Today’s Between
Master and Disciples –
“Socrates on
‘Pleasure and Temperance’
and ‘Of the Worth
and Value of Friends’” –
will be presented in Greek
with subtitles in Arabic,
Aulacese (Vietnamese),
Bulgarian, Chinese,
Czech-Slovak, English,
French, German,
Hindi, Hungarian,
Indonesian, Italian,
Japanese, Korean,
Malay, Mongolian,
Persian, Polish,
Portuguese, Punjabi,
Russian, Spanish,
and Thai.
Ancient Greece.
This was an influential
period of time
in Greek history
which has provided
the foundation
of Western Civilization
through its language,
educational systems,
philosophy, politics,
arts, and science.
Around 469 BC,
Socrates was born
in Athens, Greece.
Many people consider
him to be the father
of Western philosophy.
Others think of Socrates
as an insightful teacher
and an enlightened Master.
Most of the information
about Socrates, his life
and his philosophy,
was transcribed
after his death
by two of his students,
Plato and Xenophon.
These disciples wrote several books
about their Master
in which
Socrates is depicted
as the main character.
From these books,
we are acquainted
with Socrates’ teachings.
He believed
that an individual’s
main purpose on Earth is
to discover the Truth.
He stated that most
people focus their lives
around their families,
careers, and social
responsibilities,
when, in fact,
they should be concerned
about the welfare
of their souls.
With compassion
for all life, Socrates
followed and promoted
a vegetarian, meaning
animal free, diet.
Today, we present to you
Socrates’ philosophy titled
“Socrates on
‘Pleasure and Temperance’
and ‘Of the Worth
and Value of Friends’”
from Xenophon’s book,
“The Memorable Thoughts
of Socrates.”
Thank you for joining us
for today’s episode of
Between Master
and Disciples
on Supreme Master
Television.
Join us again
Thursday, September 30, for for part 2
of Socrates’ philosophy
on pleasure, temperance,
and friendship.
Coming up next is
Animal World:
Our Co-Inhabitants, right
after Noteworthy News.
May Heavens
grace your life
with light and love!
Thank you,
gracious viewers,
for your company
for today’s episode of
Between Master ##and Disciples.
Please stay tuned to
Supreme Master Television
for Animal World:
Our Co-Inhabitants,
coming up next, right
after Noteworthy News.
We wish you
much joy and abundance
in your life.
A CONFERENCE
OF SOCRATES
WITH ARISTIPPUS
CONCERNING
PLEASURE
AND TEMPERANCE.
He encouraged his hearers
by the following
arguments to
support hunger and thirst,
to resist the temptations
of love,
to fly from laziness,
and inure themselves
to all manner of fatigues.
For, being told
that one of them
lived too luxuriously,
he asked him this question:
"If you were entrusted,
Aristippus,
with the education
of two young men,
one to be a prince and
the other a private man,
how would you
educate them?
Let us begin with
their nourishment, as being
the foundation of all."
"It is true," said Aristippus,
"that nourishment is
the foundation of our life,
for a man must soon die
if he be not nourished."
"You would accustom
both of them,"
said Socrates, "to eat and
drink at a certain hour?"
"It is likely I should?"
"But which of the two,"
said Socrates,
"would you teach
to leave eating
before he was satisfied,
to go about
some earnest business?"
"Him, without doubt,"
answered Aristippus,
"whom I intended to
render capable to govern,
to the end that under him
the affairs of the Republic
might not suffer by delay."
"Which of the two,"
continued Socrates,
"would you teach
to abstain from drinking
when he was thirsty,
to sleep but little,
to go late to bed,
to rise early,
to watch whole nights,
to live chastely,
to get the better of
his favorite inclinations,
and not to avoid fatigues,
but expose himself freely
to them?"
"The same still,"
replied Aristippus.
"And if there be any art
that teaches
to overcome our enemies,
to which of the two
is it rather reasonable
to teach it?"
"To him to,"
said Aristippus,
"for without that art
all the rest would
avail him nothing."
"I believe," said Socrates,
"that a man,
who has been educated
in this manner,
would not suffer himself
to be so easily surprised
by his enemies….”
"You say true,"
said Aristippus.
"Well, then,"
pursued Socrates, "
…does not this happen
to adulterers, who skulk
and hide themselves in
the chambers and closets
of married women,
though they know
they run a very great risk,
and that the laws are
very strict and rigorous
against those crimes?
They know themselves
to be watched, and that,
if they are taken,
they shall not be let go
with impunity.
In a word,
they see punishment
and infamy hanging over
the heads of criminals
like themselves.
Besides,
they are not ignorant,
that there are a thousand
honorable diversions
to deliver them from
those infamous passions,
and yet they run
hand over head into
the midst of these dangers,
and what is this but to be
wretched and desperate
to the highest degree?"
"I think it so,"
answered Aristippus.
"What say you to this,"
continued Socrates,
"that the most necessary
and most important affairs
of life… are, with others
of little less consequence,
performed in the fields
and in the open air,
and that the greatest part
of mankind accustom
themselves so little
to endure the inclemency
of the seasons,
to suffer heat and cold?
Is not this a great neglect?
and do you not think
that a man who is
to command others
ought to inure himself
to all these hardships?"
"I think he ought,"
answered Aristippus.
"Therefore,"
replied Socrates,
"if they who are patient
and laborious,
as we have said,
are worthy to command,
may we not say that
they who can do nothing
of all this, ought never
to pretend to any office?"
Aristippus agreed to it,
and Socrates went on.
"Since then you know
the rank which either
of these two sorts of men
ought to hold,
amongst which would you
have us place you?"
"Me!" said Aristippus;
"why truly, not amongst
those that govern;
for that is an office
I would never choose.
Let those rule
who have a mind for it;
for my part,
I envy not their condition.
For, when I reflect that
we find it hard enough
to supply our own wants,
I do not approve of
loading ourselves, besides,
with the necessities
of a whole people;
and that being
often compelled to go
without many things
that we desire, we should
engage ourselves
in an employment
that would render us
liable to blame,
if we did not take care
to supply others
with everything they want:
I think
there is folly in all this.
For republics make use
of their magistrates
as I do of my servants,
who shall get me
my food and drink,
and all other necessaries,
as I command,
and not presume to touch
any of it themselves;
so, too, the people
will have those,
who govern the State,
take care to provide them
with plenty of all things,
and will not suffer them
to do anything
for their own advantage.
I think, therefore,
that all who are pleased
with a hurry of affairs,
and in creating business
for others,
are most fit to govern,
provided they have been
educated and instructed
in the manner
we mentioned.
But, for my part, I desire
to lead a more quiet
and easy life."
"Let us," said Socrates,
"consider
whether they who govern
lead more happy lives
than their subjects:
among the nations
that are known to us
in Asia, the Syrians,
the Phrygians,
and the Lydians,
are under the empire
of the Persians.
In Europe,
the Maeotians are
subject to the Scythians;
in Africa,
the Carthaginians reign
over the rest of the Africans.
Which now,
in your opinion,
are the most happy?
Let us look into Greece,
where you are at present.
Whose condition, think you,
is most to be desired,
that of the nations who rule,
or of the people who
are under the dominion
of others?"
"I can never,"
said Aristippus,
"consent to be a slave;
but there is a way
between both that leads
neither to empire
nor subjection,
and this is the road
of liberty, in which
I endeavor to walk,
because it is the shortest
to arrive at true quiet
and repose."
"If you had said,"
replied Socrates,
"that this way, which
leads neither to empire
nor subjection,
is a way that leads far
from all human society,
you would, perhaps,
have said something;
for, how can we live
among men,
and neither command
nor obey?
Do you not observe
that the mighty
oppress the weak, and
use them as their slaves,
after they have
made them groan under
the weight of oppression,
and given them just cause
to complain
of their cruel usage,
in a thousand instances,
both general and particular?
And if they find any
who will not submit
to the yoke,
they ravage their countries,
spoil their corn,
cut down their trees,
and attack them, in short,
in such a manner
that they are compelled
to yield themselves
up to slavery, rather than
undergo so unequal a war?
Among private men
themselves, do not the
stronger and more bold
trample on the weaker?"
"To the end, therefore,
that this may not happen
to me," said Aristippus,
"I confine myself
not to any republic,
but am sometimes here,
sometimes there,
and think it best to be
a stranger wherever I am."
"This invention of yours,"
replied Socrates,
"is very extraordinary.
Travelers, I believe, are
not now so much infested
on the roads by robbers
as formerly, deterred,
I suppose,
by the fate of Sinnis,
Scyron, Procrustes,
and the rest of that gang.
What then?
They who are settled
in their own country,
and are concerned
in the administration
of the public affairs,
they have the laws
in their favors, have
their relations and friends
to assist them,
have fortified towns…
for their defense:
over and above,
they have alliances
with their neighbors:
and yet all these
favorable circumstances
cannot entirely shelter them
from the attempts and
surprises of wicked men.
But can you, who have
none of these advantages,
who are, for the most part,
travelling on the roads,
often dangerous
to most men,
who never enter a town,
where you have not
less credit than
the meanest inhabitant,
and are as obscure
as the wretches who prey
on the properties of others;
in these circumstances,
can you, I say,
expect to be safe, merely
because you are a stranger,
or perhaps have got
passports from the States
that promise you
all manner of safety
coming or going,
or should it be
your hard fortune
to be made a slave,
you would make
such a bad one,
that a master would be
never the better for you?
For, who would suffer
in his family a man
who would not work, and
yet expected to live well?
But let us see how masters
use such servants....
If they are thieves,
they prevent them
from stealing,
by carefully locking up
whatever they could take:
they chain them for fear
they should run away:
if they are dull and lazy,
then stripes and scourges
are the rewards
we give them.
If you yourself, my friend,
had a worthless slave,
would you not take
the same measures
with him?"
"I would treat
such a fellow,"
answered Aristippus,
"with all manner
of severity,
till I had brought him
to serve me better.
But, Socrates, let us resume
our former discourse.
In what do they
who are educated
in the art of government,
which you seem to think
a great happiness,
differ from those who
suffer through necessity?
For you say they must
accustom themselves
to hunger and thirst,
to endure cold and heat,
to sleep little, and
that they must voluntarily
expose themselves
to a thousand other
fatigues and hardships.
Now, I cannot conceive
what difference there is
between being whipped
willingly and by force,
and tormenting one's body
either one way
or the other, except that
it is a folly in a man to be
willing to suffer pain."
"How," said Socrates,
"you know not
this difference
between things voluntary
and constrained,
that he who suffers hunger
because he is pleased
to do so may likewise eat
when he has a mind;
and he who suffers thirst
because he is willing
may also drink
when he pleases.
But it is not in the power
of him who suffers
either of them through
constraint and necessity
to relieve himself
by eating and drinking
the moment he desires it?
Besides, he that
voluntarily embraceth
any laborious exercise
finds much comfort
and content in the hope
that animates him….
And yet what they take,
though they think it
a reward for all their toil,
is certainly
of very little value.
Ought not they, then,
who labor to gain
the friendship of good men,
or to overcome
their enemies,
or to render themselves
capable of governing
their families, and
of serving their country,
ought not these,
I say, joyfully
to undertake the trouble,
and to rest content,
conscious of
the inward approbation
of their own minds, and
the regard and esteem
of the virtuous?
And to convince you
that it is good to impose
labors on ourselves,
it is a maxim among those
who instruct youth
that the exercises
which are easily performed
at the first attempt, and
which we immediately
take delight in,
are not capable
to form the body
to that vigor and strength
that is requisite
in great undertakings, nor
of imprinting in the soul
any considerable knowledge:
but that those
which require patience,
application, labor, and
assiduity, prepare the way
to illustrious actions
and great achievements.