Meno
virtue, or would you say the same of health, and size, and strength? Or
is the nature of health always the same, whether in man or woman?
MENO: I should say that health is the same, both in man and woman.
SOCRATES: And is not this true of size and strength? If a woman is
strong, she will be strong by reason of the same form and of the same
strength subsisting in her which there is in the man. I mean to say that
strength, as strength, whether of man or woman, is the same. Is there
any difference?
MENO: I think not.
SOCRATES: And will not virtue, as virtue, be the same, whether in a
child or in a grown-up person, in a woman or in a man?
MENO: I cannot help feeling, Socrates, that this case is different from
the others.
SOCRATES: But why? Were you not saying that the virtue of a man was to
order a state, and the virtue of a woman was to order a house?
MENO: I did say so.
SOCRATES: And can either house or state or anything be well ordered
without temperance and without justice?
MENO: Certainly not.
SOCRATES: Then they who order a state or a house temperately or justly
order them with temperance and justice?
MENO: Certainly.
SOCRATES: Then both men and women, if they are to be good men and women,
must have the same virtues of temperance and justice?
MENO: True.
SOCRATES: And can either a young man or an elder one be good, if they
are intemperate and unjust?
MENO: They cannot.
SOCRATES: They must be temperate and just?
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: Then all men are good in the same way, and by participation in
the same virtues?
MENO: Such is the inference.
SOCRATES: And they surely would not have been good in the same way,
unless their virtue had been the same?
MENO: They would not.
SOCRATES: Then now that the sameness of all virtue has been proven, try
and remember what you and Gorgias say that virtue is.
MENO: Will you have one definition of them all?
SOCRATES: That is what I am seeking.
MENO: If you want to have one definition of them all, I know not what to
say, but that virtue is the power of governing mankind.
SOCRATES: And does this definition of virtue include all virtue? Is
virtue the same in a child and in a slave, Meno? Can the child govern
his father, or the slave his master; and would he who governed be any
longer a slave?
MENO: I think not, Socrates.
SOCRATES: No, indeed; there would be small reason in that. Yet once
more, fair friend; according to you, virtue is 'the power of governing;'
but do you not add 'justly and not unjustly'?
MENO: Yes, Socrates; I agree there; for justice is virtue.
SOCRATES: Would you say 'virtue,' Meno, or 'a virtue'?
MENO: What do you mean?
SOCRATES: I mean as I might say about anything; that a round, for
example, is 'a figure' and not simply 'figure,' and I should adopt this
mode of speaking, because there are other figures.
MENO: Quite right; and that is just what I am saying about virtue--that
there are other virtues as well as justice.
SOCRATES: What are they? tell me the names of them, as I would tell you
the names of the other figures if you asked me.
MENO: Courage and temperance and wisdom and magnanimity are virtues; and
there are many others.
SOCRATES: Yes, Meno; and again we are in the same case: in searching
after one virtue we have found many, though not in the same way as
before; but we have been unable to find the common virtue which runs
through them all.
MENO: Why, Socrates, even now I am not able to follow you in the attempt
to get at one common notion of virtue as of other things.
SOCRATES: No wonder; but I will try to get nearer if I can, for you know
that all things have a common notion. Suppose now that some one asked
you the question which I asked before: Meno, he would say, what is
figure? And if you answered 'roundness,' he would reply to you, in
my way of speaking, by asking whether you would say that roundness is
'figure' or 'a figure;' and you would answer 'a figure.'
MENO: Certainly.
SOCRATES: And for this reason--that there are other figures?
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: And if he proceeded to ask, What other figures are there? you
would have told him.
MENO: I should.
SOCRATES: And if he similarly asked what colour is, and you answered
whiteness, and the questioner rejoined, Would you say that whiteness is
colour or a colour? you would reply, A colour, because there are other
colours as well.
MENO: I should.
SOCRATES: And if he had said, Tell me what they are?--you would have
told him of other colours which are colours just as much as whiteness.
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: And suppose that he were to pursue the matter in my way, he
would say: Ever and anon we are landed in particulars, but this is not
what I want; tell me then, since you call them by a common name, and
say that they are all figures, even when opposed to one another, what
is that common nature which you designate as figure--which contains
straight as well as round, and is no more one than the other--that would
be your mode of speaking?
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: And in speaking thus, you do not mean to say that the round
is round any more than straight, or the straight any more straight than
round?
MENO: Certainly not.
SOCRATES: You only assert that the round figure is not more a figure
than the straight, or the straight than the round?
MENO: Very true.
SOCRATES: To what then do we give the name of figure? Try and answer.
Suppose that when a person asked you this question either about figure
or colour, you were to reply, Man, I do not understand what you want,
or know what you are saying; he would look rather astonished and say:
Do you not understand that I am looking for the 'simile in multis'? And
then he might put the question in another form: Meno, he might say, what
is that 'simile in multis' which you call figure, and which includes
not only round and straight figures, but all? Could you not answer that
question, Meno? I wish that you would try; the attempt will be good
practice with a view to the answer about virtue.
MENO: I would rather that you should answer, Socrates.
SOCRATES: Shall I indulge you?
MENO: By all means.
SOCRATES: And then you will tell me about virtue?
MENO: I will.
SOCRATES: Then I must do my best, for there is a prize to be won.
MENO: Certainly.
SOCRATES: Well, I will try and explain to you what figure is. What do
you say to this answer?--Figure is the only thing which always follows
colour. Will you be satisfied with it, as I am sure that I should be, if
you would let me have a similar definition of virtue?
MENO: But, Socrates, it is such a simple answer.
SOCRATES: Why simple?
MENO: Because, according to you, figure is that which always follows
colour.
(SOCRATES: Granted.)
MENO: But if a person were to say that he does not know what colour is,
any more than what figure is--what sort of answer would you have given
him?
SOCRATES: I should have told him the truth. And if he were a philosopher
of the eristic and antagonistic sort, I should say to him: You have my
answer, and if I am wrong, your business is to take up the argument and
refute me. But if we were friends, and were talking as you and I are
now, I should reply in a milder strain and more in the dialectician's
vein; that is to say, I should not only speak the truth, but I should
make use of premises which the person interrogated would be willing to
admit. And this is the way in which I shall endeavour to approach you.
You will acknowledge, will you not, that there is such a thing as an
end, or termination, or extremity?--all which words I use in the same
sense, although I am aware that Prodicus might draw distinctions about
them: but still you, I am sure, would speak of a thing as ended or
terminated--that is all which I am saying--not anything very difficult.
MENO: Yes, I should; and I believe that I understand your meaning.
SOCRATES: And you would speak of a surface and also of a solid, as for
example in geometry.
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: Well then, you are now in a condition to understand my
definition of figure. I define figure to be that in which the solid
ends; or, more concisely, the limit of solid.
MENO: And now, Socrates, what is colour?
SOCRATES: You are outrageous, Meno, in thus plaguing a poor old man to
give you an answer, when you will not take the trouble of remembering
what is Gorgias' definition of virtue.
MENO: When you have told me what I ask, I will tell you, Socrates.
SOCRATES: A man who was blindfolded has only to hear you talking, and he
would know that you are a fair creature and have still many lovers.
MENO: Why do you think so?
SOCRATES: Why, because you always speak in imperatives: like all
beauties when they are in their prime, you are tyrannical; and also,
as I suspect, you have found out that I have weakness for the fair, and
therefore to humour you I must answer.
MENO: Please do.
SOCRATES: Would you like me to answer you after the manner of Gorgias,
which is familiar to you?
MENO: I should like nothing better.
SOCRATES: Do not he and you and Empedocles say that there are certain
effluences of existence?
MENO: Certainly.
SOCRATES: And passages into which and through which the effluences pass?
MENO: Exactly.
SOCRATES: And some of the effluences fit into the passages, and some of
them are too small or too large?
MENO: True.
SOCRATES: And there is such a thing as sight?
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: And now, as Pindar says, 'read my meaning:'--colour is an
effluence of form, commensurate with sight, and palpable to sense.
MENO: That, Socrates, appears to me to be an admirable answer.
SOCRATES: Why, yes, because it happens to be one which you have been in
the habit of hearing: and your wit will have discovered, I suspect, that
you may explain in the same way the nature of sound and smell, and of
many other similar phenomena.
MENO: Quite true.
SOCRATES: The answer, Meno, was in the orthodox solemn vein, and
therefore was more acceptable to you than the other answer about figure.
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: And yet, O son of Alexidemus, I cannot help thinking that
the other was the better; and I am sure that you would be of the
same opinion, if you would only stay and be initiated, and were not
compelled, as you said yesterday, to go away before the mysteries.
MENO: But I will stay, Socrates, if you will give me many such answers.
SOCRATES: Well then, for my own sake as well as for yours, I will do
my very best; but I am afraid that I shall not be able to give you very
many as good: and now, in your turn, you are to fulfil your promise, and
tell me what virtue is in the universal; and do not make a singular into
a plural, as the facetious say of those who break a thing, but deliver
virtue to me whole and sound, and not broken into a number of pieces: I
have given you the pattern.
MENO: Well then, Socrates, virtue, as I take it, is when he, who desires
the honourable, is able to provide it for himself; so the poet says, and
I say too--
'Virtue is the desire of things honourable and the power of attaining
them.'
SOCRATES: And does he who desires the honourable also desire the good?
MENO: Certainly.
SOCRATES: Then are there some who desire the evil and others who desire
the good? Do not all men, my dear sir, desire good?
MENO: I think not.
SOCRATES: There are some who desire evil?
MENO: Yes.
SOCRATES: Do you mean that they think the evils which they desire, to be
good; or do they know that they are evil and yet desire them?
MENO: Both, I think.
SOCRATES: And do you really imagine, Meno, that a man knows evils to be
evils and desires them notwithstanding?
MENO: Certainly I do.
SOCRATES: And desire is of possession?
MENO: Yes, of possession.