BOOK III. 8-14
under so many adverse circumstances. Now conceit is removed by cross-examination, and this is what Socrates starts with. . . .[1] But that the matter is not impossible, consider and search—this kind of search will do you no harm; 10and, indeed, to philosophize practically amounts to this, that is, to search how it is possible to employ desire and aversion without hindrance.
"I am superior to you, for my father has consular rank."[2] Another says, "I have been a tribune, and you have not." And if we were horses, you would be saying: "My sire was swifter than yours," or, "I have quantities of barley and fodder," or, "I have pretty neck-trappings." What then, if, when you were talking like this, I said, "Granted all that, let's run a race, then"? Come now, is there, then, nothing in man like running in the case of a horse, whereby the worse and the better will be recognized? Isn't there such a thing as reverence, faith, justice? Prove yourself superior in these points, in order to be superior as a human being. If you tell me, "I can deliver a mighty kick,"[3] I shall say to you in my turn, "You are proud over what is the act of an ass."
- ↑ There is no clear connection here with the preceding, and the topic of the removal of diffidence could scarcely have been passed over.
- ↑ The subject-matter of this is closely paralleled in frag. 18, Encheiridion 44, and in the florilegia. It was clearly a commonplace.
- ↑ Much practised by the pancratiasts, who struck both with the heel and with the knee.
