Jowett: soul (Alcibiades, Lysis, Laches, Charmides)

Socrates   : Hence the state or SOUL that is to live aright must hold fast to this knowledge, exactly as a sick man does to a doctor, or as he who would voyage safely does to a pilot. For without this, [147a] the more briskly it is wafted by fortune either to the acquisition of wealth or to bodily strength or aught else of the sort, the greater will be the mistakes in which these things, it would seem, must needs involve it. And he who has acquired the so-called mastery of learning and arts, but is destitute of this knowledge and impelled by this or that one among those others, is sure to meet with much rough weather, as he truly deserves ; since, I imagine, he must continue without a pilot on the high seas, and has only the brief span of his life in which to run his course. [147b] So that his case aptly fits the saying of the poet, in which he complains of somebody or other that ALCIBIADES II  

[150e] so you too must first have the mist removed which now enwraps your SOUL, and then you will be ready to receive the means whereby you will discern both evil and good. For at present I do not think you could do so. ALCIBIADES II  

[103a] Socrates : Son of Cleinias, I think it must surprise you that I, the first of all your lovers  , am the only one of them who has not given up his suit and thrown you over, and whereas they have all pestered you with their conversation I have not spoken one word to you for so many years. The cause of this has been nothing human, but a certain spiritual opposition, of whose power you shall be informed at some later time. However, it now opposes me no longer, [103b] so I have accordingly come to you ; and I am in good hopes that it will not oppose me again in the future. Now I have been observing you all this time, and have formed a pretty good notion of your behavior to your lovers : for although they were many and high-spirited, everyone of them has found your spirit too strong for him and has run away. [104a] Let me explain the reason of your spirit being too much for them. You say you have no need of any man in any matter ; for your resources are so great, beginning with the body and ending with the SOUL, that you lack nothing. You think, in the first place, that you are foremost in beauty and stature — and you are not mistaken in this, as is plain for all to see — and in the second place, that you are of the most gallant family in your city, the greatest city in Greece, and [104b] that there you have, through your father, very many of the best people as your friends and kinsmen, who would assist you in case of need, and other connections also, through your mother, who are not a whit inferior to these, nor fewer. And you reckon upon a stronger power than all those that I have mentioned, in Pericles, son of Xanthippus, whom your father left as guardian of you and your brother when he died, and who is able to do whatever he likes not only in this city but all over Greece and among many great nations of the barbarians. [104c] And I will add besides the wealth of your house : but on this, I observe, you presume least of all. Well, you puff yourself up on all these advantages, and have overcome your lovers, while they in their inferiority have yielded to your might, and all this has not escaped you ; so I am very sure that you wonder what on earth I mean by not getting rid of my passion, and what can be my hope in remaining when the rest have fled. ALCIBIADES I

[130a] Socrates : And the user of it must be the SOUL ? ALCIBIADES I

Socrates : SOUL, body, or both together as one whole. ALCIBIADES I

[130c] Socrates : But since neither the body nor the combination of the two is man, we are reduced, I suppose, to this : either man is nothing at all, or if something, he turns out to be nothing else than SOUL. ALCIBIADES I

Socrates : Well, do you require some yet clearer proof that the SOUL is man ? ALCIBIADES I

Socrates : The point suggested in that remark a moment ago, that we should first consider the same-in-itself ; but so far, instead of the same, we have been considering what each single thing is in itself. And perhaps we shall be satisfied with that : for surely we cannot say that anything has more absolute possession of ourselves than the SOUL. ALCIBIADES I

Socrates : And it is proper to take the view that you and I are conversing with each other, while we make use of words, by intercourse of SOUL with SOUL ? ALCIBIADES I

[130e] Socrates : Well, that is just what we suggested a little while ago — that Socrates, in using words to talk with Alcibiades, is holding speech, not with your face, it would seem, but with Alcibiades — that is, with his SOUL. ALCIBIADES I

Socrates : Then he who enjoins a knowledge of oneself bids us become acquainted with the SOUL. ALCIBIADES I

Socrates : Your lover is rather he who loves your SOUL ? ALCIBIADES I

[131d] Socrates : Whereas he who loves your SOUL will not quit you so long as it makes for what is better ? ALCIBIADES I

[132c] Socrates : And the next step, we see, is to take care of the SOUL, and look to that. ALCIBIADES I

Socrates : And if the SOUL too, my dear Alcibiades, is to know herself, she must surely look at a SOUL, and especially at that region of it in which occurs the virtue of a SOUL — wisdom, and at any other part of a SOUL which resembles this ? ALCIBIADES I

[133c] Socrates : And can we find any part of the SOUL that we can call more divine than this, which is the seat of knowledge and thought ? ALCIBIADES I

If he has a noble SOUL ; and being of your house, Critias  , he may be expected to have this. CHARMIDES  

Then, before we see his body, should we not ask him to show us his SOUL, naked and undisguised ? he is just of an age at which he will like to talk. CHARMIDES

His approving answers reassured me, and I began by degrees to regain confidence, and the vital heat returned. Such, Charmides, I said, is the nature of the charm, which I learned when serving with the army from one of the physicians of the Thracian king Zamolxis, who are to be so skilful that they can even give immortality. This Thracian told me that in these notions of theirs, which I was just now mentioning, the Greek physicians are quite right as far as they go ; but Zamolxis, he added, our king, who is also a god, says further, “that as you ought not to attempt to cure the eyes without the head, or the head without the body, so neither ought you to attempt to cure the body without the SOUL ; and this,” he said, “is the reason why the cure of many diseases is unknown to the physicians of Hellas, because they are ignorant of the whole, which ought to be studied also ; for the part can never be well unless the whole is well.” For all good and evil, whether in the body or in human nature, originates, as he declared, in the SOUL, and overflows from thence, as if from the head into the eyes. And therefore if the head and body are to be well, you must begin by curing the SOUL ; that is the first thing. And the cure, my dear youth, has to be effected by the use of certain charms, and these charms are fair words ; and by them temperance is implanted in the SOUL, and where temperance is, there health is speedily imparted, not only to the head, but to the whole body. And he who taught me the cure and the charm at the same time added a special direction : “Let no one,” he said, “persuade you to cure the head, until he has first given you his SOUL to be cured by the charm. For this,” he said, “is the great error of our day in the treatment of the human body, that physicians separate the SOUL from the body.” And he added with emphasis, at the same time making me swear to his words, “Let no one, however rich, or noble, or fair, persuade you to give him the cure, without the charm.” Now I have sworn, and I must keep my oath, and therefore if you will allow me to apply the Thracian charm first to your SOUL, as the stranger directed, I will afterwards proceed to apply the cure to your head. But if not, I do not know what I am to do with you, my dear Charmides. CHARMIDES

And is not shrewdness a quickness or cleverness of the SOUL, and not a quietness ? CHARMIDES

And in the searchings or deliberations of the SOUL, not the quietest, as I imagine, and he who with difficulty deliberates and discovers, is thought worthy of praise, but he who does so most easily and quickly ? CHARMIDES

And in all that concerns either body or SOUL, swiftness and activity are clearly better than slowness and quietness ? CHARMIDES

You see then, Critias, that I was not far wrong in fearing that I could have no sound notion about wisdom ; I was quite right in depreciating myself ; for that which is admitted to be the best of all things would never have seemed to us useless, if I had been good for anything at an enquiry. But now I have been utterly defeated, and have failed to discover what that is to which the imposer of names gave this name of temperance or wisdom. And yet many more admissions were made by us than could be fairly granted ; for we admitted that there was a science of science, although the argument said No, and protested against us ; and we admitted further, that this science knew the works of the other sciences (although this too was denied by the argument), because we wanted to show that the wise man had knowledge of what he knew and did not know ; also we nobly disregarded, and never even considered, the impossibility of a man knowing in a sort of way that which he does not know at all ; for our assumption was, that he knows that which he does not know ; than which nothing, as I think, can be more irrational. And yet, after finding us so easy and good-natured, the enquiry is still unable to discover the truth ; but mocks us to a degree, and has gone out of its way to prove the inutility of that which we admitted only by a sort of supposition and fiction to be the true definition of temperance or wisdom : which result, as far as I am concerned, is not so much to be lamented, I said. But for your sake, Charmides, I am very sorry — that you, having such beauty and such wisdom and temperance of SOUL, should have no profit or good in life from your wisdom and temperance. And still more am I grieved about the charm which I learned with so much pain, and to so little profit, from the Thracian, for the sake of a thing which is nothing worth. I think indeed that there is a mistake, and that I must be a bad enquirer, for wisdom or temperance I believe to be really a great good ; and happy are you, Charmides, if you certainly possess it. Wherefore examine yourself, and see whether you have this gift and can do without the charm ; for if you can, I would rather advise you to regard me simply as a fool who is never able to reason out anything ; and to rest assured that the more wise and temperate you are, the happier you will be. CHARMIDES

Soc. And at present we have in view some knowledge, of which the end is the SOUL of youth ? LACHES

Soc. And we are enquiring, Which of us is skilful or successful in the treatment of the SOUL, and which of us has had good teachers ? LACHES

La. I should say that courage is a sort of endurance of the SOUL, if I am to speak of the universal nature which pervades them all. LACHES

And so, Lysis   and Menexenus  , we have discovered the nature of friendship — there can be no doubt of it : Friendship is the love which by reason of the presence of evil the neither good nor evil has of the good, either in the SOUL, or in the body, or anywhere. LYSIS

And the good is loved for the sake of the evil ? Let me put the case in this way : Suppose that of the three principles, good, evil, and that which is neither good nor evil, there remained only the good and the neutral, and that evil went far away, and in no way affected SOUL or body, nor ever at all that class of things which, as we say, are neither good nor evil in themselves ; — would the good be of any use, or other than useless to us ? For if there were nothing to hurt us any longer, we should have no need of anything that would do us good. Then would be clearly seen that we did but love and desire the good because of the evil, and as the remedy of the evil, which was the disease ; but if there had been no disease, there would have been no need of a remedy. Is not this the nature of the good — to be loved by us who are placed between the two, because of the evil ? but there is no use in the good for its own sake. LYSIS

And I say, my boys, that no one who loves or desires another would ever have loved or desired or affected him, if he had not been in some way congenial to him, either in his SOUL, or in his character, or in his manners, or in his form. LYSIS