The Last Days of Socrates

by Plato

  92. the same name as those others: It is standard doctrine in the Phaedo that particulars take their ‘name’, i.e. any descriptive attribute which applies to them, as a result of their (partial) conformity with the Idea that is properly so called (cf. 102a–b). Justice, for instance, would be perfectly ‘just’, whereas any instance of a just act or just person would acquire the name ‘just’ in a secondary sense from Justice itself. Hence, while there can be no change to what Justice is, there can be considerable change in a just man and in his degree of conformity with Justice.

  93. Not visible: This seems to be qualified later at 81d, but it is really only the bodily impurities of a bad soul which make the ghost visible there.

  94. which is like what’s mortal: The shift in terminology suggests that it is no longer the soul’s similarity to the Ideas which is being claimed, but rather its similarity to the gods which are also (almost by definition) eternal.

  95. very nearly indissoluble: The last words seem to amount to a strong qualification, but soul has not been proven to be totally invariable, etc., only very like what is invariable. This is more in harmony with later developments in Plato’s theory of soul, which no longer see it as uniform; furthermore it is created from various elements at Timaeus 35a–b, and the same work regards all things which are thus created as being technically dissoluble, even if they are never actually destroyed.

  96. as in Egypt: Egyptian mummification procedures were well known, and are discussed in detail by Herodotus in Book 2. Plato himself was clearly fascinated by a great many Egyptian customs and beliefs, and was accused in his own day of plagiarizing Egyptian ideas.

  97. or unseen world: There is a pun here, and possibly an attempt to derive Hades from Aides (unseen), though Cratylus b404 forcefully rejects this derivation.

  98. and wise: The last attribute may seem less expected, but there has been a suggestion that the soul is also like the gods running through the similarity argument from 79e; Bostock indeed regards this as an independent analogy (Plato’s Phaedo, p. 118).

  99. The shadowy apparitions… can be seen: Gallop remarks (in Plato’s Phaedo) on the difficulty of reconciling this talk of ghosts with the notion of an immaterial soul; it is indeed the kind of notion which would most easily suggest the blending of a material soul with a material body. But we should not suppose that Plato’s view of immateriality is such as to imply the absence of spatial attributes, e.g. of shapelessness. Plato repeatedly uses spatial terms in describing the soul and its experiences.

  100. they are attached… during life: Plato now brings in the theory of transmigration of souls, including transmigration from one species to another. Simmias and Cebes, as Pythagoreans, are unlikely to voice any great surprise, though it does not suit the philosophic purpose of the dialogue well. Plato is arguing for individual immortality, and it is hard to see how my soul can remain my soul if it becomes that of an ant or a kite; in particular Plato is arguing that the essential nature of a human soul is to be rational, and all such creatures were thought of as lacking the potential for rationality. Surely Plato would not have wanted to allow that my soul can be destroyed qua human soul, losing its most valuable power along with its humanity. We should allow for considerable irony in what he says at this point, and note the constant reference to what is ‘likely’, i.e. to what has some affinity with the truth rather than being altogether true. In the myth at the end of the work the souls of the bad are punished in a region below us rather than above or around the tombs, and they remain very much human souls.

  101. assault: Primarily sexual assault here, since food, drink and sex are a common trio. Other kinds of assault are covered under ‘injustice’, below.

  102. the goodness of an ordinary citizen: See the introduction to Phaedo, ‘Popular and Socratic Morality’. It is interesting that these people who practise ordinary virtue seem to be included among the inferior souls who can appear as ghosts around the graveyards, and are reincarnated in such life-forms as bees or ants.

  103. lovers of prestige and authority: A single type of man, the Republic’s ‘timarchic’ type; see, on the lover of prestige, 68c.

  104. through another medium in some other thing: As I interpret the Greek, the particular case of a property ‘p’ is seen as (i) other than the Idea ‘P’, (ii) housed in some thing other than ‘P’, and (iii) apprehended via some cognitive organ other than the soul.

  105. not for the reasons that most people do: See above, 68e ff.

  106. like Penelope: On this section, see the introduction to Phaedo, ‘Pleasure and Release’.

  107. brings calm to the seas of desire: The life of alternating pleasure and pain is conceived as having great crests and troughs, which reason smooths out.

  108. their approaching end: On the swan-song, see the general introduction, p. xxv.

  109. as the eleven officers of the Athenians permit: On the Eleven, see Apology, 37c and note 73.

  110. that we take the soul to be: Tredennick translated ‘we Pythagoreans’, but it is not clear that this is a reference to his own school rather than to people in general.

  111. the body is continually changing… worn away: Here is the part of the theory that has the most impact. Cebes is accepting, as Plato often appears to be accepting, the validity of Heraclitean flux theory as applied to physical things. Hence the body is not the same now as it was two minutes ago, nor indeed can it accurately be called the same body. The bodies which the longer-lasting soul wears out are not the bodies of different individuals living in different centuries, but the succession of bodies that the individual has experienced during his one bodily life. The soul may in fact have resembled the tailor/weaver in as much as it is perpetually occupied with the renewal and replacement of its own clothes, its body, since the soul is traditionally the force behind nutrition and growth.

  112. inherently obscure: The two primary reasons for scepticism in the ancient world were the suspicions that (i) things are not of such a nature as to be known, and (ii) even if things are inherently knowable, men do not have the required cognitive ability to know them.

  113. make a vow like the Argives: Whereas the shaving-off of hair was normally a sign of grief, it had been for the Argives a sign of determination, after a heavy defeat by Sparta, to recover the territory which had been lost to them. See Herodotus 1.82.

  114. two at once: Alluding to one of Plato’s favourite myths in which Heracles, when fighting the hydra, is attacked also by a huge crab, and has to call on Iolaus as his helper; cf. Euthydemus b297–d.

  115. while the daylight lasts: i.e. while Socrates lives; the hemlock is drunk at dusk.

  116. arguing both sides: An early written example is to be found in the Dissoi Logoi, a sophistic compendium. Plato’s own Euthydemus portrays two sophists who specialize in confusing people by producing opposite arguments. The present passage suggests that such techniques might also be combined with a belief in the Heraclitean flux theory (cf. Aenesidemus in Sextus Empiricus, Pyrrhonian Hypotyposes 1.210). Argument for both sides was also a technique practised either for exercise or for display by writers of forensic speeches.

  117. the Euripus: The tidal channel between Euboea and the Greek mainland, famous for its strong alternating currents.

  118. a bad thing: Socrates persists with his well-known theme that knowledge is the only truly good thing, ignorance the only truly bad one. Hence if he lives on, he will be right, and that will be good for him; while if he perishes completely, he will be wrong, and he will be deprived of what’s bad for him!

  119. but not of soul: That this is an independent argument may legitimately be doubted, but the point emerges in such a way as to make it more difficult, psychologically, to accept Simmias’s theory.

  120. a hypothesis whichis worthy of acceptance: Anticipating Socrates’ use of the Ideas in the application of his hypothetical method; 100b ff.

  121. “as it is itself”: Another description of the Ideas; there is an allusion back to 75d. See above, 76e,
for the apparent interdependence of the theories.

  122. or in any other way: This, and Socrates’ three previous contributions, supply premises vital for the final argument against the attune-ment theory, beginning at 94b. Why they are placed here is unclear, though it may be that Plato wishes to go over various beliefs about the soul which he thinks Simmias will assent to before determining a direct line of attack. In this way the dialogue seems to develop in a manner more reminiscent of natural conversation. Plato’s Socrates often elicits premises well before they are actually used.

  123. in a greater or lesser degree: The text, in whichI follow Hackforth, Plato’s Phaedo, is difficult at this point. The manuscript reading would make any attunement such as to be no more or less of an attunement than any other, but the ‘universal’ reading is not necessary for the argument. Compare Bostock, Plato’s Phaedo, p. 128.

  124. the soul opposing the physical instincts: I take it that the proponents of the attunement theory would agree that it is the soul, not some bodily organ like the brain, which is the controlling factor here, and that the control is such as to keep the organism in tune. Plato’s own Republic would not regard the physical desires as simply the work of the body, but rather as a function of a different part of the soul; this, however, does not make the argument work any less effectively against Simmias’s theory as long as Simmias regards the body as the motive force behind the desires. If Simmias were to postulate a rational soul which resisted the appetitive soul, then he would make his psychical attunement out of tune with itself!

  125. hast thou endured: Odyssey 20, 17–18.

  126. agree with Homer: The appeal to Homer’s authority looks almost like another argument. Why does Plato here think that such an appeal can help? Probably because Simmias had treated the attunement doctrine as an endoxon, as something with widespread support among people expected to be right. To find Homer disagreeing with the doctrine would be to undermine this claim of support among men who matter.

  127. the Theban Harmonia: Harmonia was the legendary wife of Cadmus, revered founder of Thebes, who was said to have brought the alphabet to Greece; but the word harmonia is that which has been used for an attunement throughout.

  128. it existed before we were born: Notice the way Socrates brings out this aspect of Cebes’ conception of the soul’s role, compatible to some degree with the notion that the body has become a labour of love for which the soul eventually sacrifices itself.

  129. the philosophy of reasons or causes: See the general introduction, pp. xxix–xxx.

  130. the reasons: I think it dangerous to retain the translation ‘cause’; the word has a wide semantic range, and to translate ‘cause’ is to make the theory developed by Socrates to replace Presocratic physics into a quasi-physical theory itself. In view of the considerable influence of the Presocratics on the Phaedo in general, however, we should be preparedto detect possible parallels with Presocratic causation theories in Socrates’ substitute for it.

  131. comes and ceases and continues to be: It is crucial here that the verbs for ‘coming-to-be’ and ‘being’ have both an absolute sense, when a thing comes into existence and continues that existence, and another senseinwhich they take the complement:xcomes-to-be warm, iswarm, etc. The latter can also be taken as a case of warmness coming-to-be or existing. Socrates is interested not only in how men come-to-be but also how they come-to-be wise, i.e. how wisdom comes-to-be.

  132. Is it when… are bred?: These were the theories of Archelaus (an Athenian with whom Socrates is often associated, who was much influenced by Anaxagoras).

  133. Is it with the blood… in us?: This seems to be a case of thought and knowledge coming-to-be.

  134. Or is it… that knowledge comes?: The theories on thought derive from the Presocratics Empedocles, Anaximenes, Heraclitus and Alcmaeon of Croton.

  135. the small man becomes a big one: It should be noted that what Socrates is seeking to explain is the coming-to-be not of the man, but of the attribute ‘big’ as applied to him – how he came-to-be big. We should perhaps associate the present theory with Anaxagoras (cf. H. Diels and W. Kranz, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker 6th edn., Berlin, 1951–2, 59A46), though Socrates has yet to meet his mind theory. The theory could have been commonplace.

  136. taller by a head: Another instance of the coming-to-be of the attribute ‘bigger’. Naturally, when the Greeks said ‘taller by a head’, using the dative case of the word for head, they did not mean that this head was a reason for something’s being taller, even though the dative case sometimes did indicate a cause or reason. Socrates is ironically suggesting that, if the Presocratic view of causation were correct, there should be something ‘in’ the tall man, the greater number, and the larger size which is responsible for the tallness or largeness or double quantity – much as there might be water in something, making it damp. He may have been influenced by Anaxagoras, who believed that the seedsofall basic properties weretobefoundinany physical conglomerate at all (fr. 4).

  137. one from the other: A glance at Presocratic physics will help explain Socrates’ difficulty, which is a case of any given property being caused by both x and y, where x is the opposite of y. If the hot were adduced as the reason for fever, it would be odd if in other circumstances the cold were said to be the reason for fever.

  138. the reason for everything: See the general introduction, pp. xxix–xxx.

  139. whether the earth is flat or round: The flat earth was generally a feature of Ionian cosmologies, the spherical earth (occupying the centre) of Italian and Sicilian cosmologies.

  140. I lost no time in procuring the books: The books were easy to procure and inexpensive (Apology 26d–e).

  141. made no use of his Intelligence: There is a pun here.

  142. Megara or Boeotia: Natural choices; cf. Crito 53b. The idea that these bodily substances would act as an independent intelligence is here for humour’s sake, as the oath tends to confirm.

  143. to distinguish between the reason… operative: The Timaeus distinguishes the auxiliary reason, which most people think a real reason, from the true reason, which is intelligence (46c ff.). It could in fact be claimed that this work is Plato’s own attempt to work out the implications of Anaxagoras’s doctrine along the lines required here by Socrates.

  144. surrounds the earth with a vortex… wide platter: The vortex and the kneading-trough are two prominent terms (which suffer a change in terminology owing to their gender) in Aristophanes’ Clouds, though there is no direct link between them in the extant play. Socrates is being amusing here, for it strikes him as odd that anybody should use a quick thing like a vortex to keep the earth stable, or support a substantial thing like a kneading-trough on a base of insubstantial air.

  145. all-sustaining Atlas: To believe in Atlas, the giant who holds the world upon his shoulders, would by this time be an indication of gullibility.

  146. I must guard against… medium: At first sight the comparison suggests that Socrates is aware that he has just suffered a case of ‘blindness’ as a result of lifting his eyes away from the darkness of the world of the physicists straight up to the blazing light of Anaxagoras’s Intelligence principle (eclipsed by the way in which Anaxagoras had himself used it). There would then be an important parallel between the way in which Anaxagoras’s Intelligence (which always pursues the good) is here conceived, and the way in which the Idea of the Good can be compared with the Sun in Republic 6–7. Socrates, however, attributes the threatened mental ‘blindness’ not to the brightness of Anaxagorean Intelligence, but rather to the use of the senses to try to understand the physicists’ world directly (96c, 99e). This may be because the soul is blinded by the darkness of an alien sensory world in much the same way as the senses are blinded by strong light (cf. 83a).

  147. I do not entirely agree… facts: This is perhaps a denial that the approach through the senses is a direct approach to reality rather than an assertion that theory approaches it directly. The things of the senses ha
ve the status of an image or reflection of the Ideas in the Republic, though this doctrine is not explicit in the Phaedo (Bostock, Plato’s Phaedo, pp. 90–92). If Socrates is committed to the concept of an Intelligence which works out what is best according to theory before trying to realize it physically, it is not surprising that he should see theory as a potentially more direct approach to the reasons for things.

  148. I first lay down: ‘Lay down’ translates the verb related to the noun ‘hypothesis’, hence Socrates is now explaining what is known as his ‘hypothetical method’. It is naturally compared with the account of a hypothetical method at Meno 86c ff. Bostock in Plato’s Phaedo (p. 166) shows how that passage actually employs the method (described at Phaedo 101d–e) of justifying one hypothesis on the basis of a more fundamental one, and also treats the method as a second-best approach to the subject.

  149. always cropping up: For the notion that the Theory of Ideas is already much talked of, see 76d.

  150. because it partakes: The language of ‘participation’ (i.e. having a portion of) is frequently used to describe the particular’s relation to the Idea in the middle-period dialogues, but will be much criticized in the Parmenides. The metaphor should not be taken to suggest that the particular has some fixed percentage of some finite stock of (e.g.) Beauty in the world, but rather that it only possesses incomplete Beauty.

  151. (in whatever way the relation comes about): Socrates tries to avoid technicalities which do not affect the argument. Note, however, that Plato’s theory covers both simple predicates such as ‘large’ and relations such as ‘larger’ or ‘equal’ which are more difficult to think of as being ‘in’ the object. Indeed Plato was interested in the mechanics of sensation at this time, and may have been somewhat under the influence of a Protagorean view of sensation which we meet at Theae-tetus 156, whereby all predicates are relations in so far as they are dependent upon a unique relation between object and perceiver. When a white thing is perceived the ‘whiteness’ itself emerges in the midstream reaction between eye and surface, is carried to the surface, and makes it ‘white’. Hence the object’s being white is secondary to (indeed causally dependent on) the coming of whiteness to it, but it may be more accurate to speak of its being associated with whiteness than its having whiteness inside it.