INTRODUCTION TO THE LYSIS.

As Socrates was one day going from the Academy to the Lyceum he met with Hippothales, Ctesippus, and other youths, who were on that day celebrating the Hermæan festival in a newly-erected palæstra hard by. They invite him to come in and join their conversation; he promises to do so on condition that they will first tell him who is the beauty among them. Hippothales, to whom he first puts the question, shews, by his embarrassment, that he is himself far gone in love; and on being taxed with it by Socrates blushes still more, whereupon Ctesippus says that he is constantly overwhelming them with his poems and speeches on his favourite Lysis. Socrates, on hearing this, begs Hippothales to inform him how a lover ought to speak of or address his favourite. Hippothales, though he does not deny his being in love, does deny that he makes verses or speeches; but Ctesippus shews that he is constantly giving utterance to the most extravagant praises of his favourite and his family; on which Socrates remarks that he should not celebrate his victory before it is won; for that it is not wise to praise the object of one’s affection before a return of affection on his part is secured, and moreover such as are beautiful when highly praised are apt to become arrogant, and so are more difficult to be won. Hippothales takes these suggestions in good part, and begs Socrates to advise him how to address his favourite so as to win his affection, which Socrates readily promises to do if they will give him an opportunity of conversing with Lysis. To this end they all enter the palæstra, and almost as soon as Socrates, Ctesippus, Menexenus and others had seated themselves down in a quiet corner, Lysis, who is very fond of listening to conversations, comes and takes his seat next his friend Menexenus, while Hippothales is concealed in the back-ground out of sight of his favourite^[166].

478Socrates begins by addressing a few words to the latter, but on Menexenus being called out by the master of the palæstra, he turns to Lysis, and asks him whether his parents do not love him very much. On Lysis replying that they certainly do, Socrates shews him that though, since they love him, they must needs wish to make him as happy as possible, yet they are so far from letting him do whatever he pleases, that they put him under the government of others, even of slaves, and this not on account of his youth, but because he has not yet acquired sufficient experience and knowledge to be entrusted with the government of himself; but that whenever he is wise enough, not only his father, but all others, will entrust him with the management of themselves and their affairs^[167].

At this point of the conversation Menexenus returned and resumed his seat near Lysis, who begs of Socrates to say over again to Menexenus what he had been saying to him; but Socrates desires him to tell it himself on some future occasion, and for the present engages to converse on some other subject with Menexenus. Having observed, therefore, the friendship that subsisted between Lysis and Menexenus, he asks the latter, when any one loves another, which of the two becomes a friend of the other, the lover or the beloved? Menexenus replies that there is no difference. But Socrates shews that it frequently happens that a lover is not only not loved in turn, but is even hated. In that case, then, which is the friend? Menexenus is forced to admit that unless both love neither can be a friend to the other. But here Socrates interposes this difficulty; he remarks that men often love horses, dogs, and other things which cannot love in turn; and the poet, as Menexenus admits, speaks truly who says, “Happy the man who has boys for his friends and horses and dogs,” so that the beloved now appears to be a friend of the lover, and not the lover of the beloved; and by the same reasoning he who is hated is an enemy, and not he who hates, whence the absurd 479conclusion follows that people are beloved by their enemies and hated by their friends. This, however, is impossible; therefore the reverse must be the case, and the lover must be a friend of the beloved. “If, then, neither those who love are to be friends, nor those who are loved, nor yet those who both love and are loved,” who are to be called friends? Lysis interposes with the remark that they do not appear to him to have conducted their enquiries aright; so Socrates avails himself of the opportunity thus offered him, and directs his discourse to Lysis^[168].

“The poets say,” he observes, that “God ever conducts like to like,” and the wisest among men say the same, “that like must ever needs be friendly to like.” Lysis agrees to this. But, objects Socrates, only half of this appears to be true, for the more wicked men are the more hostile are they to each other; so that it appears that the good man only is a friend to the good man only, but that the bad man never arrives at true friendship. But here again a new doubt is started.

The like can derive no benefit from the like; how, therefore, can they be held in regard by each other? and how can that which is not held in regard be a friend? In like manner, the good man is sufficient for himself; but he who is sufficient needs nothing, and so will not regard any thing, and therefore not love. So that from this it appears, that not even the good will be friends to each other^[169].

Socrates then remarks, that he once heard some one say that like is most hostile to like, and the good to the good; and generally that things most like each other are most full of envy, strife and hatred, but such as are most unlike are most disposed to friendship, just as the dry desires the moist, the cold heat, and so on. Menexenus admits the truth of this, and of its consequence, that the contrary is most friendly to its contrary. But again Socrates drives him to this absurd conclusion, that since enmity is most contrary to friendship, therefore 480an enemy must be a friend to a friend, or a friend a friend to an enemy^[170].

Since it appears, then, that neither is the like friendly to the like, nor the contrary to the contrary, Socrates next proposes to enquire whether that which is neither good nor evil can be the friend of the good. According to an ancient proverb, the beautiful is friendly, and the good is beautiful, whence he would conclude that that which is neither good nor evil is friendly to the beautiful and the good. There are three several classes of things, he says, the good, the evil, and that which is neither good nor evil. It has already been proved that the good is not friendly to the good, nor the evil to the evil, nor yet the good to the evil, nor the evil to the good; it remains, therefore, that that which is neither good nor evil must be friendly to the good. But a little further discussion leads to the more narrow conclusion, that that which is neither evil nor good is friendly to the good, on account of the presence of evil^[171].

Both Lysis and Menexenus agree to this conclusion; but Socrates soon raises new difficulties, and shews the fallaciousness of their former reasoning. A friend, he says, is a friend to some one, and for the sake of something, and on account of something; for a rich man is a friend to a physician on account of disease, which is an evil, and for the sake of health, which is a good, so that that which is friendly is a friend for the sake of a friend, on account of an enemy. By proceeding in this way, he argues, we shall at length arrive at some principle, which will not have to be referred to another friend, but will arrive at the first friend, for the sake of which all other things are friends, and which is friendly for its own sake. Now it has already appeared that we are friendly to that which is good, and that we love the good on account of evil; if, therefore, evil were to be done away with the good would be of no use to us, and we should not love it. In this, too, his 481young friends are willing to acquiesce, but Socrates dispels this delusion also, and shews that evil cannot be the cause of love, since if evil were done away with the desires would still remain, which in reality are the causes of friendship; for that which desires desires what it stands in need of, and that which stands in need is friendly to that of which it stands in need: and so love, desire, and friendship respect that which, in a manner, belongs to a man; but then evil belongs to evil and good to good, consequently they will each severally be friendly to their fellow, and the evil will be no less a friend to the evil than the good to the good; but both these positions have already been shewn to be erroneous, and so no positive solution of the question proposed is arrived at^[172].

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