Meno
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MENO
by Plato
Translated by Benjamin Jowett
INTRODUCTION.
This Dialogue begins abruptly with a question of Meno, who asks,
'whether virtue can be taught.' Socrates replies that he does not as yet
know what virtue is, and has never known anyone who did. 'Then he cannot
have met Gorgias when he was at Athens.' Yes, Socrates had met him, but
he has a bad memory, and has forgotten what Gorgias said. Will Meno tell
him his own notion, which is probably not very different from that of
Gorgias? 'O yes--nothing easier: there is the virtue of a man, of a
woman, of an old man, and of a child; there is a virtue of every age and
state of life, all of which may be easily described.'
Socrates reminds Meno that this is only an enumeration of the virtues
and not a definition of the notion which is common to them all. In a
second attempt Meno defines virtue to be 'the power of command.' But to
this, again, exceptions are taken. For there must be a virtue of those
who obey, as well as of those who command; and the power of command must
be justly or not unjustly exercised. Meno is very ready to admit that
justice is virtue: 'Would you say virtue or a virtue, for there are
other virtues, such as courage, temperance, and the like; just as round
is a figure, and black and white are colours, and yet there are other
figures and other colours. Let Meno take the examples of figure and
colour, and try to define them.' Meno confesses his inability, and after
a process of interrogation, in which Socrates explains to him the
nature of a 'simile in multis,' Socrates himself defines figure as 'the
accompaniment of colour.' But some one may object that he does not know
the meaning of the word 'colour;' and if he is a candid friend, and not
a mere disputant, Socrates is willing to furnish him with a simpler and
more philosophical definition, into which no disputed word is allowed to
intrude: 'Figure is the limit of form.' Meno imperiously insists that
he must still have a definition of colour. Some raillery follows; and
at length Socrates is induced to reply, 'that colour is the effluence of
form, sensible, and in due proportion to the sight.' This definition is
exactly suited to the taste of Meno, who welcomes the familiar language
of Gorgias and Empedocles. Socrates is of opinion that the more abstract
or dialectical definition of figure is far better.
Now that Meno has been made to understand the nature of a general
definition, he answers in the spirit of a Greek gentleman, and in the
words of a poet, 'that virtue is to delight in things honourable, and to
have the power of getting them.' This is a nearer approximation than
he has yet made to a complete definition, and, regarded as a piece
of proverbial or popular morality, is not far from the truth. But the
objection is urged, 'that the honourable is the good,' and as every one
equally desires the good, the point of the definition is contained in
the words, 'the power of getting them.' 'And they must be got justly or
with justice.' The definition will then stand thus: 'Virtue is the power
of getting good with justice.' But justice is a part of virtue, and
therefore virtue is the getting of good with a part of virtue. The
definition repeats the word defined.
Meno complains that the conversation of Socrates has the effect of a
torpedo's shock upon him. When he talks with other persons he has plenty
to say about virtue; in the presence of Socrates, his thoughts desert
him. Socrates replies that he is only the cause of perplexity in others,
because he is himself perplexed. He proposes to continue the enquiry.
But how, asks Meno, can he enquire either into what he knows or into
what he does not know? This is a sophistical puzzle, which, as Socrates
remarks, saves a great deal of trouble to him who accepts it. But the
puzzle has a real difficulty latent under it, to which Socrates will
endeavour to find a reply. The difficulty is the origin of knowledge:--
He has heard from priests and priestesses, and from the poet Pindar, of
an immortal soul which is born again and again in successive periods of
existence, returning into this world when she has paid the penalty of
ancient crime, and, having wandered over all places of the upper and
under world, and seen and known all things at one time or other, is by
association out of one thing capable of recovering all. For nature is
of one kindred; and every soul has a seed or germ which may be developed
into all knowledge. The existence of this latent knowledge is further
proved by the interrogation of one of Meno's slaves, who, in the skilful
hands of Socrates, is made to acknowledge some elementary relations
of geometrical figures. The theorem that the square of the diagonal
is double the square of the side--that famous discovery of primitive
mathematics, in honour of which the legendary Pythagoras is said to
have sacrificed a hecatomb--is elicited from him. The first step in the
process of teaching has made him conscious of his own ignorance. He
has had the 'torpedo's shock' given him, and is the better for the
operation. But whence had the uneducated man this knowledge? He had
never learnt geometry in this world; nor was it born with him; he must
therefore have had it when he was not a man. And as he always either was
or was not a man, he must have always had it. (Compare Phaedo.)
After Socrates has given this specimen of the true nature of teaching,
the original question of the teachableness of virtue is renewed. Again
he professes a desire to know 'what virtue is' first. But he is willing
to argue the question, as mathematicians say, under an hypothesis. He
will assume that if virtue is knowledge, then virtue can be taught.
(This was the stage of the argument at which the Protagoras concluded.)
Socrates has no difficulty in showing that virtue is a good, and
that goods, whether of body or mind, must be under the direction of
knowledge. Upon the assumption just made, then, virtue is teachable. But
where are the teachers? There are none to be found. This is extremely
discouraging. Virtue is no sooner discovered to be teachable, than the
discovery follows that it is not taught. Virtue, therefore, is and is
not teachable.
In this dilemma an appeal is made to Anytus, a respectable and
well-to-do citizen of the old school, and a family friend of Meno,
who happens to be present. He is asked 'whether Meno shall go to the
Sophists and be taught.' The suggestion throws him into a rage. 'To
whom, then, shall Meno go?' asks Socrates. To any Athenian gentleman--to
the great Athenian statesmen of past times. Socrates replies here, as
elsewhere (Laches, Prot.), that Themistocles, Pericles, and other great
men, had sons to whom they would surely, if they could have done so,
have imparted their own political wisdom; but no one ever heard that
these sons of theirs were remarkable for anything except riding and
wrestling and similar accomplishments. Anytus is angry at the imputation
which is cast on his favourite statesmen, and on a class to which he
supposes himself to belong; he breaks off with a significant hint. The
mention of another opportunity of talking with him, and the suggestion
that Meno may do the Athenian people a service by pacifying him, are
evident allusions to the trial of Socrates.
Socrates returns to the consideration of the question 'whether virtue is
teachable,' which was denied on the ground that there are no teachers of
it: (for the Sophists are bad teachers, and the rest of the world do
not profess to teach). But there is another point which we failed to
observe, and in which Gorgias has never instructed Meno, nor Prodicus
Socrates. This is the nature of right opinion. For virtue may be under
the guidance of right opinion as well as of knowledge; and right opinion
is for practical purposes as good as knowledge, but is incapable of
being taught, and is also liable, like the images of Daedalus, to 'walk
off,' because not bound by the tie of the cause. This is the sort of
instinct which is possessed by statesmen, who are not wise or knowing
persons, but only inspired or divine. The higher virtue, which is
identical with knowledge, is an ideal only. If the statesman had this
knowledge, and could teach what he knew, he would be like Tiresias in
the world below,--'he alone has wisdom, but the rest flit like shadows.'
This Dialogue is an attempt to answer the question, Can virtue be
taught? No one would either ask or answer such a question in modern
times. But in the age of Socrates it was only by an effort that the mind
could rise to a general notion of virtue as distinct from the particular
virtues of courage, liberality, and the like. And when a hazy conception
of this ideal was attained, it was only by a further effort that the
question of the teachableness of virtue could be resolved.
The answer which is given by Plato is paradoxical enough, and seems
rather intended to stimulate than to satisfy enquiry. Virtue is
knowledge, and therefore virtue can be taught. But virtue is not taught,
and therefore in this higher and ideal sense there is no virtue and no
knowledge. The teaching of the Sophists is confessedly inadequate, and
Meno, who is their pupil, is ignorant of the very nature of general
terms. He can only produce out of their armoury the sophism, 'that you
can neither enquire into what you know nor into what you do not know;'
to which Socrates replies by his theory of reminiscence.
To the doctrine that virtue is knowledge, Plato has been constantly
tending in the previous Dialogues. But the new truth is no sooner found
than it vanishes away. 'If there is knowledge, there must be teachers;
and where are the teachers?' There is no knowledge in the higher sense
of systematic, connected, reasoned knowledge, such as may one day be
attained, and such as Plato himself seems to see in some far off vision
of a single science. And there are no teachers in the higher sense of
the word; that is to say, no real teachers who will arouse the spirit
of enquiry in their pupils, and not merely instruct them in rhetoric or
impart to them ready-made information for a fee of 'one' or of 'fifty
drachms.' Plato is desirous of deepening the notion of education, and
therefore he asserts the paradox that there are no educators. This
paradox, though different in form, is not really different from the
remark which is often made in modern times by those who would depreciate
either the methods of education commonly employed, or the standard
attained--that 'there is no true education among us.'
There remains still a possibility which must not be overlooked. Even
if there be no true knowledge, as is proved by 'the wretched state of
education,' there may be right opinion, which is a sort of guessing
or divination resting on no knowledge of causes, and incommunicable to
others. This is the gift which our statesmen have, as is proved by the
circumstance that they are unable to impart their knowledge to their
sons. Those who are possessed of it cannot be said to be men of science
or philosophers, but they are inspired and divine.
There may be some trace of irony in this curious passage, which forms
the concluding portion of the Dialogue. But Plato certainly does not
mean to intimate that the supernatural or divine is the true basis of
human life. To him knowledge, if only attainable in this world, is of
all things the most divine. Yet, like other philosophers, he is willing
to admit that 'probability is the guide of life (Butler's Analogy.);'
and he is at the same time desirous of contrasting the wisdom which
governs the world with a higher wisdom. There are many instincts,
judgments, and anticipations of the human mind which cannot be reduced