Phaedrus
future by the present. When more of our youth are trained in the best
literatures, and in the best parts of them, their minds may be expected
to have a larger growth. They will have more interests, more thoughts,
more material for conversation; they will have a higher standard and
begin to think for themselves. The number of persons who will have the
opportunity of receiving the highest education through the cheap press,
and by the help of high schools and colleges, may increase tenfold. It
is likely that in every thousand persons there is at least one who is
far above the average in natural capacity, but the seed which is in him
dies for want of cultivation. It has never had any stimulus to grow,
or any field in which to blossom and produce fruit. Here is a great
reservoir or treasure-house of human intelligence out of which new
waters may flow and cover the earth. If at any time the great men of
the world should die out, and originality or genius appear to suffer
a partial eclipse, there is a boundless hope in the multitude of
intelligences for future generations. They may bring gifts to men such
as the world has never received before. They may begin at a higher point
and yet take with them all the results of the past. The co-operation of
many may have effects not less striking, though different in character
from those which the creative genius of a single man, such as Bacon or
Newton, formerly produced. There is also great hope to be derived, not
merely from the extension of education over a wider area, but from the
continuance of it during many generations. Educated parents will have
children fit to receive education; and these again will grow up under
circumstances far more favourable to the growth of intelligence than any
which have hitherto existed in our own or in former ages.
Even if we were to suppose no more men of genius to be produced, the
great writers of ancient or of modern times will remain to furnish
abundant materials of education to the coming generation. Now that
every nation holds communication with every other, we may truly say in
a fuller sense than formerly that 'the thoughts of men are widened
with the process of the suns.' They will not be 'cribbed, cabined, and
confined' within a province or an island. The East will provide elements
of culture to the West as well as the West to the East. The religions
and literatures of the world will be open books, which he who wills may
read. The human race may not be always ground down by bodily toil, but
may have greater leisure for the improvement of the mind. The increasing
sense of the greatness and infinity of nature will tend to awaken in men
larger and more liberal thoughts. The love of mankind may be the source
of a greater development of literature than nationality has ever been.
There may be a greater freedom from prejudice and party; we may better
understand the whereabouts of truth, and therefore there may be more
success and fewer failures in the search for it. Lastly, in the coming
ages we shall carry with us the recollection of the past, in which
are necessarily contained many seeds of revival and renaissance in the
future. So far is the world from becoming exhausted, so groundless is
the fear that literature will ever die out.
PHAEDRUS
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE: Socrates, Phaedrus.
SCENE: Under a plane-tree, by the banks of the Ilissus.
SOCRATES: My dear Phaedrus, whence come you, and whither are you going?
PHAEDRUS: I come from Lysias the son of Cephalus, and I am going to
take a walk outside the wall, for I have been sitting with him the whole
morning; and our common friend Acumenus tells me that it is much more
refreshing to walk in the open air than to be shut up in a cloister.
SOCRATES: There he is right. Lysias then, I suppose, was in the town?
PHAEDRUS: Yes, he was staying with Epicrates, here at the house of
Morychus; that house which is near the temple of Olympian Zeus.
SOCRATES: And how did he entertain you? Can I be wrong in supposing that
Lysias gave you a feast of discourse?
PHAEDRUS: You shall hear, if you can spare time to accompany me.
SOCRATES: And should I not deem the conversation of you and Lysias 'a
thing of higher import,' as I may say in the words of Pindar, 'than any
business'?
PHAEDRUS: Will you go on?
SOCRATES: And will you go on with the narration?
PHAEDRUS: My tale, Socrates, is one of your sort, for love was the theme
which occupied us--love after a fashion: Lysias has been writing about
a fair youth who was being tempted, but not by a lover; and this was
the point: he ingeniously proved that the non-lover should be accepted
rather than the lover.
SOCRATES: O that is noble of him! I wish that he would say the poor man
rather than the rich, and the old man rather than the young one;--then
he would meet the case of me and of many a man; his words would be quite
refreshing, and he would be a public benefactor. For my part, I do so
long to hear his speech, that if you walk all the way to Megara, and
when you have reached the wall come back, as Herodicus recommends,
without going in, I will keep you company.
PHAEDRUS: What do you mean, my good Socrates? How can you imagine that
my unpractised memory can do justice to an elaborate work, which the
greatest rhetorician of the age spent a long time in composing. Indeed,
I cannot; I would give a great deal if I could.
SOCRATES: I believe that I know Phaedrus about as well as I know myself,
and I am very sure that the speech of Lysias was repeated to him, not
once only, but again and again;--he insisted on hearing it many times
over and Lysias was very willing to gratify him; at last, when nothing
else would do, he got hold of the book, and looked at what he most
wanted to see,--this occupied him during the whole morning;--and then
when he was tired with sitting, he went out to take a walk, not until,
by the dog, as I believe, he had simply learned by heart the entire
discourse, unless it was unusually long, and he went to a place outside
the wall that he might practise his lesson. There he saw a certain
lover of discourse who had a similar weakness;--he saw and rejoiced; now
thought he, 'I shall have a partner in my revels.' And he invited him to
come and walk with him. But when the lover of discourse begged that he
would repeat the tale, he gave himself airs and said, 'No I cannot,'
as if he were indisposed; although, if the hearer had refused, he would
sooner or later have been compelled by him to listen whether he would or
no. Therefore, Phaedrus, bid him do at once what he will soon do whether
bidden or not.
PHAEDRUS: I see that you will not let me off until I speak in some
fashion or other; verily therefore my best plan is to speak as I best
can.
SOCRATES: A very true remark, that of yours.
PHAEDRUS: I will do as I say; but believe me, Socrates, I did not learn
the very words--O no; nevertheless I have a general notion of what
he said, and will give you a summary of the points in which the lover
differed from the non-lover. Let me begin at the beginning.
SOCRATES: Yes, my sweet one; but you must first of all show what you
have in your left hand under your cloak, for that roll, as I suspect,
is the actual discourse. Now, much as I love you, I would not have you
suppose that I am going to have your memory exercised at my expense, if
you have Lysias himself here.
PHAEDRUS: Enough; I see that I have no hope of practising my art upon
you. But if I am to read, where would you please to sit?
SOCRATES: Let us turn aside and go by the Ilissus; we will sit down at
some quiet spot.
PHAEDRUS: I am fortunate in not having my sandals, and as you never have
any, I think that we may go along the brook and cool our feet in the
water; this will be the easiest way, and at midday and in the summer is
far from being unpleasant.
SOCRATES: Lead on, and look out for a place in which we can sit down.
PHAEDRUS: Do you see the tallest plane-tree in the distance?
SOCRATES: Yes.
PHAEDRUS: There are shade and gentle breezes, and grass on which we may
either sit or lie down.
SOCRATES: Move forward.
PHAEDRUS: I should like to know, Socrates, whether the place is not
somewhere here at which Boreas is said to have carried off Orithyia from
the banks of the Ilissus?
SOCRATES: Such is the tradition.
PHAEDRUS: And is this the exact spot? The little stream is delightfully
clear and bright; I can fancy that there might be maidens playing near.
SOCRATES: I believe that the spot is not exactly here, but about a
quarter of a mile lower down, where you cross to the temple of Artemis,
and there is, I think, some sort of an altar of Boreas at the place.
PHAEDRUS: I have never noticed it; but I beseech you to tell me,
Socrates, do you believe this tale?
SOCRATES: The wise are doubtful, and I should not be singular if, like
them, I too doubted. I might have a rational explanation that Orithyia
was playing with Pharmacia, when a northern gust carried her over the
neighbouring rocks; and this being the manner of her death, she was said
to have been carried away by Boreas. There is a discrepancy, however,
about the locality; according to another version of the story she was
taken from Areopagus, and not from this place. Now I quite acknowledge
that these allegories are very nice, but he is not to be envied who has
to invent them; much labour and ingenuity will be required of him; and
when he has once begun, he must go on and rehabilitate Hippocentaurs and
chimeras dire. Gorgons and winged steeds flow in apace, and numberless
other inconceivable and portentous natures. And if he is sceptical
about them, and would fain reduce them one after another to the rules of
probability, this sort of crude philosophy will take up a great deal of
time. Now I have no leisure for such enquiries; shall I tell you why? I
must first know myself, as the Delphian inscription says; to be curious
about that which is not my concern, while I am still in ignorance of my
own self, would be ridiculous. And therefore I bid farewell to all this;
the common opinion is enough for me. For, as I was saying, I want to
know not about this, but about myself: am I a monster more complicated
and swollen with passion than the serpent Typho, or a creature of a
gentler and simpler sort, to whom Nature has given a diviner and lowlier
destiny? But let me ask you, friend: have we not reached the plane-tree
to which you were conducting us?
PHAEDRUS: Yes, this is the tree.
SOCRATES: By Here, a fair resting-place, full of summer sounds and
scents. Here is this lofty and spreading plane-tree, and the agnus
castus high and clustering, in the fullest blossom and the greatest
fragrance; and the stream which flows beneath the plane-tree is
deliciously cold to the feet. Judging from the ornaments and images,
this must be a spot sacred to Achelous and the Nymphs. How delightful is
the breeze:--so very sweet; and there is a sound in the air shrill and
summerlike which makes answer to the chorus of the cicadae. But the
greatest charm of all is the grass, like a pillow gently sloping to the
head. My dear Phaedrus, you have been an admirable guide.
PHAEDRUS: What an incomprehensible being you are, Socrates: when you are
in the country, as you say, you really are like some stranger who is led
about by a guide. Do you ever cross the border? I rather think that you
never venture even outside the gates.
SOCRATES: Very true, my good friend; and I hope that you will excuse me
when you hear the reason, which is, that I am a lover of knowledge, and
the men who dwell in the city are my teachers, and not the trees or the
country. Though I do indeed believe that you have found a spell with
which to draw me out of the city into the country, like a hungry cow