Читать книгу Alkibiades - Charles Hamilton Bromby - Страница 5

Table of Contents

‘Chè in la mente m’è fitta, ...

La cara e buona imagine paterna

Di voi, quando nel mondo ad ora ad ora

M’ insegnavate come l’uom s’eterna.’

Dante: Inferno, xv.

‘For in my mind is fixed ... your dear and good paternal form, when in the world from time to time you taught me how man can make himself eternal.’

A year and a month have passed away. On a warm June afternoon, escaping from Zopyros, the boy we attempted to describe in the last chapter had wandered by himself a short way out of Athens. He was altered somewhat since we saw him last. The high forehead had a more thoughtful air, the look was more disdainful. The face, which had given one joy to look at from its perfect purity, now, if very slightly, had become a little sensual. But the wonder in the eyes was still the same—intensified. The questioning and baffled look was there. The desire, the determination to know, the strong will, shone out through them—‘If I don’t know now I will some day.’

Wrapt in admiration as he lay upon the grass, gazing up to heaven and the white clouds which passed slowly across the sky, half lulled to sleep by the gentle gurgling of the Ilissos, in a waking dream, a voice of deep and tender earnestness came suddenly upon his ears.

He half raised himself in haste, awakening from his reverie, and looking round, saw Sokrates. A deep flush came on the boy’s face when he found himself alone before the man he had so often, sometimes for fun indeed, but often in earnest, declared that he would know. As he felt his gaze fall full upon him—a look in which he saw love, pity, admiration, all together—he blushed with a sense of happiness, and felt a consciousness of shame he had never known before.

‘Oh, son of Kleinias and Deinomaché, have I thus come upon you wondering when you will get wings to fly away beyond the clouds, and thinking you can make them for yourself, and teach yourself to use them? Oh, foolish Daidalos, have I not found out your thoughts?’

‘Indeed you have, Sokrates!’

‘And if I tell you how you may make these wings to grow, what will you do for me?’

‘I think, Sokrates, I would do anything you asked.’

‘But if, when you have got your wings, you know not how to fly with them: what then?’

‘I would do still more for you if you will teach me how to use them.’

‘But if the way to use them is so difficult it would take you days and nights to learn it, and require you to give up many things you love, and make you work and toil to get this learning, could you do all that, think you?’

‘Indeed I do, if it be not too hard for me to learn.’

‘Which, now, gives you greater pleasure to look upon—Perikles’ marble statue of Apollo, or a heap of dirt?’

‘Why, how could it be but to look upon the statue, Sokrates?’

‘And you would rather gaze on Aspasia’s face than on the wrinkled skin of your old paidagogos?’

‘Of course I would.’

‘Then tell me, is it not because in Aspasia’s face and in the statue of Apollo you see more beauty than in Zopyros or in the dirt?’

‘Yes, by Zeus, it is!’

‘And for the soldier—is it more beautiful in him to die fighting for his country, or to run away and live?’

‘To die, of course. I would gladly do that, if that is all.’

‘And for the statesman—is it not more beautiful in him to endeavour to persuade the people to make wise laws, and to induce them to do wise things, though he knows they will not love him for it, but perhaps turn on him, and thrust him from his power, and destroy him? Or is it better to let them do those foolish things he knows they love, and will admire him for advising, and so perhaps keep him a long time in power?’

‘By Herakles! the first seems to me to be more beautiful.’

‘And these things that seem beautiful, are they not good things too to do?’

‘They must be good as well as beautiful. And if I had the power I would make the people do what is wise and beautiful.’

‘Yet you have said the statesman who would rather lose his power than persuade the people to the worse course was good.’

‘I know I did.’

‘Then the beautiful and the good are one?’

‘It seems so, Sokrates.’

‘Now I will tell thee, son of Kleinias, the wings you long for only come to those who love and do the beautiful and good. And they give us pain and trouble as they try to burst forth from the body. If you would get these wings you must ever look upon the beautiful and do the good, and, as I think your wish will be to lead the people, and be chief among them, you should first learn what is the good, and how you may persuade them to it—and this is difficult. To do this you must get Wisdom first yourself, and she is hard to find. You must work at many toilsome things. Like Herakles, you must go through many labours, and give up much of what seems pleasant to you now, and be content at last if, after all this trouble, the foolish people turn you out of power, and banish you from Athens, and perhaps sentence you to death as a reward for all your pains.’

‘Oh Sokrates, these things seem hard you tell me of. Is there no other way?’

‘Yes, you can flatter and cajole them—you can tell them to make war when you see the war spirit swarming like a swarm of bees among them, though you know it is not for their good, and will end only in a disgraceful peace; you can advise them to ally themselves with states they happen to be fond of, though you know that others are the true friends of Athens. Then will the changing people love you, and look upon you as a wise counsellor, and for some time, perhaps, you will be chief man in Athens.’

The boy had risen up, and the two were walking by the river-side towards the town, a cloudy look of disappointment on the young one’s face.

‘Now I will ask you one thing more, Sokrates—a thing I have often thought about, but never spoken it to anyone. If I could get the wings you tell me can only be got by pain and suffering, and by giving up the things that I care most about, what would they do for me when I had got them?’

‘Did you not say you longed to rise above the earth, and see the things beyond the sky? When I came to you were you not feeling tired of the earth, and yearning some day to reach the dwellings of the gods?’

‘Yes, Sokrates, there it is, and this is what I mean. Who are these gods really, and where in heaven do they dwell? My teachers tell me of Zeus, father of Aiakos, and I am of the race of Aiakos. But they cannot tell me where he is, nor the old gods before him. And yet they were immortal too. I often wonder whither they are gone. Poems of Homer that I love to read and hear recited say Zeus dwells on Mount Olympos; why cannot men go there and find him, and see the banquets of the gods? I think these things be but idle tales, and only Homer’s poetry, before men had our wisdom. And if Athene really lives in the Parthenon, why cannot I see her? Where are the great gods, Sokrates?’

‘They dwell not in the clouds, nor on Olympos’ top, lovely son of Kleinias! That was, but Homer’s image. They dwell around us, and within us, all day long. And when you feel the strong desire to find them out, and a yearning of your soul to see and know the gods, it is the gods themselves within you struggling against your lower passions, striving to give you wings with which to fly above your small desires.’

‘Oh, oh, oh! hah, hah, hah! So have we found you, Sokrates, alone with Alkibiades. And has your daimôn thus at length permitted you to speak to him, or is it that only now for the first time you have found an opportunity?’

‘Hush, Kritias and Sikias, hush! See how you have angered Alkibiades, and sent him off blushing and frowning in a rage.’

‘Oh, wisest of the Greeks, seek not to make it seem it was our coming that has angered Alkibiades. What were you telling him when we came up and interrupted you? We have been looking for you all the afternoon. Hippokrates has a great feast to-night. Harmonidas of Skios will be there, and a new flute-player from Delos, and we know not who besides—but all the greatest wits in Athens. He tells us to bid you to his house.’

‘Oh, Sikias! I have feasted here already, and at a finer feast than your Hippokrates can make. But tell me, Kritias, or you, Sikias, son of Sikias, would not a feast of thistles seem more sumptuous to an ass than all the dainties of Hippokrates?’

‘Doubtless it would, Sokrates.’

‘And the harsh croaking of a frog, does not that seem more melodious to him than the flute-playing of Harmonidas?’

‘Perhaps it does. Why do you ask such questions?’

‘But one more. Tell me, Kritias, to the male frog does not his female seem more beautiful than the face and form of Alkibiades?’

‘I believe it does, Sokrates.’

‘Then are these things really beautiful, or do they only seem so according to the eyes with which we look, or the ears we listen to the sounds withal?’

‘I should say, Sokrates, to the frog the ugly female seems more beautiful, because he is a frog; as to the ass, the thistle seems the better fare, because of his dull bestiality.’

‘Just so, Kritias! To the dull asses who appear to us as men the converse of the soul with soul will ever seem a fitting theme for jest and ridicule.’