what he thinks, whether you and I forbid him or not?"
"I presume then that you are going to make one of the interdicted answers?"
"I dare say that I may, notwithstanding the danger, if upon
"Just as if the two cases were at all alike!" he said.
"Why should they not be?" I replied "and even if they are not, but only appear to be so to the person who is asked, ought he not to say
If one of these numbers which you interdict be the true answer to the question, am I falsely to say some other number which is not the right one?--is that your meaning?' --How would you answer him?"
'for this sort of nonsense will not do for me,'--then obviously, that is your way of putting the question, no one can answer you. But suppose that he were to retort, 'Thrasymachus, what do you mean?
"and well know that if you ask a person what numbers make up twelve, taking care to prohibit him whom you ask from answering twice six, or three times four, or six times two, or four times three,
already told you, that whatever he was asked he would refuse to answer, and try irony or any other shuffle, in order that he might avoid answering?"
"You are a philosopher, Thrasymachus" I replied
people who know all things should pity us and not be angry with us."
"How characteristic of Socrates!" he replied with a bitter laugh "that's your ironical style! Did I not foresee--have I not
we are weakly yielding to one another and not doing our utmost to get at the truth? Nay, my good friend, we are most willing and anxious to do so, but the fact is that we cannot. And if so, you
imagine that we were 'knocking under to one another,' and so losing our chance of finding it. And why, when we are seeking for justice, a thing more precious than many pieces of gold, do you say that
upon us. Polemarchus and I may have been guilty of a little mistake in the argument, but I can assure you that the error was not intentional. If we were seeking for a piece of gold, you would not
my eye upon him, I should have been struck dumb, but when I saw his fury rising, I looked at him first, and was therefore able to reply to him.
"Thrasymachus" I said with a quiver "don't be hard
sort of nonsense will not do for me; I must have clearness and accuracy."
I was panic-stricken at his words, and could not look at him without trembling. Indeed I believe that if I had not fixed
opponent, but have your own answer; for there is many a one who can ask and cannot answer. And now I will not have you say that justice is duty or advantage or profit or gain or interest, for this
you knock under to one another? I say that if you want really to know what justice is, you should not only ask but answer, and you should not seek honour to yourself from the refutation of an
beast, seeking to devour us. We were quite panic-stricken at the sight of him.
He roared out to the whole company "What folly. Socrates, has taken possession of you all? And why, sillybillies, do
the company, who wanted to hear the end. But when Polemarchus and I had done speaking and there was a pause, he could no longer hold his peace; and, gathering himself up, he came at us like a wild
breaks down, what other can be offered?"
Several times in the course of the discussion Thrasymachus had made an attempt to get the argument into his own hands, and had been put down by the rest of
opinion of his own power, was the first to say that justice is 'doing good to your friends and harm to your enemies.'"
"Most true." he said.
"Yes" I said "but if this definition of justice also
"Shall I tell you whose I believe the saying to be?"
"Whose?"
"I believe that Periander or Perdiccas or Xerxes or Ismenias the Theban, or some other rich and mighty man, who had a great
are prepared to take up arms against any one who attributes such a saying to Simonides or Bias or Pittacus, or any other wise man or seer?"
"I am quite ready to do battle at your side." he said.
his enemies, to say this is not wise; for it is not true, if, as has been clearly shown, the injuring of another can be in no case just."
"I agree with you." said Polemarchus.
"Then you and I
you say is quite true, Socrates."
"Then if a man says that justice consists in the repayment of debts, and that good is the debt which a man owes to his friends, and evil the debt which he owes to
"Impossible."
"And the just is the good?"
"Certainly."
"Then, to injure a friend or any one else is not the act of a just man, but of the opposite, who is the unjust?"
"I think that what
the good by virtue make them bad?"
"Assuredly not."
"Any more than heat can produce cold?"
"It cannot."
"Or drought moisture?"
"Clearly not."
"Nor can the good harm any one?"
