Part 67

Socr. Do you see, most excellent Callicles, that you do not make the same objection to me that I do to you? For you allege that I always say the same things, and blame me for it; and I, on the contrary, complain of you, that you never say the same things on the same subjects; but at one time you defined the better and the superior to be the stronger, and at another time the more wise: and now again you come with something else; and certain persons that are braver are said by you to be the superior and better. But, my friend, tell me once for all, whom you call the better and superior, and in reference to what.

102. Cal. I have already said that they are such as are wise and brave, with respect to the affairs of a city. For it belongs to them to govern cities, and it is just that they should have more than others, the governors than the governed.

Socr. But what? my friend, as governing themselves, or being governed?

Cal. What mean you?

Socr. I mean that each person governs himself. Is there no occasion for this, that a man should govern himself, but only others?

Cal. What do you mean by governing himself?

Socr. Nothing uncommon; but as men frequently say, that a man is temperate, and master of himself, controlling the pleasures and desires that are within himself.

Cal. How ridiculous you are! By the temperate you mean the foolish.

Socr. How otherwise? There is no one but would know that that is my meaning.

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Footnote 71:

I have followed Stallbaum’s reading, οὐδεὶς ὅστις οὐκ ἂν γνοίη, ὅτι οὕτω λέγω . Socrates grants his opponent’s erroneous inference, that so he may be led on to a still greater absurdity.

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Cal. Most assuredly, Socrates; since how can a man be happy who is a slave to any one? But this it is which is beautiful, and just according to nature, and which I now freely tell you, namely, that a man who lives rightly should suffer his desires to be as great as possible, and should not restrain them; but should be able, when they are at their height, to minister to them by his courage and prudence, and satisfy each desire as it springs up. 103. This, however, I think, is not possible for the generality of men; wherefore they blame such persons through shame, to conceal their own impotency, and say that intemperance is base; as I said before, enslaving men of a better nature, and themselves not being able to satisfy their own pleasures, they praise temperance and justice, on account of their own effeminacy. For to those whom it has befallen from the first either to be the sons of kings, or who are able by nature to procure for themselves a government, or tyranny, or dynasty, what can be more disgraceful and base than temperance? who, when it is in their power to enjoy the good things of this life, and no one hinders them, impose a master on themselves, the law, discourse, and censure of the multitude? Or how should they be otherwise than miserable through the beauty of justice and temperance, while they impart no more to their friends than to their enemies, and this though they have supreme power in their own city? Thus, then, it stands with the truth, Socrates, which you say you are in search of: luxury, intemperance, and liberty, if they have the proper aids, these are virtue and felicity; but all those other fine things, those compacts contrary to nature, are extravagancies of men, and of no value.

104. Socr. Not at all ignobly, Callicles, have you expressed your opinions, speaking freely; for you now plainly say what others think, indeed, but are unwilling to say. I beg of you, therefore, on no account to relax, in order that it may really become evident how we ought to live. Come tell me: do you say that our desires ought not to be checked, if one intends to be such as one ought, and that, suffering them to be as great as possible, one ought to provide for their satisfaction from every possible source, and that this constitutes virtue?

Cal. I do say so.

Socr. They, therefore, who need nothing, are not rightly said to be happy.

Cal. For thus stones and the dead would be most happy.

Socr. But, indeed, even as you say, life is grievous. For in truth I should not wonder if Euripides speaks the truth when he says: “Who knows whether to live is not death, and to die, life?” And we, perhaps, are really dead; as I have heard from one of the wise, that we are now dead, and that the body is our sepulchre, and that the part of the soul in which the desires are is of such a nature that it can be persuaded different ways, and change upwards and downwards; and this, some skilful man, perhaps a Sicilian, or Italian, turning into a fable, by a slight change of the word, called a cask, from its being credulous and easily persuaded, but the foolish he called uninitiated. He further compared that part of the soul of the uninitiated in which the desires are, namely, its intemperate and unclosed part, to a pierced cask, on account of its insatiable greediness. 105. This man, too, quite contrary to you, Callicles, shews that of those in Hades (meaning thereby the invisible world) the most miserable must be the uninitiated, and that they carry water to a perforated cask by a similarly perforated sieve. The sieve, as he who spoke to me said, is the soul. But he likened the soul of the foolish to a sieve, as being perforated and not able to retain any thing, through incredulity and forgetfulness. This probably is somewhat absurd, nevertheless it shews that by proof of which I wish, if by any means I can, to persuade you to change your opinion, and to prefer to an insatiable and intemperate life one that is well regulated, and that is satisfied and contented with the things that are from time to time present. But do I persuade you at all, and do you change your opinion, and admit that the moderate are more happy than the intemperate? or have I produced no impression, and though I tell you many such fables, will you not be any the more disposed to change your opinion?

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Footnote 72:

The English language does not enable a translator to preserve the play on the words πιθανὸν and πίθον, nor the equivoque in ἀμυήτους, which means “leaky,” as well as “uninitiated.”

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Cal. In this you have spoken more truly, Socrates.

106. Socr. Come, then, I will mention to you another similitude from the same school as the preceding. For consider whether you would speak thus of each kind of life, the temperate and the intemperate, as if two men had each many casks; and that those of one were sound and full, one of wine, another of honey, a third of milk, and many others of other things; that the fountains of each were rare and difficult to be obtained, and could only be procured by many and severe toils; the one, then, having filled his casks, pours no more into them, nor is at all concerned about them, but on this score is at ease; that the fountains of the other, as of the former one, are possible to be procured, though with difficulty, that his vessels are perforated and defective, and he compelled, both night and day, to fill them, or suffer the most extreme pain. When such is the life of each, do you say that of the intemperate is more happy than that of the moderate man? Do I persuade you at all, by relating these things, to grant that a moderate life is better than an intemperate one, or do I not persuade you?

Cal. You do not persuade me, Socrates. For he that has filled his casks has no longer any pleasure: but this is, what I just now mentioned, to live like a stone, when he has filled them, neither rejoicing any more nor grieving: but a pleasant life consists in as much flowing in as possible.

107. Socr. Is it not, therefore, necessary, if much flows in, that much also should go out, and that there should be certain large holes for its flowing out?

Cal. Certainly.