Socrates laid the foundation for conscious morality by placing the ground of right and wrong in an eternal and unchangeable reason which illuminates the reason and conscience of every man. He often asserted that morality is a science which can not be taught. It depends mainly upon principles which are discovered by an inward light. Accordingly he regarded it as the main business of education to "draw out" into the light of consciousness the principles of right and justice which are infolded within the conscience of man--to deliver the mind of the secret truth which was striving towards the light of day. Therefore he called his method the "maieutic" or "obstetric" art. He felt there was something divine in all men (answering to his τὸ δαιµόνιον or δαιµόνιον τι--a divine and supernatural something--a warning "voice"--a gnomic "sign"--a "law of God written on the heart"), which by a system of skillful interrogations he sought to elicit, so that each might hear for himself the voice of God, and, hearing, might obey. Thus was he the "great prophet of the human conscience," and a messenger of God to the heathen world, to prepare the way of the Lord.
The morality of conscience was carried to its highest point by Plato. From the moment he became the disciple of Socrates he sympathized deeply with the spirit and the method of his master. He had the same deep seriousness of spirit, that same earnestness of purpose, that same inward reverence for justice, and purity, and goodness, which dwelt in the heart of Socrates. A naturally noble nature, he loved truth with all the glow and fervor of his young heart. He felt that if any thing gave meaning and value to life, it must be the contemplation of absolute truth, absolute beauty, and absolute Good. This absolute Good is God, who is the first principle of all ideas, the fountain of all the order and proportion and beauty of the universe, the source of all the good which exists in nature and in man. To practise goodness--to conform the character to the eternal models of order, proportion, and excellence, is to resemble God. To aspire after perfection of moral being, to secure assimilation to God (όµοίωσις θεῷ) is the noble aspiration of Plato's soul.
When we read the "Gorgias," the "Philebus," and especially the "Republic," with what noble joy are we filled on hearing the voice of conscience, like a harp swept by a seraph's hand, uttering such deep-toned melodies! How does he drown the clamors of passion, the calculations of mere expediency, the sophism of mere personal interest and utility. If he calls us to witness the triumph of the wicked in the first part of the "Republic," it is in order that we may at the end of the book see the deceitfulness of their triumph. "As to the wicked," he says, "I maintain that even if they succeed at first in concealing what they are, most of them betray themselves at the end of their career. They are covered with opprobrium, and present evils are nothing compared with those that await them in the other life. As to the just man, whether in sickness or in poverty, these imaginary evils will turn to his advantage in this life, and after his death; because the providence of the gods is necessarily attentive to the interests of him who labors to become just, and to attain, by the practice of virtue, to the most perfect resemblance to God which is possible to man." [916] He rises above all "greatest happiness principles," and asserts distinctly in the "Gorgias" that it is better to suffer wrong than to do wrong. [917] "I maintain," says he, "that what is most shameful is not to be struck unjustly on the cheek, or to be wounded in the body; but that to strike and wound me unjustly, to rob me, or reduce me to slavery--to commit, in a word, any kind of injustice towards me, or what is mine--is a thing far worse and more odious for him who commits the injustice, than for me who suffer it." [918] It is a great combat, he says, greater than we think, that wherein the issue is whether we shall be virtuous or wicked. Neither glory, nor riches, nor dignities, nor poetry, deserves that we should neglect justice for them. The moral idea in Plato has such intense truth and force, that it has at times a striking analogy with the language of the Holy Scriptures. [919]
[Footnote 916: ][ (return) ] "Republic," bk. x. ch. xii.
[Footnote 907: ][ (return) ] "Gorgias," §§ 59-80.
[Footnote 918: ][ (return) ] Ibid., § 137.
[Footnote 919: ][ (return) ] Pressensé, "Religions before Christ," p. 129.
The obligation of moral rectitude is, by Plato, derived from the authoritative utterances of conscience as the voice of God. We must do right because reason and conscience say it is right. In the "Euthyphron" he maintains that the moral quality of actions is not dependent on the arbitrary will of a Supreme Governor;--"an act is not holy because the gods love it, but the gods love it because it is holy." The eternal law of right dwells in the Eternal Reason of God, the idea of right in all human minds is a ray of that Eternal Reason; and the requirement of the divine law that we shall do right is, and must be, in harmony with both.
The present life is regarded by Plato as a state of probation and discipline, the future life as one of reward and punishment. [920]
[Footnote 920: ][ (return) ] "Republic," bk. x. ch. xv., xvi.; "Laws," bk. x. ch. xiii.