[289] Plato, Republic, ix. p. 580 D. ἐάν τε λανθάνωσι τοιοῦτοι ὄντες ἐάν τε μὴ πάντας ἀνθρώπους τε καὶ θεούς.
There are two other lines of argument (continues Sokrates) establishing the same conclusion.
Other arguments proving the same conclusion — Pleasures of Intelligence are the best of all pleasures.
1. We have seen that both the collective city and the individual mind are distributed into three portions: Reason, Energy, Appetite. Each of these portions has its own peculiar pleasures and pains, desires and aversions, beginnings or principles of action: Love of Knowledge: Love of Honour: Love of Gain. If you question men in whom these three varieties of temper respectively preponderate, each of them will extol the pleasures of his own department above those belonging to the other two. The lover of wealth will declare the pleasures of acquisition and appetite to be far greater than those of honour or of knowledge: each of the other two will say the same for himself, and for the pleasures of his own department. Here then the question is opened, Which of the three is in the right? Which of the three varieties of pleasure and modes of life is the more honourable or base, the better or worse, the more pleasurable or painful?[290] By what criterion, or by whose judgment, is this question to be decided? It must be decided by experience, intelligence and rational discourse.[291] Now it is certain that the lover of knowledge, or the philosopher, has greater experience of all the three varieties of pleasure than is possessed by either of the other two men. He must in his younger days have tasted and tried the pleasures of both; but the other two have never tasted his.[292] Moreover, each of the three acquires more or less of honour, if he succeeds in his own pursuits: accordingly the pleasures belonging to the love of honour are shared, and may be appreciated, by the philosopher; while the lover of honour as such, has no sense for the pleasures of philosophy. In the range of personal experience, therefore, the philosopher surpasses the other two: he surpasses them no less in exercised intelligence, and in rational discourse, which is his own principal instrument.[293] If wealth and profit furnished the proper means of judgment, the money-lover would have been the best judge of the three: if honour and victory furnished the proper means, we should consult the lover of honour: but experience, intelligence, and rational discourse, have been shown to be the means — and therefore it is plain that the philosopher is a better authority than either of the other two. His verdict must be considered as final. He will assuredly tell us, that the pleasures belonging to the love of knowledge are the greatest: those belonging to the love of honour and power, the next: those belonging to the love of money and to appetite, the least.[294]
[290] Plato, Republic, ix. p. 581.
[291] Plato, Republic, ix. p. 582 A. ἐμπειρίᾳ τε καὶ φρονήσει καὶ λόγῳ.
[292] Plato, Republic, ix. p. 582 B.
[293] Plato, Republic, ix. p. 582 C-D. λόγοι δὲ τούτου μάλιστα ὄργανον.
[294] Plato, Republic, ix. pp. 582-583.
They are the only pleasures completely true and pure. Comparison of pleasure and pain with neutrality. Prevalent illusions.