Advice and oratory

Use in the book

At 144e–145a orators illustrate the states that precede ready action: they advise either knowing how or thinking they know. War and peace, walls and harbours give concrete objects of civic deliberation. Socrates sweepingly says that everything the city does toward another city or by itself comes from their advice. The passage presents that broad claim as part of the speakers’ argument, not as a separately documented account of every Athenian institutional process.

The test at 145b–c distinguishes advising ability from knowing whether and when it is better. A person with the relevant skill becomes an intelligent and sufficient adviser only if knowledge of the best accompanies him. The dual destination, city and self, is important: public importance does not create a different standard from the guidance needed in one’s own life.

The “political blast” at 145e gives rhetoric a comic and inflated sound among the unguided experts. Yet advice itself is not discarded. At 151a Alcibiades credits Socrates with advising well and crowns him. The advice has yielded the bounded decision to wait rather than the grand public action envisaged earlier. This provides an enacted example of useful counsel without a demonstration that Socrates has exhaustively taught the knowledge of the best.

Places to read

1. 144e–145aCivic orators advise on war, peace, walls and harbours from knowledge or its appearance.
2. 145b–cA sufficient adviser must also know whether, when and what is beneficial.
3. 145eRhetorical men add an inflated political blast to the unguided commonwealth.
4. 151aAlcibiades recognises Socrates’ advice through the wreath.

Translation in this edition

“Adviser”, “advice” and “advise” retain one family. Burnet prints rhētorikōn at 145e where T has politikōn, “political”; the edition follows “men of rhetoric”. At 151a “advised me well” preserves kalōs, rather than replacing it with the adjective “good”.