Theaetetus

​SOCRATES: For the slavery from youth has taken away their growth, their uprightness, and their freedom, forcing them to do crooked things, imposing great dangers and fears upon their still tender souls. Not being able to bear these with justice and truth, turning immediately to falsehood and to mutual injustice, they are much bent and broken, so that they end up going from youths to men having nothing healthy in their intellect, having become clever and wise, as they think. And these people indeed are such, Theodorus; but as for those of our chorus, do you wish that we go through them or pass them over and turn back to our argument, so that we may not, as we were just saying, too greatly abuse our freedom and change of arguments? THEODORUS: By no means, Socrates, but go through them. For you have said this very well, that we who dance in such a chorus are not the servants of our arguments, but the arguments are ours like slaves, and each of them waits to be completed whenever it seems good to us; for neither judge nor spectator stands over us to censure or rule us as they would over poets. SOCRATES: Let us speak then, as it seems, since it pleases you, about the leaders; for why indeed should one speak of those who spend their time poorly in philosophy? These indeed from youth, first of all, do not know the way to the marketplace, nor where a law court is, or a council chamber, or any other public assembly of the city; and laws and decrees, whether spoken or written, they neither see nor hear; and the strivings of political clubs for office, and meetings, and dinners, and revels with flute-girls—not even in a dream does it occur to them to do these things. And whether someone in the city has been born well or poorly, or what evil has come to someone from his ancestors, whether on the male or female side, has escaped him more than the proverbially called “measures of the sea.” And all these things he does not even know that he does not know; for he does not keep away from them for the sake of good reputation, but in truth only his body lies in the city and dwells there, while his intellect, having led all these things to be small and nothing, and having dishonored them, flies everywhere, as Pindar says, both beneath the earth, and measuring the flat surfaces, and above the heaven, studying the stars, and searching in every way into the whole nature of each of the things that are, letting itself down to nothing of the things nearby.

​THEODORUS: How do you mean this, Socrates? SOCRATES: Just as, Theodorus, when Thales was studying the stars and looking upward, and fell into a well, a witty and charming Thracian servant-girl is said to have joked that he was eager to know the things in heaven, but the things in front of him and at his feet escaped him. And the same joke suffices for all who spend their lives in philosophy. For in truth, such a person is unaware of his neighbor and associate, not only as to what he does, but almost even whether he is a human being or some other creature; but what indeed a human being is, and what is fitting for such a nature to do or suffer differently from others, he seeks and takes trouble to investigate. For you understand, I suppose, Theodorus; or not? THEODORUS: I do, and you speak the truth. SOCRATES: Therefore, my friend, when such a person associates privately with each individual and publicly, which is what I was saying at the beginning, when he is forced in a court of law or somewhere else to discuss the things at his feet and before his eyes, he provides laughter not only to Thracian girls but also to the rest of the crowd, falling into wells and every perplexity through inexperience, and his clumsiness is terrible, presenting an appearance of foolishness; for in verbal abuse he has nothing private to abuse anyone with, because he knows no evil of anyone from not having studied it; being perplexed, he therefore appears ridiculous. And in praises and the boastings of others, becoming clearly seen to be laughing not pretentiously but in truth, he seems to be a fool. For when a tyrant or king is eulogized, he thinks he is hearing one of the herdsmen, such as a swineherd or shepherd or some cowherd, being congratulated for milking a lot; but he thinks they pasture and milk a more difficult and more treacherous animal than those herdsmen do, and that such a ruler must become rustic and uneducated because of lack of leisure, no less than those herdsmen, since he is enclosed in a wall like a fold in the mountains. And when he hears of ten thousand plethra of land or even more, as if someone who possessed this possessed a wonderful amount, he thinks he is hearing of something tiny, being accustomed to look at the whole earth.