β. We hence see this other negative side in the same connection when Socrates brings Euthydemus into the conversation, for he asks him whether he did not strive after the virtue without which neither the private man nor the citizen could be useful to himself or to his people or the State. Euthydemus declares that this undoubtedly is so. But without justice, replies Socrates, this is not possible, and he further asks whether Euthydemus had thus attained to justice in himself. Euthydemus answers affirmatively, for he says that he thinks he is no less just than any other man. Socrates now replies, “Just as workmen can show their work, the just will be able to say what their works are.” This he also agrees to, and replies that he could easily do so. Socrates now proposes if this is so to write, “on the one hand under Δ the actions of the just, and on the other, under Α, those of the unjust?” With the approbation of Euthydemus, lies, deceit, robbery, making a slave of a free man, thus fall on the side of the unjust. Now Socrates asks, “But if a general subdues the enemy’s State, would this not be justice?” Euthydemus says “Yes.” Socrates replies, “Likewise if he deceives and robs the enemy and makes slaves?” Euthydemus has to admit the justice of this. It is thus shown “that the same qualities come under the determination both of justice and of injustice.” Here it strikes Euthydemus to add the qualification that he intended that Socrates should understand the action to be only in reference to friends; as regards them it is wrong. Socrates accepts this, but proceeds, “If a general at the decisive moment of the battle saw his own army in fear, and he deceived them by falsely saying that help was coming in order to lead them on to victory, could it be deemed right?” Euthydemus acknowledges that it could. Socrates says, “If a father gives a sick child a medicine which it does not wish to take, in its food, and makes it well through deceit, is this right?” Euthydemus—“Yes.” Socrates—“Or is anyone wrong who takes arms from his friend secretly or by force, when he sees him in despair, and in the act of taking his own life?” Euthydemus has to admit that this is not wrong.[128] Thus it is again shown here, that as regards friends also, the same determinations have to hold good on both sides, as justice as well as injustice. Here we see that abstention from lying, deceit, and robbery, that which we naturally hold to be established, contradicts itself by being put into connection with something different, and something which holds equally good. This example further explains how through thought, which would lay hold of the universal in the form of the universal only, the particular becomes uncertain.
γ. The positive, which Socrates sets in the place of what was fixed and has now become vacillating, in order to give a content to the universal, is, on the one hand, and in opposition to this last, obedience to law (p. 416), that is, the mode of thought and idea which is inconsistent; and, on the other hand, since such determinations do not hold good for the Notion, it is perception, in which the immediately posited has now, in the mediating negation, to justify itself as a determination proceeding out of the constitution of the whole. But it is both true that we do not find this perception present in Socrates, for it remains in its content undetermined, and that in reality it is a contingent, which is seen in the fact, that the universal commands, such as “Thou shalt not kill,” are connected with a particular content which is conditioned. Now whether the universal maxim in this particular case has value or not, depends first on the circumstances; and it is the perception which discovers the conditions and circumstances whereby exceptions to this law of unconditioned validity arise. However, because through this contingency in the instances, the fixed nature of the universal principle disappears, since it, too, appears as a particular only, the consciousness of Socrates arrives at pure freedom in each particular content. This freedom, which does not leave the content as it is in its dissipated determination to the natural consciousness, but makes it to be penetrated by the universal, is the real mind which, as unity of the universal content and of freedom, is the veritable truth. Thus if we here consider further what is the true in this consciousness, we pass on to the mode in which the realization of the universal appeared to Socrates himself.
Even the uneducated mind does not follow the content of its consciousness as this content appears in it; but, as mind, it corrects that which is wrong in its consciousness, and is thus implicitly, if not explicitly as consciousness, free. That is, though this consciousness expresses the universal law, “Thou shalt not kill,” as a duty, that consciousness—if no cowardly spirit dwells within it—will still bravely attack and slay the enemy in war. Here, if it is asked whether there is a command to kill one’s enemies, the reply would be affirmative, as likewise when a hangman puts to death a criminal. But when in private life we become involved with adversaries, this command to kill one’s enemies will not occur to us. We may thus call this the mind which thinks at the right time, first of the one, and then of the other; it is spirit, but an unspiritual consciousness. The first step towards reaching a spiritual consciousness is the negative one of acquiring freedom for one’s consciousness. For since perception attempts to prove individual laws, it proceeds from a determination to which, as a universal basis, particular duty is submitted; but this basis is itself not absolute, and falls under the same dialectic. For example, were moderation commanded as a duty on the ground that intemperance undermined the health, health is the ultimate which is here considered as absolute; but it is at the same time not absolute, for there are other duties which ordain that health, and even life itself, should be risked and sacrificed. The so-called conflict of duties is nothing but duty, which is expressed as absolute, showing itself as not absolute; in the constant contradiction morals become unsettled. For a consciousness which has become consistent, law, because it has then been brought into contact with its opposite, has been sublated. For the positive truth has not yet become known in its determination. But to know the universal in its determination, i.e. the limitation of the universal which comes to us as fixed and not contingent, is only possible in connection with the whole system of actuality. Thus if with Socrates the content has become spiritualized, yet manifold independent grounds have merely taken the place of manifold laws. For the perception is not yet expressed as the real perception of these grounds over which it rules; but the truth of consciousness simply is this very movement of pure perception. The true ground is, however, spirit, and the spirit of the people—a perception of the constitution of a people, and the connection of the individual with this real universal spirit. Laws, morals, the actual social life, thus have in themselves their own corrective against the inconsistent, which consists of the expression of a definite content as absolute. In ordinary life we merely forget this limitation of universal principles, and these still hold their place with us; but the other point of view is thus when the limitation comes before our consciousness.
When we have the perfect consciousness that in actual life fixed duties and actions do not exist, for each concrete case is really a conflict of many duties which separate themselves in the moral understanding, but which mind treats as not absolute, comprehending them in the unity of its judgment, we call this pure, deciding individuality, the knowledge of what is right, or conscience, just as we call the pure universal of consciousness not a particular but an all-comprehensive one, duty. Now both sides here present, the universal law and the deciding spirit which is in its abstraction the active individual, are also necessary to the consciousness of Socrates as the content and the power over this content. That is, because with Socrates the particular law has become vacillating, there now comes in the place of the universal single mind, which, with the Greeks, was unconscious determination through unreflective morality, individual mind as individuality deciding for itself. Thus with Socrates the deciding spirit is transformed into the subjective consciousness of man, since the power of deciding originates with himself; and the first question now is, how this subjectivity appears in Socrates himself. Because the person, the individual, now gives the decision, we come back to Socrates as person, as subject, and what follows is a development of his personal relations. But since the moral element is generally placed in the personality of Socrates, we see the contingent nature of the instruction and of the culture which was obtained through Socrates’ character; for it was the actual basis on which men fortified themselves in associating with Socrates, by actual communication with him and by their manner of life. Thus it was true that “the intercourse with his friends was, on the whole, beneficial and instructive to them, but in many cases they became unfaithful to Socrates,”[129] because not everyone attains to perception, and he who possesses it may remain at the negative. The education of the citizens, life in the people, is quite a fresh force in the individual, and does not mean that he educates himself through arguments; hence, however truly educative the intercourse with Socrates was, this contingency still entered into it. We thus see as an unhappy symptom of disorder, how Socrates’ greatest favourites, and those endowed with the most genial natures (such as Alcibiades, that genius of levity, who played with the Athenian people, and Critias, the most active of the Thirty) afterwards experienced the fate of being judged in their own country, one as an enemy and traitor to his fellows, and the other as an oppressor and tyrant of the State. They lived according to the principle of subjective perception, and thus cast a bad light on Socrates, for it is shown in this how the Socratic principle in another form brought about the ruin of Greek life.[130]
c. The characteristic form in which this subjectivity—this implicit and deciding certainty—appears in Socrates, has still to be mentioned. That is, since everyone here has this personal mind which appears to him to be his mind, we see how in connection with this, we have what is known under the name of the Genius (δαιμόνιον) of Socrates; for it implies that now man decides in accordance with his perception and by himself. But in this Genius of Socrates—notorious as a much discussed bizarrerie of his imagination—we are neither to imagine the existence of protective spirit, angel, and such-like, nor even of conscience. For conscience is the idea of universal individuality, of the mind certain of itself, which is at the same time universal truth. But the Genius of Socrates is rather all the other and necessary sides of his universality, that is, the individuality of mind which came to consciousness in him equally with the former. His pure consciousness stands over both sides. The deficiency in the universal, which lies in its indeterminateness, is unsatisfactorily supplied in an individual way, because Socrates’ judgment, as coming from himself, was characterized by the form of an unconscious impulse. The Genius of Socrates is not Socrates himself, not his opinions and conviction, but an oracle which, however, is not external, but is subjective, his oracle. It bore the form of a knowledge which was directly associated with a condition of unconsciousness; it was a knowledge which may also appear under other conditions as a magnetic state. It may happen that at death, in illness and catalepsy, men know about circumstances future or present, which, in the understood relations of things, are altogether unknown. These are facts which are usually rudely denied. That in Socrates we should discover what comes to pass through reflection in the form of the unconscious, makes it appear to be an exceptional matter, revealed to the individual only, and not as being what it is in truth. Thereby it certainly receives the stamp of imagination, but there is nothing more of what is visionary or superstitious to be seen in it, for it is a necessary manifestation, though Socrates did not recognize the necessity, this element being only generally before his imagination.
In connection with what follows, we must yet further consider the relationship of the Genius to the earlier existent form of decision, and that into which it led Socrates; regarding both Xenophon expresses himself in his history most distinctly. Because the standpoint of the Greek mind was natural morality, in which man did not yet determine himself, and still less was what we call conscience present, since laws were, in their fundamental principles, regarded as traditional, these last now presented an appearance of being sanctioned by the gods. We know that the Greeks undoubtedly had laws on which to form their judgments, but on the other hand, both in private and public life, immediate decisions had to be made. But in them the Greeks, with all their freedom, did not decide from the subjective will. The general or the people did not take upon themselves to decide as to what was best in the State, nor did the individual do so in the family. For in making these decisions, the Greeks took refuge in oracles, sacrificial animals, soothsayers, or, like the Romans, asked counsel of birds in flight. The general who had to fight a battle was guided in his decision by the entrails of animals, as we often find in Xenophon’s Anabasis. Pausanias tormented himself thus a whole day long before he gave the command to fight.[131] This element, the fact that the people had not the power of decision but were determined from without, was a real factor in Greek consciousness; and oracles were everywhere essential where man did not yet know himself inwardly as being sufficiently free and independent to take upon himself to decide as we do. This subjective freedom, which was not yet present with the Greeks, is what we mean in the present day when we speak of freedom; in the Platonic Republic we shall see more of it. Our responsibility for what we do is a characteristic of modern times; we wish to decide according to grounds of common sense, and consider this as ultimate. The Greeks did not possess the knowledge of this infinitude.
In the first book of Xenophon’s Memorabilia (chap. I, §§ 7-9), on the occasion of the defence by Socrates of his δαιμόνιον, Socrates says at the very beginning: “The gods have reserved to themselves what is most important in knowledge. Architecture, agriculture, forging, are human arts, as also government, the science of law, management of the household and generalship. In all this man can attain to skill, but for the other, divination is necessary. He who cultivates a field does not know who will enjoy the fruit, nor does he who builds a house know who will inhabit it; the general does not know whether the army should be brought into the field; he who rules a State whether it is good for him” (the individual) “or bad. Nor does he who marries a wife know whether he will experience happiness or whether grief and sorrow will not come through this to him; neither can he who has powerful relations in the State, know whether, on account of these, he may not be banished from the State. Because of this uncertainty, men have to take refuge in divination.” Regarding it Xenophon expresses himself (ibid. §§ 3, 4) to the effect that it manifests itself in different ways through oracles, sacrifices, flight of birds, &c., but to Socrates this oracle is his Genius. To hold the future, or what is foreseen by the somnambulist or at death to be a higher kind of insight, is a perversion which easily arises even in our ideas; but looked at more closely, we find in this the particular interests of individuals merely, and the knowledge of what is right and moral is something much higher. If anyone wishes to marry or to build a house, &c., the result is important to the individual only. The truly divine and universal is the institution of agriculture, the state, marriage, &c.; compared to this it is a trivial matter to know whether, when I go to sea, I shall perish or not. The Genius of Socrates moreover reveals itself in him through nothing other than the counsel given respecting these particular issues, such as when and whether his friends ought to travel. To anything true, existing in and for itself in art and science, he made no reference, for this pertains to the universal mind, and these dæmonic revelations are thus much more unimportant than those of his thinking mind. There is certainly something universal in them, since a wise man can often foresee whether anything is advisable or not. But what is truly divine pertains to all, and though talents and genius are also personal characteristics, they find their first truth in their works which are universal.
Now because with Socrates judgment from within first begins to break free from the external oracle, it was requisite that this return into itself should, in its first commencement, still appear in physiological guise (supra, pp. 390, 391). The Genius of Socrates stands midway between the externality of the oracle and the pure inwardness of the mind; it is inward, but it is also presented as a personal genius, separate from human will, and not yet as the wisdom and free will of Socrates himself. The further investigation of this Genius consequently presents to us a form which passes into somnambulism, into this double of consciousness; and in Socrates there clearly appears to be something of the kind, or something which is magnetic, for, as we already mentioned (p. 390), he is said often to have fallen into trances and catalepsy. In modern times we have seen this in the form of a rigid eye, an inward knowledge, perception of this thing and that, of what is gone, of what is best to do, &c.; but magnetism carries science no further than this. The Genius of Socrates is thus to be taken as an actual state, and is remarkable because it is not morbid but was necessarily called up through a special condition of his consciousness. For the turning point in the whole world-famed change of views constituting the principle of Socrates, is that in place of the oracle, the testimony of the mind of the individual has been brought forward and that the subject has taken upon itself to decide.
[3. The Fate of Socrates.] With this Genius of Socrates as one of the chief points of his indictment, we now enter upon the subject of his fate, which ends with his condemnation. We may find this fate out of harmony with his professed business of instructing his fellow-citizens in what is good, but taken in connection with what Socrates and his people were, we shall recognize the necessity of it. The contemporaries of Socrates, who came forward as his accusers before the Athenian people, laid hold on him as the man who made known that what was held as absolute was not absolute. Socrates, with this new principle, and as one who was an Athenian citizen whose express business was this form of instruction, came, through this his personality, into relationship with the whole Athenian people; and this relationship was not merely with a certain number or with a commanding number, but it was a living relationship with the spirit of the Athenian people. The spirit of this people in itself, its constitution, its whole life, rested, however, on a moral ground, on religion, and could not exist without this absolutely secure basis. Thus because Socrates makes the truth rest on the judgment of inward consciousness, he enters upon a struggle with the Athenian people as to what is right and true. His accusation was therefore just, and we have to consider this accusation as also the end of his career. The attacks which Socrates experienced are well known, and were from two sources; Aristophanes attacked him in the “Clouds,” and then he was formally accused before the people.
Aristophanes regarded the Socratic philosophy from the negative side, maintaining that through the cultivation of reflecting consciousness, the idea of law had been shaken, and we cannot question the justice of this conception. Aristophanes’ consciousness of the one-sidedness of Socrates may be regarded as a prelude to his death; the Athenian people likewise certainly recognized his negative methods in condemning him. It is known that Aristophanes brought upon the stage along with Socrates, not only such men as Aeschylus, and more specially Euripides, but also the Athenians generally and their generals—the personified Athenian people and the gods themselves—a freedom which we would not dream of were it not historically authenticated. We have not here to consider the real nature of the Comedy of Aristophanes, nor the wanton way in which he was said to have treated Socrates. As to the first, it should not startle us, nor do we require to justify Aristophanes or to excuse him. The Comedy of Aristophanes is in itself as real a part of the Athenian people, and Aristophanes is as essential a figure, as were the sublime Pericles, the happy Alcibiades, the divine Sophocles, and the moral Socrates, for he belongs as much as any other to this circle of luminaries (Vol. I., p. 322). Thus much can alone be said, that it certainly goes against our German seriousness to see how Aristophanes brings on the boards men living in the State, by name, in order to make a jest of them; and we feel this specially in regard to so upright a man as Socrates.