77a
77d
Men.
But I should stay, Socrates, if you would give me many such answers.
Soc.
Well then, I will spare no endeavor, both for your sake and for my own, to continue in that style; but I fear I may not succeed in keeping for long on that level. But come now, you in your turn must try and fulfil your promise by telling me what virtue is in a general way; and you must stop producing a plural from the singular, as the wags say whenever one breaks something, but leave virtue
77b
whole and sound, and tell me what it is. The pattern you have now got from me.
Men.
Well, in my view, Socrates, virtue is, in the poet’s words,
to rejoice in things honorable and be able for them
1
; and that, I say, is virtue—to desire what is honorable and be able to procure it.Soc.
Do you say that he who desires the honorable is desirous of the good?
Men.
Certainly.
Soc.
Implying that there are some who desire the evil, and others the good? Do not all men,
77c
in your opinion, my dear sir, desire the good?
Men.
I think not.
Soc.
There are some who desire the evil?
Men.
Yes.
Soc.
Thinking the evil to be good, do you mean, or actually recognizing it to be evil, and desiring it nevertheless?
Men.
Both, I believe.
Soc.
Do you really believe, Meno, that a man knows the evil to be evil, and still desires it?
Men.
Certainly.
Soc.
What do you mean by
desires? Desires the possession of it?
Men.
Yes; what else could it be?
Soc.
And does he think the evil benefits him who gets it, or does he know that it harms him who has it?
Men.
There are some who think the evil is a benefit, and others who know that it does harm.
Soc.
And, in your opinion, do those who think the evil a benefit know that it is evil?
Men.
I do not think that at all.
Soc.
Obviously those who are ignorant of the evil do not desire it, but only what they supposed
77e
to be good, though it is really evil; so that those who are ignorant of it and think it good are really desiring the good. Is not that so?
Men.
It would seem to be so in their case.
Soc.
Well now, I presume those who, as you say, desire the evil, and consider that the evil harms him who gets it, know that they will be harmed by it?
Meno. Plato. Walter Rangeley Maitland Lamb (Translator). Cambridge, MA. 1924.
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