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own powers , and of the possibility of our attaining truth . Having softened Protagoras by some compliments , and | by disclaiming any design in conversing with him , except that of facilitating the attainment of truth , by seeking fox it in conjunction with the wisest man whom he knows , he at length prevails upon Protagoras to make answer to his
interrogations : and again asking Protagoras whether he adheres to his opinion , that wisdom , temperance , courage , justice , and holiness , are different things , he receives this answer , —That four of the five are very closely allied , but that courage is altogether different from the others , since there are many men who are extremely unwise , intemperate , unjust , and unholy , hut highly courageous .
By the courageous , said Socrates , you mean the daring?—Yes ; those who will encounter what others are afraid to face . —Virtue is a beautiful thing , is it not ?—The most beautiful of all things . —Is all virtue beautiful , or only some virtue ?—All , and in the highest degree . —Who are they who dive daringly ?—Divers . —Is it because they understand diving ? —It is . —Who fight on horseback daringly ? good riders or bad?—Good riders . In short , said Protagoras , those who know most are the
most daring . —Are you acquainted with persons who , although they know nothing of all these matters , are yet extremely daring ?—But too much so . —Are these to be deemed courageous ?—Courage would not be a beautiful thing if they were , since they are out of their senses . — Then if those who dare without knowledge are not courageous , but are out of their senses , while the wise are not only daring but courageous , are not wisdom and courage by this account the same thing ?
You have not , said Protagoras , correctly remembered what I said . I affirmed that the courageous were daring , but not that the daring were courageous : had you asked this , I should have answered , Not all of them ; and you have not shown me to have been wrong in affirming that the courageous were daring . You conclude that wisdom is the same thing with courage , because those who know are more daring than those who know not : but in this manner you might prove bodily strength to be the same thing with courage ; for the strong in body , it cannot be
denied , are powerful ; and those who know how to wrestle , being undoubtedly more powerful than those who do not , you might infer that they were more muscular . But I do not admit that the powerful are strong in body ; only , that the strong in body are powerful . Power is not the same thing with bodily strength ; power may proceed from knowledge , from passion , or from insanity ; but bodily strength , from nature , and good acquired habits of body . In like manner , I Bay that daring is not the same thing with courage . Daring may proceed from scientific skill , from passion , or from insanity ; courage , from nature , and good
acquired habits of mind . Hero commences the last , and most interesting and most philosophical , of the discussions in this dialogue : —On the true nature of courage ; and , incidentally , on the proper test of virtue and of vice . Do not some men , asks Socrates , live well , and others ill ?—Without
doubt . —Does a man live weM if he lives in pain and vexation ?¦—No . — But if he passes his life pleasantly to its very termination , he lives well ? —He does so . —To live pleasantly then if uood , to live unpleasantly is ° vil ? - —If he lives pleasantly by honest p leasures . —You call then some pleasant things evil , and some painful things good , like the generality
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Plato 8 Dialogues ; ike Protagoras . 207
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1834, page 207, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2631/page/51/
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