Part 45

Gorg. It is so.

Socr. Tell me then in reference to what? what is the particular thing about which these words are, which rhetoric uses?

Gorg. The greatest of all human concerns, Socrates, and the best.

Socr. But, Gorgias, what you say is questionable, and by no means clear. For I think you must have heard at banquets men singing that song in which the singers enumerate that the best thing is health, the second beauty, and the third, as the author of the song says, riches gained without fraud.

Gorg. I have heard it; but with what object do you mention this?

15. Socr. Because the artificers of those things which the author of the song has commended, namely, the physician, the master of gymnastics, and the money-getter, will forthwith present themselves, and the physician will say: Socrates, Gorgias deceives you. For his art is not employed about the greatest good to men, but mine is. If, then, I should ask him, Who are you that say this? he would probably answer, I am a physician. What then do you say? that the object of your art is the greatest good? How can it be otherwise, Socrates, he would probably say, since its object is health? and what greater good can men have than health? And if after him again the master of gymnastics should say, I too should wonder, Socrates, if Gorgias could shew you any greater good from his art than I can from mine, I should again say to him, And who are you, Sir, and what is your employment? A master of gymnastics, he would say, and my employment is to make men beautiful and strong in their bodies. 16. After the master of gymnastics, the money-getter would say, as I imagine, despising all others, Consider, I beg, Socrates, whether there is any greater good than riches, either with Gorgias, or any one else? I should thereupon say to him, What, then, are you the artificer of this good? He would say, I am. Who are you then? A money-getter. What then? Do you consider riches to be the greatest good to men? I shall say. Assuredly, he will answer. However, Gorgias here contends that his art is the cause of greater good than yours. It is clear then that after this he would ask, And what is this good? let Gorgias answer. Come then, Gorgias, suppose that you are asked by them and by me, and answer, What is this, which you say is the greatest good to men, and of which you are the artificer?

Gorg. That which is in reality, Socrates, the greatest good, and is at the same time the cause of liberty to men, and of their being able to rule over others in their several cities.

Socr. What then do you say it is?

Gorg. I say it is the power of persuading by words judges in a court of justice, senators in the senate-house, and the hearers in a public assembly, and in every other convention of a political nature. Moreover, by this power you will make the physician your slave, and the master of gymnastics your slave, and the money-getter will be found to have gained money, not for himself, but for another, for you who are able to speak, and persuade the multitude.

Socr. At length you appear to me, Gorgias, to have shewn as nearly as possible what kind of art you consider rhetoric to be; and if I understand you rightly, you say that rhetoric is the artificer of persuasion, and that its whole employment and the sum of it terminates in this. Can you say that rhetoric has any further power than that of producing persuasion in the minds of the hearers?

Gorg. By no means, Socrates; but you appear to me to have defined it sufficiently. For that is the sum of it.

18. Socr. Listen then, Gorgias. Be assured that I, as I persuade myself, if there is any one, who in conversing with another, wishes to know the very thing about which the conversation is, be assured, I say, that I am such a person; and I think that you are too.

Gorg. What then, Socrates?

Socr. I will now tell you. The persuasion which you speak of as resulting from rhetoric, what it is, and with what particulars it is conversant, be assured I do not clearly understand, not but that I have a suspicion of what I suppose you mean, and about what it is employed: yet I will not the less ask you what persuasion you mean results from rhetoric, and with what particulars it is conversant. Why then do I who have a suspicion ask you, and not rather myself speak? Not on your account, but on account of the discussion, that it may proceed in such a manner as to make the subject of the discussion most clear to us. 19. For consider whether I seem to you right in putting the question to you: just as if I should ask you what kind of a painter is Zeuxis? if you were to tell me that he paints animals, might I not justly enquire of you, what kind of animals he paints? is it not so?

Gorg. Certainly.

Socr. And would it not be for this reason, because there are also other painters who paint many other animals?

Gorg. Yes.

Socr. But if no one else but Zeuxis painted them, you would have answered properly.

Gorg. Assuredly.

Socr. Come then, with respect to rhetoric, tell me, whether it appears to you that rhetoric alone produces persuasion, or do other arts produce it likewise? My meaning is this: Does he who teaches any thing persuade what he teaches, or not?

Gorg. He does certainly persuade, Socrates.

Socr. Again, if we speak of the same arts of which we just now made mention, does not arithmetic teach us such things as relate to number? and does not an arithmetician the same?

Gorg. Certainly.

20. Socr. Does it not also persuade?

Gorg. Yes.

Socr. Arithmetic, then, is an artificer of persuasion.

Gorg. It appears so.

Socr. If, then, any one should ask us, What persuasion it produces, and with respect to what? we should answer, That which teaches about the quantity of even and odd. In like manner we may shew, that all the other arts of which we spoke just now, produce persuasion, and what kind of persuasion, and with respect to what: is it not so?