Complete Works

by Plato, Cooper, John M. , Hutchinson, D. S.

SISYPHUS: Of course not.

  SOCRATES: In all such cases, then, our conclusion is as follows: nobody can ever try to find out anything that he knows, only what he doesn’t know. Would you agree with me about that?

  SISYPHUS: I would.

  [b] SOCRATES: Now isn’t this what deliberation seemed to us to be—somebody trying to find out the best course to follow in matters requiring him to take action?

  SISYPHUS: Yes.

  SOCRATES: And we thought that deliberation was trying to find out something concerning practical matters, didn’t we?

  SISYPHUS: Yes, of course.

  SOCRATES: So now it’s time for us to consider what it is that prevents people from finding out what they’re trying to find out.

  SISYPHUS: I think it is.

  [c] SOCRATES: And what should we say it is that prevents them, if not incomprehension?

  SISYPHUS: Let’s look into it, for Heaven’s sake.

  SOCRATES: Absolutely!—we must let out every reef, as they say, and raise full cry.

  So now let’s examine the following question together: do you think it’s possible for a man to deliberate about music if he has no knowledge of music, and knows neither how to play the cithara nor how to perform any other kind of music?

  SISYPHUS: No, I don’t.

  [d] SOCRATES: And what about military or nautical expertise? Would someone who knew neither of those subjects be able to deliberate at all about what he should do in either field? Would he be able to deliberate about how to command a force or captain a vessel if he lacked all knowledge of military or nautical matters?

  SISYPHUS: No.

  SOCRATES: And would you expect the same to hold in all other fields? It is quite impossible for someone who doesn’t understand something either to know or to deliberate about what he doesn’t understand.

  SISYPHUS: I agree.

  SOCRATES: But it is possible to try to find out what one doesn’t know; isn’t that right?

  SISYPHUS: Certainly.[e]

  SOCRATES: Then trying to find out can no longer be identified with deliberating.

  SISYPHUS: Why not?

  SOCRATES: Because what one tries to find out is evidently something one doesn’t know, whereas apparently no human being can deliberate about what he doesn’t know. Wasn’t that what we just said?

  SISYPHUS: It certainly was.

  SOCRATES: And isn’t that what you Pharsalians were doing yesterday, trying to find out the best things for your city to do, yet not knowing them? Because if you knew them, you surely wouldn’t still have been trying to find them out—just as we don’t try to find out anything else we already know, do we?

  SISYPHUS: No, we don’t.

  SOCRATES: And if one doesn’t know something, Sisyphus, which do you think one should do: try to find it out or learn it?

  SISYPHUS: Learn it, for Heaven’s sake; that’s what I think. [390]

  SOCRATES: And there you’re right. But tell me, is it for the following reason that you think one should learn it rather than try to find it out? One can discover it more quickly and easily by learning it from those who understand it, than by trying to find it out on one’s own, when one doesn’t know it. Or is there some other reason?

  SISYPHUS: No, that is the reason.

  SOCRATES: Well then, why did you people take the trouble to deliberate yesterday on matters you don’t understand, and try to find out the best course of action for the city to take? Why weren’t you learning those things, rather, from someone who understands them, so that you could take the [b] best course of action for the city? Instead, it seems to me that you spent the whole day yesterday sitting there, making things up and divining about matters you didn’t understand, instead of taking the trouble to learn them—I mean those who govern your city, including you.

  Perhaps you’ll say that I’ve been jesting at your expense merely for the sake of having a discussion, but that you think nothing has been seriously [c] proved. Yet you’ll certainly have to take this next point seriously, Sisyphus. Suppose it be granted that there is such a thing as deliberation; suppose it does not, as was discovered just now, prove identical with sheer incomprehension,2 guesswork, or making things up, no different, but just using a grander name for it. In that case, don’t you think there’s a difference between some people and others with respect to deliberating well or being good deliberators, just as some people differ from others in all other areas of expertise—as, for example, some carpenters differ from others, or some [d] doctors from others, or some pipers from others, or as tradesmen in general differ from one another?3 Just as those experts differ in their respective skills, don’t you think the same applies to deliberating—that there’s a difference between some people and others?

  SISYPHUS: Yes, I do.

  SOCRATES: Now tell me, don’t all those who deliberate either well or badly deliberate about things that are going to exist in the future?

  SISYPHUS: Certainly.

  SOCRATES: And what’s in the future doesn’t exist yet. Isn’t that right?

  SISYPHUS: Of course.

  [e] SOCRATES: Because otherwise, presumably, it wouldn’t still be going to exist in the future, but would exist already, wouldn’t it?

  SISYPHUS: Yes.

  SOCRATES: And if it doesn’t exist yet, it hasn’t yet4 come into being either.

  SISYPHUS: No, it hasn’t.

  SOCRATES: But if it hasn’t even yet come into being, then it doesn’t yet possess any nature of its own either, does it?

  SISYPHUS: None at all.

  SOCRATES: Then those who deliberate well and those who do it badly are all deliberating about matters that neither exist nor have come into being nor possess any nature, whenever they deliberate about what’s in the future. Isn’t that right?

  SISYPHUS: It does appear to be.

  SOCRATES: Now do you think it’s possible for anyone to hit upon the nonexistent either well or badly?

  SISYPHUS: What do you mean by that?

  SOCRATES: I’ll show you what I’m suggesting. Consider a number of [391] archers. How would you distinguish which of them was a good marksman and which was a poor one? That’s not hard to tell, is it? You would presumably ask them to aim at some target.

  SISYPHUS: Certainly.

  SOCRATES: And the one who most often succeeded in hitting the target you would judge the winner?

  SISYPHUS: I would.

  SOCRATES: But if there were no target set up for them to aim at, and each [b] just shot wherever he pleased, how could you distinguish between the good marksman and the poor one?

  SISYPHUS: I couldn’t.

  SOCRATES: And wouldn’t you also be at a loss to distinguish good deliberators from bad ones, if they didn’t understand what they were deliberating about?

  SISYPHUS: I would.

  SOCRATES: And if those who deliberate are deliberating about matters in the future, they’re deliberating about matters that don’t exist, aren’t they?

  SISYPHUS: Absolutely.

  SOCRATES: And it’s impossible, isn’t it, for anyone to hit upon the nonexistent. How do you think anyone could ever hit upon what doesn’t exist? [c]

  SISYPHUS: It can’t be done.

  SOCRATES: And since it’s impossible to hit upon the nonexistent, no one who’s deliberating about the nonexistent could actually hit upon it. For the future is something that doesn’t exist, isn’t it?

  SISYPHUS: So I believe.

  SOCRATES: Then since nobody can hit upon what’s in the future, no human being can actually be good or bad at deliberation.

  SISYPHUS: Apparently not.

  SOCRATES: Nor can one person be either a better or a worse deliberator than another, if one cannot, in fact, be more or less successful at hitting upon the nonexistent.

  SISYPHUS: Indeed not. [d]

  SOCRATES: So what standard could people possibly have in mind when they call certain people good or bad deliberators? Don’t you think, Sisyphus, that it would be worth delving into this again some time?

/>   1. Accepting the deletion of ouch hostis eiē ho Kallistratos in c6.

  2. Accepting the conjecture anepistēmosunē in c4.

  3. Placing a question-mark after diapherousin in 390d2, and a comma after technais in d3.

  4. Conjecturing oupō for houtōs in e2.

  HALCYON

  Translated by Brad Inwood. Text: M. D. MacLeod, Luciani Opera (Oxford, 1987), vol. IV.

  Socrates tells his devoted friend Chaerephon the legend of Halcyon, who was transformed by some heavenly power into a sea bird, the better to search for her much-beloved husband, who had drowned at sea. Chaerephon doubts the truth of the legend, but Socrates argues that his doubt is unfounded; we are ignorant of the limits of divine power, which is unimaginably greater than human power and has shown itself to be capable of tremendous things.

  The topic and the setting of this lyrical little dialogue appear to be derived from a passage in Plato’s Phaedrus where Socrates also interprets a legend about the transformation of human beings into animals (258e–259d). The association between cosmos, heaven, nature, and divine power is characteristic of Platonism in later times, as is the skeptical stress on the limits of human knowledge, and the affinity between human beings and other animals. The dialogue is elaborately cultivated, both in vocabulary and composition, and is a good example of the artificial style called ‘Asiatic’ by later critics. It was probably composed between 150 B.C. and 50 A.D.

  The ending of Halcyon contains a sly allusion to the story of the two wives of Socrates, Xanthippe and Myrto, both of whom, he hopes, will be as devoted to him as Halcyon was to her husband. This story of the bigamy of Socrates goes back to the fourth century B.C. at least.

  Although many manuscripts attribute Halcyon to Plato and an ancient book list records it as being among the works incorrectly ascribed to him, it has virtually disappeared from the Platonic corpus. This is because it was later attributed to Lucian, the second-century A.D. orator and dialogue writer, probably by Byzantine scholars who noticed similarities with the methods and themes of Lucian. When the corpus of Platonic works was established for modern times in the sixteenth-century edition of Henri Étienne (Stephanus), Halcyon was not printed, and it has normally not been printed in other modern editions of Plato. It is nowadays usually printed only in editions of the Lucianic corpus.

  D.S.H.

  CHAEREPHON: Socrates, what was that voice that reached us from way [1] down along the beach, under the headland? It was so sweet to my ears! What creature can it be that makes that sound? Surely creatures that live in the sea are silent.

  SOCRATES: It’s a sort of sea bird, Chaerephon, called the halcyon, much given to lamenting and weeping. There is an ancient account about this bird, which was handed down as a myth by men of old. They say that it was once a woman, the daughter of Aeolus the son of Hellen, who ached with love and lamented the death of her wedded husband, Ceyx of Trachis, the son of Eosphorus the Dawn Star—a handsome son of a handsome father. And then, through some act of divine will, she grew wings like a bird and now flies about the sea searching for him, since she could not find him when she wandered all over the face of the earth.

  CHAEREPHON: Is it Halcyon that you’re referring to? I had never heard [2] the voice before; it really did strike me as something exotic. Anyway, the creature certainly does produce a mournful sound. About how big is it, Socrates?

  SOCRATES: Not very large. Yet great is the honor she has been given by the gods because of her love for her husband. For it’s when the halcyons are nesting that the cosmos brings us what are called the ‘halcyon days’ in mid-winter, days distinguished for their fair weather—today is an especially good example. Don’t you see how bright the sky above is and how the whole sea is calm and tranquil, like a mirror, so to speak?

  CHAEREPHON: You’re right; today does seem to be a halcyon day, and yesterday was much like it. But by the gods, Socrates! How can we actually believe those ancient tales, that once upon a time birds turned into women or women into birds? All that sort of thing seems utterly impossible.

  SOCRATES: Ah, my dear Chaerephon, we seem to be utterly short-sighted [3] judges of what is possible or impossible—we make our assessment according to the best of our human ability, which is unknowing, unreliable, and blind. Many things which are feasible seem, to us, not feasible, and many things which are attainable seem unattainable—often because of our inexperience, and often because of the childish folly in our minds. For in fact all human beings, even very old men, really do seem to be as foolish as children, since the span of our lives is small indeed, no longer than childhood when compared with all eternity. My good friend, how could people who know nothing about the powers of the gods and divinities, or of nature as a whole, possibly tell whether something like this is possible or impossible?

  Did you notice, Chaerephon, how big a storm we had the day before yesterday? Someone pondering those lightning flashes and thunderbolts and the tremendous force of the winds might well be struck by fear; one might have thought the whole inhabited world was actually going to collapse. But a little later there was an astounding restoration of fair weather [4] which has lasted right up to the present moment. Do you think, then, that it is a greater and more laborious task to conjure up this kind of fair weather out of such an overwhelming storm and disturbance and to bring the entire cosmos into a state of calm, than it is to reshape a woman’s form and turn it into a bird’s? Even our little children who know how to model such things out of clay or wax can easily work them into all kinds of shapes, all out of the same material. Since the divinity possesses great power, incomparably greater than ours, perhaps all such things are actually very easy for it. After all, how much greater than yourself would you say that the whole of heaven is?

  [5] CHAEREPHON: Socrates, who among men could imagine or find words for anything of the sort? Even to say it is beyond human attainment.

  SOCRATES: When we compare people with each other, do we not see that there are vast differences in their abilities and inabilities? Adult men, when compared to mere infants who are five or ten days old, have an amazing superiority in their ability at virtually all the practical affairs of life, those carried out by means of our sophisticated skills as well as those carried out by means of the body and soul; these things cannot, as I said, even [6] cross the minds of young children. And how immeasurably superior is the physical strength of one man grown to full size, compared to them, for one man could easily vanquish thousands of such children; and it is surely natural that in the initial stages of life men should be utterly helpless and incapable of anything. When one person, as it seems, is so far superior to another, how are we to suppose that the powers of the whole heaven would appear, compared with our powers, to those who are capable of grasping such matters? Perhaps indeed many people will think it plausible that, just as the size of the cosmos surpasses the form of Socrates or Chaerephon, so its power and wisdom and intelligence will to the same degree surpass our condition.

  [7] For you and me and many others like us, many things are impossible which are quite easy for others to do. For as long as they lack the knowledge, it is more impossible that people who cannot play the flute should do so or that the illiterate should read or write, than it is to make women out of birds or birds out of women. Nature virtually tosses into a honeycomb an animal which is footless and wingless; then she gives it feet and wings, adorns it with all kinds of variegated and beautiful colors and so produces a bee, wise producer of heavenly honey; and from mute and lifeless eggs she shapes many species of winged, walking and water-dwelling animals, [8] using (as some say) the sacred arts of the vast aether. We are mortal and utterly trivial, unable to see clearly either great or small matters and in the dark about most of the things which happen to us; so we could not possibly make any reliable claim about the mighty powers of the immortals, whether as regards halcyons or as regards nightingales.1

  O bird of musical lamentations, I shall pass on to my children the far-famed myth about your son
gs just as I received it from my ancestors, and I shall sing frequently to my wives, Xanthippe and Myrto, of your piety and loving devotion to your husband, with special emphasis on the honor you received from the gods. Will you too do something like this, Chaerephon?

  CHAEREPHON: That would certainly be appropriate, Socrates, and what you say is a double exhortation to the bond between husbands and wives.

  SOCRATES: Well, now it’s time to bid farewell to Halcyon, and go on to the city from Cape Phaleron.

  CHAEREPHON: Certainly; let’s do so.

  1. Legend tells that Procne and Philomela were also turned into birds, one into a nightingale, the other into a swallow.

  ERYXIAS

  Translated by Mark Joyal.

  Socrates falls into conversation with Erasistratus, and the talk turns to the topic of wealth and virtue. If the wealthiest person is whoever possesses what is of the greatest value, then those who possess the skill of practical wisdom must be the wealthiest, argues Socrates. Eryxias rejects this line of thinking, but when he asserts that it is good to be materially prosperous, he is defeated by Critias’ argument that having money is not always a good thing. Socrates shows that Eryxias’ common-sense ideas about money are confused; money has only conventional value and is no more useful, for providing ourselves with what our bodies need, than the skills which a teacher can communicate to others. In a subtle argument addressed to Critias, Socrates concludes that money cannot be considered useful at all, even when it is needed to obtain something of value. The final paradox: if money is useful, whoever has the most of it must be in the worst condition; if he wasn’t in a very bad condition, he wouldn’t need a lot of money and he wouldn’t find it useful.

  In between the arguments about wealth runs another theme, a discussion about the nature of philosophical argument: What is the difference between serious philosophical arguments and intellectual games? What is the difference between philosophical arguments and quarrels? Is it the argument or the speaker that carries credibility? Is philosophy a matter of personal commitment or a diverting performance?