Complete Works

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

  CLINIAS: You’re right in that, at least.

  ATHENIAN: So let’s accept what we’ve said so far as an adequate statement of what wrestling can do for a man. The proper term for most of the other [e] movements that can be executed by the body as a whole is ‘dancing’. Two varieties, the decent and the disreputable, have to be distinguished. The first is a representation of the movements of graceful people, and the aim is to create an effect of grandeur; the second imitates the movements of unsightly people and tries to present them in an unattractive light. Both have two subdivisions. The first subdivision of the decent kind represents handsome, courageous soldiers locked in the violent struggles of war; the second portrays a man of temperate character enjoying moderate pleasures [815] in a state of prosperity, and the natural name for this is ‘dance of peace’. The dance of war differs fundamentally from the dance of peace, and the correct name for it will be the ‘Pyrrhic’. It depicts the motions executed to avoid blows and shots of all kinds (dodging, retreating, jumping into the air, crouching); and it also tries to represent the opposite kind of motion, the more aggressive postures adopted for shooting and discharging javelins and delivering various kinds of blows. In these dances, which portray fine [b] physiques and noble characters, the correct posture is maintained if the body is kept erect in a state of vigorous tension, with the limbs extended nearly straight. A posture with the opposite characteristics we reject as not correct. As for the dance of peace, the point we have to watch in every chorus-performer is this: how successfully—or how disastrously—does he keep up the fine style of dancing to be expected from men who’ve been brought up under good laws? This means we’d better distinguish the [c] dubious style of dancing from the style we may accept without question. So can we define the two? Where should the line be drawn between them? ‘Bacchic’ dances and the like, which (the dancers allege) are a ‘representation’ of drunken persons they call Nymphs and Pans and Sileni and Satyrs, and which are performed during ‘purifications’ and ‘initiations’, are something of a problem: taken as a group, they cannot be termed either ‘dances of peace’ or ‘dances of war’, and indeed they resist all attempts to label them. The best procedure, I think, is to treat them as separate from ‘war-dances’ [d] and ‘dances of peace’, and put them in a category of their own which a statesman may ignore as outside his province. That will entitle us to leave them on one side and get back to dances of peace and war, both of which undeniably deserve our attention.

  Now, what about the non-combatant Muse? The dances she leads in honor of the gods and children of gods will comprise one broad category of dances performed with a sense of well-being. This is how we shall [e] distinguish between the two forms this feeling may take: (1) the particularly keen pleasure felt by people who have emerged from trouble and danger to a state of happiness; (2) the quieter pleasures of those whose past good fortune has not only continued but increased. Now, take a man in either of these situations. The greater his pleasure the brisker his body’s movements; more modest pleasures make his actions correspondingly less brisk. Again, the more composed the man’s temperament, and the tougher he has been [816] trained to be, the more deliberate are his movements; on the other hand, if he’s a coward and has not been trained to show restraint, his actions are wilder and his postures change more violently. And in general, when a man uses his voice to talk or sing, he finds it very difficult to keep his body still. This is the origin of the whole art of dancing: the gestures that express what one is saying. Some of us make gestures that are invariably in harmony with our words, but some of us fail. In fact, one has only to reflect on many other ancient terms that have come down to us, to see [b] that they should be commended for their aptness and accuracy. One such term describes the dances performed by those who enjoy prosperity and seek only moderate pleasures: it’s just the right word, and whoever coined it must have been a real musician. He very sensibly gave all such dances the name ‘emmeleiai’,17 and established two categories of approved dancing, the ‘war-dance’ (which he called ‘Pyrrhic’) and ‘dance of peace’ (‘emmeleiai’), [c] thus giving each its apt and appropriate title. The lawgiver should give an outline of them, and the Guardian of the Laws should see where they are to be found; then, after hunting them out, he must combine the dance-sequences with the other musical elements, and allocate each sacrifice and feast in the calendar the style of dance that is appropriate. After thus consecrating the whole list of dances, he must henceforth refrain from altering any feature either of the dancing or the singing: the same state and the same citizens (who should all be the same sort of people, as [d] far as possible), should enjoy the same pleasures in the same fashion: that is the secret of a happy and a blessed life.

  So much for the way men of superior physique and noble character should perform in choruses of the kind we’ve prescribed. We are now obliged to examine and pronounce on the misshapen bodies and degraded outlook of those performers who have turned to producing ludicrous and comic effects by exploiting the opportunities for humorous mimicry offered by dialogue, song and dance. Now anyone who means to acquire a discerning [e] judgment will find it impossible to understand the serious side of things in isolation from their ridiculous aspect, or indeed appreciate anything at all except in the light of its opposite. But if we intend to acquire virtue, even on a small scale, we can’t be serious and comic too, and this is precisely why we must learn to recognize buffoonery, to avoid being trapped by our ignorance of it into doing or saying anything ridiculous when there’s no call for it. Such mimicry must be left to slaves and hired aliens, and no one must ever take it at all seriously. No citizen or citizeness must be found learning it, and the performances must always contain some new twist. With that law, and that explanation of it, humorous [817] amusements—usually known as ‘comedy’—may be dismissed.

  But what about our ‘serious’ poets, as they’re called, the tragedians? Suppose some of them were to come forward and ask us some such question as this: ‘Gentlemen, may we enter your state and country, or not? And may we bring our work with us? Or what’s your policy on this point?’ What would be the right reply for us to make to these inspired geniuses? [b] This, I think: ‘Most honored guests, we’re tragedians ourselves, and our tragedy is the finest and best we can create. At any rate, our entire state has been constructed so as to be a “representation” of the finest and noblest life—the very thing we maintain is most genuinely a tragedy. So we are poets like yourselves, composing in the same genre, and your competitors as artists and actors in the finest drama, which true law alone has the [c] natural powers to “produce” to perfection (of that we’re quite confident). So don’t run away with the idea that we shall ever blithely allow you to set up stage in the market-place and bring on your actors whose fine voices will carry further than ours. Don’t think we’ll let you declaim to women and children and the general public, and talk about the same practices as we do but treat them differently—indeed, more often than not, so as virtually to contradict us. We should be absolutely daft, and so would any [d] state as a whole, to let you go ahead as we’ve described before the authorities had decided whether your work was fit to be recited and suitable for public performance or not. So, you sons of the charming Muses, first of all show your songs to the authorities for comparison with ours, and if your doctrines seem the same as or better than our own, we’ll let you produce your plays; but if not, friends, that we can never do.’

  [e] So as regards chorus performances in general and the question of learning a part in them, custom will march hand in hand with law—dealing with slaves and their masters separately, if you are agreeable.

  CLINIAS: How could we fail to agree, at any rate for the moment?

  ATHENIAN: For gentlemen three related disciplines still remain: (1) computation and the study of numbers; (2) measurements of lines, surfaces and solids; (3) the mutual relationship of the heavenly bodies as they [818] revolve in their courses. None of these subjects must be studied in minute detai
l by the general public, but only by a chosen few (and who they are, we shall say when the time comes, when our discussion is drawing to a close). But what about the man in the street? It would certainly be a disgrace for him to be ignorant of what people very rightly call the ‘indispensable rudiments’; but it will be difficult—impossible, even—for him to make a minute study of the entire subject. However, we can’t dispense with the basic necessities, which was probably the point in the mind of the coiner [b] of that saying about God, to the effect that ‘not even God will be found at odds with necessity’18—presumably divine necessities, because if you interpret the remark as referring to necessities in the mortal realm, as do most people who quote such things, it’s by far the most naive remark that could be made.

  CLINIAS: Well, then, sir, what necessities, divine rather than the other sort, are relevant to these studies?

  ATHENIAN: These, I think: the necessities of which at least some practical and theoretical knowledge will always be essential for every god, spirit [c] or hero who means to take charge of human beings in a responsible fashion. A man, at any rate, will fall a long way short of such godlike standards if he can’t recognize one, two and three, or odd and even numbers in general, or hasn’t the faintest notion how to count, or can’t reckon up the days and nights, and is ignorant of the revolutions of the sun and moon and the other heavenly bodies. It’s downright stupid to expect that anyone who wants to make the slightest progress in the highest branches of knowledge [d] can afford to ignore any of these subjects. But what parts of them should be studied, and how intensively, and when? Which topics should be combined, and which kept separate? How will they be synthesized? These are the first questions we have to answer, and then with these preliminary lessons to guide us we may advance to the remaining studies. This is the natural procedure enforced by the necessity with which we maintain no god contends now, or ever will.

  CLINIAS: Yes, sir, those proposals of yours, put like that, seem natural [e] and correct.

  ATHENIAN: They certainly are, Clinias, but such a preliminary statement of them is difficult to put into legal form. If you like, we’ll postpone more precise legislation till later.

  CLINIAS: It looks to us, sir, as if you’re deterred by the way our countrymen commonly neglect this sort of subject. But your fears are quite groundless, so try to tell us what you think, without keeping anything back on that account.

  ATHENIAN: I am indeed deterred, for the reasons you mention, but I am [819] even more appalled at those who have actually undertaken those studies, but in the wrong manner. Total ignorance over an entire field is never dangerous or disastrous; much more damage is done when a subject is known intimately and in detail, but has been improperly taught.

  CLINIAS: You’re right.

  ATHENIAN: So we should insist that gentlemen should study each of these [b] subjects to at least the same level as very many children in Egypt, who acquire such knowledge at the same time as they learn to read and write. First, lessons in calculation have been devised for tiny tots to learn while they are enjoying themselves at play: they divide up a given number of garlands or apples among larger or smaller groups, and arrange boxers or wrestlers in an alternation of ‘byes’ and ‘pairs’, or in a sequence of either, and in the various further ways in which ‘byes’ and ‘pairs’ naturally succeed each other. Another game the teachers play with them is to jumble up bowls of gold and [c] bronze and silver and so on, or distribute whole sets of one material. In this way, as I indicated, they make the uses of elementary arithmetic an integral part of their pupils’ play, so that they get a useful introduction to the art of marshaling, leading and deploying an army, or running a household; and in general they make them more alert and resourceful persons. Next, the [d] teacher puts the children on to measuring lengths, surfaces and solids—a study which rescues them from the deep-rooted ignorance, at once comic and shocking, that all men display in this field.

  CLINIAS: What sort of ignorance do you mean, in particular?

  ATHENIAN: My dear Clinias, even I took a very long time to discover mankind’s plight in this business; but when I did, I was amazed, and could scarcely believe that human beings could suffer from such swinish [e] stupidity. I blushed not only for myself, but for Greeks in general.

  CLINIAS: Why so? Go on, sir, tell us what you’re getting at.

  ATHENIAN: I’ll explain—or rather, I’ll make my point by asking you a few questions. Here’s a simple one: you know what’s meant by a ‘line’, I suppose?

  CLINIAS: Of course.

  ATHENIAN: Very well. What about ‘surface’?

  CLINIAS: Surely.

  ATHENIAN: You appreciate that these are two distinct things, and that ‘volume’ is a third?

  CLINIAS: Naturally.

  ATHENIAN: And you regard all these as commensurable?

  CLINIAS: Yes.

  ATHENIAN: And one length, I suppose, is essentially expressible in terms [820] of another length, one surface in terms of another surface, and one volume in terms of another volume?

  CLINIAS: Exactly.

  ATHENIAN: Well, what if some of these can’t be thus expressed, either ‘exactly’ or approximately. What if some can, and some cannot, in spite of your thinking they all can? What do you think of your ideas on the subject now?

  CLINIAS: They’re worthless, obviously.

  ATHENIAN: What about the relationship of line and surface to volume, or surface and line to each other? Don’t all we Greeks regard them as in some sense commensurable?

  [b] CLINIAS: We certainly do.

  ATHENIAN: But if, as I put it, ‘all we Greeks’ believe them to be commensurable when fundamentally they are in commensurable, one had better address these people as follows (blushing the while on their behalf): ‘Now then, most esteemed among the Greeks, isn’t this one of those subjects we said19 it was disgraceful not to understand—not that a knowledge of the basic essentials was much to be proud of?’

  CLINIAS: Of course.

  ATHENIAN: Now there are a number of additional and related topics [c] which are a fertile breeding-ground for mistakes similar to those we’ve mentioned.

  CLINIAS: What sort of topics?

  ATHENIAN: The real relationship between commensurables and incommensurables. We must be very poor specimens if on inspection we can’t tell them apart. These are the problems we ought to keep on putting up to each other, in a competitive spirit, when we’ve sufficient time to do them justice; and it’s a much more civilized pastime for old men than checkers.

  CLINIAS: Perhaps so. Come to think of it, checkers is not radically different [d] from such studies.

  ATHENIAN: Well, Clinias, I maintain that these subjects are what the younger generation should go in for. They do no harm, and are not very difficult: they can be learned in play, and so far from harming the state, they’ll do it some good. But if anyone disagrees, we must listen to his case.

  CLINIAS: Of course.

  ATHENIAN: However, although obviously we shall sanction them if that proves to be their effect, we shall reject them if they seem to disappoint our expectations.

  CLINIAS: Obviously indeed. No doubt about it. [e]

  ATHENIAN: Well then, sir, so that our legal code shall have no gaps, let’s regard these studies as an established but independent part of the desired curriculum—independent, that is, of the rest of the framework of the state, so that they can be ‘redeemed’ like ‘pledges’, in case the arrangements fail to work out to the satisfaction of us the depositors or you the pledgees.

  CLINIAS: Yes, that’s a fair way to present them.

  ATHENIAN: Next, consider astronomy. Would a proposal to teach it to the young meet with your approval, or not?

  CLINIAS: Just tell us what you think.

  ATHENIAN: Now here’s a very odd thing, that really is quite intolerable. [821]

  CLINIAS: What?

  ATHENIAN: We generally say that so far as the supreme deity and the universe are concerned, we ought not to bother our hea
ds hunting up explanations, because that is an act of impiety. In fact, precisely the opposite seems to be true.

  CLINIAS: What’s your point?

  ATHENIAN: My words will surprise you, and you may well think them out of place on the lips of an old man. But it’s quite impossible to keep quiet about a study, if one believes it is noble and true, a blessing to society and pleasing in the sight of God. [b]

  CLINIAS: That’s reasonable enough, but what astronomy are we going to find of which we can say all that?

  ATHENIAN: My dear fellows, at the present day nearly all we Greeks do the great gods—Sun and Moon—an injustice.

  CLINIAS: How so?

  ATHENIAN: We say that they, and certain other heavenly bodies with them, never follow the same path. Hence our name for them: ‘planets.’20

  [c] CLINIAS: Good heavens, sir, that’s absolutely right. In the course of my life I’ve often seen with my own eyes how the Morning and the Evening Star, and a number of others, never describe the same course, but vary from one to another; and we all know that the sun and moon always move like that.21

  ATHENIAN: Megillus and Clinias, this is precisely the sort of point about the gods of the heavens that I am insisting our citizens and young men [d] must study, so as to learn enough about them all to avoid blasphemy, and to use reverent language whenever they sacrifice and offer up their pious prayers.

  CLINIAS: Right enough—if it’s possible, in the first place, to acquire the knowledge you mention. On the assumption that investigation will enable us to correct any errors in our present statements, I too agree that this subject must be studied, in view of its grandeur and importance. So do your level best to convince us of the case you’re making, and we’ll try to follow you and take in what you say.