SOCRATES

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The Sophistic Movement

⊕ "This man Gorgias, the sophist from Leontini, came here from home in the public capacity of envoy, as being best able of all the citizens of Leontini to attend to the interests of the community, and it was the general opinion that he spoke excellently in the public assembly, and in his private capacity, by giving exhibitions and associating with the young, he earned and received a great deal of money from this city. Or, if you like, our friend here, Prodicus, often went to other places in a public capacity, and the last time, just lately, when he came here in a public capacity from Ceos, he gained great reputation by his speaking before the Council, and in his private capacity, by giving exhibitions and associating with the young, he received a marvelous sum of money. None of the ancients ever thought fit to exact the money as payment or to give exhibitions among people of various places; so simple-minded were they, and so unconscious of the fact that money is of the greatest value" (Hippias Major 282b).

Protagoras of Abdera (early 5th to late 5th century BCE)

Georgias of Leontini (early 5th to early 4th century BCE)

Prodicus of Ceos (middle 5th to early 4th century BCE)

Hippias of Elis (middle 5th to early 4th century BCE)



The Protagoras is a conversation within a conversation. It opens with Socrates meeting an unnamed friend (Protagoras 309a). Socrates has just returned from the company of Protagoras. The friend asks Socrates where he has been, and Socrates reports to him what happened the previous night. This can make the dialogue a little confusing to read because Socrates' report is a mixture of quotation and description of what happened. When I can, I recast the report simply as a conversation between Socrates and Protagoras. The Sophistic movement began with political embassies who came to Athens on the behalf of their home cities. Once in Athens, some of those who spoke on behalf of their cities realized that there was a demand for them to teach others how to speak persuasively.

The noun "sophist" (σοφιστής) first meant someone who is wise, but it came to have the more specific use for someone who teaches virtue. Protagoras is the most famous example.

The Protagoras and Gorgias portray the Sophistic movement and contrast what the Sophists teach with Socrates and his interest in wisdom and truth and the best state of the soul.

• Protagoras 312b

  Are you, Hippocrates, aware of what you are now about to do, or is it not clear to you?
  To what do you refer, Socrates?
  I mean your intention of submitting your soul to the treatment of a man who, as you say, is a sophist; and as to what a sophist really is, I shall be surprised if you can tell me. And yet, if you are ignorant of this, you cannot know to whom you are entrusting your soul,—whether it is to something good or to something bad.
  I really think that I know.
  Then tell me, please, what you consider a sophist (σοφιστήν) to be.

Notes on the Text

Hippocrates had heard Protagoras was in town and has asked Socrates to introduce him.

Socrates tells him to consider the "treatment" and to be sure it is good for his soul.

This raises the question of what is good for the soul.

Someone does what he does as he lives his life because of the states in his soul. So when he lives the good life, his soul is in a certain state. The good for the soul consists in this state.

What are this state?

Socrates, it seems, thinks it is wisdom.

• Protagoras 312e

  What is this thing, of which the sophist himself has knowledge and gives it to his pupil?
  Ah, there, in good faith, Socrates, I fail to find you an answer.
  Now tell me, are you aware upon what sort of hazard you are going to stake your soul? If you had to entrust your body to someone, taking the risk of its being made better or worse, you would first consider most carefully whether you ought to entrust it or not, and would seek the advice of your friends and relations and ponder it for a number of days: but in the case of your soul, which you value much more highly than your body, and on which depends the good or ill condition of all your affairs, according as it is made better or worse, would you omit to consult first with either your father or your brother or one of us your comrades,—as to whether or no you should entrust your very soul to this newly-arrived foreigner; but choose rather, having heard of him in the evening, as you say, and coming to me at dawn, to make no mention of this question, and take no counsel upon it—whether you ought to entrust yourself to him or not; and are ready to spend your own substance and that of your friends, in the settled conviction that at all costs you must converse with Protagoras, whom you neither know, as you tell me, nor have ever met in argument before, and whom you call sophist, in patent ignorance of what this sophist may be to whom you are about to entrust yourself?

Notes on the Text

The student comes to the sophists for "knowledge" involved in living the good life.

Hippocrates does not know whether they have this knowledge.

• Protagoras 313c

⊕ "[I]f you give him a fee and win him over he will make you wise (σοφόν)..." (Protagoras 310d).

Hippocrates tells Socrates that "everyone praises the man and tells of his mastery of speech..." (Protagoras 310e)

  "[W]hat title do they give Protagoras?
  A sophist (σοφιστὴν), to be sure, Socrates, is what they call him" (Protagoras 311e).

"teachings" (μαθήμασιν). A μάθημα (singular form of μαθήμασιν) is "that which is learned, a lesson, knowledge."

"I am a sophist and I educate men" (Protagoras 317b).

"Not only do you consider yourself noble and good (καλὸς κἀγαθὸς), like sundry other people, who are sensible enough themselves, but cannot make others so; but you are both good yourself and have the gift of making others good. And you are so confident of yourself that, while others make a secret of this art, you have had yourself publicly proclaimed to all the Greeks with the title of sophist, and have appointed yourself as a producer of education and teacher of virtue (ἀρετῆς), and are the first who has ever demanded a regular fee for such work" (Protagoras 348e).   Then can it be, Hippocrates, that the sophist is really a sort of merchant or dealer in provisions on which a soul is nourished? For such is the view I take of him.
  With what, Socrates, is a soul nourished?
  With teachings, presumably. And we must take care, my good friend, that the sophist, in commending his wares, does not deceive us, as both merchant and dealer do in the case of our bodily food. For among the provisions, you know, in which these men deal, not only are they themselves ignorant what is good or bad for the body, since in selling they commend them all, but the people who buy from them are so too, unless one happens to be a trainer or a doctor. And in the same way, those who take their doctrines the round of our cities, hawking them about to any odd purchaser who desires them, commend everything that they sell, and there may well be some of these too, my good sir, who are ignorant which of their wares is good or bad for the soul; and in just the same case are the people who buy from them, unless one happens to have a doctor's knowledge here also, but of the soul. So then, if you are well informed as to what is good or bad among these wares, it will be safe for you to buy doctrines from Protagoras or from anyone else you please: but if not, take care, my dear fellow, that you do not risk your greatest treasure on a toss of the dice.

Notes on the Text

Socrates suggests that the Sophists are not wise, contrary to their name.

They sell "teachings" for the soul, and Socrates suggests they have little interest in whether these "teachings" are good or bad for the soul. Their interest is in the sale.

• Protagoras 318a

  My friend Hippocrates finds himself desirous of joining your classes; and therefore he says he would be glad to know what result he will get from joining them. That is all the speech we have to make.
  Young man, you will gain this by coming to my classes, that on the day when you join them you will go home a better man, and on the day after it will be the same; every day you will constantly improve more and more.

Notes on the Text

Socrates points out that if someone were a student of a painter, he would get better at painting (Protagoras 318b). He asks Protagoras to say what his students become better at doing.

• Protagoras 318d

  [T]ell us for what, Protagoras, and in what connexion my friend Hippocrates, on any day of attendance at the classes of Protagoras, will go away a better man, and on each of the succeeding days will make a like advance.
  You do right to ask that, while I am only too glad to answer those who ask the right question. For Hippocrates, if he comes to me, will not be treated as he would have been if he had joined the classes of an ordinary sophist. The ⊕ "They seemed to be asking him a series of astronomical questions on nature and the heavenly bodies, while he, seated in his chair, was distinguishing and expounding to each in turn the subjects of their questions" (Protagoras 315c).

Aristophanes makes fun of the Sophists for forcing their students back into the arts (Clouds 637ff). generality of them maltreat the young; for when they have escaped from the arts they bring them back against their will and force them into arts, teaching them arithmetic and astronomy and geometry and music; whereas, if he applies to me, he will learn precisely and solely that for which he has come. That learning consists of good judgement, showing how best to order his own home; and in the affairs of the city, showing how he may have most influence in political debate and in negotiating.

Notes on the Text

Now we have the beginning of answer to an earlier question.

The "knowledge" for which the student comes to the Sophist and the "teachings" the Sophists provide the student is wide-ranging, but Protagoras thinks that it should consist in "good judgement" in the sorts of situations an Athenian male citizen faces in his life.

In saying this, Protagoras comes close to saying that he makes them better at living.

• Protagoras 319a

⊕ "art of citizenship (τὴν πολιτικὴν)"

"to make men good citizens (ἀγαθοὺς πολίτας)"

What is this?

"Callias [one of the richest men in Athens], if your two sons had happened to be two colts or two calves, we should be able to get and hire for them an overseer who would make them good in the kind of virtue proper to them; and he would be a horse-trainer or a husbandman; but now, since they are two human beings, whom have you in mind to get as overseer? Who has knowledge of that kind of virtue, that of a man and a citizen (ἀνθρωπίνης τε καὶ πολιτικῆς)? For I think you have looked into the matter, because you have sons" (Apology 20a).

  "Meno has been declaring to me ever so long, Anytus, that he desires to have that wisdom and virtue whereby men keep their house or their city in good order, and honor their parents, and know when to welcome and when to speed citizens and strangers as befits a good man. Now tell me, to whom ought we properly to send him for lessons in this virtue? Or is it clear enough, from our argument just now, that he should go to these men who profess to be teachers of virtue and advertise themselves as the common teachers of the Greeks, and are ready to instruct anyone who chooses in return for fees charged on a fixed scale?
  To whom are you referring, Socrates?
  Surely you know as well as anyone; they are the men whom people call sophists" (Meno 91a).   I wonder whether I follow what you are saying; for you appear to be speaking of the art of citizenship, and undertaking to make men good citizens.
  That, Socrates is exactly the purport of what I profess.
  Then it is a goodly accomplishment that you have acquired, to be sure, if indeed you have acquired it—to such a man as you I may say sincerely what I think. For this is a thing, Protagoras, that I did not suppose to be teachable; but when you say it is, I do not see how I am to disbelieve it. How I came to think that it cannot be taught, or provided by men for men, I may be allowed to explain. I say, in common with the rest of the Greeks, that the Athenians are wise. Now I observe, when we are collected for the Assembly, and the city has to deal with an affair of building, we send for builders to advise us on what is proposed to be built; and when it is a case of laying down a ship, we send for shipwrights; and so in all other matters which are considered learnable and teachable: but if anyone else, whom the people do not regard as a craftsman, attempts to advise them, no matter how handsome and wealthy and well-born he may be, not one of these things induces them to accept him; they merely laugh him to scorn and shout him down, until either the speaker retires from his attempt, overborne by the clamor, or the tipstaves pull him from his place or turn him out altogether by order of the chair. Such is their procedure in matters which they consider professional. But when they have to deliberate on something connected with the administration of the city, the man who rises to advise them on this may equally well be a smith, a shoemaker, a merchant, a sea-captain, a rich man, a poor man, of good family or of none, and nobody thinks of casting in his teeth, as one would in the former case, that his attempt to give advice is justified by no instruction obtained in any quarter, no guidance of any master; and obviously it is because they hold that here the thing cannot be taught. Nay further, it is not only so with the service of the city, but in private life our best and wisest citizens are unable to transmit this (ἀρετὴν) of theirs to others; for Pericles, the father of these young fellows here, gave them a first-rate training in the subjects for which he found teachers, but in those of which he is himself a master he neither trains them personally nor commits them to another's guidance, and so they go about grazing at will like sacred oxen, on the chance of their picking up virtue here or there for themselves. Or, if you like, there is Cleinias, the younger brother of Alcibiades here, whom this same Pericles, acting as his guardian, and fearing lie might be corrupted, I suppose, by Alcibiades, carried off from his brother and placed in Ariphron's family to be educated: but before six months had passed he handed him back to Alcibiades, at a loss what to do with him. And there are a great many others whom I could mention to you as having never succeeded, though virtuous themselves, in making anyone else better, either of their own or of other families. I therefore, Protagoras, in view of these facts, believe that virtue (ἀρετήν) is not teachable: but when I hear you speak thus, I am swayed over, and suppose there is something in what you say, because I consider you to have gained experience in many things and to have learnt many, besides finding out some for yourself. So if you can demonstrate to us more explicitly that virtue is teachable, do not grudge us your demonstration.

Notes on the Text

Protagoras claims to teach the competency involved in being a "good citizen." This is the "good judgement" in the sorts of situations an Athenian male citizen faces in his life.

Socrates argues that this virtue is not teachable. The Assembly, in the case of technical matters, only allows professionals to speak, but they allow anyone to advise them on the affairs of the city. This is their practice, Socrates says, because they do not think virtue can be taught. Further, contrary to what one would expect if it could be taught, those who are thought to have virtue do not pass it on to their sons. As an example, Socrates cites Pericles (who presided over Athens in its golden age, roughly the time between the Persian and Peloponnesian War).

Protagoras, in turn, explains to Socrates that virtue can be taught.

⊕ I fancy the more agreeable (χαριέστερον) way is for me to tell you a myth'" (Protagoras 320c).

"After this great and fine performance Protagoras ceased from speaking. As for me, for a good while I was still under his spell and kept on looking at him as though he were going to say more, such was my eagerness to hear: but when I perceived that he had really come to a stop, I pulled myself together, as it were..." (Protagoras 328d). Protagoras asks Socrates how he should give the explanation that shows that virtue can be taught, in a "myth" or in an "argument." Socrates lets Protagoras choose, and he chooses "myth" because this format is more "agreeable" than Socrates' method of question and answer.

Socrates thinks that truth is the issue, not agreeableness.

• Protagoras 322a

Thus far provided, men dwelt separately in the beginning, and cities there were none; so that they were being destroyed by the wild beasts, since these were in all ways stronger than they; and although their skill in handiwork was a sufficient aid in respect of food, in their warfare with the beasts it was defective; for as yet they had no art of politics, which includes the art of war. So they sought to band themselves together and secure their lives by founding cities. Now as often as they were banded together they did wrong to one another through the lack of the art of citizenship, and thus they began to be scattered again and to perish. So Zeus, fearing that our race was in danger of utter destruction, sent Hermes to bring shame and right among ⊕ "shame and right (αἰδῶ τε καὶ δίκην)" men, to the end that there should be regulation of cities and friendly ties to draw them together. Then Hermes asked Zeus in what manner then was he to give men right and shame: 'Am I to deal them out as the arts have been dealt? That dealing was done in such wise that one man possessing medical art is able to treat many ordinary men, and so with the other craftsmen. Am I to place among men right and shame in this way also, or deal them out to all?' 'To all,' replied Zeus; 'let all have their share: for cities cannot be formed if only a few have a share of these as of other arts. And make thereto a law of my ordaining, that he who cannot partake of shame and right shall die. For he is a pestilence to the city.' Hence it comes about, Socrates, that people in cities, and especially in Athens, consider it the concern of a few to advise on matters of architectural virtue or the virtue proper to any other professional speciality, and if anyone outside the few gives advice they disallow it, as you say, and not without reason, as I think. But when they meet for a consultation on political virtue, where they should be guided throughout by justice and good sense, they naturally allow advice from everybody, since it is held that everyone should partake of this virtue or else that states cannot be.

Notes on the Text

According to the myth, human psychology changed in the distant past. Before the change, human beings did not have "shame and right." This prevented them from living together in cities. They lived on their own, and this gave the beasts a competitive advantage. Zeus thought the race was in danger of going out of existence, so he had Hermes (the messenger between the gods and human beings) give "shame and right" to each human being.

The "shame and right" (αἰδῶ τε καὶ δίκην) Hermes gives to each human being somehow prevents them from acting in ways not conducive to stable group living.

• Protagoras 325c

From earliest childhood till the last day of their lives, we teach and admonish them. As soon as one of them grasps what is said to him, the nurse, the mother, the tutor, and the father himself strive hard that the child may excel, and as each act and word occurs they teach and impress upon him that ⊕ this is right, and that not right, one thing noble, another base, one holy, another unholy, and this do, and that do not. If he readily obeys, fine; but if not, they treat him as a bent and twisted piece of wood and straighten him with threats and blows. After this they send them to school and charge the master to take far more pains over their children's good behavior than over their letters and harp-playing. The masters take pains accordingly, and the children, when they have learnt their letters and are getting to understand the written word as before they did only the spoken, are furnished with works of good poets to read as they sit in class, and are made to learn them off by heart: here they meet with many admonitions, many descriptions and praises and eulogies of good men in times past, that the boy in envy may imitate them and yearn to become even as they. ... This is what people do, who are most able; and the most able are the wealthiest. Their sons begin school at the earliest age, and are freed from it at the latest. And when they are released from their schooling the city next compels them to learn the laws and to live according to them and that they may not do as they please, but just as writing-masters first draw letters in faint outline with the pen for their less advanced pupils, and then give them the copy-book and make them write according to the guidance of their lines, so the city sketches out for them the laws devised by good lawgivers of yore, and constrains them to govern and be governed according to these and punishes them if they do not. ... Seeing, then, that so much care is taken in the matter of both private and public virtue, are you still puzzled, Socrates, about virtue being teachable? The wonder would be if it were not teachable.

Notes on the Text

Teaching virtue consists in manipulating the "shame and right" in human beings.

This suggests taht the "shame and right" is the basis for a coordination among attitudes about what is and is not permissible. The specific form the coordination takes is reflected in the norms in the community. It is instilled in children in the home, in lessons in school, in punishments in the legal system, and through the power of persuasion in rhetoric. In the home, it begins in the nursery. The lessons develop the implanted sense of "shame and right" so that the traditional morality becomes second nature to them. This transforms them. It causes them to agree in thought and action with their parents, teachers, and lawgivers when they say "this is right, and that not right, one thing noble, another base, one holy, another unholy, and that he is to do this, and not do that." This development of "shame and right" continues throughout the years of school and later into adult life with the enforcement of the laws.

• Protagoras 329b

  And now, Protagoras, there is one little thing wanting to the completeness of what I have got, so please answer me this. You say that virtue may be taught, and if there is anybody in the world who could convince me, you are the man: but there was a point in your speech at which I wondered, and on which my spirit would fain be satisfied. You said that Zeus had sent right and shame to mankind, and furthermore it was frequently stated in your discourse that justice, temperance, holiness and the rest were all but one single thing, ⊕ "The question, I believe, was this: Are the five names of wisdom, temperance, courage, justice, and holiness attached to one thing, or underlying each of these names is there a distinct existence or thing that has its own particular function, each thing being different from the others? And your answer was that they are not names attached to one thing, but that each of these names applies to a distinct thing, and that all these are parts of virtue; not like the parts of gold, which are similar to each other and to the whole of which they are parts, but like the parts of the face, dissimilar to the whole of which they are parts and to each other, and each having a distinct function" (Protagoras 349b). virtue: pray, now proceed to deal with these in more precise exposition, stating whether virtue is a single thing, of which justice and temperance and holiness are parts, or whether the qualities I have just mentioned are all names of the same single thing. This is what I am still hankering after.
  Why, the answer to that is easy, Socrates. It is that virtue is a single thing and the qualities in question are parts of it.
  Do you mean parts in the sense of the parts of a face, as mouth, nose, eyes, and ears; or, as in the parts of gold, is there no difference among the pieces, either between the parts or between a part and the whole, except in greatness and smallness?
  In the former sense, I think, Socrates; as the parts of the face are to the whole face.
  Well then, when men partake of these portions of virtue, do some have one, and some another, or if you get one, must you have them all?
  By no means, since many are brave but unjust, and many again are just but not wise.
  Then are these also parts of virtue, wisdom and courage?
  Most certainly, I should say, and of the parts, wisdom is the greatest.
  Each of them, I proceeded, is distinct from any other?
  Yes, Socrates.

Notes on the Text

Protagoras has given his speech. Now Socrates questions him.

In this speech, Protagoras talks about virtue and about particular virtues. The question Socrates asks is not very clear, but he seems to want to know whether virtue is one thing.

Socrates' question, it seems, is whether virtue is a single state of the soul and the different kinds of actions (courageous actions, temperate actions, and so on) result from this single state.

The alternative, which Socrates himself seems to reject, is that courage is the state of soul from which courageous actions result, temperance the state of soul from which temperate actions result, and that these and the other particular virtues are different states of the soul.

Protagoras takes virtue to be many, but he cannot defend this view in questioning.

• Gorgias 449a

⊕   What, Chaerephon? Has Socrates a desire to hear Gorgias?
  Yes, it is for that very purpose we are here.
  Then whenever you have a mind to pay me a call—Gorgias is staying with me, and he will give you a display.
  Thank you, Callicles: but would he consent to discuss with us? For I want to find out from the man what is the power (δύναμις) of his art, and what it is he makes claims about and teaches. As for the rest of his performance, he must give it us, as you suggest, on another occasion (Gorgias 447b).   Gorgias, do you tell us yourself in what art it is you are skilled, and hence, what we ought to call you.
  Rhetoric, Socrates.
  So we are supposed to call you an rhetor?
  Yes, and a good one, Socrates.

Notes on the Text

The Gorgias focuses on what the power of rhetoric is.

Socrates's interlocutors are Gorigas, Polus, and Callicles. He takes them on in turn.

Socrates has told Callicles that he wants to "to find out from the man what is the power of his art, and what it is he makes claims about and teaches."

To this end, Socrates first asks Gorgias what he is.

He is an "rhetor" (ῥήτωρ). This Greek word translates in Latin as orator.

• Gorgias 452d

⊕   "Of the things that are, which is the one that these speeches used by rhetoric are concerned with?
  The greatest of human concerns, Socrates, and the best" (Gorgias 451d).

  "Seeing then that it is the same virtue in all cases, try and tell me, Meno, if you can recollect, what Gorgias—and you in agreement with him—say it is.
  Simply that it is the power of governing mankind— if you want some single description to cover all cases" (Meno 73c).   Tell us, Gorgias, what is this thing that you say is the greatest good for men, and that you claim to produce.
  A thing, Socrates, which in truth is the greatest good. It is the source of freedom for a man himself and at the same time it is the source of rule over others in one’s own city.
  Well, and what do you call it?
  I call it the ability to persuade with speeches judges in the law courts, statesmen in the council-chamber or the commons in the Assembly, or an audience at any other meeting that may be held on public affairs. And I tell you that because of this power you will have the doctor as your slave, and the trainer as your slave; your money-getter will turn out to be making money not for himself, but for another,—in fact for you, who are able to speak and persuade the multitude.
  I think now, Gorgias, you have come very near to showing us the art of rhetoric as you conceive it, and if I at all take your meaning, you say ⊕ "you say that rhetoric is a producer of persuasion, λέγεις ὅτι πειθοῦς δημιουργός ἐστιν ἡ ῥητορική" that rhetoric is a producer of persuasion, and has therein its whole business and main consummation. Or can you tell us of any other function it can have beyond that of effecting persuasion in the minds of an audience?
  None at all, Socrates; your definition seems to me satisfactory.

Notes on the Text

Gorgias tells Socrates rhetoric is about "the greatest of human concerns." (The text is in the sidenotes.) Socrates takes him to be talking about the "greatest good for men." He asks him what this “greatest good." In reply, Gorgias says that rhetoric "is the source of freedom for a man himself and at the same time it is the source of rule over others in one’s own city."

In this answer, Gorgias comes close to saying that rhetoric is the power to live the good life.

• Gorgias 454b

⊕ "Many a time, Socrates, I have gone with my brother [Herodicus (Gorgias 448b)] or with other doctors to call on some sick person who refuses to take his medicine or allow the doctor to perform surgery or cauterization on him. And when the doctor failed to persuade him, I succeeded, by no other art than rhetoric" (Gorgias 456b).

  "Is not rhetoric in its entire nature an art which leads the soul (ψυχαγωγία) by means of words, not only in law courts and the various other public assemblages, but in private companies as well" (Phaedrus 261a)?   The persuasion I mean, Socrates, is the kind you find in the law-courts and in any public gatherings, as I was saying just now, that deals with what is just and unjust.
  Yes, Gorgias, I had a suspicion that it was this persuasion that you meant, and as dealing with those things.

Notes on the Text

Socrates asks what this persuasion is about.

Gorgias says that it "deals with what is just and unjust (δίκαιά τε καὶ ἄδικα)."

It is a little unclear how this squares with what Gorgias says about going with his brother and other doctors to persuade their patients to following the advice the they have been given.

The point, it seems, is that the persuasion the rhetor produces is generally about what is right and what is wrong and that "the law-courts and in any public gatherings" are salient contexts in which the rhetor uses words to produce this persuasion.

• Gorgias 454d

⊕ A conviction can be true or false. Knowledge must be true. (If someone says he knows some proposition, but that proposition is false, then he is wrong. He only thinks he knows it.) So conviction and knowledge are not the same.

"But I, alone here before you, do not admit it [that the wrongdoer is happy], for you fail to convince me: you only attempt, by producing a number of false witnesses against me, to oust me from my property, the truth" (Gorgias 472b).

"So I disregard the things held in honor by the majority of people, and by practicing truth (ἀλήθειαν ἀσκῶν) I try in reality to be the best I can" (Gorgias 526d).   Then do you think that having learned and learning are the same as to be convinced and conviction, or different?
  In my opinion, Socrates, they are different.
  And your opinion is right, as you can prove in this way: if some one asked you--Is there, Gorgias, a false and a true conviction?--you would say, Yes, I imagine.
  I should.
  But now, is there a false and a true knowledge?
  Surely not.
  So it is evident they are not the same.
  You are right.
  But yet those who have learned and those who have come to be convinced have come to be persuaded?
  That is so.
⊕ "one providing conviction without knowledge, and the other knowledge, τὸ μὲν πίστιν παρεχόμενον ἄνευ τοῦ εἰδέναι, τὸ δ᾽ ἐπιστήμην"   Then would you have us assume two forms of persuasion--one providing conviction without knowledge, and the other knowledge?
  Certainly.
  Now which kind of persuasion is it that rhetoric creates in law courts or any public meeting on matters of right and wrong (δικαίων τε καὶ ἀδίκων)? The kind that results in being convinced without knowledge, or that from which we get knowledge?
  Obviously, I presume, Socrates, that from which we get conviction.
⊕   Thus rhetoric, it seems, is a producer of persuasion for conviction, not for teaching in the matter of right and wrong (τὸ δίκαιόν τε καὶ ἄδικον).
  Yes.

Notes on the Text

Socrates gets Gorgias to admit that rhetorical persuasion does not produce knowledge.

• Gorigas 457e

Your present remarks do not seem to me quite in keeping or accord with what you said at first about rhetoric. So I am afraid to pursue my examination with you, for fear that you should take me to be speaking with eagerness to win against you, rather than have our subject become clear. For my part, if you are a person of the same sort as myself, I should be glad to continue questioning you, otherwise I would drop it. ⊕ "For you see, Callicles, that our debate is about a question which has the highest conceivable claims to the serious interest even of a person who has but little intelligence--namely, about how we are supposed to live--whether it should be the life you urge me toward, with all those manly pursuits of speaking in Assembly and practicing rhetoric and going in for politics after the fashion of you modern politicians, or the life in the love of wisdom (φιλοσοφίᾳ); and what makes the difference between these two" (Gorgias 500b). And what kind of man am I? One of those who would be pleased to be refuted if I say anything untrue, and pleased to refute anyone else who might speak untruly; but just as pleased, mind you, to be refuted as to refute, since I regard the former as the greater benefit, in proportion as it is a greater benefit for oneself to be delivered from the greatest bad than to deliver some one else. For I consider that a man cannot suffer any bad so great as a false opinion about the things we are discussing right now. Now if you say that you too are of that sort, let us go on with the conversation; but if you think we had better drop it, let us have done with it at once and make an end of the discussion.

Notes on the Text

Socrates thinks that Gorgias has contradictory beliefs.

• Gorgias 459c

⊕   "What kind of speech, Gorgias? Do you mean that which shows sick people by what regimen they could get well?
  No.
  Then rhetoric is not concerned with all kinds of speech.
  No, I say.
  Yet it does make men able to speak.
  Yes.
  And also to be wise about the things they speak about?.
  Of course" (Gorgias 449e).   Let us consider first whether the rhetoric is in the same relation to what is just and unjust, base and noble, good and bad, as he is to what is healthful, and to the various objects of all the other arts. Does not know what is really good or bad, noble or base, just or unjust, but has devised a persuasion to deal with these matters so as to appear to those who, like himself, do not know to know better than he who knows? Or is it necessary to know, and must anyone who intends to learn rhetoric have a previous knowledge of these things when he comes to you? Or if not, are you, as the teacher of rhetoric, to teach the person who comes to you nothing about them—for it is not your business—but only to make him appear in the eyes of the multitude to know things of this sort when he does not know, and to appear to be good when he is not? Or will you be utterly unable to teach him rhetoric unless he previously knows the truth about these matters? Or what is the real state of the case, Gorgias? By Zeus, as you proposed just now, draw aside the veil and tell us what rhetoric can accomplish.
  Why, I suppose, if he happens not to know these things he will learn them too from me.

Notes on the Text

⊕ "How is this, Socrates? Is that really your opinion of rhetoric, as you now express it? Or, think you, because Gorgias was ashamed not to admit your point that the rhetorician knows what is just and noble and good, and will himself teach these to anyone who comes to him without knowing them; and then from this admission I daresay there followed some inconsistency in the statements made—the result that you are so fond of—when it was yourself who led him into that set of questions! For who do you think will deny that he has a knowledge of what is just and can also teach it to others? I call it very bad taste to lead the discussion in such a direction" (Gorgias 461b). Gorgias has said that those who have learned rhetoric can use it unjustly but that the teacher is not to blame, just as the boxing teacher is not to blame if his student uses what he learned to strike his father and mother (Gorgias 456d). This might be the correct way to think about rhetoric and the teacher, but Gorgias also says that the rhetor gives his student knowledge of what is and is not just if he does not already have it (Gorgias 459c) and that someone with knowledge of justice is just (Gorgias 460b) and thus cannot use rhetoric for bad ends.

Gorgias drops out of the conversation rather than deal with the contradiction.

• Gorgias 462b

⊕ "Chaerephon, there are many arts (τέχναι) amongst mankind that have been discovered experimentally (ἐμπείρως), as the result of experiences (ἐμπειριῶν). Experience (ἐμπειρία) makes our age march according to art, but inexperience according to chance. Of these several arts various men partake in various ways, and the best men of the best. Gorgias here is one of these, and he is a partner in the finest art of all" (Gorgias 448c).

"Then the case is the same in all the other arts for the rhetor and his rhetoric [as it is in the case of medicine]: there is no need to know the truth of the actual matters, but one merely needs to have discovered some contrivance (μηχανὴν) of persuasion which will make one appear to those who do not know to know better than those who know" (Gorgias 459b).

A μηχανή is a "machine, contrivance, artificial means" for doing something. In the theater, it is a machine used to make gods appear in the air. In Aristophanes' Clouds, Socrates makes his first appearance this way. Strepsiades asks Socrates what it is doing. In reply, he says "I walk the air and contemplate (περιφρονῶ) the sun" (225). Part of the joke is that "despise" is another meaning of the verb περιφρονέω. Most of the audience, and the Greeks generally, regarded the sun as a god. Aristophanes portrays Socrates as one of the inquirers into nature who rejected this common belief. Anaxagoras thought, for example, that the sun was a stone.

  "Do I not even believe that the sun or yet the moon are gods, as the rest of mankind do?
  No, by Zeus, judges, since he says that the sun is a stone and the moon earth.
  Do you think you are accusing Anaxagoras, my dear Meletus, and do you so despise (καταφρονεῖς) these gentlemen and think they are so unversed in letters as not to know, that the books of Anaxagoras the Clazomenian are full of such utterances" (Apology 26d).

Plato may be making fun of the description φιλοσοφία in Isocrates, (436-338 BCE) was a rhetor and younger contemporary of Socrates. In about 392 BCE, Isocrates opened a school near the Lyceum to compete with the Sophists. He thinks of the students in his school as "lovers of wisdom" and that they acquire wisdom by practicing with forms of discourse that have been found persuasive.

"These things, I hold, require much study and are the task of a vigorous and imaginative soul (ψυχῆς ἀνδρικῆς καὶ δοξαστικῆς). For this, the student must not only have the requisite aptitude but he must learn the different kinds of discourse and practice himself in their use; and the teacher, for his part, must so expound the principles of the art with the utmost possible exactness as to leave out nothing that can be taught, and, for the rest, he must in himself set such an example of rhetoric that the students who have taken form under his instruction and are able to pattern after him will, from the outset, show in their speaking a degree of grace and charm (χαριέστερον) not found in others. When all of these requisites are found together, then the devotees of the love of wisdom (ἀνθηρότερον καὶ φιλοσοφοῦντες) will achieve complete success; but according as any one of the things which I have mentioned is lacking, to this extent must their disciples of necessity fall below the mark" (Isocrates, Against the Sophists 17-18).

"Rhetors are not permitted the use of such devices; they must use with precision only words in current use and only such ideas as bear upon the actual facts. Besides, the poets compose all their works with meter and rhythm, while the rhetors do not share in any of these advantages; and these lend such charm (χάριν) that even though the poets may be deficient in style and thoughts, yet by the very spell of their rhythm and harmony they bewitch (ψυχαγωγοῦσι) their listeners" (Isocrates, Evagoras 10).   So answer me this, Socrates: since you think that Gorgias is at a loss about rhetoric, what is your own account of it?
  Polus, are you asking what art (τέχνην) I call it?
  Yes.
  None at all, I consider, Polus, if you would have the honest truth.
  But what do you consider rhetoric to be?
  A thing which you say--in the treatise which I read of late--'made art.'
  What thing do you mean?
  I mean a certain knack (ἐμπειρίαν).
  Then do you take rhetoric to be a knack?
  I do, if you have no other suggestion.
  A knack for what?
  Of producing a kind of gratification and pleasure (χάριτός τινος καὶ ἡδονῆς).
  So cookery and rhetoric are the same thing?
  Not at all, only parts of the same practice.
  I fear it may be too rude to tell the truth; for I shrink from saying it on Gorgias' account, lest he suppose I am making satirical fun of his own profession. Yet indeed I do not know whether this is the rhetoric which Gorgias practices, for from our argument just now we got no very clear view as to how he conceives it; but what I call rhetoric is a part of a certain business which has nothing fine about it.
⊕   What is that, Socrates? Tell us, without scruple on my account.
  It seems to me then, Gorgias, to be a pursuit that is not a matter of art, but but belongs to a soul given to making guesses and that is bold (ψυχῆς δὲ στοχαστικῆς καὶ ἀνδρείας) and that has a natural bent for clever dealing with mankind, and I sum up its substance in the name flattery.

Notes on the Text

Now that Socrates has forced Gorgias to contradict himself about rhetoric and what he teaches, Polus jumps in to take his place as Socrates' primary interlocutor.

Polus wants Socrates to answer questions, not just ask them, as he has been doing with Gorgias. Socrates agrees to answer. He is ready to give his own views about rhetoric and its value. This marks a departure from the behavior of the character Socrates in early dialogues, such as the Euthyphro, where he does not depart much from his role as questioner in the dialectic.

A τέχνη is an "art" or "craft," "a set of rules, system or method of making or doing." Socrates contrasts it with what he calls ἐμπειρία. What exactly he has in mind is not very clear, but the suggestion is that "experience" is somehow a matter of perception and memory, not "reason."

Gorgias said that "rhetoric is a producer of persuasion," and in fact this seems to be what it is. Now, however, Socrates says that rhetoric is a producer of "gratification and pleasure."

There seem to be three main possibilities. On the first, Socrates means that the rhetor takes advantage of the tendency in people to make decisions in terms of "gratification and pleasure" in order to persuade them to believe that some proposition is true. On the second, he means that the rhetor persuades people to believe that some proposition is true in order to produce "gratification and pleasure" in himself. On the third, he means the rhetor does both.

How does the rhetor produce a belief by producing "gratification and pleasure"?

Gorgias says that many times he has gone with his brother "or with other doctors to call on some sick person who refuses to take his medicine or allow the doctor to use the knife or cautery [the twin horrors preanesthetic surgery]. And when the doctor failed to persuade him, I succeeded, by no other art than rhetoric" (Gorgias 456b).

How did Gorgias use rhetoric to produce this persuasion?

The dialogue provides no clear explanation. If, however, he "gratifies and pleases" the patient into believing, then the idea seems to be that the patient forms the belief incorrectly. He forms the belief to get the "pleasure and gratification" he takes from believing the proposition, not because he has sufficient justification to believe that the proposition is true.

• Gorgias 464d

⊕ "Each of these private teachers who work for pay, whom the politicians call sophists (σοφιστὰς) and regard as their rivals, teaches anything other than the convictions the masses hold when they are assembled together, and this he calls wisdom. It is just as if someone were learning the passions and appetites of a huge, strong beast that he is rearing—how to approach and handle it, when it is most difficult to deal with or most docile and what makes it so, what sounds it utters in either condition, and what tones of voice soothe or anger it. Having learned all this through associating and spending time with the beast, he calls this wisdom, gathers this information together as if it were a craft, and starts to teach it. Knowing nothing in reality about which of these convictions or appetites is fine or shameful, good or bad, just or unjust, he uses all these terms in conformity with the great beast’s beliefs—calling the things it enjoys good and the things that anger it bad. He has no other account to give of them, but calls everything he is compelled to do just and fine, never having seen how much the natures of necessity and goodness really differ, and being unable to explain it to anyone" (Republic VI.493a) Flattery takes no thought for what is best. With the lure of what is most pleasant for the moment, it sniffs out folly and hoodwinks it.... It guesses at the pleasant and ignores the best; and I say it is not an art, but a knack (ἐμπειρίαν), since it has no account to give of the nature of whatever things it applies by which it applies them, and so cannot state the cause of each thing. I refuse to give the name of art to anything that is without such an account.

Notes on the Text

Socrates thinks that an "art" (τέχνη) must have a view about the good. The art of medicine takes the health of the body to be the good it aims to secure.

Socrates thinks that rhetoric is a kind of flattery, that it has no view about the good, but it aims for pleasure without considering whether the pleasure is good or bad.

Further, he thinks that "arts" embody knowledge. Someone who masters an "art" has knowledge. This knowledge constitutes his mastery. Socrates thinks this is not true for rhetoric.

In this, Socrates seems to be restricting the thinking that counts as knowledge.

• Gorgias 465c

For indeed, if the soul were not in command of the body, but the latter had charge of itself, and so cookery and medicine were not surveyed and distinguished by the soul, but the body itself were the judge, forming its own estimate of them by the gratifications (χάρισι) they gave it, we should have a fine instance of what Anaxagoras described, my dear Polus,—for you are versed in these matters: everything would be jumbled together in the same place, and there would be no distinction between matters of medicine and health, matters of cookery.

Notes on the Text

Socrates takes the aim of "cookery" to produce pleasure, not what is good for the body. This distinction, however, is not available to someone who thinks that the pleasant is the good.

• Gorgias 470b

  And let us consider another point besides; do we not admit that sometimes it is better to do those things that we were mentioning just now—to put people to death and banish them and deprive them of property—while sometimes it is not?
  To be sure, Socrates.
  Then here is a point, it seems, that is admitted both on your side and on mine.
  Yes.
  Then when do you say it is better to do these things? Tell me where you draw the line.
  No, I would rather that you, Socrates, answered that.
  Well then I say, Polus, if you prefer to hear it from me, that it is better when these things are done justly, and worse when unjustly.

Notes on the Text

Socrates has argued that although perhaps the rhetor does do whatever he sees fit, doing this may not coincide with what he wishes (Gorgias 468e). What he wishes is to live a good life, but doing what one sees fit need not be the same as living this life. So it is possible that the tyrant does what he sees fit ("put people to death and banish them and deprive them of property" and so on) but that so acting does not contribute to the goodness of his life.

Socrates tries to get Polus to "draw the line," but he asks Socrates to draw it instead.

Socrates thinks that we should do something if, and only if, it will contribute to the goodness of our life. Doing this, he thinks, is acting "justly." Not doing this is acting "unjustly."

• Gorgias 470d

  I suppose you see that Archelaus, son of Perdiccas, is ruler of Macedonia?
⊕ Archelaus usurped the throne of Macedonia in 413 BCE and ruled till his death in 399 BCE. Socrates was invited to his court but declined the invitation (Aristotle, Rhetoric 2.23.8).   Well, if I do not, at any rate I hear it.
  Do you consider him happy or wretched?
  I do not know, Polus; I have never met the man.
  What? Could you find out by meeting him, and cannot otherwise tell, straight off, that he is happy?
  No, indeed, upon my word.
  Then doubtless you will say, Socrates, that you do not know that even the Great King is happy (εὐδαίμονα).
  Yes, and I shall be speaking the truth; for I do not know how he stands in point of education and justice (οὐ γὰρ οἶδα παιδείας ὅπως ἔχει καὶ δικαιοσύνης).
  Why, does happiness entirely consist in that?
⊕ "For indeed, Polus, the points which we have at issue are by no means of slight importance: rather, one might say, they are matters on which it is most honorable to have knowledge, and most disgraceful to lack it; for in sum they involve our knowing or not knowing who is happy and who is not" (Gorgias 472c).   Yes, by my account, Polus; for a fine and good man or woman, I say, is happy, and an unjust and wicked one is wretched.

Notes on the Text

Polus thinks that acting unjustly can contribute to the goodness of one's life. He puts forward the tyrant Archelaus as an example. In this, he has common opinion on his side.

⊕ αἰσχρός ("shameful")

κακός ("bad")

καλός ("fine") is an antonym of αἰσχρός.

"In my opinion, Polus, the wrongdoer or the unjust is wretched anyhow; more wretched, however, if he does not pay the penalty and gets no punishment for his wrongdoing, but less wretched if he pays the penalty and meets with requital from gods and men" (Gorgias 472e). "Neither of them will ever be happier than the other—neither he who has unjustly compassed the despotic power, nor he who pays the penalty; for of two wretched persons neither can be happier; but still more wretched is he who goes scot-free and establishes himself as despot" (Gorgias 473d). Socrates tries to get Polus to admit that doing wrong is "worse" (κάκιον) than suffering it.

Polus agrees that doing wrong is more "shameful" (αἴσχιον) than suffering wrong (Gorgias 474c) and that what is "fine" (καλόν) is pleasant, beneficial, or both.

Polus agrees too that fine is opposite of shameful.

It follows thatdoing wrong must be less pleasant, beneficial, or both.

It is not less pleasant, Polus thinks.

In this case, it is not both less pleasant and less beneficial. Hence doing wrong must be less beneficial. If it is less beneficial, then doing wrong must be worse than suffering wrong.

Why does Socrates think that doing wrong is worse than suffering wrong?

The idea, it seems, that in doing wrong you are acting on and reinforcing false beliefs about what is good and what is bad. In suffering wrong, you are not doing this. So, given that false beliefs are the problem for the good life, doing wrong is worse than suffering it.

⊕   "Happiest therefore is he who has no bad in his soul, since we found this to be the greatest of evils"
  Clearly so, Socrates.
  Next after him, I take it, is he who is relieved of it.
  So it seems.
  And that was the man who is reproved, reprimanded, and made to pay the penalty.
  Yes.
  Hence the worst life is led by him who has the bad and is not relieved of it.
  Apparently" (Gorgias 478e).

  "Then, Polus, does it result that injustice and wrongdoing is the greatest evil?
  Yes, apparently" (Gorgias 479c). Socrates next tries to get Polus to admit that doing wrong and not paying what is due is worse than doing wrong and paying what is due (Gorgias 476a).

Socrates gets Polus to agree that paying what is due is being disciplined rightly, that someone who is disciplined rightly suffers what is just, that right things are fine, and that what is fine is good because it is either pleasant or beneficial. Since Polus thinks that paying what is due is not pleasant, it must be beneficial. What is beneficial is good. So paying what is due is good.

Socrates argues that someone pays what is due relieves himself from the "greatest bad" (Gorgias 477a). What is this "greatest bad"? How does paying what is due eliminate it?

• Gorgias 477b

  And in soul too you believe there is a certain wickedness?
  Of course.
  And do you not call this injustice, ignorance, cowardice, and so forth?
  Certainly I do.
  So now in property, body, and soul, these three, you have mentioned three vices—poverty, disease, and injustice?
  Yes.
  Then which of these vices is the foulest? Is it not injustice—in short, the vice of the soul?
  Far the foulest.
  And if foulest, then also most evil?

Notes on the Text

Socrates gets Polus to agree there is a good and bad for the soul, that the bad is "injustice, ignorance, cowardice, and so forth," that injustice is the most shameful and thus the most painful, harmful, or both (Gorgias 477c), that it must be the most harmful because it is not the most painful (Gorgias 477d), that justice thus must be the most beneficial (Gorgias 478b), and that it is worth while to endure the pain to pay the penalty (Gorgias 478c).

What is injustice in the soul?

It is the condition of the soul when someone acts unjustly?

What is this condition?

• Gorgias 479a

⊕   Because, I conceive, Polus, what these persons [tyrants and rhetors who get away with injustice] have contrived for themselves is very much as though a man who was the victim of the worst diseases should contrive not to submit to the doctor's penalty for his bodily transgressions and take the prescribed treatment, from a childish fear of cautery or incision, as being so painful. Or do you not agree to this view of it?
   I do.
   Since he was ignorant, it would seem, of the what health and bodily virtue are like. For it is very probable, from what we have just agreed, that something like this is done also by those who evade their due penalty, Polus; they perceive its painfulness, but are blind to its benefits, and are unaware how much more wretched than lack of health in the body it is to dwell with a soul that is not healthy, but is corrupt with injustice and impiety; and hence it is that they do all they can to avoid paying the penalty and being relieved of the greatest of evils, by providing themselves with money and friends and the ability to excel in persuasive speech. But if what we have agreed is true, Polus, do you observe the consequences of our argument? Or, if you like, shall we reckon them up together?
   Yes, if you do not mind.
   Then does it result that injustice and wrongdoing is the greatest evil?
   Yes, apparently.
   And further, it appeared that paying the penalty is a relief from this evil?
   It looks like it.
   Whereas not paying it is a retention of the evil in us?
   Yes.
   Thus wrongdoing is second of evils in greatness; but to do wrong and not pay the penalty is the greatest and takes the first place among all evils.
   It seems so.
   Well now, my friend, was this the point at issue between us, that you counted Archelaus, who did the greatest wrong, happy because he paid no penalty, whilst I on the contrary thought that anyone—whether Archelaus or any other person you please—who pays no penalty for the wrong he has done, is peculiarly and pre-eminently wretched among men, and that it is always the wrongdoer who is more wretched than the wronged, and the unpunished than the punished? Is not this what I stated?
   Yes.
   Then has it not been proved that this was a true statement?
   Apparently, Socrates.

Notes on the Text

If Archelaus is unjust, he is not happy. If is unjust and does not pay what is due, he is like someone who will not accept medical treatment because it is painful. Such a person is confused. He would rather live with a worse harm than submit to a lesser to eliminate it.

• Gorgia 481b

   Tell me, Chaerephon, is Socrates in earnest over this, or only joking?
   To my thinking, Callicles, prodigiously in earnest: still, there is nothing like asking him.

Notes on the Text

Now that Socrates has forced Polus to contradict himself, Callicles takes his place.

• Gorgias 491e

⊕   "What do you mean, Socrates, by one who rules himself?
  Nothing recondite, Callicles, merely what most people mean—one who is temperate and master of oneself, ruler of the pleasures and desires that are in himself" (Gorgias 491d).

"No, in good truth, Socrates—which you claim to be seeking—the fact is this: luxury and licentiousness and liberty, if they have the support of force, are virtue and happiness (ἀρετή τε καὶ εὐδαιμονία), and the rest of these embellishments—the unnatural covenants of mankind—are all mere stuff and nonsense" (Gorgias 492c).

  "Do you say the desires are not to be chastened if a man would be such as he ought to be, but he should let them be as great as possible and provide them with satisfaction from some source or other, and this is virtue?
  Yes, Socrates, I say that" (Gorgias 492d).

"Callicles, I once heard sages say that we are now dead, and the body is our tomb (σῆμα), and the part of the soul in which out appetites reside is liable to be over-persuaded and to vacillate to and fro, and so some clever man, a teller of stories, a Sicilian, perhaps, or Italian, named this part a jar (πίθον), its being so persuadable (πιθανόν) and suggestible, thus slightly changing the name. And fools he called uninitiated (ἀμυήτους), suggesting [by the similarity of the verb μυέω (from which ἀμυήτους derives) and the verb μύω that means "be shut"] that the part of the soul of fools where their appetites are located is their undisciplined part, not tightly closed, a leaking jar, as it were, it to not to be filled [because it is in the uninitiated]. Now this man, Callicles, contrary to your view [about who is happy (εὐδαίμων)], shows that of those in Hades, ... these, the uninitiated, would be the most miserable" (Gorgias 493a). For how can a man be happy if he is a slave to anybody at all? No, what is fine and just by nature (τὸ κατὰ φύσιν καλὸν καὶ δίκαιον), I tell you now quite frankly, is this—that he who would live rightly should let his desires be as strong as possible and not chasten them, and should be able to minister to them when they are at their height by reason of his manliness and intelligence, and satisfy each appetite in turn with what it desires.

Notes on the Text

Callicles, in a long speech, argues that there is what is just by nature and what is just by convention (Gorgias 483e). He thinks that not controlling one's desires but letting them grow and satisfying them is the activity in which happiness consists.

So to the question what reason is there to think that doing what one sees fit coincides with living a good life, Callicles has an answer. He thinks that we should do what we see fit. This, he thinks, is acting justly. He thinks that nature says that this is true (Gorgias 483d).

In questioning, Socrates forces Callicles to see that he has reason to abandon this conception of virtue because it is inconsistent with other things he believes. Socrates points out that Callicles must accept that certain lives that are commonly thought to be bad are in fact good. Callicles has to think that pleasure is good, no matter what the pleasure (Gorgias 494e).

• Gorgias 499e

  And similarly, Callicles, in the case of pains, are some worthy and some base?
  Of course.
  So it is the worthy pleasures and pains that we ought to choose in all our doings?
  Certainly.
  And the base ones not?
  Clearly so.
  Because, you know, Polus and I, if you recollect, decided that everything we do should be for the sake of what is good. Do you agree with us in this view--that the good is the end of all our actions, and it is for its sake that all other things should be done, and not it for theirs? Do you add your vote to ours, and make a third?
  I do.
  Then it is for the sake of what is good that we should do everything, including what is pleasant, not the good for the sake of the pleasant.
  Certainly.
  Now is it in every man's power to pick out which sort of pleasant things are good and which bad, or is art required in each case?
  Art.
⊕   Then let us recall those former points I was putting to Polus and Gorgias. I said, if you remember, that there were certain industries, some of which extend only to pleasure, procuring that and no more, and ignorant of better and worse; while others know what is good and what bad. And I placed among those that are concerned with pleasure the experience, not art, of cookery, and among those concerned with good the art of medicine. Now by the sanctity of friendship, Callicles, do not on your part indulge in jesting with me, or give me random answers against your conviction, or again, take what I say as though I were jesting. For you see that our debate is upon a question which has the highest conceivable claims to the serious interest even of a person who has but little intelligence--namely, what course of life is best; whether it should be that to which you invite me, with all those manly pursuits of speaking in Assembly and practicing rhetoric and going in for politics after the fashion of you modern politicians, or this life in the love of wisdom (φιλοσοφίᾳ); and what makes the difference between these two.

Notes on the Text

Like Gorgias and Polus before him, Callicles cannot defend his view in questioning.

• Gorgias 500d

  Well, I will put it to you more plainly. Seeing that we have agreed, you and I, that there is such a thing as good, and such a thing as pleasant, and that the pleasant is other than the good, and that for the acquisition of either there is a certain practice or preparation—the quest of the pleasant in the one case, and that of the good in the other—but first you must either assent or object to this statement of mine: do you assent?
   Yes, I do.
  Then try and come to a definite agreement with me on what I was saying to our friends here, and see if you now find that what I then said was true. I was saying, I think, that cookery seems to me not an art but experience, unlike medicine, which, I argued, is an art. It has investigated the nature of the object it serves the cause of what it does, and has some account to give of each of these things. The other, the one concerned with pleasure, to which the whole of its service is entirely devoted, proceeds toward its object quite inexpertly, without having investigated at all either the nature of pleasure or its cause. It does so altogether without reason (ἀλόγως)--with no discrimination, relying on routine and experience (τριβῇ καὶ ἐμπειρίᾳ) for merely preserving a memory of what customarily happens; and that is how it supplies its pleasures. Now consider first whether you think that this account is satisfactory, and that there are certain other such occupations likewise, having to do with the soul; some are arts, with forethought for what is best for to soul, and others making light of this, but again, as in the former case, considering merely the soul's way of getting its pleasure, neither inquiring which of the pleasures is a better or a worse one, nor caring for anything but gratification, whether for better or worse. For I, Callicles, hold that there are such, and for my part I call this sort of thing flattery, both in the case of the body and that of the soul and in any other case in which a person waits upon a pleasure without regard for what is better or worse; and you now, do you support us with the same opinion on this matter, or do you dissent from it?

Notes on the Text

Socrates returns to his previous point that rhetoric is not an "art."

• Gorgias 502e

  Do the rhetors, Callicles, strike you as speaking always with a view to what is best, with the single aim of making the citizens as good as possible by their speeches, or are they, like the poets, set on gratifying the citizens, and do they, sacrificing the common weal to their own personal interest, behave to these assemblies as to children, trying merely to gratify them, nor care a jot whether they will be better or worse in consequence?
  This question of yours, Socrates. is not quite so simple; for there are some who have a regard for the citizens in the words that they utter, while there are also others of the sort that you mention.
  That is enough for me. For if this thing also is twofold, one part of it, I presume, will be flattery and a base mob-rhetoric, while the other is noble—the endeavor to make the citizens' souls as good as possible, and the persistent effort to say what is best, whether it prove more or less pleasant to one's hearers. ⊕ "Then it is this [justice and temperance] that our rhetor [the one who practices the "rhetoric you never saw"], the man of art and virtue, will have in view, when he applies to our souls the words that he speaks, and also in all his actions, and in giving any gift he will give it, and in taking anything away he will take it, with this thought always before his mind—how justice may be engendered in the souls of his fellow-citizens, and how injustice may be removed; how temperance may be bred in them and licentiousness cut off; and how virtue as a whole may be produced and vice expelled" (Gorgias 504d).

"I think I am one of few, not to say the only one, in Athens who attempts the true art of politics, and the only man of the present time who manages affairs of state: hence, as the speeches that I make from time to time are not aimed at gratification, but at what is best instead of what is most pleasant" (Gorgias 521d) But this is a rhetoric you never yet saw; or if you have any rhetor of this kind that you can mention, without more ado let me know who he is!
   No, upon my word, I cannot tell you of anyone, at least among the rhetors of today.
  Well then, can you mention one among those of older times whom the Athenians have to thank for any betterment that started at the time of his first harangues, as a change from the worse state in which he originally found them? For my part, I have no idea who the man is.
  Why, do you hear no mention of Themistocles and what a good man he was, and Cimon and Miltiades and the great Pericles, who has died recently, and whom you have listened to yourself?
  Yes, Callicles, if that which you spoke of just now is true virtue—the satisfaction of one's own and other men's desires; but if that is not so, and the truth is—as we were compelled to admit in the subsequent discussion—that only those desires which make man better by their satisfaction should be fulfilled, but those which make him worse should not, and that this is a special art, then I for one cannot tell you of any man so skilled having appeared among them.

Notes on the Text

Virtue is not desire satisfaction.

• Gorgias 505a

  And so the satisfaction of one's desires—if one is hungry, eating as much as one likes, or if thirsty, drinking—is generally allowed by doctors when one is in health; but they practically never allow one in sickness to take one's fill of things that one desires: do you agree with me in this?
  I do, Socrates.
  And does not the same rule, my excellent friend, apply to the soul? So long as it is in a bad state—thoughtless, licentious, unjust and unholy—we must restrain its desires and not permit it to do anything except what will help it to be better: do you grant this, or not?
  I do.
  For thus, I take it, the soul itself is better off?
  And is restraining a person from what he desires correcting him?
  Yes.
  Then correction is better for the soul than uncorrected licence, as you were thinking just now.
  I have no notion what you are referring to, Socrates; do ask some one else.

Notes on the Text

Socrates thinks that not acting on certain desires somehow helps to remove vice from the soul. The vice, it seems, is false belief about what is good and what is bad. So it seems that to abandon some beliefs, it is not enough simply to recognize they are false.

An example helps make this a little clearer.

Suppose I believe it good to eat sweets before I go to bed. So every night before bed, I form the desire. The suggestion, it seems, is that if over time I resist this desire, the belief will weaken because it needs the reinforcement that comes from the pleasure I take in eating the sweets. Socrates seems to think that such resistance is necessary to remove vice from the soul.

• Gorgias 506c

  I will resume our argument from the beginning. Are the pleasant and the good the same thing? ⊕ The pleasant ≠ the good

The pleasures in which we engage should be for the good

The property that makes something good is its virtue

Something has its virtue just in case it has the proper order Not the same, as Callicles and I agreed. Is the pleasant thing to be done for the sake of the good, or the good for the sake of the pleasant? The pleasant for the sake of the good. And is that thing pleasant by whose advent we are pleased, and that thing good by whose presence we are good? Certainly. But further, both we and everything else that is good, are good by the advent of some virtue? In my view this must be so, Callicles. But surely the virtue of each thing, whether of an implement or of a body, or again of a soul or any live creature, does not arrive most properly by accident [or: without plan or purpose (εἰκῇ)], but by an arranging or rightness or art (τάξει καὶ ὀρθότητι καὶ τέχνῃ) that is apportioned to each. Is that so? I certainly agree. So it is due the arrangement that the virtue of each thing is something which is put in and has order? I at least should say so. Hence it is a certain order (κόσμος) proper to each existent thing that by its advent in each makes it good? That is my view. So then a soul which has its own proper order is better than one which is unordered? Necessarily. But further, one that has order is orderly? Of course it will be. ⊕ If a man instills the proper order in his soul, he is temperate And the orderly one is temperate? Most necessarily. So the temperate soul is good. For my part, I can find nothing to say in objection to this, my dear Callicles; but if you can, do instruct me.
  Proceed, good sir.
  I say, then, that if the temperate soul is good, one that is in the opposite state to this sensible one is bad; and that was the senseless and dissolute one. Certainly. And further, the sensible man will do what is fitting as regards both gods and men; for he could not be sensible if he did what was unfitting. That must needs be so. And again, when he does what is fitting as regards men, his actions will be just, and as regards the gods, pious; and he who does what is just and pious must needs be a just and pious man. That is so. And surely he must be brave also: for you know a sound or temperate mind is shown, not by pursuing and shunning what one ought not, but by shunning and pursuing what one ought, whether they be things or people or pleasures or pains, and by ⊕ If he is temperate, he is just, pious, and brave

If he is temperate, just, pious, and brave, he is good

If he is good, he is "blest and happy" steadfastly persevering in one's duty; so that it follows of strict necessity, Callicles, that the temperate man, as shown in our exposition, being just and brave and pious, is the good man fully reached (ἀγαθὸν ἄνδρα εἶναι τελέως); and that the good man does well and finely whatever he does and that he who does well is blessed and happy (μακάριόν τε καὶ εὐδαίμονα), while the wicked man or evil-doer is wretched. And this must be the man who is in an opposite case to the temperate,--the licentious man whom you were commending.

Notes on the Text

The suggestion is that human beings need to take control of themselves if they are to live good lives. This control is a matter of instilling the proper order in the soul.

• Gorgias 507c

So there is my account of the matter, and I say that this is the truth; and that, if this is true, anyone, as it seems who desires to be happy must ensue and practice temperance, and flee from licentiousness, each of us as fast as his feet will carry him, and must contrive, if possible, to need no correction; but if he have need of it, either himself or anyone belonging to him, either an individual or a city, then right must be applied and they must be corrected, if they are to be happy. This, in my opinion, is the mark on which a man should fix his eyes throughout life; he should concentrate all his own and his city's efforts on this one business of providing a man who would be blessed with the needful justice and temperance; not letting one's desires go unrestrained and in one's attempts to satisfy them—an interminable evil—leading the life of a robber (οὐκ ἐπιθυμίας ἐῶντα ἀκολάστους εἶναι καὶ ταύτας ἐπιχειροῦντα πληροῦν, ἀνήνυτον κακόν, λῃστοῦ βίον ζῶντα). For neither to any of his fellow-men can such a one be dear, nor to God; since he cannot commune with any, and where there is no communion, there can be no friendship. And wise men tell us, Callicles, that heaven and earth and gods and men are held together by communion and friendship, by orderliness, temperance, and justice; and that is the reason, my friend, why they call the whole of this world by the name of order, not of disorder or dissoluteness. Now you, as it seems to me, do not give proper attention to this, for all your cleverness, but have failed to observe the great power of geometrical equality amongst both gods and men: you hold that self-advantage (πλεονεξίαν) is what one ought to practice, because you neglect geometry. Very well: either we must refute this statement, that it is by the possession of justice and temperance that the happy are happy and by that of vice the wretched are wretched; or if this is true, we must investigate its consequences. Those former results, Callicles, must all follow, on which you asked me if I was speaking in earnest when I said that a man must accuse himself or his son or his comrade if he do any wrong, and that this is what rhetoric must be used for; and what you supposed Polus to be conceding from shame is after all true— that to do wrong is worse, in the same degree as it is baser, than to suffer it, and that whoever means to be the right sort of rhetorician must really be just and well-informed of the ways of justice, which again Polus said that Gorgias was only shamed into admitting.

Notes on the Text

Happiness requires self-control.

• Gorgias 527b

Among the many statements we have made [in the dialectic], all are refuted and this one alone is unshaken—that doing wrong (τὸ ἀδικεῖν) is to be guarded agaist more than suffering it; that above all things a man should take care not to seem but to be good both in private and in public; that if one becomes bad in any respect one must be corrected; that this is good in the second place,— next to being just, to become so and to be corrected by paying the penalty; and that every kind of flattery, with regard either to oneself or to others, to few or to many, must be avoided; and that rhetoric is to be used for this one purpose always, of pointing to what is just, and so in every other activity. Take my advice, Callicles, and follow me to where I am. Once you arrive, you will be happy both in life and after life's end, as this account declares.