Complete Works (81 page)

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: This seems both to follow, and to be, as you say; and we must do as you suggest.

[c] V
ISITOR
: So then we must also remove those who participate in all these constitutions, except for the one based on knowledge, as being, not statesmen, but experts in faction; we must say that, as presiding over insubstantial images, on the largest scale, they are themselves of the same sort, and that as the greatest imitators and magicians they turn out the be the greatest sophists among sophists.
⁶⁹

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: This term ‘sophist’ looks as if it has been only too correctly turned round against the so-called experts in statesmanship.

V
ISITOR
: So: this is our play, as it were—as we said just now that there [d] was some band of centaurs and satyrs in view, one that we had to set apart from the expertise of the statesman; and now it has been set apart, as we have seen, with great difficulty.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: It appears so.

V
ISITOR
: Yes, but there is something else remaining that is still more difficult than this, by reason of its being both more akin to the kingly class, and closer to it, and harder to understand; and we seem to me to be in a situation similar to that of those who refine gold.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: How so?

V
ISITOR
: I imagine that these craftsmen also begin by separating out earth, and stones, and many different things; and after these, there remain [e] commingled with the gold those things that are akin to it, precious things and only removable with the use of fire: copper, silver, and sometimes adamant, the removal of which through repeated smelting and testing leaves the ‘unalloyed’ gold that people talk about there for us to see, itself alone by itself.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes, they certainly do say these things happen in this way.

V
ISITOR
: Well, it seems that in the same way we have now separated off those things that are different from the expert knowledge of statesmanship, and those that are alien and hostile to it, and that there remain those that are precious and related to it. Among these, I think, are generalship, the art of the judge, and that part of rhetoric which in partnership with kingship
[304]
persuades people of what is just and so helps in steering through the business of cities. As for these, in what way will one most easily portion them off and show, stripped and alone by himself, that person we are looking for?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: It’s clear that we must try to do this somehow.

V
ISITOR
: Well, if it depends on our trying, we’ll find him; music will help us reveal him. Answer me this.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: What?

V
ISITOR
: I imagine we recognize such a thing as the learning of music, [b] and in general of the sorts of expert knowledge involving work with the hands?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: We do.

V
ISITOR
: And what of this—the matter of whether we should learn any one of these or not? Shall we say that this too, in its turn, is a sort of knowledge, concerned with these very things, or what shall we say?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes, we’ll say that it is.

V
ISITOR
: Then shall we agree that this sort of knowledge is distinct from those?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes.

V
ISITOR
: And shall we agree that no one of them should control any other, or that the others should control this one, or that this one should [c] manage and control all the others together?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: This one should control them.

V
ISITOR
: In that case you, at any rate, declare it to be your opinion that the one that decides whether one should learn or not should be in control, so far as we are concerned, over the one that is the object of learning and does the teaching?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Very much so.

V
ISITOR
: And also, in that case, that the one which decides whether one should persuade or not should control the one which is capable of persuading?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Of course.

V
ISITOR
: Well then: to which sort of expert knowledge shall we assign what is capable of persuading mass and crowd, through the telling of [d] stories, and not through teaching?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: This too is clear, I think: it must be given to rhetoric.

V
ISITOR
: And the matter of whether to do through persuasion whatever it may be in relation to some people or other, or else by the use of some sort of force, or indeed to do nothing at all: to what sort of expert knowledge shall we attach this?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: To the one that controls the art of persuasion and speaking.

V
ISITOR
: This would be none other, I think, than the capacity of the statesman.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Very well said.

V
ISITOR
: This matter of rhetoric too seems to have been separated quickly [e] from statesmanship, as a distinct class, but subordinate to it.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes.

V
ISITOR
: What should we think about the following sort of capacity, in its turn?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Which one?

V
ISITOR
: The one that decides how to make war against each group of people against whom we choose to make war. The question is whether we shall say that this is or is not a matter of expertise.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: And how could we suppose it not to involve expertise: that capacity which is exercised by generalship and all activity concerned with war?

V
ISITOR
: And are we to understand as different from this the expertise that is able and knows how to reach a considered decision about whether we should make war, or whether we should withdraw in friendly fashion? Or are we to take it to be the same as this one?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Anyone who was following what was said before must suppose that it is distinct.

[305]
V
ISITOR
: Shall we then declare our view that it controls it, if in fact we are going to take things in line with what we said before?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: I say yes.

V
ISITOR
: Then what mistress will we even try to propose for so terrifying and important an expertise, the whole of that concerned with war, except the true art of kingship?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: No other.

V
ISITOR
: In that case we shall not set down the expert knowledge of generals as statesmanship, since it is subordinate.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: It seems unlikely that we shall.

[b] V
ISITOR
: Come on then; let’s look at the capacity that belongs to those judges who judge correctly.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Absolutely.

V
ISITOR
: Well then, does its capacity extend to anything more than taking over from the legislator-king all those things that are established as lawful in relation to contracts, and judging by reference to these the things that have been prescribed as just and unjust, providing its own individual excellence by virtue of the fact that it would not be willing to decide the [c] complaints of one citizen against another contrary to the prescription of the legislator through being overcome by presents of some sort, or fears, or feelings of compassion, or again by any enmity or friendship?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: No, the function of this capacity extends, roughly speaking, to what you have said.

V
ISITOR
: In that case we discover the power of judges too not to be that belonging to the king, but to be a guardian of the laws and a subordinate of that other capacity.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: It seems so, at any rate.

V
ISITOR
: If then one looks at all the sorts of expert knowledge that have been discussed, it must be observed that none of them has been declared to be statesmanship. For what is really kingship must not itself perform [d] practical tasks, but control those with the capacity to perform them, because it knows when it is the right time to begin and set in motion the most important things in cities, and when it is the wrong time; and the others must do what has been prescribed for them.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Correct.

V
ISITOR
: For this reason, then, the sorts of expertise we have just examined control neither each other nor themselves, but each is concerned with some individual practical activity of its own, and in accordance with the individual nature of the activities in question has appropriately acquired a name that is individual to it.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: That seems so, at any rate. [e]

V
ISITOR
: Whereas the one that controls all of these, and the laws, and cares for every aspect of things in the city, weaving everything together in the most correct way—this, embracing its capacity with the appellation belonging to the whole,
⁷⁰
we would, it seems, most appropriately call statesmanship.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes, absolutely.

V
ISITOR
: At this point we’ll want, won’t we, to pursue it further by reference to the model of the art of weaving, now that all the classes of things in the city have become clear to us?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes, very much so.

V
ISITOR
: Then it seems that we should discuss the intertwining that
[306]
belongs to kingship—of what kind it is, and in what way it intertwines to render us what sort of fabric.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Clearly.

V
ISITOR
: What it seems we have to deal with, in that case, is certainly a difficult thing to show.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: But in any case we have to discuss it.

V
ISITOR
: To say that part of virtue is in a certain sense different in kind from virtue provides an all too easy target for those expert in disputing statements, if we view things in relation to what the majority of people think.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: I don’t understand.

V
ISITOR
: I’ll put it again, like this. I imagine you think that courage, for us, constitutes one part of virtue. [b]

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Certainly.

V
ISITOR
: And also that moderation is something distinct from courage, but at the same time that this too is one part of what the other is part of.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes.

V
ISITOR
: Well, we must take our courage in our hands and declare something astonishing in relation to these two.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: What?

V
ISITOR
: That, in some sort of way, they are extremely hostile to each other and occupy opposed positions in many things.
⁷¹

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: What do you mean?

V
ISITOR
: Not in any way the sort of thing people are used to saying. For [c] certainly, I imagine, all the parts of virtue are said to be amicably disposed towards each other, if anything is.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes.

V
ISITOR
: Then should we look, with extremely close attention, to see whether this is unqualifiedly the case, or whether emphatically some aspects of them admit of dissent in some respect with what is related to them?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Yes; please say how we should do so.

V
ISITOR
: We should look at the matter in relation to all those things that we call fine, but then go on to place them in two classes which are opposed to each other.

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Put it still more clearly.

[d] V
ISITOR
: Sharpness and speed, whether in bodies, or in minds, or in the movement of the voice,
⁷²
whether belonging to the things themselves or as represented in images of them—all those imitations that music, and painting too, provide: have you ever either praised any of these yourself, or been present to hear someone else praising them?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: Of course.

V
ISITOR
: And do you remember how they do it in every one of such cases?

Y
OUNG
S
OCRATES
: I don’t at all.