Plato and His Dialogues

G. Lowes Dickinson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN:
  9781317340188
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

First published in 1931, this book explores the nature and importance of Plato's dialogues. The book was written for an audience of non-scholarly men and women who want to know something about one of the most remarkable thinkers of the Western world. The chapters were originally delivered as broadcast talks.

Chapter I
The Historic Background

I

Intensity of Life in Athens

THE Platonic dialogues cannot be properly understood unless we remember the setting in which they were framed. They were a natural product of ancient Athens, where there was collected, in what seems to us a very small city, a crowd of the most active-minded people that has ever been gathered together, except perhaps in the Florence of the Renaissance. Everybody of any note was known, at any rate by sight and reputation, to everybody else. Life was lived, as it is still in the south, much more out-of-doors than indoors. The boys and men of the well-to-do classes spent much of their time in the gymnasium, which was a centre of conversation as well as of athletics. There was of course no printing, and though books were written and handed about, most teaching was oral, whether for boys or grown-up men. Word of mouth in public, not book-reading in private, was the medium of intellectual culture.

At the same time this little city was a centre of intense political life. For Athens, like the other Greek cities, was a sovereign independent state, governing itself, contracting alliances, and waging war. Thus all the main problems of political science arose there both in practice and theory, though on what seems to us a miniature scale; and Greek political speculation, arising out of Greek experience, gave the general form to all later political thinking, however much the scale may have been enlarged and the details varied in the two thousand years of history that have elapsed since Plato’s date. The history of ancient Greece is indeed, in certain respects, an epitome of the history of Europe; and since it was discussed and debated by perhaps the most brilliant set of people that have ever been brought together, its reflection in thought has never ceased to fascinate those who have been intelligent and cultivated enough to understand it.

Brevity of the Great Period

But if the history of ancient Greece was small in scale, it was also brief in time. Its origins, of course, extend indefinitely into the past, but its time of flourishing was only about two hundred years, say, from the middle of the sixth century B.C. to the middle of the fourth. After that, Greece was absorbed politically, first into the Macedonian, then into the Roman state. Athens then assumed a position like that of Oxford in England, or Paris in France, or Weimar in Germany. We now are only concerned with the latter half of the fifth and the earlier half of the fourth century B.C. For Plato’s date is 427–347; and his master, Socrates, was born some forty years earlier.

Sketch of Plato’s Life

Plato’s boyhood and youth were thus passed in the stress of the Peloponnesian war (431–404 B.C.), in which all the cities of Greece took part and which ended in the crushing defeat of Athens. He belonged to an aristocratic and political family and would naturally have adopted a political career. Perhaps the mere defeat of Athens would not have altered his mind; but he had witnessed in 399 B.C. the imprisonment of his master and his condemnation to death. The injustice of this drove him from Athens. He spent some years travelling abroad, and when he did venture into practical politics it was not in Athens, but in Sicily. At Athens his career was that of a teacher; but among the things he taught, politics took a conspicuous place. To appreciate what he has to say on this theme we must remind ourselves Of what politics meant in Athens.

The City Democracy of Athens

Athens, it has been said, was governed by public meeting; and though this statement over-simplifies the matter, it serves to throw into relief the difference between a city democracy and the democracies of our own time. Actually, in Athens, a public meeting which all citizens could attend did transact all the most important political business and take the most important decisions, particularly those of peace and war. The meeting on great occasions would be crowded, and to be influential there a statesman must be able to hold it by oratory. On the character of the leaders who could control the assembly the city would stand or fall. The speeches of some of these statesmen-orators have been preserved verbally or in essentials. One of the greatest of them was Pericles, and in his famous speech about Athens, reported by the historian Thucydides, we see how a patriotic Athenian judged the character and achievement of Athens:

Pericles Parises Athens

“Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. We do not copy our neighbours, but are an example to them. It is true that we are called a democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few. But while the law secures equal justice to all alike in their private disputes, the claim of excellence is also recognised; and when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit. Neither is poverty a bar, but a man may benefit his country whatever be the obscurity of his condition. There is no exclusiveness in our public life, and in our private intercourse we are not suspicious of one another, nor angry with our neighbour if he does what lie likes; we do not put on sour looks at him which, though harmless, are not pleasant. While we are thus unconstrained in our private intercourse, a spirit of reverence pervades our public acts; we are prevented from doing wrong by respect for authority and for the laws, having an especial regard to those which are ordained for the protection of the injured as well as to those unwritten laws which bring upon the transgressor of them the reprobation of the general sentiment.

“And we have not forgotten to provide for our weary spirits many relaxations from toil; we have regular games and sacrifices throughout the year; at home the style of our life is refined; and the delight which we daily feel in all these things helps to banish melancholy. Because of the greatness of our city the fruits of the whole earth flow in upon us; so that we enjoy the goods of other countries as freely as of our own.

“Then, again, our military training is in many respects superior to that of our adversaries. Our city is thrown open to the world, and we never expel a foreigner or prevent him from seeing or learning anything of which the secret if revealed to an enemy might profit him. We rely not upon management or trickery, but upon our own hearts and hands. And in the matter of education, whereas they from early youth are always undergoing laborious exercises which are to make them brave, we live at ease, and yet are equally ready to face the perils which they face. And here is the proof. The Lacedaemonians come into Attica not by themselves, but with their whole confederacy following; we go alone into a neighbour’s country; and although our opponents are fighting for their homes and we on a foreign soil, we have seldom any difficulty in overcoming them. Our enemies have never yet felt our united strength; the care of a navy divides our attention, and on land we are obliged to send our own citizens everywhere. But they, if they meet and defeat a part of our army, are as proud as if they had routed us all, and when defeated they pretend to have been vanquished by us all.

“If then we prefer to meet danger with a light heart but without laborious training, and with a courage which is gained by habit and not enforced by law, are we not greatly the gainers? Since we do not anticipate the pain, although, when the hour comes, we can be as brave as those who never allow themselves to rest; and thus, too, our city is equally admirable in peace and in war. For we are lovers of the beautiful, yet simple in our tastes, and we cultivate the mind without loss of manliness. Wealth we employ, not for talk and ostentation, but when there is a real use for it. To avow poverty with us is no disgrace; the true disgrace is in doing nothing to avoid it. An Athenian citizen does not neglect the state because he takes care of his own household; and even those of us who are engaged in business have a very fair idea of politics. We alone regard a man who takes no interest in public affairs, not as a harmless, but as a useless character; and if few of us are originators, we are all sound judges of a policy. The great impediment to action is, in our opinion, not discussion, but the want of that knowledge which is gained by discussion preparatory to action. For we have a peculiar power of thinking before we act and of acting too, whereas other men are courageous from ignorance, but hesitate upon reflection. And they are surely to be esteemed the bravest spirits who, having the clearest sense both of the pains and pleasures of life, do not on that account shrink from danger. In doing good, again, we are unlike others; we make our friends by conferring, not by receiving favours. Now he who confers a favour is the firmer friend, because he would fain by kindness keep alive the memory of an obligation; but the recipient is colder in his feelings, because he knows that in requiting another’s generosity he will not be winning gratitude, but only paying a debt. We alone do good to our neighbours not upon a calculation of interest, but in the confidence of freedom and in a frank and fearless spirit.

“To sum up, I say that Athens is the school of Hellas, and that the individual Athenian in his own person seems to have the power of adapting himself to the most varied forms of action with the utmost versatility and grace. This is no passing and idle word, but truth and fact; and the assertion is verified by the position to which these qualities have raised the state. For in the hour of trial Athens alone among her contemporaries is superior to the report of her. No enemy who comes against her is indignant at the reverses which he sustains at the hands of such a city; no subject complains that his masters are unworthy of him. And we shall assuredly not be without witnesses; there are mighty monuments of our power which will make us the wonder of this and of succeeding ages: we shall not need the praises of Homer or of any other panegyrist, whose poetry may please for the moment, although his representation of the facts will not bear the light of day. For we have compelled every land and every sea to open a path for our valour, and have everywhere planted eternal memorials of our friendship and of our enmity.” ¹

The Effects of the Peloponnesian War

This passage is a superb example of the way in which a leader in war may encourage his fellow-citizens to fight. Two years later the Athenians, with their territory invaded and their citizens crowded into a city decimated by famine and plague, were crying for peace and turning against Pericles as the author of all their sufferings. Nor was that all. The war between the sovereign city states gave birth to civil war between the factions within; and it is thus that, five years after the beginning of the war, we find Thucydides describing the condition of Greece:

“Not long afterwards the whole Hellenic world was in commotion; in every city the chiefs of the democracy and of the oligarchy were struggling, the one to bring in the Athenians, the other the Lacedaemonians. Now in time of peace, men would have had no excuse for introducing either, and no desire to do so, but when they were at war and both sides could easily obtain allies to the hurt of their enemies and the advantage of themselves, the dissatisfied party were only too ready to invoke foreign aid. And revolution brought upon the cities of Hellas many terrible calamities, such as have been and always will be while human nature remains the same, but which are more or less aggravated and differ in character with every new combination of circumstances. In peace and prosperity both states and individuals are actuated by higher motives, because they do not fall under the dominion of imperious necessities; but war which takes away the comfortable provision of daily life is a hard master, and tends to assimilate men’s characters to their conditions.

“When troubles had once begun in the cities, those who followed carried the revolutionary spirit further and further, and determined to outdo the report of all who had preceded them by the ingenuity of their enterprises and the atrocity of their revenges. The meaning of words had no longer the same relation to things, but was changed by them as they thought proper. Reckless daring was held to be loyal courage; prudent delay was the excuse of a coward; moderation was the disguise of unmanly weakness; to know everything was to do nothing, Frantic energy was the true quality of a man. A conspirator who wanted to be safe was a recreant in disguise. The lover of violence was always trusted, and his opponent suspected. He who succeeded in a plot was deemed knowing, but a still greater master in craft was he who detected one. On the other hand, he who plotted from the first to have nothing to do with plots was a breaker up of parties and a poltroon who was afraid of the enemy. In a word, he who could outstrip another in a bad action was applauded, and so was he who encouraged to evil one who had no idea of it. The tie of party was stronger than the tie of blood, because a partisan was more ready to dare without asking why. For party associations are not based upon any established law, nor do they seek the public good; they are formed in defiance of the laws and from self-interest. The seal of good faith was not divine law, but fellowship in crime. If an enemy when he was in the ascendant offered fair words, the opposite party received them not in a generous spirit, but by a jealous watchfulness of his actions. Revenge was dearer than self-preservation. Any agreements sworn to by either party, when they could do nothing else, were binding as long as both were powerless. But he who on a favourable opportunity first took courage and struck at his enemy when he saw him off his guard, had greater pleasure in a perfidious than he would have had in an open act of revenge; he congratulated himself that he had taken the safer course, and also that he had overreached his enemy and gained the prize of superior ability. In general, the dishonest more easily gain credit for cleverness than the simple for goodness; men take a pride in the one, but are ashamed of the other.

“The cause of all these evils was the love of power, originating in avarice and ambition, and the party-spirit which is engendered by them when men are fairly embarked in a contest. For the leaders on either side used specious names, the one party professing to uphold the constitutional equality of the many, the other the wisdom of an aristocracy, while they made the public interests, to which in name they were devoted, in reality their prize. Striving in every way to overcome each other, they committed the most monstrous crimes; yet even these were surpassed by the magnitude of their revenges which they pursued to the very utmost, neither party observing any definite limits either of justice or public expediency, but both alike making the caprice of the moment their law. Either by the help of an unrighteous sentence, or grasping power with the strong hand, they were eager to satiate the impatience of party spirit. Neither faction cared for religion; but any fair pretence which succeeded in effecting some odious purpose was greatly lauded. And the citizens who were of neither party fell a prey to both; either they were disliked because they held aloof, or men were jealous of their surviving.

“Thus revolution gave birth to every form of wickedness in Hellas. The simplicity which is so large an element in a noble nature was laughed to scorn and disappeared. An attitude of perfidious antagonism everywhere prevailed, for there was no word binding enough nor oath terrible enough to reconcile enemies. Each man was strong only in the conviction that nothing was secure; he must look to his own safety, and could not afford to trust others. Inferior intellects generally succeeded best. For, aware of their own deficiencies, and fearing the capacity of their opponents, for whom they were no match in powers of speech, and whose subtle wits were likely to anticipate them in contriving evil, they struck boldly and at once. But the cleverer sort, presuming in their arrogance that they would be aware in time, and disdaining to act when they could think, were taken off their guard and easily destroyed.”¹

Such was the city in which Socrates and Plato lived and died, and such the circumstances in which the one passed his prime and the other his youth. Neither can be understood without that background of history. We will now proceed to describe more particularly the life and death of Socrates.

Notes

1 Thucydides, Book II, Jowett’s trans., vol. i, p. 117 sq., ed. 1881.

1 Thucydides, Book III, p. 221.

Chapter II
Socrates

Alcibiades Describes Socrates

As we have seen, the life and conversation of Socrates was the origin and inspiration of Plato’s dialogues. It has been, and I suppose always will be, disputed how much of the disciple’s philosophy was derived from his master. But there is no doubt whence the inspiration came. Socrates is the principal speaker in almost all the dialogues; and it is mainly from them that we learn what we know of his character, appearance, life, and death. Take, for instance, the following passage, in which the young Alcibiades who was later to be so famous describes the personal appearance of Socrates:

“And now, my boys, I shall praise Socrates in a figure which will appear to him to be a caricature, and yet I speak, not to make fun of him, but only for the truth’s sake. I say, that he is exactly like the busts of Silenus, which are set up in the statuaries’ shops, holding pipes and flutes in their mouths; and they are made to open in the middle, and have images of gods inside them. I say also that he is like Marsyas the satyr. You yourself will not deny, Socrates, that your face is like that of a satyr. Aye, and there is ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Original Title
• Original Copyright
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• CONTENTS
• INTRODUCTION
• CHAPTER I THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND
• CHAPTER II SOCRATES
• CHAPTER III THE CHARACTER OF PLATO’S DIALOGUES
• CHAPTER IV THE “REPUBLIC”
• CHAPTER V THE “LAWS”
• CHAPTER VI LOVE AND PHILOSOPHY