PHAEDRUS: Certainly.
SOCRATES: Thirdly, having classified men and speeches, and their kinds and affections, and adapted SOCRATES: His whole effort is directed to the them to one another, he will tell the reasons of his soul; for in that he seeks to produce conviction.
arrangement, and show why one soul is persuaded by a particular form of argument, and another not.
PHAEDRUS: Yes.
PHAEDRUS: You have hit upon a very good way.
SOCRATES: Then clearly, Thrasymachus or any one else who teaches rhetoric in earnest will give an SOCRATES: Yes, that is the true and only way in exact description of the nature of the soul; which which any subject can be set forth or treated by will enable us to see whether she be single and rules of art, whether in speaking or writing. But same, or, like the body, multiform. That is what we the writers of the present day, at whose feet you should call showing the nature of the soul.
have sat, craftily conceal the nature of the soul which they know quite well. Nor, until they adopt PHAEDRUS: Exactly.
our method of reading and writing, can we admit that they write by rules of art?
SOCRATES: He will explain, secondly, the mode in which she acts or is acted upon.
PHAEDRUS: What is our method?
PHAEDRUS: True.
SOCRATES: I cannot give you the exact details; but I should like to tell you generally, as far as is 110
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in my power, how a man ought to proceed ac-and sees the person about whom he was speak-cording to rules of art.
ing in the abstract actually before him, and knows that it is he, and can say to himself, ‘This PHAEDRUS: Let me hear.
is the man or this is the character who ought to have a certain argument applied to him in order SOCRATES: Oratory is the art of enchanting the to convince him of a certain opinion;’—he who soul, and therefore he who would be an orator knows all this, and knows also when he should has to learn the differences of human souls—they speak and when he should refrain, and when he are so many and of such a nature, and from them should use pithy sayings, pathetic appeals, sen-come the differences between man and man.
sational effects, and all the other modes of speech Having proceeded thus far in his analysis, he will which he has learned;—when, I say, he knows the next divide speeches into their different classes:—
times and seasons of all these things, then, and
’Such and such persons,’ he will say, are affected not till then, he is a perfect master of his art; by this or that kind of speech in this or that way, ’
but if he fail in any of these points, whether in and he will tell you why. The pupil must have a speaking or teaching or writing them, and yet good theoretical notion of them first, and then declares that he speaks by rules of art, he who he must have experience of them in actual life, says ‘I don’t believe you’ has the better of him.
and be able to follow them with all his senses Well, the teacher will say, is this, Phaedrus and about him, or he will never get beyond the pre-Socrates, your account of the so-called art of cepts of his masters. But when he understands rhetoric, or am I to look for another?
what persons are persuaded by what arguments, 111
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PHAEDRUS: He must take this, Socrates, for SOCRATES: May not ‘the wolf,’ as the proverb there is no possibility of another, and yet the cre-says, ‘claim a hearing’?
ation of such an art is not easy.
PHAEDRUS: Do you say what can be said for him.
SOCRATES: Very true; and therefore let us consider this matter in every light, and see whether SOCRATES: He will argue that there is no use in we cannot find a shorter and easier road; there putting a solemn face on these matters, or in is no use in taking a long rough roundabout way going round and round, until you arrive at first if there be a shorter and easier one. And I wish principles; for, as I said at first, when the ques-that you would try and remember whether you tion is of justice and good, or is a question in have heard from Lysias or any one else anything which men are concerned who are just and good, which might be of service to us.
either by nature or habit, he who would be a skilful rhetorician has no need of truth—for that PHAEDRUS: If trying would avail, then I might; in courts of law men literally care nothing about but at the moment I can think of nothing.
truth, but only about conviction: and this is based on probability, to which he who would be a skil-SOCRATES: Suppose I tell you something which ful orator should therefore give his whole atten-somebody who knows told me.
tion. And they say also that there are cases in which the actual facts, if they are improbable, PHAEDRUS: Certainly.
ought to be withheld, and only the probabilities should be told either in accusation or defence, 112
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and that always in speaking, the orator should or of something or other; he is brought into court, keep probability in view, and say good-bye to the and then Tisias says that both parties should tell truth. And the observance of this principle lies: the coward should say that he was assaulted throughout a speech furnishes the whole art.
by more men than one; the other should prove that they were alone, and should argue thus: PHAEDRUS: That is what the professors of rheto-
‘How could a weak man like me have assaulted ric do actually say, Socrates. I have not forgotten a strong man like him?’ The complainant will that we have quite briefly touched upon this not like to confess his own cowardice, and will matter already; with them the point is all-impor-therefore invent some other lie which his adver-tant.
sary will thus gain an opportunity of refuting.
And there are other devices of the same kind SOCRATES: I dare say that you are familiar with which have a place in the system. Am I not right, Tisias. Does he not define probability to be that Phaedrus?
which the many think?
PHAEDRUS: Certainly.
PHAEDRUS: Certainly, he does.
SOCRATES: Bless me, what a wonderfully mys-SOCRATES: I believe that he has a clever and terious art is this which Tisias or some other ingenious case of this sort: —He supposes a feeble gentleman, in whatever name or country he re-and valiant man to have assaulted a strong and joices, has discovered. Shall we say a word to cowardly one, and to have robbed him of his coat him or not?