^e should have no means 
 of telling whether he were capable or not, 
 except by the standard of Plato's judgment; 
 since his methods are totally hidden from us, 
 and his Essential Forms innumerable." 
 
 Here Thrasybulus chipped in: ** It's no use 
 your splitting hairs, Glaukon; Sokrates is 
 right for all practical purposes. We know 
 what's the matter with that big brother of 
 yours : aristocratic pride and priggish conceit. 
 
THRASYBULUS IS OPEN-MINDED. 37 
 
 . . . But look here, Sokrates ! I'm not 
 proud, and Fm willing to learn from my 
 opponents. We mustn't simply make fun of 
 Plato. It's evident to me that in claiming 
 that we have a mysterious innate sense of 
 Right and Wrong he's got hold of the right 
 end of the stick; and, as to his Dialectic or 
 whatever he calls it, I'll go so far with him 
 as to say that some people seem to have a 
 keener sense of Right than others. Just as 
 some people have a keener insight into geo- 
 metry than others — for I must say I was rather VL510. 
 struck by that analogy with the mathematics 
 which Plato drew and which you mentioned to 
 me before Glaukon came into the room. It 
 seems clear to me that our apprehension of 
 geometrical truth is not drawn from experi- 
 ence, and is far more perfect than anything 
 experience can teach." 
 
 *' I don't agree with you, Thrasybulus," 
 said Sokrates, decisively. *' But, unless we 
 are to lose sight of the main subject, we must 
 appoint another day to discourse of mathe- 
 matical truth, and how our knowledge of it is 
 drawn, like all our other knowledge, from the 
 experience of our senses." 
 
38 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 ** Very well, Sokrates," said Thrasybulus : 
 " another day." * « But as to this discovery 
 of Justice : maybe Plato really can work it 
 out by Dialectic, but I think there is a more 
 VII. 493. excellent way. There's the general sense of 
 Ijs"* 563' °^a^kin^ as to what is good for it. Of course 
 I know Plato derides that, and everything 
 deducible from experiment and observation." 
 
 **You ought to have heard him on that 
 point! " said Sokrates. And I said, 
 '' Rather! " 
 
 **Yet," continued Thrasybulus, **by his 
 continual appeal to us to say whether this, 
 that, or the other, is not universally judged 
 to be best, or worst — Plato, I claim, tacitly 
 allows that there is another way besides his 
 own : namely, a dim, rough-and-ready, 
 inaccurate, but extremely useful sense of Eight 
 and Wrong, possessed in some measure by all 
 men, though frequently at fault and per- 
 plexed." 
 
 ** I think you are right there, Thrasybulus," 
 said Sokrates. ** Otherwise the argument 
 
 * Though we are ignorant of what Sokrates may have said 
 on " another day '*, we are able to lay this plausible meta- 
 physical gh©st of Plato's raising, by reference to George Henry 
 Lewes's History of Philosophy, 4th ed. : Prolegomena, V. 
 (especially sections 68-74) i also the chapter on Kant, vol II., 
 pp. 478 & 479. 
 
us— THAT IS, THE STATE. 39 
 
 which Plato followed so industriously must 
 have been an argumentative solo." 
 
 *' Which it occasionally was," said I. 
 
 ** And," said Thrasybulus, "may not Plato 
 be found to mean the same as I ? May he not 
 mean — surely he must have meant ! — that, by 
 his ideal Justice, everybody's interest would be 
 safeguarded, everybody made as happy as he 
 could desire ? " 
 
 **By no means!" said Sokrates. '* At 
 first, indeed, I thought he was merely dis- ^^- '♦^°- 
 claiming partiality as between sections; but 
 it soon appeared that his principle necessarily 
 shut out people in general from all hope of 
 attaining — even prohibited their striving for — 
 complete fulfilment of their desires in this life. 
 He said it was the State that was to enjoy the 
 happiness; persuading or compelling the 
 guardians ' to study only how to make them- iv. 421 ; 
 selves the best possible workmen at their own vil.520. 
 occupation, and treating all the rest in like 
 manner; and thus, while the whole city grows 
 and becomes prosperously organized, permit- 
 ting each class to partake of as much happiness 
 as the nature of the case allows to it.' That 
 is the doctrine of Efficiency in Function. As 
 much happiness as is compatible with that, and 
 
40 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 no more. So we need not be surprised to find 
 V. 459, 461. that Plato advocates human stud-farms and 
 occasional infanticide.'* 
 
 *' And by what means, Sokrates," inquired 
 Thrasybulus, ** did Plato propose to persuade 
 the members of his commonwealth to the 
 sacrifice involved ? " 
 
 *' As to the rulers," Sokrates replied, ** he 
 V. 463-464 appeared to rely largely upon the nobility of 
 their nature, and the watch their communal 
 life would compel them to keep on each other. 
 But even as to them, and certainly as to the 
 ; III. 389, 414 commonalty, methinks he was wiser when he 
 proposed to tell lies and fables : about their 
 having been dug up out of the land, for 
 instance, and owing it filial allegiance. For, 
 as the mass of men join to form a State wholly 
 from self-interest, the only course likely to 
 succeed with the common herd must be to make 
 them forget why they have formed it." 
 
 ** Nevertheless," said Thrasybulus, '' it may 
 still be that what is best for the State would 
 also be the best way of securing the greatest 
 possible happiness for everybody. I don't 
 mean the infanticide, of course; nor yet the 
 stud -farms — it is not proved that they are good 
 for the State. Nor yet the measured neglect 
 
PLATONISM NOT DEMOCRATIZABLE. 41 
 
 of that carpenter's health. These may not be 
 for the good of the State. Well, then! Sup- 
 posing I'm right in this, and failing a constant 
 stream of infallible Platos, what better criterion 
 can we have than the Vote ? -' 
 
 *' This," said Sokrates, " has, oddly enough, 
 some support from Plato; for he left us to 
 infer the existence of his Justice in an 
 adulterated form in the government of States 
 as we know them in this world — of course 
 there would have been no point in contra- 
 dicting Thrasymachus if he hadn't meant that 
 the general sense of mankind as expressed in 
 State constitutions does somehow work in ax. 612. 613. 
 clumsy way toward righteousness. But then 
 you give up all idea of Right and Wrong as 
 absolute and eternal things ? " queried 
 Sokrates. ** Because appeal to the Vote 
 results in * Yes ' to-day and ' No ' to-morrow." 
 
 ** Yes — on unessentials. But not on the big 
 eternal questions." 
 
 ** That is to say, not on the questions which 
 are at the moment popularly regarded as big 
 and eternal ... I think on this line we 
 might argue for evermore and get nowhere. 
 We are in danger of forgetting that what we 
 are or were in search of is a sure touchstone 
 
42 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED, 
 
 of Eight, to set against the assertion of Thrasy- 
 machus that there is no such thing beyond the 
 will and interest of the stronger party for the 
 time being. Your touchstone, Thrasybulus, 
 in so far as it is a touchstone at all, does not 
 repudiate Thrasymachus, but rather establishes 
 his doctrine." 
 
 **What!" screamed Thrasybulus, ** estab- 
 lishes the vile doctrine of that Asiatic bar- 
 barian ! You say this to me, who ever strive 
 for justice and equality between man and man 
 without fear or favour! " 
 
 *' Whoso looketh no farther than the Vote 
 for his standard of Right," said Sokrates, 
 ** endorseth the doctrine of Thrasymachus. 
 . . . I'm afraid that's a platitude, if the 
 Vote is to be in reality the voice of the people. 
 But it's quite as true with a restricted franchise, 
 so long as there is power to maintain the 
 restriction. W^ould you have me take the word 
 of your slave as readily as I take yours ? " 
 
 *' Here, now! don't come it, old un ! " said 
 the democrat. " I was talking of men, and 
 you drag in slaves ! ' ' 
 
 *' Nevertheless, Thrasybulus," said my 
 master, *' a day will assuredly come when a 
 considerable part of the people will go the 
 
THE MEANING OF THE VOTE. 43 
 
 length of saying that a slave's word and judg- 
 ment are as good as his master's, and will 
 perhaps enfranchise all slaves." 
 
 *'0h, I say! " 
 
 ** Moreover, Thrasybulus, the very men who 
 will free the slaves will laugh to scorn the 
 notion proposed by some few of their contem- 
 poraries, that horses and cattle and other beasts 
 have as much right to live out their lives as 
 we have, and that it is only by constant use 
 of force and guile that we persuade ourselves 
 of our right to slay them." 
 
 In reply to this, Thrasybulus could only 
 throw himself back in his seat, and stare. 
 
 My master went on : * ' I judge of the future 
 by the past; and the past (with which, Thrasy- 
 bulus, you, as a popular leader, ought to 
 acquaint yourself) tells me that there is nothing 
 too odd to be done by mankind in its desire 
 for change and in its hatred of change. Be a 
 little before or after your age, and you will 
 have a time of it at the hands of the justice- 
 loving public." 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ** Base, sensuous, and sordid views of happiness and success.* 
 
 — International Encyclopcedia article on PUto, 
 
 iH, Sokrates ! " said Tlirasybulus ^dis- 
 l\ gustedly, '* where's your common- 
 sense? What's the use of poring 
 over musty history-books, and drawing myopic 
 conclusions, when the plain truth is visible, 
 to a clear unprejudiced eye, in the world 
 around us! Let the future be as you say as 
 to the slaves, or^ even as to the cattle : limit 
 the question for the present to justice betw^een 
 free Greek and free Greek; I stand to it that 
 the definition of Eight is Equality — there's no 
 question-begging about that anyway. And I 
 don't think we'll ever get nearer the absolute 
 eternal Eight than that." 
 
 (44) 
 
THE *' GREATEST HAPPINESS " TEST. 45 
 
 ** Your position, then," said Sokrates 
 steadily, *' is that the greater the sway of this 
 idea of equahty, the nearer we shall get to pure 
 eternal Eight ? '' 
 
 ** I don't see why we shouldn't/' 
 
 ** Then you probably think that, provided 
 the State could secure to every man (and 
 woman — Plato might add) an equal chance of 
 personal happiness : the thing which the part 
 of mankind that counts cares most for : the 
 less discontent there would be, and the more 
 firmly fixed would be the State — ^while, if we 
 managed to assure perfect equality, the State 
 would be fixed so firmly that nothing could 
 move it ? '^ 
 
 " Such is my faith," said the democrat. 
 ** Yes," he added after a pause, ** I believe 
 that perfect Justice would prove itself perfect 
 by being unshakable." 
 
 ** It's well you do," said Sokrates. '* Else 
 I should be at a loss to know, apart from 
 Plato's Forms, what you understand by per- 
 fection. . . . But I am anxious," ho 
 continued, leaning forward, '* to view your 
 position in the most favourable light; therefore 
 I will assume, with your permission, that your 
 State is world-wide, or at least that it will 
 
IX. 583-585 
 
 46 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 never have any foreign enemies. Do you agree 
 that this would make its position securer ? " 
 
 *' Yes. I imagine that every nation would 
 finally amalgamate with such a State." 
 
 ** I will waive all preliminary difficulties, and 
 consider the thing done," said Sokrates. 
 ** Now, I want to examine first Plato's guiding 
 principle and then yours, to see if they assimi- 
 late. I suppose you remember that, after 
 belittling Happiness as an end, Plato finally 
 proved that there is really no such thing?** 
 
 ** No such thing as Happiness! ** exclaimed 
 Thrasybulus. 
 
 ** Pleasure was the exact term used; but 
 Plato's argument disposed of Happiness in its 
 widest sense. Let me recall his wisdom : Did 
 he not, Glaukon, by reminding us that in a 
 state of pain we regard as pleasure the mere 
 absence of pain (which at other times would 
 not be so reckoned), conclude that pleasure 
 could be no real thing, since we sometimes 
 give its name to a state from which at other 
 times we should withhold that name ?'" 
 
 '' H*mh*m.'' 
 
 ** And is not Happiness in its widest sense 
 open to the same objection — if it be an objec- 
 tion ?'* 
 
A BIFURCATE BLUNDER. 47 
 
 *' Possibly. I will admit it for the sake of 
 argument/' 
 
 ''Plato would not be satisfied with that 
 answ,er, my lad; but I must make the best 
 of it. Well, is it not possible that Plato made 
 a bloomer here ? " 
 
 "It is remotely possible." 
 
 " Both here, and in another matter, Plato 
 may have made one and the same bloomer. 
 You remember how, when trying to show the 
 essential difference between just and unjust 
 actions, he stated that injustice could not be 
 consistent with itself '^; so that thieves, in 
 order to be successful in their joint thievery, 
 had to be honest with each other ? " 
 
 " Yes, he uttered that ineffable blether/' 
 said I. 
 
 "The reason being that your brother's n 38^.381 
 universe is a static universe, and he takes no 
 proper account of the direction of movements. 
 He is unable to see that a ship tacking is not 
 hesitating, but is taking the most direct way 
 possible. A party of thieves stealing have the 
 
 * Any readers of War and Peace who are not acquainted 
 with this Platonic theory are bound to be puzzled by the 
 anxiety Tolstoy displays in that novel, especially a propos of 
 the Battle of Borodino,' to prove that no Science of War is 
 possible. 
 
48 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 same object in stealing as they have in being 
 honest with each other : their actions are 
 perfectly consistent when you take their aim 
 into account; and their aim is not to be 
 * wicked ' or ' unjust,' but to acquire some 
 property in the easiest way.'* 
 
 **That/' said I, ''seems hobvious, as Pole- 
 marchus would say." 
 
 **So that Dishonesty, which Plato reckons 
 as Injustice, may bind men together, just as 
 does Justice according to Plato ? '* 
 
 ** Yes. He mentioned the binding together 
 as one of the marks of Justice or Right." 
 
 ** But, if Plato can allege that Injustice is 
 unreal by reason of its being inconsistent with 
 itself in this matter, may we not with propriety 
 maintain that Plato's Justice, in condemning 
 and punishing criminals, is equally inconsistent, 
 as it separates the criminal from his fellows as 
 completely as it can ? ** 
 
 " With the utmost propriety we may," 
 said I. 
 
 ** And that therefore, if consistency in every 
 detail (according to Plato's crude notion of 
 consistency) be the test of reality, his Justice 
 is as unreal as he alleged Injustice to be ? " 
 ** To be sure!" 
 
HAPPINESS IS ENCROACHMENT. 49 
 
 ** And may it not be that Happiness is 
 invisible to Plato because here again he is 
 somewhat blind to Movement and Direction? 
 You concur. Well, supposing Happiness to 
 be a movement in a certain direction, Unhappi- 
 ness would be either a standing still or a move- 
 ment in another direction? Let us proceed 
 with a guess : based, not on our inner 
 consciousness, but on our observation of the vi. 493 - 
 world, a thing Plato contemns. Let us ask : 532,' 537'. 
 How may we define the direction taken by this 
 movement of Pleasure or Happiness? May we 
 define it as an Encroachment ? '* 
 
 '' Expound.'' 
 
 *' When the tide is rising, or the stream 
 increasing in volume, it encroaches on the dry 
 land. When the tree grows, it encroaches on 
 the surrounding space above-ground, and on 
 the surrounding earth by its roots. So with 
 the growing child. The waters feed the stream 
 and the sea; the earth and the air feed the 
 tree; various meats feed the child and become 
 part of him, so that he is larger and heavier 
 and stronger at the expense of other things. 
 The things by which the child grows satisfy 
 him, and (as we say) make him happy. If he 
 ^ets indigestion, or dropsy, it is because his 
 
50 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 meat and drink are not absorbed by his living 
 self: they remain for a time in him but not 
 of him. What he loses of his food, and of 
 the matters that form part of him, must be 
 replaced, or the child reaches that unhappy 
 state called starvation — no matter how much 
 he may have eaten previously. Other things 
 also make him happy : first toys, then other 
 possessions such as weapons; until he becomes 
 a man; when, his bodily growth ceasing, he 
 extends himself in yet other ways, by appro- 
 priating a house, a wife, children, and so on. 
 Even should he never set up house or marry, 
 he still desires to make something his own, be 
 it only the knowledge that Plato commends. 
 For, in the acquirement of knowledge, a man 
 does in a sense add to himself something of the 
 things he gets to know about : the poems of 
 Homer, the stars, distant lands — all belong to 
 him in such measure as he knows them. Do 
 I strain your credulity at all ? " 
 
 '*Not yet, Sokrates,'' said Thrasybulus. 
 
 ** But I may, shortly. I would ask you, 
 however, in regard to these encroachments 
 made by the man outside his body and without 
 their increasing its bulk — do they not bear a 
 strong resemblance to his bodily food in this 
 
THE WHY OF THE PHYSICARPENTER. 51 
 
 respect : that they do not satisfy once and for 
 all, but must be taken continually, on pain of 
 dissatisfaction and unhappiness? What makes 
 a man happy? — The sense that he counts foi 
 more in the world than he counted yesterday. 
 Is he ruler over one city ? — He aspires to ten 
 cities. Has he made ten thousand drachmas £ 
 — He would like a million. Has he succeeded 
 in clearing a plethron of land around him '?— 
 He wants a schoinos square. Has he ten 
 children? — Give him the means of having a 
 hundred. Has he become the foremost 
 physician in the town ? — It may be essential 
 to his happiness that he become the foremost 
 carpenter also. Happiness, in short, is growth, 
 and the conditions of Happiness are unlimited 
 room to swell and continual power to do so.* 
 Those who without pain see their possessions 
 depart from them : are they not always men 
 who either did not amass those possessions or 
 made no effort to amass — their happiness lying 
 in other kinds of growth or encroachment ? ' ' 
 
 ** I think you're right," said I. Thrasybulus 
 held his peace, and looked suspicious. 
 
 ** Man's body requiring space, however, man 
 
 * A similar idea is expressed in Samuel Butler's Luck or 
 Cunning ? 
 
52 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 is on the whole a devourer of space and its 
 contents. But besides that, all men are greedy 
 of Time.'' 
 
 Of which ? " said the suspicious one. 
 *' Of Time," reiterated Sokrates. "Man, 
 having but a short life before him, does all 
 he can to make it longer. He begets children, 
 who are largely himself; not only that he may 
 possess them and have their services while he 
 lives, but that they may continue his existence 
 upon earth after he is dead. He that has no 
 children seeks immortality in the minds of 
 posterity, called Fame. The insatiable hunger 
 of man, which as regards spatial affairs is 
 disputed by some, is indisputable as regards 
 this other dimension, wherein there is scarce 
 a man that will rest content with anything short 
 of eternity. Witness the passionate desire for 
 the boon of personal immortality, perhaps 
 strongest in those who have (as it were) 
 renounced space and its contents : a boon 
 which Plato made so comical an effort to assure 
 to them." 
 
 *' You mean," said I, '* when he said that 
 X. 608-611. because Crime, the disease of the soul, does 
 not kill the man, nothing can kill him — not 
 even Death." 
 
" CRIME " AN ARBITRARY TERM. 53 
 
 ** All werry pritty ! '' said Sokrates. " But, 
 ff conventional Justice be nothing more than 
 the protection of their interests by the stronger 
 (and, apart from Plato's Essential Forms, we 
 don't yet know what else it is), then Crime is 
 possibly not the disease of the soul, but merely 
 an elementary form of natural acquisitiveness 
 — using that wide term to denote the appetite 
 for Space and its contents. What we call 
 Crime would then seem to be merely part of 
 those manifestations of growth which must 
 always threaten established conditions, which 
 render the permanence of any State constitu- 
 tion impossible, and which make every settle- 
 ment of every State question necessarily a 
 temporary compromise. . . . It is absurd, 
 I think, to consider Ci'ime as a specific disturb- 
 ance of a man's natural inward harmony, as 
 Plato considers it. Why ! I have known a 
 murderer, too brutal and ignorant to be dis- 
 turbed by fear of the law's vengeance, being 
 found in a peaceful slumber beside the corpse 
 of his victim! The soldier, too, who is merely 
 a murderer relieved by warlike custom from 
 fear of punishment and disgrace — " 
 
 *' Reserve that point for another day," 
 said I. 
 
54 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 " — has no qualms about killing and plunder- 
 ing his enemies : as Plato tacitly admitted, I 
 think, as regards barbarian enemies/' 
 
 ** But what are you driving at, Sokrates ? ' 
 asked Thrasybulus. "Have you forgotten 
 what you were going to argue about' ? That 
 would be as bad as Plato's arguing first and 
 then finding out what he had been arguing 
 about/' 
 
 ' ' I have not forgotten, Honest Friend ! But 
 I was thinking of Plato's theory of harmony 
 within the individual, which he made the basis 
 of the harmony or Justice of the State. For, 
 if this theory of separate compartments in the 
 soul, either in or out of harmony with each 
 other, be false, then Plato's definition of Justice 
 JV. 435-437. Qr Right is by his own confession smashed, 
 and nothing remains of State Justice except 
 that outward show of harmony stigmatized by 
 Thrasymachus as the prevalence of the will 
 of the stronger. That is why I brought in the 
 murderer. . . . We will postpone con- 
 sideration of your democratic State and its 
 Justice, until we have further examined this 
 theory of internal harmony in man." 
 
 *'Go ahead, then," said Thrasybulus; '' I'll 
 remind you of it again." 
 
PLATO DIVIDES US UP. 55 
 
 *' This harmony of the soul," resumed 
 Sokrates, *' Plato conceived to be nearly akin 
 to his Social or State Justice, and as being most 
 likely to be found in those who are socially 
 just; because this internal calm seems to Plato 
 to result from each department of the soul 
 attending to its own business and not trying 
 to usurp the functions of the other two. For 
 he divided the soul of man, as well as the 
 State, into three watertight compartments : the 
 Appetitive or animal-desire part, the Spirited 
 or manly-courageous part, and the Eeasoning jy ^ 
 part. He laid it down that ' we learn with one 
 internal faculty, become angry with another, 
 and with a third feel desire for all the pleasures 
 connected with eating and drinking.' He based 
 this division upon such phenomena as that jy 
 * people are sometimes thirsty and yet do not 
 wish to drink ' — from which he concluded 
 that there is a war between the Appetitive 
 principle and the Eeasoning principle inside 
 us. The Spirited principle was also supposed 
 to struggle often against the Appetitive prin- vi. 439- 
 ciple : as when somebody goes to see dead 
 bodies of executed criminals, although he is 
 disgusted and unedified by the sight. Thrasy- 
 machus would have another explanation of the 
 
56 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 phenomenon of people doing that which they 
 profess to dislike and which they confess to 
 be theoretically wrong: he would call it 
 hypocrisy. He would also point out that the 
 Social Justice of Plato, which prohibits inter- 
 ference with the goods and bodies of other 
 persons, is absent from the make-up of many 
 people who are characterized by the utmost 
 internal harmony and calm — and who ought 
 therefore to be classed among the just men, 
 
 VI. 435-441 
 
 we may presume. And, as to not drinking 
 when you are thirsty : Thrasymachus would 
 say there is no subduing of any carnal appetite ; 
 on the contrary, if we refrain from drinking 
 when thirsty, it is in order to avoid something 
 distasteful to the carnal appetite — ^namely, the 
 pains of the flesh in this world, or the tortures 
 of hell in the next." 
 
 ** Carried unanimously!" said I. 
 
 '* Far be it from me," said Sokrates, ** to 
 prevent any gentleman cutting up his soul to 
 please himself; but, when Plato tells me that 
 my soul falls naturally into three parts, I reply 
 that it would fall into about three million with 
 power to add to their number — all of them, 
 however, reducible to terms of physical 
 appetite; whose simplicity or complication is 
 
RESULTS OF SELF-SUBDUAL. 57 
 
 my courage or cowardice; and the perfection 
 or imperfection of whose record of success and 
 failure constitutes my reasoning part, my 
 wisdom or folly. Plato bolstered up his theory 
 of the separateness of his three ' principles/ 
 on which separateness his whole theory of iv. 437. 
 Justice depends, by appealing to popular pre- 
 judice as embodied in the phrase about a man j^ 
 being ' master of himself ' ; asserting that this 
 denotes a defeat of the lower or animal self 
 by the higher or intellectual : whereas * master 
 of himself ' is a misleading phrase, denoting 
 merely an environment favourable to placidity. 
 No man was ever * master of himself ' during 
 a bout of neuralgia, and every man is ' master 
 of himself ' so long as he sees his way clear 
 to what he wants. So that the phrase is as 
 bad in the sense in which Plato used it as 
 in the sense which he decried. . . . When 
 you wisely regulate your appetites, you do so 
 in the interest of the appetites; but when you 
 mortify your appetites (which seems to be \?;x'^^^' 
 Plato's idea of the office of the intellect), the ix. 581 
 only result is that you become the minister 
 of the appetites of the more selfish members 
 of the society you live in. — So I imagine 
 Thrasymachus might reason." 
 
 582. 
 
58 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 '* Do you put it all on Thrasymachus in 
 order to get out of justifying your attack upon 
 the poor soldier ? " said I. 
 
 **I did not attack the poor soldier/' s^id 
 Sokrates. *' I explained the poor murderer/' 
 
 ** Celestial spheres! " said I. 
 
 ** And the only harmony within the indi- 
 vidual," continued Sokrates energetically, '' is 
 the harmony for purposes of personal defence 
 and aggrandizement. Every beauty of face 
 and figure and limb and mind is a fitness for 
 combat. The very definition of disease and 
 imbecility is impotence in struggle : repulsive 
 and contemptible to om- instincts; while such 
 terms as * wicked ' and ' saucy ' are on the 
 contrary used in approbation." 
 
 **They are!" said I. 
 
 ** But that's only in fun!" murmured 
 Thrasybulus disconsolately. Sokrates was evi- 
 dently going a great deal too fast for him. 
 
 ** I am now coming," said the sage, '' to 
 your democratic State, Thrasybulus : your 
 State which has secured to all its members the 
 opportunity of being happy. There the Happi- 
 ness of All is the reason and end of the con- 
 stitution. In Plato's philosopho-aristocratic 
 State, nobody's happiness is considered as an 
 
AN UNSTABLE PERFECTION. 59 
 
 end : the stability of the constitution is the aim 
 of the constitution — if that which is drawn 
 strictly according to a Heavenly Form can be 
 said to have any earthly aim/' 
 
 ** And yet," said I, '* though Plato seemed 
 to be for subordinating everything and every- 
 body to the State's welfare — which I suppose 
 to mean freedom from the ailments of which 
 States die — he prophesied that even the perfect vili. 546. 
 State must come to an end, notwithstanding 
 that no forces but internal ones are at work 
 upon it/' 
 
 '' What right had he to call it perfect, 
 then ?" asked Thrasybulus, rather stupidly. 
 
 ** Because," said Sokrates, ** it was all 
 according to the proper Form." 
 
 *' If the thing must eventually collapse," 
 said Thrasybulus, '* and if for its establishment 
 it can hold out no more dazzling inducement 
 than the attainment by everybody of Efficiency 
 in some special Function to which he will be 
 rigorously restricted, why sacrifice so much for 
 this perfection of the copyist ? " 
 
 **To please Plato," said I. 
 
 *' Now /," said Thrasybulus, ** call viy State 
 perfect because it secures for the people perfect 
 happiness — and that includes permanent 
 
VIII. 56i. 
 
 60 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 security. Of course in practice we could only 
 approximate that; but I think it stands to 
 reason that, as, with happiness placed within 
 the reach of all, the State must endure for 
 ever (if not attacked from outside) — so, with 
 almost everybody almost perfectly satisfied, the 
 State must endure for ... an indefinite 
 period. On the whole, seeing that Plato's 
 model Republic by his own admission must of 
 its nature decay, and seeing he admits also 
 that under a Democracy while it lasts we shall 
 probably be very happy, my Republic has more 
 commonsense than Plato's about it, don't you 
 think?'* H^ 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 *The tale, . . . preserved, . . . may also preserve ui, if 
 we will listen to its warning." 
 
 — Concluding paragraph of the Republic. 
 
 SIR! " said Sokrates with eruptive force, 
 '* I do not ! I think the Republic of 
 Plato infinitely more commoji sensible 
 than yours! "" 
 
 Thrasybulus faltered '' Why ? '' 
 *' Because (to begin with), his, purposeless 
 as it is from the point of view of everybody 
 except the ruler, could be brought about, by the 
 means he suggested ; lying to the people, and 389^ 414; 
 cajoling them. It would probably work as well *'^^^' 
 as any other State; that is to say, very badly 
 indeed. Yours, on the other hand, is an imposs- 
 ibility. That is why, instead of asking how 
 
 (61) 
 
62 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 you propose to establish it, I am ready to 
 assume that it is estabUshed : as geometers sup- 
 pose impossibihties done, for the purpose of 
 showing their impossibihty. Your State, we'll 
 say, is established, and everybody is perfectly 
 happy. Or, something like your State is estab- 
 lished, and practically everybody is reasonably 
 content. It could not, either now or in any age, 
 endure for a day; because Happiness is an 
 individual encroaching or growth, and Unhappi- 
 ness a stoppage of that growth." 
 
 ** You mean," said I, '*that the happiness 
 of one man must encroach upon the happiness 
 of others, and that therefore one man's happi- 
 ness is another man's misery? But have you 
 forgotten that, in the case of the happiness 
 which consists in increase of knowledge, there 
 is no encroaching on anybody else's sphere, 
 and that all men may grow happy simul- 
 taneously if they are willing to limit the satis- 
 faction of their physical desires and to encroach 
 only on the boundless domains of wisdom ? 
 
 I said this because Thrasybulus was hesi- 
 tating whether to accept the doctrine of En- 
 croachment or not, and the discussion seemed 
 in danger of coming to a sudden and unsatis- 
 factory end. Thrasybulus now turned to 
 
UNREWARDED WISDOM NO HAPPINESS. 68 
 
 Sokrates and asked him what he had to say 
 to that — meaning my objection. 
 
 * ' I have this to say, ' ' replied Sokrates : 
 " that if Glaukon imagines that men pm'sue 
 knowledge with so disembodied a mind that 
 they will be happy in a joint acquirement of 
 wisdom, he is less a man of the world than I 
 took him for. Nearly every man who follows 
 after knowledge expects at least to be relieved 
 of other irksome labour — that is, he expects 
 to be kept by others, like an aristocrat; and 
 the rivalry among learned men is largely com- 
 petition for this limited privilege. Even apart 
 from that, however, there is decided dissatis- 
 faction in getting to know only those things 
 which all others are getting to know — such 
 learning as that is a labour and not a happi- 
 ness : like the toilsome learning to read, which 
 nobody would ever go through if it were not 
 expected to lead to success of a more particular 
 and personal kind. If nothing more solid is 
 desired. Fame is desired, and the supply of 
 Fame is permanently limited.* But all this 
 is really beside the point; for we are talking 
 
 * Vide, e.g., Flamstced's quarrels with Newton, and 
 Newton's with Leibnitz. 
 
64 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 about a State where ^ the happiness of all is 
 considered, and to limit the encroaching desires 
 of all men to intellectual pursuits is an im- 
 possibihty." 
 
 " How so ?*' demanded Thrasybulus. 
 ** Let us enter into particulars/' said 
 Sokrates. *' In your State, Thrasybulus, every 
 man is assured a competence : he must do a 
 certain amount of work periodically for the 
 good of the commonwealth; in return for 
 which he has a sufficient house, garden, and 
 furnishings — lands for his support, or else a 
 ration of food and raiment. He will be ex- 
 pected, if married, to have so many children 
 and no more; because, all being well fed and 
 looked after by physicians, and freed from 
 untoward and excessive labour, nearly all will 
 add profusely to the population, which will 
 thus tend rapidly to increase." 
 
 *'I don't know about that! " said Thrasy- 
 bulus. 
 
 *' But I do! '' said Sokrates. " For (with- 
 out the continued help of some god, which is 
 tacitly ruled out of our discussion, because with 
 a god's help anything is possible), you could 
 never prevent the risk of some rebel insisting 
 on bringing more than his allotted quota of 
 
WHY SAINTS ARE PRAISED. 65 
 
 children into the world, and resorting to 
 violence in order to maintain them." 
 
 *' Oh, be sensible! '' exclaimed Thrasybulus. 
 ** When the great bulk of example is in the 
 direction of reasonable self-control, what cause 
 have we to fear a throwback here and there? 
 Do not nearly all men even now commend self- 
 denial, though they are remiss in its practice? '' 
 
 ** I think you misunderstand the force of 
 example," said Sokrates. *' It compels praise 
 when it is in the nature of self-denial; it 
 compels following when it is in the nature of 
 self-indulgence. Pure self-denial (sometimes 
 hypocritically called self-control), for which 
 some people have an unhealthy appetite, is 
 commended by most men, because, though 
 they never intend to practise it, it is to their 
 interest that others should." 
 
 **You believe," said Thrasybulus, ** that 
 the popular tributes paid to the virtue of self- 
 control are insincere ? " 
 
 "I do," said Sokrates. "Far more 
 popular, as examples to follow, are the daring 
 and the spunky. Suppose, in your State, some 
 very virtuous people should decide to exercise 
 even more self-control than that to which the 
 law binds them — to have fewer children, for 
 
66 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 example, in order that those born may have 
 more room and more attention ? " 
 
 **Well?^' 
 
 '* These people, I have no doubt, would be 
 highly commended by their fellow-citizens; 
 who would nevertheless breed at the customary 
 rate, or probably at a slightly higher rate ; with 
 the result that the people commended for exer- 
 cising self-control would remain a small and 
 diminishing number. Whereas, the example 
 of one throwback arising and insisting on his 
 natural fecundity, would stimulate others to do 
 likewise in mere self-defence and to prevent 
 the blotting-out of their names. ... In 
 short, the more self-control is exercised, the 
 higher is the natural premium on self-indul- 
 gence. That's why your scheme won't work. 
 The vitality of the creed of Self-Control lies 
 in its being to every man's interest to inculcate 
 this mortification in the breasts of others, and 
 it seizes upon the minds of weaklings like fire 
 upon tinder." 
 
 " Sokrates," said Thrasybulus, ** you ought 
 to remember your own dogmas. If people in 
 general commend self-control because they do 
 not wish to follow it themselves but desire all 
 otHers to follow it, they will condemn in others 
 
THE STATE WAS MADE FOR MAN. 67 
 
 that self-indulgence which they themselves 
 would wish to practice. Do you think they 
 would not enforce the law against those throw- 
 backs — perhaps to the extent of killing the 
 superfluous and illegally-born children ? " 
 
 '* Commendation of self-control," said 
 Sokrates, would entail condemnation of self- 
 indulgence, if it were a sincere commendation. 
 But it is, whether consciously or unconsciously, 
 insincere. So that if the self-indulgence we are 
 speaking of were prohibited, so general would 
 be the offence taken, that, on the first attempt 
 to enforce the law, there would be a revolt, 
 and the State would be destroyed — not through 
 collective solicitude for the race, but through 
 each rebel's faith and pride in his own line of 
 descent. Why should strong men, on whose 
 support the existence of a prosperous State 
 depends, consent to maintain it, if it offers no 
 profit on their outlay of effort, over and above 
 what they might reasonably expect from their 
 personal efforts if no State existed ? It is 
 possible that the State gets along all the better 
 for the existence of some who offer thoroughly 
 disinterested devotion to its interest; but the 
 profit of that too would be lost if there were 
 no selfish people to take advantage of it." 
 
68 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 **Yet/' said Thrasybulus, " mutual r.r.self- 
 ishness is a very beautiful, and surely a bene- 
 ficent, thing ? " 
 
 '* An appearance of mutual unselfishness,'' 
 said Sokrates, '* is a very decorative thing, and 
 possible in a small party whose wants are sup- 
 plied from without; but the total membership 
 of a self-supporting State can no more derive 
 a net advantage from their mutual unselfishness 
 than they can live by taking in each other's 
 washing." * 
 
 " Sokrates! " said Thrasybulus in a shocked 
 whisper, *' if you go on like this, you'll come 
 to a bad end. Athens will never stand 1 1 ! " 
 
 *' Dear me!" said the master, smiling. 
 ** And I thought I was getting platitudinous 
 again! . . . But perhaps they do execuie 
 people for uttering platitudes in an unfamiliar 
 form! " 
 
 There was a short pause for meditation here. 
 It was ended by Thrasybulus : 
 
 ** After all, why should we try to set bounds 
 to the population? The world is wide : why 
 shouldn't we breed as fast as we like ? The 
 more the merrier! " 
 
 '' We should certainly have to spread out," 
 
 * This has a flavour of Buckle's History of Civilization. 
 
THE POPULATION BOGEY. 69 
 
 said Sokrates, " beyond the bounds of Greater 
 Greece, even. And, admitting barbarians into 
 your commonwealth, I don't see how you can 
 forbid them the same privilege in their own 
 lands. We know not how large the world is; 
 but we know that, the farther we go, the less 
 suitable for Greeks is the climate. In torrid 
 India we could hardly keep alive; while the 
 regions beyond Makedon seem to us inhospit- 
 able, though the barbarians flourish there in 
 spite of the cold. But suppose all nations, 
 notwithstanding all obstacles, united in one 
 State, and that State yours — I think that, war 
 being eliminated, many natural risks reduced 
 by science, pestilence checked by the universal 
 application of medical knowledge, and labour 
 lessened by everybody doing his share, we 
 should soon (if supplies continued sufficient to 
 prevent famine) be crowded to the tops of the 
 mountains and to the brink of the sea. But, 
 even if that did not happen for many genera- 
 tions, we have enough experience of the results v. 460. 
 of security of life in cities, to be assured that, 
 in such favourable conditions, despite your 
 * intensive culture ' and ' increased produc- 
 tivity,' the Law of Diminishing Returns* 
 
 * A very obscure passage ! 
 
70 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 would come into play, and would soon render 
 impossible the spaciousness necessary to the 
 enjoyment of life as we have been accustomed 
 to live it. For instance, the city becoming 
 large, conveyances would be built to carry the 
 people to and fro in comfort, and perhaps for 
 a time they would travel in comfort — yea, in 
 luxury ! But soon these comfortable and 
 luxurious vehicles would become so crowded 
 that the passengers, instead of reclining upon 
 the cushions provided, would be hanging on 
 by thongs, so packed as to be almost unable 
 to breathe — " 
 
 ** Oh! chuck it! '' said Thrasybulus. 
 
 ** — even if we burrowed underground we 
 should cram the tunnels — ** 
 
 '* Chuck it, I say! " shouted Thrasybulus, 
 rising and brandishing his stool. 
 
 Sokrates desisted. 
 
 ** I don't object to reasonable flights of 
 imagination," said Thrasybulus, resuming his 
 seat, ** but there's a medium in all things! a 
 medium in all things! " 
 
 ** We should always be in a sweat and a 
 hurry," said Sokrates, and then he waited to 
 see if Thrasybulus had calmed down. And 
 tEen He proceeded: '' As I indicated before, 
 
THE PROSE OF ADVENTURE. 71 
 
 Happiness is the exercise of unlimited power 
 to swell ... To swell, and to survive by 
 outswelling; and that means mutual pushing 
 of some sort, long before it comes to a question 
 of elbow-room — though it seems to me that, 
 the longer the pushing is suspended or 
 deferred, the sooner the question of elbow- 
 room will become a burning one. We love 
 our fellow-creatures — some of them. We like 
 to see them basking in our sphere of influence; 
 it gives us a sense of power. We will even 
 consent to bask in theirs : but always, if we 
 are wise, with reservations; there is always 
 competition for baskers. Don't we make even 
 our friends despise us, if we practise no reserve 
 toward them, and if we fail to exhibit ability 
 and readiness to defend ourselves ? They 
 respect us less when we give ourselves away 
 even to them. . . . People don't scale 
 heights or take up arms or compete in perilous 
 games or go exploring the savage corners of the 
 earth, in order to endanger their own lives : 
 they climb, and explore, and fight, to show that 
 they can come out on top, whoever else falls. 
 — With the risk of disaster, of course; which, 
 however, is always present even with those who 
 coddle themselves. Even those of us who 
 
72 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 are inclined to compromise in the battle of life 
 are able to snatch a second-hand joy from the 
 contemplation of somebody else tillering-out in 
 this way : hence our delight in hearing or 
 reading tales, or seeing plays. . . . And the 
 unfailing horrid dulness of all these model-State 
 schemes should teach us, if nothing else will, 
 that the arrest of an individual's progress does 
 not merely arrest the growth of his happiness; 
 it destroys his happiness." 
 
 As Sokrates appeared to be wound up, we 
 waited in silence until he had drawn breath 
 and resumed : 
 
 " We need not be always actually stabbing 
 each other in hand-to-hand conflict, in order to 
 demonstrate the continuousness of the shoulder- 
 ing-aside principle. Of course, it does not 
 follow that it is wise for everybody to fight (as 
 many fought in the late war'^) at the bidding of 
 commanders, against people who are fighting 
 only because bidden by their commanders. 
 Every wise man will yield allegiance and devote 
 his sword to the cause most profitable to him- 
 self — as rulers do. The man with little or no 
 property will usually do well to ally himself 
 with the democrats, and, if he be an educated 
 
 * The Peloponnesian War. 
 
A PLACE FOR PLATONISiM. 73 
 
 or able man, to combat error in the popular 
 mind and to dispel enslaving superstitions. The 
 man of property and station will find it more 
 to his interest to follow Plato and tell lies to 
 the people : to tell them, for instance, that 
 the State is a kind of Plant or Animal made by 
 God, and that it would be sacrilege to break it 
 up even when it has ceased to yield a dividend 
 to those who hold shares'* in it; whereas he 
 knows very well that the State is only a 
 Machine, useful in the doing of certain work, 
 from which work the wise man will derive what 
 benefit he can. All co-operation, in this and in 
 other work, is for wise men a mere expedient : 
 interested and temporary. Rivalry, on the con- 
 trary, is eternal; for individuality is a general 
 declaration of war, to whch truces and alliances 
 and armistices are but incidental. Disinterested 
 co-operation, as in an ideal hive of bees, means 
 the destruction of noble Individuality : it is 
 noteworthy that the bees are able to make a 
 show of maintaining it only by regular killing 
 of some and stunting of others." 
 
 Thrasybulus was fidgetting, and now said in 
 a discontented way : ** If I believed all this, I 
 should take a leaf out of Plato's book, and 
 
 * Another obscure passage in the original. 
 
74 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 advocate the telling of lies to the people. What 
 would be the result on morals, if people believed 
 alljthat you say ? " 
 
 ** Be easy, Thrasybulus," said the sage. 
 ** The danger is one which you have been in 
 the midst of all your life, so that you cannot 
 have any excuse for thinking Thrasymachus or 
 myself responsible for it to any of the powers 
 that be. In their heart of hearts the people do 
 believe all this : Thrasymachus and this 
 philosophy of his are but symptoms of the 
 public feeling and inevitable belief. Why, does 
 not every shrewd man know, for instance, that 
 imbeciles (as I have already said) are merely 
 those foolish enough to believe the delusive doc- 
 trine of altruism which people preach at each 
 other in self-defence ? To keep that article on 
 the open market among a people of any sense, 
 its professional teachers are obliged to be con- 
 tinually making exceptions and qualifications, 
 and saying, not * Ho, ho ! we've found it 1 ' but 
 ' H'm, ha ! there's a medium in all things ! ' " 
 
 '* Then you assert," said Thrasybulus, '* that 
 mankind holds the Thrasymachian philosophy?" 
 
 *' In the only way in which it can be said to 
 hold anvthing in its mind — darkly and half- 
 
THERSITES EXPLAINED. 75 
 
 consciously. No doubt many a big good- 
 natured fellow would feel indignant at the 
 aspersion ; and such a one might be able to say 
 with truth that he had never bullied or intrigued 
 against anybody in his life; and he may think 
 the malice of some little Thersites toward him- 
 self is unprovoked. But it is provoked, by that 
 same bigness and strength of his, which give 
 him most of the prizes of life without his 
 having to ask for them; while the little or 
 weak man, with no very inordinate ambition, 
 must fight every step of his way, or go under. 
 . . . As to what would happen if all 
 believed these things with full unintermittent 
 consciousness : you suppose an impossibility. 
 People are, and always will be — because Hap- 
 piness, and therefore Life (of which Happiness 
 is the ebullition), is an encroachment — too 
 busy eating and drinking and fighting and 
 making love, to theorize all their actions into a 
 system. Humanity does not, and will not, 
 renew itself physically from intellectuals. The 
 common man does theorize, it is true; but only 
 about one or two things at a time, and a very 
 brief time at that : and he never bothers 
 theorizing at all, until driven to it by some 
 physical pressure. And it must be consider- 
 
76 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 able pressure, if Platonic lies have been worked 
 to any extent." 
 
 ** Then of what use is your philosophy i^ '* 
 demanded the democrat. 
 
 '' Of the same use that sails are to the 
 mariner," Sokrates replied. " The mass of 
 mankind are the winds, driven hither and 
 thither by the forces which the gods exert upon 
 them. The philosopher, by studying their 
 motions, is enabled to navigate his bark 
 whither he will. . . Moreover, by disabusing 
 his mind of preconceptions of the Absolute 
 (Essential Beds and Absolute Oughts and Cate- 
 gorical Imperatives*), the philosopher, recog- 
 nizing that the absolute necessity of any event 
 is proved by its happening, gradually ceases to 
 be subject to storms of virtuous indignation, 
 which hurt himself more than they can hurt 
 anybody else; he likewise ceases to be per^ 
 plexed and dumbfounded by the so-called 
 ' causeless enmity ' of others — recognizing 
 that, if he cannot be made to serve their 
 designs, he furnishes sufficient cause for enmity 
 by taking up space and air and attention which 
 they desire for themselves. We all furnish 
 
 • A third obscurity. 
 
WAR HANGS OVER. 77 
 
 enough reason by that circumstance, to be hated 
 even by our friends, if we do not keep on 
 adding to the other side of the account. We 
 are always taking some wind out of their sails/' 
 
 **And wars?'' said I. "Are they tem- 
 pests ?" 
 
 ** As you will," said Sokrates. *' Which 
 reminds me : Plato assumed War to be a 
 necessary exercise of the model State, but never 
 attempted to relate it to his doctrine of Essen- 
 tial Forms. Wisely did he refrain. If the 
 doctrine of Essential Forms were true, if every- 
 ^thing had an absolutely permanent proper rela- 
 tion to everything else : then, measures 
 designed for the ultimate abolition of War 
 (which, more than the habit of legislation, to 
 which he objected, alters the settled relations 
 of things) ought to bulk very large in the 
 programme of the model statesman. Plato's 
 Right or JuvStice being evidently the mere 
 abstraction of Plato's prejudices. War is seen 
 to be but an expression of the commercial, 
 intriguing, litigating instinct of man, which 
 urges him to do the best for himself before 
 helping others. Saints and martyrs and heroes 
 are popular because they set an example to the 
 foolish which makes it easier for people neither 
 
 1. 351 
 
78 WHERE THE ARGUMENT LED. 
 
 saintly nor martyrlike nor heroic to do the 
 best for their individual selves. So long as 
 there are two independent States in the world, 
 there will be War and rumours of War; and, 
 if War is ever abolished by the formation of one 
 World-State, it will only be to enable men to 
 devote more time to their more lucrative single- 
 combats. Only when that has come to p:;ss 
 will the nobility of man be definitely raised 
 above that of the flock of sheep Thrasymaclias 
 J ^^ and Plato argued about." 
 
 Here Sokrates at length ran down. 
 
 ** It would be of no use, I suppose,*' ^aid 
 I, ** to abolish the State ? '' 
 
 ** Probably not," said Thrasybulus slily; 
 ** for I daresay that the State, like Philoso;'hy, 
 is only a symptom." 
 
 Sokrates nodded. 
 
 Thrasybulus had to go away to attend a [arty 
 meeting. Sokrates and I had a drink. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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