Phaedrus

SOCRATES: And what? Do we see another speech, a legitimate brother of this one, in what way it comes to be, and by how much better and more powerful than this one it grows? PHAEDRUS: What is this speech, and how do you say it comes to be? SOCRATES: The one that is written with knowledge in the soul of the learner, capable of defending itself, and knowing how to speak and to keep silence toward those whom it ought. PHAEDRUS: You mean the living and animate speech of the one who knows, of which the written one might justly be called a kind of image. SOCRATES: Absolutely. Now tell me this: would a farmer who has understanding, regarding the seeds he cared for and wished to become fruitful, seriously plant them in summer in the gardens of Adonis, and rejoice at seeing them become beautiful in eight days? Or would he do these things, when he does them at all, for the sake of play and festival, but for those about which he is serious, using the art of agriculture and sowing in the proper soil, be content when what he sowed reached its end in the eighth month? PHAEDRUS: In that way, Socrates, he would do the ones seriously, and the others differently, as you say. SOCRATES: And shall we say that the one who has knowledge of things just, beautiful, and good has less understanding regarding his own seeds than the farmer? PHAEDRUS: By no means. SOCRATES: He will not, then, write them seriously in water, sowing them with ink through a reed pen, along with speeches that are unable to help themselves by speech, and unable to sufficiently teach the truth. PHAEDRUS: At least that is not likely. SOCRATES: No indeed. But the gardens in letters, as it seems, he will sow and write for the sake of play, when he writes, treasuring up reminders for himself against the forgetfulness of old age, if he should reach it, and for anyone who follows the same path; and he will be pleased to see them growing tenderly. And when others employ themselves in other plays, watering themselves with banquets and other things akin to these, then he, as it seems, will spend his time playing instead of those things I mention. PHAEDRUS: You speak of a very beautiful play, Socrates, in contrast to a trivial one, for the one who is able to play in speeches, spinning stories about justice and the other things you mention.

​SOCRATES: For it is so, my dear Phaedrus. But I think a much more beautiful seriousness arises concerning these things when someone, employing the dialectical art, taking a fitting soul, plants and sows speeches with knowledge, which are capable of helping themselves and the one who planted them, and are not fruitless but have seed, from which other speeches growing up in other characters are capable of making this ever immortal, and making the one who possesses it happy to the greatest extent possible for a human being. PHAEDRUS: For this that you speak of is still much more beautiful. SOCRATES: Now indeed, Phaedrus, we are finally able to judge those other things, since these have been agreed upon. PHAEDRUS: Which things? SOCRATES: The very things, indeed, wishing to see which we came to this point, so that we might examine the reproach against Lysias concerning the writing of speeches, and the speeches themselves, which ones are written with art and which without art. Now, what is with art and what is not seems to me to have been shown moderately well. PHAEDRUS: So it seemed, indeed; but remind me again how. SOCRATES: Until someone knows the truth about each of the things he speaks or writes, and becomes capable of defining everything in itself, and having defined it, knows how to divide it again by classes down to the indivisible; and having discerned the nature of the soul in the same way, discovering the class that fits each nature, in this way arranges and orders his speech, giving complex speeches to a complex soul and simple ones to a simple soul, it is not possible for the genus of speeches to be handled with art to the extent of its nature, either for the purpose of teaching or for that of persuading, as all our previous argument has indicated to us. PHAEDRUS: Absolutely, at least this appeared in some such way. SOCRATES: And what, again, about its being beautiful or shameful to speak and write speeches, and in what way it would justly be called a reproach or not, has not what was said a little while ago made it clear— PHAEDRUS: Which things? SOCRATES: That if Lysias or anyone else has ever written or will write, privately or publicly in establishing laws, writing a political document and believing that there is some great solidity and clarity in it, such writing is a reproach to the writer, whether anyone says so or not. For to be ignorant, awake or asleep, of what is just and unjust, bad and good, does not in truth escape being blameworthy, not even if the entire crowd should praise it. PHAEDRUS: No, indeed.