Laches.
Analysis.
are useless and ridiculous. This man Stesilaus has been seen by
Analysis, him on board ship making a very sorry exhibition of himself. The
possession of the art will make the coward rash, and subject the 184
courageous, if he chance to make a shp, to invidious remarks.
And now let Socrates be taken into counsel. As they differ he
must decide.
Socrates would rather not decide the question by a plurality of votes: in such a serious matter as the education of a friend's 185 children, he would consult the one skilled person who has had masters, and has works to show as evidences of his skill. This is not himself; for he has never been able to pay the sophists for 186 instructing him, and has never had the wit to do or discover any- thing. But Nicias and Laches are older and richer than he is : 187 they have had teachers, and perhaps have made discoveries ; and he would have trusted them entirely, if they had not been diametri- cally opposed. Lysimachus here proposes to resign the argument into the hands of the younger part of the company, as he is old, and has a bad memory. He earnestly requests Socrates to remain ;-4n this showing, as Nicias says, how little he knows the man, who 188 will certainly not go away until he has cross-examined the company about their past lives. Nicias has often submitted to this process ; and Laches is quite willing to learn from Socrates, because his 189 actions, in the true Dorian mode, correspond to his words. Socrates proceeds : We might ask who are our teachers? But 190 a better and more thorough way of examining the question will be to ask, 'What is Virtue?' — or rather, to restrict the enquiry to that part of virtue which is concerned with the use of weapons — 'What is Courage ? ' Laches thinks that he knows this : (i) ' He is courageous who remains at his post.' But some nations fight 191 flying, after the manner of Aeneas in Homer ; or as the heavy- armed Spartans also did at the battle of Plataea. (2) Socrates wants a more general definition, not only of military courage, but 192 of courage of all sorts, tried both amid pleasures and pains. Laches replies that this universal courage is endurance. But courage is a good thing, and mere endurance may be hurtful and injurious. Therefore (3) the element of intelligence must be added. But then 193 again unintelligent endurance may often be more courageous than the intelligent, the bad than the good. How is this contradiction
