Hipparchus

Key Words of the Dialogue

These notes are for orientation, not reference: each explains a word the argument leans on, what it meant in the Athens of Socrates, and what the dialogue does with it. The Glossary at the back lists the renderings with the places where they matter.

Gain, lover of gain (kerdos, kerdainein; philokerdēs, to philokerdes)

Kerdos is gain or profit of any kind, from trade, from wages, from a trick; kerdainein is to make it. Philokerdēs, “loving gain”, was in everyday speech a reproach: the grasping man, the man who will take a profit where a decent man would not. The dialogue asks what the love of gain is (225a) and ends by finding that, by the companion’s own argument, “all men would be lovers of gain, both the decent and the base” (232c). To make that conclusion visible, the family has one English word throughout: kerdos and kerdainein are “gain”, philokerdēs “lover of gain”, to philokerdes “the love of gain”, philokerdein “love gain”, kerdaleos “gainful” (230d, 231e, 232a) and akerdēs “without gain” (231e). The argument turns on the word’s two sides, the gaining and the thing gained: “gain and gaining” are named together at 229e, and Socrates’ definition, “every possession that one acquires either without spending anything, or by spending less and getting more” (231a), makes gain a possession, so that the argument can ask which possessions are gain.

Loss, suffer loss (zēmia, zēmiousthai)

Zēmia is loss, damage, and also a penalty or fine; zēmiousthai is to suffer it. It is the opposite of gain throughout, and the argument’s first proof that gain is good runs through it: men are harmed by loss, so loss is bad, and gain, its opposite, is good (226e–227a). At 227e the companion’s “going to be harmed” is taken as “going to suffer loss”, and men are said to suffer loss “both by loss and by base gain”. It is rendered “loss” and “suffer loss” throughout. “At a loss” at 231c renders another word, aporein, “be perplexed”.

Worth, think fit (axios, axia, axioun; anaxios)

Axios is “worth”, weighing as much as something; axia is worth or value; axioun is to think something fit or right, to claim. The companion’s first answer joins them: the lovers of gain are those who “think fit to gain from things worth nothing” (225a), and Socrates asks whether axioun means anything other than “thinking that one ought to gain” (225d). From 225b to 226c the farmer’s plant, the horse’s food and the craftsmen’s tools are all “worth nothing”, and at 231d worth returns as what gain must have: silver weighs more than gold but is not of more worth, so “gain must have this belonging to it as well: worth”. “Then what is of worth is gainful, whether it is small or great, and what is of no worth is without gain”; and what is of worth is “worth possessing” (231e). Axios is “worth” throughout and anaxios “of no worth”; axioun is “think fit”, as in the Alcibiades I.

Decent and base (chrēstos, ponēros)

Chrēstos, from chrēsthai, “use”, is useful, serviceable, and of men honest, respectable, decent; ponēros, from ponos, “toil”, is wretched, worthless, and of men base or wicked. They are the moral pair, beside the general pair agathos and kakos, “good” and “bad”. The companion’s first answer calls the lovers of gain “base” (225b) and his third sets them against “decent men” (227d); then “base gain” (227e) and “decent gain” (230c) bring the pair into the argument, and Socrates sets it beside the other: “does any decent and good thing seem to you to be base?” (227e). The English keeps the two pairs apart, so that the reader can watch the argument pass from the decent to the good. Even drink, “the wet nourishment of the body”, is “decent or base” (230e–231a), and there the pair is kept, a little stiffly, so that the analogy can be followed; food is “good” and “bad” (230a, 230e).

Good and bad, benefit and harm (agathos, kakos; ōpheleisthai, ōphelimos; blaptesthai)

Agathos and kakos are the widest words of praise and blame: good of its kind, good for someone, good morally. The dialogue uses the second sense most: what benefits is good, what harms bad. Loss is bad because “men are harmed by loss” (227a); gain is good; “to gain is to be benefited” (227d); and at the end what is of worth is “worth possessing”, the beneficial is good, and so the gainful is good (231e–232a). Kakos is “bad”, never “evil”; ōpheleisthai is “be benefited”, ōphelimos “beneficial” and anōphelēs “of no benefit”; blaptesthai is “be harmed”.

Know, be ignorant, senseless (gignōskein; agnoein; anoētos)

The first definition stands or falls on knowledge: do the lovers of gain know that what they gain from is worth nothing, or not (225a)? If not, the companion is calling them “senseless” (anoētos); if so, the crafts show that no one who knows his things are worth nothing thinks he gains from them (225b–226c); and of the men of the companion’s second answer, who crave even things worth nothing, Socrates concludes, “if not knowing it, plainly being ignorant of it” (226e). Gignōskein is “know”, agnoein “be ignorant”, as in the Alcibiades I and II, and anoētos “senseless”. Epistēmōn, “knowing”, “expert”, is rendered “has knowledge of” (225c).

Deceive (exapatan)

The charge of deception runs through the dialogue. Socrates warns the companion not to “try to deceive me” by answering what he does not think (225d), and says the same when the companion contradicts himself (228a); the companion turns it back: “it is you who are deceiving me” (228a). Socrates’ answer is the saying on Hipparchus’ Herm, “do not deceive a friend” (229b), and the companion’s retort that he cannot be persuaded that Socrates is not deceiving him (229d–e) leads to the offer to take back a move. Exapatan is “deceive” throughout.

Obey, persuade, compel (peithesthai, peithein; anankazein)

Peithein is to persuade; its middle and passive peithesthai is both to be persuaded and to obey. The dialogue plays on both: Socrates “would certainly not be acting well” if he did not obey “a good and wise man” (228b), and the companion answers that either Socrates does not think him a friend or he does not “obey Hipparchus”, for the companion “cannot be persuaded” that Socrates is not deceiving him (229d–e). At the end the argument has “compelled” him “rather than persuaded” (232b), and Socrates allows that it “might also persuade you”. “Obey”, “persuade” and “compel” are kept throughout.

Agree, take back (homologein; anatithesthai)

Homologein, “agree”, marks each step the companion grants: “And gain we agreed was good?” (227c), “we agreed just now” (227d, 228a). Its opposite is anatithesthai, the word in the board game petteia for taking back a move: Socrates, “just as when playing draughts”, offers to “take back” any of the agreed steps, and at the companion’s request Socrates takes back the claim that all gaining is good (229e–230a). The game makes the argument a contest with rules, and the taking back a favour. Homologein is “agree”, symphanai “concur” (232b), anatithesthai “take back”.

Wisdom, educate (sophia, sophos; paideuein)

Hipparchus is praised for wisdom: “the eldest and wisest of Pisistratus’ sons”, who displayed “fine works of wisdom”, would not “begrudge wisdom to anyone”, and set up his sayings so that the Athenians would think them wiser than “those wise inscriptions at Delphi” (228b–e). He wished “to educate the citizens”, and “plotting in turn to educate those in the country”, set up his Herms (228c–d); in Socrates’ story Aristogeiton “prided himself on having educated a man, and thought Hipparchus his opponent” (229c). The ironies of a tyrant’s son who rules by educating, in a dialogue that allows Athens a tyranny only in his brother’s three years (229b), are the reader’s to weigh. Sophia and sophos are “wisdom” and “wise”, paideuein “educate”, as elsewhere in the series.

Possession, acquire, spend (ktēma, ktasthai, kektēsthai; analiskein)

The last part of the argument is about acquiring. Socrates proposes that gain is “every possession that one acquires either without spending anything, or by spending less and getting more” (231a); a man who acquires a disease at a feast has not gained (231b); and what is of worth is “worth possessing” (231e). Ktēma is “possession”, ktasthai “acquire”, its perfect kektēsthai “possess”, analiskein “spend” and lambanein “get”.

Food, drink, nourishment (sition, poton, trophē)

Socrates’ analogy for good and bad gain: good food and bad food are “equally food”, as both are “dry nourishment of the body”, and drink is “the wet nourishment of the body, whether decent or base” (230a–231a). Sition is “food”, poton “drink” and trophē “nourishment”; sition was “food” also for the horse’s food at 226a–b, so that one word runs through.