Complete Works (198 page)

H
IPPIAS
: What do you mean?

S
OCRATES
: If he happens to have a stick, and I don’t run and run away from him, he’ll try to give me a thrashing.

H
IPPIAS
: What? Is the man your owner or something? Do you mean he could do that and not be arrested and convicted? Or don’t you have any [b] laws in this city, but people are allowed to hit each other without any right?

S
OCRATES
: No, that’s not allowed at all.

H
IPPIAS
: Then he’ll be punished for hitting you without any right.

S
OCRATES
: I don’t think so, Hippias. No, if I gave
that
answer he’d have a right—in
my
opinion anyway.

H
IPPIAS
: Then I think so too, seeing that you yourself believe it.

S
OCRATES
: Should I tell you why
I
believe he’d have a right to hit me if I gave that answer? Or will you hit me without trial too? Will you hear my case?

H
IPPIAS
: It would be awful if I wouldn’t. What do you have to say? [c]

S
OCRATES
: I’ll tell you the same way as before. I’ll be acting out his part—so the words I use are not directed against you; they’re like what he says to me, harsh and grotesque. “Tell me, Socrates,” you can be sure he’ll say, “do you think it’s wrong for a man to be whipped when he sings such a dithyramb
¹⁰
as that, so raucously, way out of tune with the question?” “How?” I’ll say. “How!” he’ll say. “Aren’t you capable of remembering that I asked for the fine itself? For what when added to anything—whether [d] to a stone or a plank or a man or a god or any action or any lesson—
anything
gets to be fine? I’m asking you to tell me what fineness is itself, my man, and I am no more able to make you hear me than if you were sitting here in stone—and a millstone at that, with no ears and no brain!”

Hippias, wouldn’t you be upset if I got scared and came back with this: [e] “But that’s what Hippias said the fine was. And I asked him the way you asked me, for that which is fine always and for everyone.” So what do you say? Wouldn’t you be upset if I said that?

H
IPPIAS
: Socrates, I know perfectly well that what I said is fine for everyone—everyone will think so.

S
OCRATES
: “And
will
be fine?” he’ll ask. “I suppose the fine is always fine.”

H
IPPIAS
: Certainly.

S
OCRATES
: “Then it
was
fine, too,” he’ll say.

H
IPPIAS
: It was.

S
OCRATES
: “For Achilles as well?” he’ll ask. “Does the visitor from Elis
[293]
say it is fine for
him
to be buried after his parents? And for his grandfather Aeacus? And for the other children of the gods? And for the gods themselves?”
¹¹

H
IPPIAS
: What’s that? Go to blessedness. These questions the man asks, Socrates, they’re sacrilegious!

S
OCRATES
: What? Is it a sacrilege to say that’s so when someone else asks the question?

H
IPPIAS
: Maybe.

S
OCRATES
: “Then maybe you’re the one who says that it is fine for everyone, always, to be buried by his children, and to bury his parents? And isn’t Heracles included in ‘everyone’ as well as everybody we mentioned a moment ago?”

H
IPPIAS
: But I didn’t mean it for the
gods.

[b] S
OCRATES
: “Apparently you didn’t mean it for the heroes either.”

H
IPPIAS
: Not if they’re children of gods.

S
OCRATES
: “But if they’re not?”

H
IPPIAS
: Certainly.

S
OCRATES
: “Then according to your latest theory, I see, what’s awful and unholy and foul for some heroes—Tantalus and Dardanus and Zethus—is fine for Pelops and those with similar parentage.”

H
IPPIAS
: That’s my opinion.

S
OCRATES
: “Then what you think is what you did not say a moment [c] ago—that being buried by your children and burying your parents is foul sometimes, and for some people. Apparently it’s still more impossible for that to become and be fine for everyone; so that has met the same fate as the earlier ones, the girl and the pot, and a more laughable fate besides; it is fine for some, not fine for others. And to this very day, Socrates, you aren’t able to answer the question about the fine, what it is.”

That’s how he’ll scold me—and he’s right if I give him such an answer.

[d] Most of what he says to me is somewhat like that. But sometimes, as if he took pity on my inexperience and lack of education, he himself makes me a suggestion. He asks if I don’t think such and such is the fine, or whatever else he happens to be investigating and the discussion is about.

H
IPPIAS
: How do you mean?

S
OCRATES
: I’ll show you. “You’re a strange man, Socrates,” he’ll say, “giving answers like that, in that way. You should stop that. They’re very [e] simple and easy to refute. But see if you think this sort of answer is fine. We had a grip on it just now when we replied that gold is fine for things it’s appropriate to, but not for those it’s not. And anything else is fine if
this
has been added to it: this, the appropriate itself—the nature of the appropriate itself. See if it turns out to be the fine.”

I’m used to agreeing with such things every time, because I don’t know what to say. What do you think? Is the appropriate fine?

H
IPPIAS
: In every way, Socrates.

S
OCRATES
: Let’s look it over. We’d better not be deceived.

H
IPPIAS
: We have to look it over.

S
OCRATES
: See here, then. What do we say about the appropriate: Is it
[294]
what makes—by coming to be present—each thing to which it is present
be seen to be fine,
or
be fine,
or neither?

H
IPPIAS
: I think it’s what makes things be seen to be fine. For example, when someone puts on clothes and shoes that suit him, even if he’s ridiculous, he is seen to be finer.

S
OCRATES
: Then if the appropriate makes things be seen to be finer than they are, it would be a kind of deceit about the fine, and it wouldn’t be what we are looking for, would it, Hippias? I thought we were looking [b] for that by which all fine things are fine. For example, what all large things are large by is
the projecting.
For by that all large things—even if they are not seen to be so—if they project they are necessarily large. Similarly, we say the fine is what all things are fine by, whether or not they are seen to be fine. What would it be? It wouldn’t be the appropriate. Because that makes things be seen to be finer than they are—so you said—and it won’t let things be seen to be as they are. We must try to say what it is that [c] makes things fine, whether they are seen to be fine or not, just as I said a moment ago. That’s what we’re looking for, if we’re really looking for the fine.

H
IPPIAS
: But Socrates, the appropriate makes things both be fine and be seen to be fine, when it’s present.

S
OCRATES
: Is it impossible for things that are really fine not to be seen to be fine, since what makes them be seen is present?

H
IPPIAS
: It’s impossible.

S
OCRATES
: Then shall we agree to this, Hippias: that everything really [d] fine—customs and activities both—are both thought to be, and seen to be, fine always, by everybody? Or just the opposite, that they’re unknown, and individuals in private and cities in public both have more strife and contention about them than anything?

H
IPPIAS
: Much more the latter, Socrates. They are unknown.

S
OCRATES
: They wouldn’t be, if “being seen to be” had been added to them. And that would have been added if the appropriate were fine and made things not only be but be seen to be fine. Therefore, if the appropriate is what makes things fine, it would be the fine we’re looking for, but it [e] would not be what makes things be seen to be fine. Or, if the appropriate is what makes things be seen to be fine, it wouldn’t be the fine we’re looking for. Because
that
makes things be; but by itself it could not make things be seen to be and be, nor could anything else. Let’s choose whether we think the appropriate is what makes things be seen to be, or be, fine.

H
IPPIAS
: It’s what makes things be seen to be, in my opinion, Socrates.

S
OCRATES
: Oh dear! It’s gone and escaped from us, our chance to know what the fine is, since the appropriate has been seen to be something other than fine.

H
IPPIAS
: God yes, Socrates. And I think that’s very strange.

[295]
S
OCRATES
: But we shouldn’t let it go yet, my friend. I still have some hope that the fine will make itself be seen for what it is.

H
IPPIAS
: Of course it will. It’s not hard to find. I’m sure if I went off and looked for it by myself—in quiet—I would tell it to you more precisely than any preciseness.

S
OCRATES
: Ah, Hippias! Don’t talk big. You see how much trouble it has [b] given us already; and if it gets mad at us I’m afraid it will run away still harder. But that’s nonsense. You’ll easily find it, I think, when you’re alone. But for god’s sake, find it in front of me, or look for it with me if you want, as we’ve been doing. If we find it, that would be the finest thing; but if not, I will content myself with my fate, while you go away and find it easily. And if we find it now, of course I won’t be a nuisance to you [c] later, trying to figure out what it was you found on your own. Now see what you think the fine is: I’m saying that it’s—pay attention now, be careful I’m not raving—let this be fine for us: whatever is useful. What I had in mind when I said that was this. We say eyes are fine not when we think they are in such a state they’re unable to see, but whenever they
are able,
and are useful for seeing. Yes?

H
IPPIAS
: Yes.

S
OCRATES
: And that’s how we call the whole body fine, sometimes for [d] running, sometimes for wrestling. And the same goes for all animals—a fine horse, rooster, or quail—and all utensils and means of transport on land and sea, boats and warships, and the tools of every skill, music and all the others; and, if you want, activities and laws—virtually all these are called fine in the same way. In each case we look at the nature it’s got, its [e] manufacture, its condition; then we call what is useful “fine” in respect of
the way
it is useful,
what
it is useful
for,
and
when
it is useful; but anything useless in all those respects we call “foul.” Don’t you think that way too, Hippias?

H
IPPIAS
: Yes, I do.

S
OCRATES
: So then are we right to say now that the useful more than anything turns out to be fine?

H
IPPIAS
: Right, Socrates.

S
OCRATES
: So what’s
able
to accomplish a particular thing is useful for that for which it is able; and what’s unable is useless.

H
IPPIAS
: Certainly.

S
OCRATES
: Then is ability
¹²
fine, but inability foul?

H
IPPIAS
: Very much so. Many things give us evidence for the truth of
[296]
that, especially politics. The finest thing of all is to be able politically in your own city, and to be unable is the foulest of all.

S
OCRATES
: Good! Then doesn’t it follow from these points that, by god, wisdom is really the finest thing of all, and ignorance the foulest?

H
IPPIAS
: What are you thinking?

S
OCRATES
: Keep quiet, my friend. I’m frightened. What on earth are we saying now?

H
IPPIAS
: Why should you be frightened now? The discussion has gone [b] really well for you this time.

S
OCRATES
: I wish it had! Look this over with me: could anyone do something he doesn’t know how to do, and isn’t at all able to do?

H
IPPIAS
: Not at all. How could he do what he isn’t able to do?

S
OCRATES
: Then when people make mistakes, do bad work, even when they do it unintentionally—if they aren’t able to do things, they wouldn’t ever do them, would they?

H
IPPIAS
: That’s clear.

S
OCRATES
: But people who are able are able by ability? I don’t suppose [c] it’s by inability.

H
IPPIAS
: Of course not.

S
OCRATES
: And everyone who does things is able to do the things he does.

H
IPPIAS
: Yes.

S
OCRATES
: And all men do much more bad work than good, starting from childhood—and make mistakes unintentionally.

H
IPPIAS
: That’s right.

S
OCRATES
: So? We don’t call that ability and that sort of useful thing [d] fine, do we? The sort that’s useful for doing some bad piece of work? Far from it.

H
IPPIAS
: Far indeed, Socrates. That’s what I think.

S
OCRATES
: Then this able and useful of ours is apparently not the fine, Hippias.

H
IPPIAS
: It is, Socrates, if it’s able to do good, if it’s useful for that sort of thing.

S
OCRATES
: Then here’s what got away from us: the able-and-useful without qualification is fine. And this is what our mind wanted to say, Hippias: the useful-and-able for making some good—
that
is the fine. [e]