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Book II Chapter 3

Chapter 3

⟨On Rhetoric⟩⁹¹

Plato from Alcibiades II

“What sort of state, then, do you think there would be, consisting of good archers and flute players, and also athletes and other skilled practitioners, with those we just mentioned mixed among them—people who know warfare itself and killing itself—and, besides these, rhetorical men puffing out political bluster, if all of them lacked knowledge of what is best, and lacked anyone who knew when it was best to employ each of these skills and against whom?”⁹²

“A poor sort of state, I should say, Socrates.”

Plato from the Gorgias

“Now, Gorgias, you seem to me to have explained very nearly what sort of art you take rhetoric to be. If I understand you at all, you say that rhetoric is a maker of persuasion, and that its entire activity and its chief purpose come to this. Or can you say that rhetoric has any further power beyond producing persuasion in the souls of its hearers?”⁹³

“Not at all, Socrates; you seem to me to have defined it adequately.”

Plato the comic poet

For if one scoundrel dies, two orators spring up. There is no Iolaus in our city to burn away the orators’ heads.⁹⁴

⟨An unidentified comic poet⟩

You have been a passive sexual partner; so you will be an orator.⁹⁵

The same author

Seeing a man who acted badly but pleaded cases for others, Plato said: “This man carries his understanding on his tongue.”⁹⁶

91.The chapter title is supplied in Wachsmuth’s edition from Photius’s account of the anthology. The sequence considers the use of expertise, persuasion as the product of rhetoric, and the conduct of public speakers.

92.Alcibiades II 145E–146A; Socrates questions Alcibiades. Technical ability requires judgment about its use. The phrase φύσημα φυσώντων repeats the image of blowing or puffing; “political bluster” preserves its disparaging force. The printed βέλτιστον, “best,” is retained rather than the comparative βέλτιον recorded for Plato in the apparatus.

93.Gorgias 452E–453A; Socrates speaks first and Gorgias replies. Δημιουργός, “maker,” describes rhetoric by what it produces: persuasion. It carries no implication of a cosmic creator here. The excerpt ends at the agreed definition, before the dialogue further distinguishes kinds of persuasion and their relation to knowledge.

94.Wachsmuth identifies these verses as belonging to Plato the comic poet, distinct from the philosopher whose dialogues precede them. Iolaus helped Heracles defeat the Hydra by burning the severed necks to prevent new heads from growing (Apollodorus, Library 2.5.2). The orators multiply like the Hydra’s heads. The English name Iolaus renders the printed form Ἰόλεως.

95.The supplied Latin heading means “of an unidentified comic poet.” Wachsmuth separates this line from the preceding verses, although it has also been printed with the comic Plato’s fragment. Κολλοπεύω is a coarse sexual taunt about taking the receptive role in sex. The translation states its sense directly; the insult belongs to the comic speaker.

96.The printed heading is “The same author”; the anecdote itself names Plato. “On his tongue” contrasts the man’s ability to speak for others with his own conduct. Wachsmuth refers to the proverb in Eustathius’s commentary on Iliad 2, p. 252. The attribution is preserved without treating the preceding unidentified comic line as a philosophical saying.