[45] Plat. Gorg. p. 474 C.
[46] Plat. Gorg. p. 482 C. To maintain that τὸ ἀδικεῖν βέλτιον τοῦ ἀδικεῖσθαι was an ἄδοξος ὑπόθεσις — one which it was χείρονος ἤθους ἑλέσθαι: which therefore Aristotle advises the dialectician not to defend (Aristot. Topic. viii. 156, 6-15).
[47] This portion of the Gorgias may receive illustration from the third chapter (pp. 99-101) of Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments, entitled, “Of the corruption of our moral sentiments, which is occasioned by the disposition to admire the rich and great, and to neglect or despise persons of poor and mean condition”. He says — “The disposition to admire and almost to worship the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or at least to neglect, persons of poor and mean condition, though necessary both to establish and maintain the distinction of ranks and the order of society, is, at the same time, the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments.… They are the wise and the virtuous chiefly — a select, though I am afraid, a small party — who are the real and steady admirers of wisdom and virtue. The great mob of mankind are the admirers and worshippers — and what may seem more extraordinary, most frequently the disinterested admirers and worshippers — of wealth and greatness.…. It is scarce agreeable to good morals, or even to good language, perhaps, to say that mere wealth and greatness, abstracted from merit and virtue, deserve our respect. We must acknowledge, however, that they almost constantly obtain it: and that they may therefore in a certain sense be considered as the natural objects of it.”
Now Archelaus is a most conspicuous example of this disposition of the mass of mankind to worship and admire, disinterestedly, power and greatness: and the language used by Adam Smith in the last sentence illustrates the conversation of Sokrates, Polus, and Kalliklês. Adam Smith admits that energetic proceedings, ending in great power, such as those of Archelaus, obtain honour and worship from the vast majority of disinterested spectators: and that, therefore they are in a certain sense the natural objects of such a sentiment (κατὰ φύσιν). But if the question be put to him, Whether such proceedings, with such a position, are worthy of honour, he is constrained by good morals (κατὰ νόμον) to reply in the negative. It is true that Adam Smith numbers himself with the small minority, while Polus shares the opinion of the large majority. But what is required by King Nomos must be professed even by dissentients, unless they possess the unbending resolution of Sokrates.
[48] Aristot. De Soph. Elench. pp. 172-173, where he contrasts the opinions which men must make a show of holding, with those which they really do — αἱ φανεραὶ δόξαι — αἱ ἀφανεῖς, ἀποκεκρυμμέναι, δόξαι.
The definition of Pulchrum and Turpe, given by Sokrates, will not hold.
He proceeds to define Pulchrum and Turpe (καλὸν-αἰσχρόν). When we recollect the Hippias Major, in which dialogue many definitions of Pulchrum were canvassed and all rejected, so that the search ended in total disappointment — we are surprised to see that Sokrates hits off at once a definition satisfactory both to himself and Polus: and we are the more surprised, because the definition here admitted without a remark, is in substance one of those shown to be untenable in the Hippias Major.[49] It depends upon the actual argumentative purpose which Plato has in hand, whether he chooses to multiply objections and give them effect — or to ignore them altogether. But the definition which he here proposes, even if assumed as incontestable, fails altogether to sustain the conclusion that he draws from it. He defines Pulchrum to be that which either confers pleasure upon the spectator when he contemplates it, or produces ulterior profit or good — we must presume profit to the spectator, or to him along with others — at any rate it is not said to whom. He next defines the ugly and disgraceful (τὸ αἰσχρὸν) as comprehending both the painful and the hurtful or evil. If then (he argues) to do wrong is more ugly and disgraceful than to suffer wrong, this must be either because it is more painful — or because it is more hurtful, more evil (worse). It certainly is not more painful: therefore it must be worse.
[49] Plat. Hipp. Maj. pp. 45-46. See above, [ vol. ii. ch. xiii].
Worse or better — for whom? The argument of Sokrates does not specify. If understood in the sense necessary for his inference, the definition would be inadmissible.
But worse, for whom? For the spectators, who declare the proceedings of Archelaus to be disgraceful? For the persons who suffer by his proceedings? Or for Archelaus himself? It is the last of the three which Sokrates undertakes to prove: but his definition does not help him to the proof. Turpe is defined to be either what causes immediate pain to the spectator, or ulterior hurt — to whom? If we say to the spectator — the definition will not serve as a ground of inference to the condition of the agent contemplated. If on the other hand, we say — to the agent — the definition so understood becomes inadmissible: as well for other reasons, as because there are a great many Turpia which are not agents at all, and which the definition therefore would not include. Either therefore the definition given by Sokrates is a bad one — or it will not sustain his conclusion. And thus, on this very important argument, where Sokrates admits that he stands alone, and where therefore the proof would need to be doubly cogent — an argument too where the great cause (so Adam Smith terms it) of the corruption of men’s moral sentiments has to be combated — Sokrates has nothing to produce except premisses alike far-fetched and irrelevant. What increases our regret is, that the real arguments establishing the turpitude of Archelaus and his acts are obvious enough, if you look for them in the right direction. You discover nothing while your eye is fixed on Archelaus himself: far from presenting any indications of misery, which Sokrates professes to discover, he has gained much of what men admire as good wherever they see it. But when you turn to the persons whom he has killed, banished, or ruined — to the mass of suffering which he has inflicted — and to the widespread insecurity which such acts of successful iniquity spread through all societies where they become known — there is no lack of argument to justify that sentiment which prompts a reflecting spectator to brand him as a disgraceful man. This argument however is here altogether neglected by Plato. Here, as elsewhere, he looks only at the self-regarding side of Ethics.