Dialogues

the track, and not be lazy? Laches Certainly, he should. Socrates And shall we invite Nicias to join us? he may be better at the sport than we are. What do you say? Laches I should like that. Socrates Come then, Nicias, and do what you can to help your friends, who are tossing on the waves of argument, and at the last gasp: you see our extremity, and may save us and also settle your own opinion, if you will tell us what you think about courage. Nicias I have been thinking, Socrates, that you and Laches are not defining courage in the right way; for you have forgotten an excellent saying which I have heard from your own lips. Socrates What is it, Nicias? Nicias I have often heard you say that “Every man is good in that in which he is wise, and bad in that in which he is unwise.” Socrates That is certainly true, Nicias. Nicias And therefore if the brave man is good, he is also wise. Socrates Do you hear him, Laches? Laches Yes, I hear him, but I do not very well understand him. Socrates I think that I understand him; and he appears to me to mean that courage is a sort of wisdom. Laches What can he possibly mean, Socrates? Socrates That is a question which you must ask of himself. Laches Yes. Socrates Tell him then, Nicias, what you mean by this wisdom; for you surely do not mean the wisdom which plays the flute? Nicias Certainly not. Socrates Nor the wisdom which plays the lyre? Nicias No. Socrates But what is this knowledge then, and of what? Laches I think that you put the question to him very well, Socrates; and I would like him to say what is the nature of this knowledge or wisdom. Nicias I mean to say, Laches, that courage is the knowledge of that which inspires fear or confidence in war, or in anything. Laches How strangely he is talking, Socrates. Socrates Why do you say so, Laches? Laches Why, surely courage is one thing, and wisdom another. Socrates That is just what Nicias denies. Laches Yes, that is what he denies; but he is so silly. Socrates Suppose that we instruct instead of abusing him? Nicias Laches does not want to instruct me, Socrates; but having been proved to be talking nonsense himself, he wants to prove that I have been doing the same. Laches Very true, Nicias; and you are talking nonsense, as I shall endeavour to show. Let me ask you a question: Do not physicians know the dangers of disease? or do the courageous know them? or are the physicians the same as the courageous? Nicias Not at all. Laches No more than the husbandmen who know the dangers of husbandry, or than other craftsmen, who have a knowledge of that which inspires them with fear or confidence in their own arts, and yet they are not courageous a whit the more for that. Socrates What is Laches saying, Nicias? He appears to be saying something of importance. Nicias Yes, he is saying something, but it is not true. Socrates How so? Nicias Why, because he does not see that the physician’s knowledge only extends to the nature of health and disease: he can tell the sick man no more than this. Do you imagine, Laches, that the physician knows whether health or disease is the more terrible to a man? Had not many a man better never get up from a sick bed? I should like to know whether you think that life is always better than death. May not death often be the better of the two? Laches Yes certainly so in my opinion. Nicias And do you think that the same things are terrible to those who had better die, and to those who had better live? Laches Certainly not. Nicias And do you suppose that the physician or any other artist knows this, or anyone indeed, except he who is skilled in the grounds of fear and hope? And him I call the courageous. Socrates Do you understand his meaning, Laches? Laches Yes; I suppose that, in his way of speaking, the soothsayers are courageous. For who but one of them can know to whom to die or to live is better? And yet Nicias, would you allow that you are yourself a soothsayer, or are you neither a soothsayer nor courageous? Nicias What! do you mean to say that the soothsayer ought to know the grounds of hope or fear? Laches Indeed I do: who but he? Nicias Much rather I should say he of whom I speak; for the soothsayer ought to know only the signs of things that are about to come to pass, whether death or disease, or loss of property, or victory, or defeat in war, or in any sort of contest; but to whom the suffering or not suffering of these things will be for the best, can no more be decided by the soothsayer than by one who is no soothsayer. Laches I cannot understand what Nicias would be at, Socrates; for he represents the courageous man as neither a soothsayer, nor a physician, nor in any other character, unless he means to say that he is a god. My opinion is that he does not like honestly to confess that he is talking nonsense, but that he shuffles up and down in order to conceal the difficulty into which he has got himself. You and I, Socrates, might have practised a similar shuffle just now, if we had only wanted to avoid the appearance of inconsistency. And if we had been arguing in a court of law there might have been reason in so doing; but why should a man deck himself out with vain words at a meeting of friends such as this? Socrates I quite agree with you, Laches, that he should not. But perhaps Nicias is serious, and not merely talking for the sake of talking. Let us ask him just to explain what he means, and if he has reason on his side we will agree with him; if not, we will instruct him. Laches Do you, Socrates, if you