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    more than a match for friend or foe , that he should beat , and wound , and slay his friends : neither , if when , by gymnastic exercises , a man has acquired strength and skill , he beats his father , or his mother , or

    any of his relations or friends , ought we therefore to abhor and expel from the state the teachers of gymnastics and tlie fencing masters . They communicated the art , that it might be used justly , against the enemy and against wrongdoers , defensively , not for purposes of aggression ; but their pupils pervert the faculty , and turn their strength and their art to an improper use . We are not , however , to impute this , and the criminality of it , to the art or to the teachers of the art , but to

    Socrates thtre replied : — ' I think , Gorgias , that you have had experience of many discussions , and must have perceived this , that men seldom know how jointly to examine and mark out the things about which they attempt to discuss ; and having learnt and instructed themselves , so to break off the conversation . But if they dispute on any matter , and one of them charges the other with not speaking rightly , or not clearly , they are angry , and think that it is said in envy , and not in the pursuit of the proposed object of discourse ; and they sometimes end by shamefully reproaching one another , and bandying such words as make the bystanders ashamed of themselves for having desired to listen to such men . Why do I say this ? Because , what you now say , appears to me not very consistent with what you previously said concerning rhetoric . Now , I am afraid to confute you , lest you should suppose that I do it not from zeal to find the thing which we are in quest of ,

    those who employ it ill . The like is true with rhetoric . An orator is able to speak to all men and on any subject , so as to persuade the multitude ; but he ought not to employ this faculty in depriving- physicians or artificers of their reputation , merely because he has the power to do so : he should use rhetoric , like any other power , with justice : and if , having become a rhetorician , he employs his power and his art to do wrong , we should not abhor and banish the teacher , who gave the art for a good purpose , but him who employs it for a bad one . '

    but in the spirit of contention against you . Now , if you are such a person as I am , I should like to go on interrogating you ; if not , I will let it alone . And what sort of a man am I ? One , who would gladly be refuted , if I affirm what is not true ; and who would gladly refute , when another person does so ; but who would just as gladly be refuted

    a » refute ; for I think it a greater good , by so much as it is a greater thing , to be ourselves relieved from the greatest of evils , than to relieve another person ; and I conceive that there is no human evil bo great as false opinion on the subject of which our present discourse treats . If , then , you are a person of the same sort , let us continue ; but if you think we had better leave off , we will . '

    I , * said Gorgias , * profess to be such a person as you describe ; hut perhaps we should consider the wish of those who are present . ' They , however , unanimously begged that the argument might proceed ; and Gorgias said it would be disgraceful for him , especially after he had undertaken to answer all questions , not to be willing to continue . * Hear , then / resumed Socrates , something in your discourse which surprises me . You say that you can make any person , who receives your instructions , an orator , capable of persuading a multitude ; not producing knowledge in their minds , but belief . You 6 aid that , on the

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    Plato 8 Dialogues ; the Gorgias , 697

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1834, page 697, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2638/page/21/