Complete Works

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

  SOCRATES: If I were directing you, Meno, and not only myself, we would not have investigated whether virtue is teachable or not before we had investigated what virtue itself is. But because you do not even attempt to rule yourself, in order that you may be free, but you try to rule me and do so, I will agree with you—for what can I do? So we must, it appears, inquire into the qualities of something the nature of which we do not yet know. However, [e] please relax your rule a little bit for me and agree to investigate whether it is teachable or not by means of a hypothesis. I mean the way geometers often carry on their investigations. For example, if they are asked whether a specific [87] area can be inscribed in the form of a triangle within a given circle, one of them might say: “I do not yet know whether that area has that property, but I think I have, as it were, a hypothesis that is of use for the problem, namely this: If that area is such that when one has applied it as a rectangle to the given straight line in the circle it is deficient by a figure similar to the very [b] figure which is applied, then I think one alternative results, whereas another results if it is impossible for this to happen. So, by using this hypothesis, I am willing to tell you what results with regard to inscribing it in the circle—that is, whether it is impossible or not.”14 So let us speak about virtue also, since we do not know either what it is or what qualities it possesses, and let us investigate whether it is teachable or not by means of a hypothesis, and say this: Among the things existing in the soul, of what sort is virtue, that it should be teachable or not? First, if it is another sort than knowledge, is it teachable or not, or, as we were just saying, recollectable? Let it make no [c] difference to us which term we use: is it teachable? Or is it plain to anyone that men cannot be taught anything but knowledge?—I think so.

  SOCRATES: But, if virtue is a kind of knowledge, it is clear that it could be taught.—Of course.

  SOCRATES: We have dealt with that question quickly, that if it is of one kind it can be taught; if it is of a different kind, it cannot.—We have indeed.

  SOCRATES: The next point to consider seems to be whether virtue is knowledge or something else.—That does seem to be the next point to consider.

  [d] SOCRATES: Well now, do we say that virtue is itself something good, and will this hypothesis stand firm for us, that it is something good?—Of course.

  SOCRATES: If then there is anything else good that is different and separate from knowledge, virtue might well not be a kind of knowledge; but if there is nothing good that knowledge does not encompass, we would be right to suspect that it is a kind of knowledge.—That is so.

  SOCRATES: Surely virtue makes us good?—Yes. [e]

  SOCRATES: And if we are good, we are beneficent, for all that is good is beneficial. Is that not so?—Yes.

  SOCRATES: So virtue is something beneficial?

  MENO: That necessarily follows from what has been agreed.

  SOCRATES: Let us then examine what kinds of things benefit us, taking them up one by one: health, we say, and strength, and beauty, and also wealth. We say that these things, and others of the same kind, benefit us, do we not?—We do.

  SOCRATES: Yet we say that these same things also sometimes harm one. [88] Do you agree or not?—I do.

  SOCRATES: Look then, what directing factor determines in each case whether these things benefit or harm us? Is it not the right use of them that benefits us, and the wrong use that harms us?—Certainly.

  SOCRATES: Let us now look at the qualities of the soul. There is something you call moderation, and justice, courage, intelligence, memory, munificence, and all such things?—There is.

  [b] SOCRATES: Consider whichever of these you believe not to be knowledge but different from it; do they not at times harm us, at other times benefit us? Courage, for example, when it is not wisdom but like a kind of recklessness: when a man is reckless without understanding, he is harmed; when with understanding, he is benefitted.—Yes.

  SOCRATES: The same is true of moderation and mental quickness; when they are learned and disciplined with understanding they are beneficial, but without understanding they are harmful?—Very much so.

  [c] SOCRATES: Therefore, in a word, all that the soul undertakes and endures, if directed by wisdom, ends in happiness, but if directed by ignorance, it ends in the opposite?—That is likely.

  SOCRATES: If then virtue is something in the soul and it must be beneficial, it must be knowledge, since all the qualities of the soul are in themselves [d] neither beneficial nor harmful, but accompanied by wisdom or folly they become harmful or beneficial. This argument shows that virtue, being beneficial, must be a kind of wisdom.—I agree.

  SOCRATES: Furthermore, those other things we were mentioning just now, wealth and the like, are at times good and at times harmful. Just as for the rest of the soul the direction of wisdom makes things beneficial, but harmful [e] if directed by folly, so in these cases, if the soul uses and directs them right it makes them beneficial, but bad use makes them harmful?—Quite so.

  SOCRATES: The wise soul directs them right, the foolish soul wrongly?—That is so.

  SOCRATES: So one may say this about everything; all other human activities depend on the soul, and those of the soul itself depend on wisdom if [89] they are to be good. According to this argument the beneficial would be wisdom, and we say that virtue is beneficial?—Certainly.

  SOCRATES: Then we say that virtue is wisdom, either the whole or a part of it?

  MENO: What you say, Socrates, seems to me quite right.

  SOCRATES: Then, if that is so, the good are not so by nature?—I do not think they are.

  [b] SOCRATES: For if they were, this would follow: if the good were so by nature, we would have people who knew which among the young were by nature good; we would take those whom they had pointed out and guard them in the Acropolis, sealing them up there much more carefully than gold so that no one could corrupt them, and when they reached maturity they would be useful to their cities.—Reasonable enough, Socrates.

  SOCRATES: Since the good are not good by nature, does learning make [c] them so?

  MENO: Necessarily, as I now think, Socrates, and clearly, on our hypothesis, if virtue is knowledge, it can be taught.

  SOCRATES: Perhaps, by Zeus, but may it be that we were not right to agree to this?

  MENO: Yet it seemed to be right at the time.

  SOCRATES: We should not only think it right at the time, but also now and in the future if it is to be at all sound.

  MENO: What is the difficulty? What do you have in mind that you do [d] not like about it and doubt that virtue is knowledge?

  SOCRATES: I will tell you, Meno. I am not saying that it is wrong to say that virtue is teachable if it is knowledge, but look whether it is reasonable of me to doubt whether it is knowledge. Tell me this: if not only virtue but anything whatever can be taught, should there not be of necessity people who teach it and people who learn it?—I think so.

  SOCRATES: Then again, if on the contrary there are no teachers or learners [e] of something, we should be right to assume that the subject cannot be taught?

  MENO: Quite so, but do you think that there are no teachers of virtue?

  SOCRATES: I have often tried to find out whether there were any teachers of it, but in spite of all my efforts I cannot find any. And yet I have searched for them with the help of many people, especially those whom I believed to be most experienced in this matter. And now, Meno, Anytus15 here has opportunely come to sit down by us. Let us share our search with him. It would be reasonable for us to do so, for Anytus, in the first place, is the [90] son of Anthemion, a man of wealth and wisdom, who did not become rich automatically or as the result of a gift like Ismenias the Theban, who recently acquired the possessions of Polycrates, but through his own wisdom and efforts. Further, he did not seem to be an arrogant or puffed up or offensive citizen in other ways, but he was a well-mannered and well-behaved man. Also he gave our friend here a good upbringing and [b] education, as the majority of Athenians believe, f
or they are electing him to the highest offices. It is right then to look for the teachers of virtue with the help of men such as he, whether there are any and if so who they are. Therefore, Anytus, please join me and your guest friend Meno here, in our inquiry as to who are the teachers of virtue. Look at it in this way: if we wanted Meno to become a good physician, to what teachers would [c] we send him? Would we not send him to the physicians?

  ANYTUS: Certainly.

  SOCRATES: And if we wanted him to be a good shoemaker, to shoemakers?—Yes.

  SOCRATES: And so with other pursuits?—Certainly.

  SOCRATES: Tell me again on this same topic, like this: we say that we would be right to send him to the physicians if we want him to become [d] a physician; whenever we say that, we mean that it would be reasonable to send him to those who practice the craft rather than to those who do not, and to those who exact fees for this very practice and have shown themselves to be teachers of anyone who wishes to come to them and learn. Is it not with this in mind that we would be right to send him?—Yes.

  SOCRATES: And the same is true about flute-playing and the other crafts? [e] It would be very foolish for those who want to make someone a fluteplayer to refuse to send him to those who profess to teach the craft and make money at it, but to send him to make trouble for others by seeking to learn from those who do not claim to be teachers or have a single pupil in that subject which we want the one we send to learn from them? Do you not think it very unreasonable to do so?—By Zeus I do, and also very ignorant.

  SOCRATES: Quite right. However, you can now deliberate with me about our guest friend Meno here. He has been telling me for some time, Anytus, [91] that he longs to acquire that wisdom and virtue which enables men to manage their households and their cities well, to take care of their parents, to know how to welcome and to send away both citizens and strangers [b] as a good man should. Consider to whom we should be right to send him to learn this virtue. Or is it obvious in view of what was said just now that we should send him to those who profess to be teachers of virtue and have shown themselves to be available to any Greek who wishes to learn, and for this fix a fee and exact it?

  ANYTUS: And who do you say these are, Socrates?

  SOCRATES: You surely know yourself that they are those whom men call sophists.

  [c] ANYTUS: By Heracles, hush, Socrates. May no one of my household or friends, whether citizen or stranger, be mad enough to go to these people and be harmed by them, for they clearly cause the ruin and corruption of their followers.

  SOCRATES: How do you mean, Anytus? Are these people, alone of those who claim the knowledge to benefit one, so different from the others that they not only do not benefit what one entrusts to them but on the contrary [d] corrupt it, even though they obviously expect to make money from the process? I find I cannot believe you, for I know that one man, Protagoras, made more money from this knowledge of his than Phidias who made such notably fine works, and ten other sculptors. Surely what you say is extraordinary, if those who mend old sandals and restore clothes would be found out within the month if they returned the clothes and sandals [e] in a worse state than they received them; if they did this they would soon die of starvation, but the whole of Greece has not noticed for forty years that Protagoras corrupts those who frequent him and sends them away in a worse moral condition than he received them. I believe that he was nearly seventy when he died and had practiced his craft for forty years. During all that time to this very day his reputation has stood high; and not only Protagoras but a great many others, some born before him and some still alive today. Are we to say that you maintain that they deceive [92] and harm the young knowingly, or that they themselves are not aware of it? Are we to deem those whom some people consider the wisest of men to be so mad as that?

  ANYTUS: They are far from being mad, Socrates. It is much rather those among the young who pay their fees who are mad, and even more the relatives who entrust their young to them and most of all the cities who [b] allow them to come in and do not drive out any citizen or stranger who attempts to behave in this manner.

  SOCRATES: Has some sophist wronged you, Anytus, or why are you so hard on them?

  ANYTUS: No, by Zeus, I have never met one of them, nor would I allow any one of my people to do so.

  SOCRATES: Are you then altogether without any experience of these men?

  ANYTUS: And may I remain so.

  SOCRATES: How then, my good sir, can you know whether there is any [c] good in their instruction or not, if you are altogether without experience of it?

  ANYTUS: Easily, for I know who they are, whether I have experience of them or not.

  SOCRATES: Perhaps you are a wizard, Anytus, for I wonder, from what you yourself say, how else you know about these things. However, let us not try to find out who the men are whose company would make Meno [d] wicked—let them be the sophists if you like—but tell us, and benefit your family friend here by telling him, to whom he should go in so large a city to acquire, to any worthwhile degree, the virtue I was just now describing.

  ANYTUS: Why did you not tell him yourself?

  SOCRATES: I did mention those whom I thought to be teachers of it, but you say I am wrong, and perhaps you are right. You tell him in your turn [e] to whom among the Athenians he should go. Tell him the name of anyone you want.

  ANYTUS: Why give him the name of one individual? Any Athenian gentleman he may meet, if he is willing to be persuaded, will make him a better man than the sophists would.

  SOCRATES: And have these gentlemen become virtuous automatically, without learning from anyone, and are they able to teach others what they themselves never learned? [93]

  ANYTUS: I believe that these men have learned from those who were gentlemen before them; or do you not think that there are many good men in this city?

  SOCRATES: I believe, Anytus, that there are many men here who are good at public affairs, and that there have been as many in the past, but have they been good teachers of their own virtue? That is the point we are discussing, not whether there are good men here or not, or whether there [b] have been in the past, but we have been investigating for some time whether virtue can be taught. And in the course of that investigation we are inquiring whether the good men of today and of the past knew how to pass on to another the virtue they themselves possessed, or whether a man cannot pass it on or receive it from another. This is what Meno and I have been investigating for some time. Look at it this way, from what [c] you yourself have said. Would you not say that Themistocles16 was a good man?—Yes. Even the best of men.

  SOCRATES: And therefore a good teacher of his own virtue if anyone was?

  ANYTUS: I think so, if he wanted to be.

  SOCRATES: But do you think he did not want some other people to be worthy men, and especially his own son? Or do you think he begrudged [d] him this, and deliberately did not pass on to him his own virtue? Have you not heard that Themistocles taught his son Cleophantus to be a good horseman? He could remain standing upright on horseback and shoot javelins from that position and do many other remarkable things which his father had him taught and made skillful at, all of which required good teachers. Have you not heard this from your elders?—I have.

  SOCRATES: So one could not blame the poor natural talents of the son [e] for his failure in virtue?—Perhaps not.

  SOCRATES: But have you ever heard anyone, young or old, say that Cleophantus, the son of Themistocles, was a good and wise man at the same pursuits as his father?—Never.

  SOCRATES: Are we to believe that he wanted to educate his son in those other things but not to do better than his neighbors in that skill which he himself possessed, if indeed virtue can be taught?—Perhaps not, by Zeus.

  SOCRATES: And yet he was, as you yourself agree, among the best teachers [94] of virtue in the past. Let us consider another man, Aristides, the son of Lysimachus. Do you not agree that he was good?—I very definitely do.

  SOCRATES: He too gave his own son Lysimachus the bes
t Athenian education in matters which are the business of teachers, and do you think he made him a better man than anyone else? For you have been in his company [b] wisdom. You know that he brought up two sons, Paralus and Xanthippus?—I know.

  SOCRATES: You also know that he taught them to be as good horsemen as any Athenian, that he educated them in the arts, in gymnastics, and in all else that was a matter of skill not to be inferior to anyone, but did he not want to make them good men? I think he did, but this could not be taught. And lest you think that only a few most inferior Athenians are incapable in this respect, reflect that Thucydides17 too brought up two sons, Melesias and Stephanus, that he educated them well in all other things. [c] They were the best wrestlers in Athens—he entrusted the one to Xanthias and the other to Eudorus, who were thought to be the best wrestlers of the day, or do you not remember?

  ANYTUS: I remember I have heard that said.

  SOCRATES: It is surely clear that he would not have taught his boys what [d] it costs money to teach, but have failed to teach them what costs nothing—making them good men—if that could be taught? Or was Thucydides perhaps an inferior person who had not many friends among the Athenians and the allies? He belonged to a great house; he had great influence in the city and among the other Greeks, so that if virtue could be taught he would have found the man who could make his sons good men, be it a citizen or a stranger, if he himself did not have the time because of his [e] public concerns. But, friend Anytus, virtue can certainly not be taught.

  ANYTUS: I think, Socrates, that you easily speak ill of people. I would advise you, if you will listen to me, to be careful. Perhaps also in another city, and certainly here, it is easier to injure people than to benefit them. I think you know that yourself. [95]

  SOCRATES: I think, Meno, that Anytus is angry, and I am not at all surprised. He thinks, to begin with, that I am slandering those men, and then he believes himself to be one of them. If he ever realizes what slander is, he will cease from anger, but he does not know it now. You tell me, are there not worthy men among your people?—Certainly.