Gorgias

​SOCRATES: For it was for the sake of good things, I think, that we—both Polus and I—agreed that all things should be done, if you remember. Does it seem so to you as well? Namely, that the good is the end of all actions, and that for the sake of that, all other things must be done, but not that for the sake of the others? Are you also of the same vote with us, as the third? CALLICLES: I am. SOCRATES: It is for the sake of good things, then, that we must do other things, including pleasant things, and not good things for the sake of pleasant things. CALLICLES: Most certainly. SOCRATES: Is it, then, the part of any and every man to select which of the pleasant things are good and which are bad, or is a craftsman needed for each case? CALLICLES: A craftsman. SOCRATES: Let us, then, recall what I happened to be saying in turn to Polus and Gorgias. For I was saying, if you remember, that there are some preparations that extend only to pleasure, procuring this very thing alone, while being ignorant of the better and the worse, and others that know what is good and what is bad. And I placed among those concerning pleasures cookery as a mere knack but not a craft, and among those concerning the good, medicine as a craft. And by the god of friendship, Callicles, neither think that you yourself ought to jest with me, nor answer whatever comes into your head contrary to your real opinions, nor, on the other hand, accept what comes from me as if I were jesting. For you see that our discussion is about this, than which what could a man, even one having but little sense, be more serious about than this: in what way one ought to live? Whether to that way of life to which you exhort me, doing these deeds of a “man,” speaking in the assembly, practicing rhetoric, and engaging in politics in this manner in which you now engage in it, or to this life in philosophy, and in what way this one differs from that. Perhaps, then, it is best, as I just now attempted, to make a division, and after dividing and agreeing with each other, if indeed these are two distinct lives, to examine in what way they differ from each other and which of the two must be lived. Perhaps, then, you do not yet know what I mean. CALLICLES: No indeed. SOCRATES: But I will tell you more clearly. Since you and I have agreed that there is something good, and there is something pleasant, and that the pleasant is different from the good, and that there is a certain care and preparation for acquiring each of them, the one being the hunt for the pleasant, and the other for the good—but first, either agree with me on this very point or deny it. Do you agree? CALLICLES: I say so.