CHAPTER XXIII.

PROTAGORAS.

Scenic arrangement and personages of the dialogue 259

Introduction. Eagerness of the youthful Hippokrates to become acquainted with Protagoras 260

Sokrates questions Hippokrates as to his purpose and expectations from Protagoras _ib._

Danger of going to imbibe the instruction of a Sophist without knowing beforehand what he is about to teach 262

Remarks on the Introduction. False persuasion of knowledge brought to light 263

Sokrates and Hippokrates go to the house of Kallias. Company therein. Respect shown to Protagoras 264

Questions of Sokrates to Protagoras. Answer of the latter, declaring the antiquity of the sophistical profession, and his own openness in avowing himself a sophist _ib._

Protagoras prefers to converse in presence of the assembled company 266

Answers of Protagoras. He intends to train young men as virtuous citizens _ib._

Sokrates doubts whether virtue is teachable. Reasons for such doubt. Protagoras is asked to explain whether it is or not. _ib._

Explanation of Protagoras. He begins with a mythe 267

Mythe. First fabrication of men by the Gods. Prometheus and Epimetheus. Bad distribution of endowments to man by the latter. It is partly amended by Prometheus 267

Prometheus gave to mankind skill for the supply of individual wants, but could not give them the social art--Mankind are on the point of perishing, when Zeus sends to them the dispositions essential for society 268

Protagoras follows up his mythe by a discourse. Justice and the sense of shame are not professional attributes, but are possessed by all citizens and taught by all to all 269

Constant teaching of virtue. Theory of punishment 270

Why eminent men cannot make their sons eminent 271

Teaching by parents, schoolmaster, harpist, laws, dikastery, &c. _ib._

All learn virtue from the same teaching by all. Whether a learner shall acquire more or less of it, depends upon his own individual aptitude 272

Analogy of learning vernacular Greek. No special teacher thereof. Protagoras teaches virtue somewhat better than others 273

The sons of great artists do not themselves become great artists 274

Remarks upon the mythe and discourse. They explain the manner in which the established sentiment of a community propagates and perpetuates itself 274

Antithesis of Protagoras and Sokrates. Whether virtue is to be assimilated to a special art 275

Procedure of Sokrates in regard to the discourse of Protagoras--he compliments it as an exposition, and analyses some of the fundamental assumptions 276

One purpose of the dialogue. To contrast continuous discourse with short cross-examining question and answer 277

Questions by Sokrates--Whether virtue is one and indivisible, or composed of different parts? Whether the parts are homogeneous or heterogeneous? _ib._

Whether justice is just, and holiness holy? How far justice is like to holiness? Sokrates protests against an answer, "If you please" 278

Intelligence and moderation are identical, because they have the same contrary 279

Insufficient reasons given by Sokrates. He seldom cares to distinguish different meanings of the same term _ib._

Protagoras is puzzled, and becomes irritated 280

Sokrates presses Protagoras farther. His purpose is, to test opinions and not persons. Protagoras answers with angry prolixity _ib._

Remonstrance of Sokrates against long answers as inconsistent with the laws of dialogue. Protagoras persists. Sokrates rises to depart 281

Interference of Kallias to get the debate continued. Promiscuous conversation. Alkibiades declares that Protagoras ought to acknowledge superiority of Sokrates in dialogue 282

Claim of a special _locus standi_ and professorship for Dialectic, apart from Rhetoric _ib._

Sokrates is prevailed upon to continue, and invites Protagoras to question him _ib._

Protagoras extols the importance of knowing the works of the poets, and questions about parts of a song of Simonides. Dissenting opinions about the interpretation of the song 283

Long speech of Sokrates, expounding the purpose of the song, and laying down an ironical theory about the numerous concealed sophists at Krete and Sparta, masters of short speech 283

Character of this speech--its connection with the dialogue, and its general purpose. Sokrates inferior to Protagoras in continuous speech 284

Sokrates depreciates the value of debates on the poets. Their meaning is always disputed, and you can never ask from themselves what it is. Protagoras consents reluctantly to resume the task of answering 285

Purpose of Sokrates to sift difficulties which he really feels in his own mind. Importance of a colloquial companion for this purpose 287

The interrupted debate is resumed. Protagoras says that courage differs materially from the other branches of virtue 288

Sokrates argues to prove that courage consists in knowledge or intelligence. Protagoras does not admit this. Sokrates changes his attack _ib._

Identity of the pleasurable with the good--of the painful with the evil. Sokrates maintains it. Protagoras denies. Debate 289

Enquiry about knowledge. Is it the dominant agency in the mind? Or is it overcome frequently by other agencies, pleasure or pain? Both agree that knowledge is dominant 290

Mistake of supposing that men act contrary to knowledge. We never call pleasures evils, except when they entail a preponderance of pain, or a disappointment of greater pleasures 291

Pleasure is the only good--pain the only evil. No man does evil voluntarily, knowing it to be evil. Difference between pleasures present and future--resolves itself into pleasure and pain 292

Necessary resort to the measuring art for choosing pleasures rightly--all the security of our lives depend upon it 293

To do wrong, overcome by pleasure, is only a bad phrase for describing what is really a case of grave ignorance 294

Reasoning of Sokrates assented to by all. Actions which conduct to pleasures or freedom from pain, are honourable 295

Explanation of courage. It consists in a wise estimate of things terrible and not terrible _ib._

Reluctance of Protagoras to continue answering. Close of the discussion. Sokrates declares that the subject is still in confusion, and that he wishes to debate it again with Protagoras. Amicable reply of Protagoras 297

Remarks on the dialogue. It closes without the least allusion to Hippokrates 298

Two distinct aspects of ethics and politics exhibited: one under the name of Protagoras; the other, under that of Sokrates 299

Order of ethical problems, as conceived by Sokrates _ib._

Difference of method between him and Protagoras flows from this difference of order. Protagoras assumes what virtue is, without enquiry 300

Method of Protagoras. Continuous lectures addressed to established public sentiments with which he is in harmony 301

Method of Sokrates. Dwells upon that part of the problem which Protagoras had left out _ib._

Antithesis between the eloquent lecturer and the analytical cross-examiner 303

Protagoras not intended to be always in the wrong, though he is described as brought to a contradiction _ib._

Affirmation of Protagoras about courage is affirmed by Plato himself elsewhere _ib._

The harsh epithets applied by critics to Protagoras are not borne out by the dialogue. He stands on the same ground as the common consciousness 304

Aversion of Protagoras for dialectic. Interlude about the song of Simonides 305

Ethical view given by Sokrates worked out at length clearly. Good and evil consist in right or wrong calculation of pleasures and pains of the agent _ib._

Protagoras is at first opposed to this theory 306

Reasoning of Sokrates 307

Application of that reasoning to the case of courage _ib._

The theory which Plato here lays down is more distinct and specific than any theory laid down in other dialogues 308

Remarks on the theory here laid down by Sokrates. It is too narrow, and exclusively prudential 309

Comparison with the Republic 310

The discourse of Protagoras brings out an important part of the whole case, which is omitted in the analysis by Sokrates 311

The Ethical End, as implied in the discourse of Protagoras, involves a direct regard to the pleasures and pains of other persons besides the agent himself 312

Plato's reasoning in the dialogue is not clear or satisfactory, especially about courage 313

Doctrine of Stallbaum and other critics is not correct. That the analysis here ascribed to Sokrates is not intended by Plato as serious, but as a mockery of the sophists 314

Grounds of that doctrine. Their insufficiency 315

Subject is professedly still left unsettled at the close of the dialogue 316