Blessed

Use in the book

Said of a person, "blessed" comes twice, both times to Charmides and both times on a condition. Socrates first praises the boy's family, his father's house celebrated by the poets for its beauty and virtue "and everything else that goes by the name of happiness", and then his looks (157e–158b2). The blessing follows: "And if, as Critias here says, you are also well enough endowed for temperance and the rest, then blessed is the child, my dear Charmides, … your mother bore" (158b). The words are the old formula of blessing, and, as the edition's note says, "Socrates is laying it on". But the condition is real: Socrates at once puts the claim of Critias, Charmides' cousin and guardian, to the boy as a question (158b–c; see Adequacy and deficiency). Happiness is what the family is celebrated for; whether the child is blessed can be read as waiting on his soul.

The vocative is a different thing. At 157a it falls in Socrates' report to Charmides of what a Thracian doctor, met on campaign, taught him: "And the soul, my dear fellow, he said, is treated with certain charms" (157a). The Greek gives the doctor's teaching in indirect speech, so the address is Socrates' own, to Charmides. At 166d it is said to Critias, after his charge that Socrates is trying to refute him (166c): "Then take heart, my dear fellow, … answer the question as it seems to you" (166d). Neither address judges anyone's lot.

At the end "blessed" returns. When the argument has left temperance of no benefit (175a–d2), Socrates lays the fault on himself, "a poor inquirer", and goes on: "For I do think that temperance is a great good, and that if you have it you are blessed" (175e–176a). A moment later, on the same condition, he joins "happier" to it (176a; see Babbling and self-deprecation). The argument about what would make us "do well and be happy" (172a–174c2345) speaks only of being happy, never of being blessed. "Blessed" is Socrates' own word to Charmides, and it frames the inquiry: given before any definition was tried, it is given again on the same condition after every definition has failed. The argument found no account of temperance, but did not shake his belief in its worth; and Charmides, who cannot say whether he has it (176a), cannot tell whether the blessing is his.

Places to read

1. 157aIn his report of the Thracian's teaching, Socrates addresses Charmides as "my dear fellow".
2. 157e–158b2After praising Charmides' houses and his looks, Socrates calls him blessed if, as Critias says, he is also well enough endowed for temperance and the rest.
3. 166dSocrates encourages Critias, "my dear fellow", to answer as it seems to him.
4. 175e–176aSocrates holds temperance a great good and Charmides blessed if he has it, and, if he has it, would have him count himself the happier the more temperate he is.

Translation in this edition

The adjective is "blessed" at both its places (158b, 176a), and the vocative ὦ μακάριε "my dear fellow" at both of its (157a, 166d); the phrase "my dear fellow" renders nothing else in the dialogue. At 158b the Greek, μακάριόν σε … ἡ μήτηρ ἔτικτεν, says literally "your mother bore you blessed", which the edition gives as "blessed is the child … your mother bore". The εὐδαιμ- family is kept apart: the adjective εὐδαίμων is "happy" (172a, 173e, 174a), the verb εὐδαιμονεῖν "be happy" (173d, 174c), the noun εὐδαιμονία "happiness" (158a), and the comparative at 176a "happier".

μακάριος

Attested: μακάριε (makarie; 157a, 166d), μακάριον (makarion; 158b, 176a). Blessed, to be congratulated on an enviable lot. Twice it is said of Charmides, on condition that he has temperance (158b, 176a). In the vocative, "my dear fellow", it is a friendly address: to Charmides in Socrates' report of the Thracian's teaching (157a), and to Critias in the argument (166d). Lemma: μακάριος.

Elsewhere in Plato

In the Gorgias Socrates argues what in the Charmides he only holds: the temperate man, being just, brave and pious, is perfectly good; the good man does well and finely whatever he does; and "the one who does well is blessed and happy", while the wicked man who does badly is wretched (507a–c). Near the end of the first book of the Republic, arguing against the sophist Thrasymachus of Chalcedon, Socrates has him grant that the just man lives well and the unjust badly, that the man who lives well is blessed and happy, and that being wretched does not profit while being happy does; and he concludes, "Never, then, my blessed Thrasymachus, is injustice more profitable than justice" (353e–354a). There the adjective and the address stand a few lines apart.

Use in the book

Socrates uses μακάριον while restating the apparent paradox that parents who want Lysis happy nevertheless prevent his doing what he wants. He repeats μακάριος when imagining whether the mother lets him handle her wool-working equipment so that he can be happy.

The adjective reinforces the preceding εὐδαίμων without introducing a separate theory of blessedness. Its slightly elevated force contributes to the playful mismatch between a sweeping promise of happiness and the mundane question whether a boy may touch a loom.

Places to read

1. 208dἵν’ αὐτῇ μακάριος ᾖς — so that you may be happy for her.
2. 207e–208a

Use in the book

The Hermetic soul laments separation from a blessed shared life with the gods and confinement in lowly bodily dwellings. Blessedness characterizes the former mode of existence through proximity, splendor, and divine companionship. The adjective does not by itself identify a separately defined rank of being.

Places to read

1. I.49.44.38The lost heavenly life with the gods is called blessed.

Translation in this edition

“Blessed” preserves the religious setting; “happy” alone may understate its contrast with embodiment.

Use in the book

B119 breaks off in an exclamation about the honour and height of blessedness from which departure has occurred. Its scale makes the loss immense without specifying a literal altitude. B1152 gives the complementary relation: the offending daimon must wander far from the blessed. Together these passages set moral exile against a remembered or excluded condition of flourishing.

B132 makes blessedness relevant to understanding. The person who acquires the wealth of divine understanding is blessed, while one troubled by a dark opinion about gods is wretched. The contrast ties flourishing to the quality of theological knowledge rather than merely to possessions or public success. B131's prayer for a good account of the blessed gods gives a related poetic task.

B147 portrays release through sharing the immortals' hearth and table without human griefs. This is a social and affective picture of the desired condition. The fragment does not, however, narrate every step from the lament of B119 to that fellowship. B158 adds the expression of being deprived of a blessed age, but the introduction expressly marks its attribution as doubtful. It can be indexed for readers without becoming the foundation for a doctrine.

Places to read

1. B 119The speaker evokes lost honour and a great extent of blessedness.
2. B 115.5–8Exile is distance from the blessed.
3. B 132Divine understanding distinguishes the blessed person from one with dark beliefs.
4. B 147Fellowship with immortals is characterized by freedom from human grief.
5. B 158A doubtful fragment speaks of deprivation of a blessed age.

Translation in this edition

B158's local note marks its unusual numbering, while Introduction VII adds the stronger warning that it is doubtful. The entry preserves that qualification. The different Greek families behind “blessed” are not automatically technical synonyms.

Use in the book

The opening argument connects immortality with the possibility of blessedness. Ficino emphasizes the restless soul, frail body, and extensive human needs, then reasons that a being drawing near God through worship cannot finally be the most miserable animal. God is the author of blessedness, and the soul's fuller good is sought beyond bodily death. In the five-level prospectus, the soul is called most blessed insofar as it enters into divine things. Blessedness also figures in the rejection of a composite God: a being lacking its whole self in each supposed part would not enjoy itself as fully as an utterly simple being. The term thus concerns complete enjoyment and fulfillment, not only a passing pleasant feeling. Felicitas in the Proem is tied to apprehending things and ordering life. The supplied passages support a relation among knowledge, worship, and happiness without reducing every one of these terms to a single technical synonym.

Further passage references. Proem.6; I.1.1–I.1.323, I.1.7; I.6.6

Places to read

1. Proem.6Happiness is joined to apprehension and the ordering of life.
2. I.1.1–323Human restlessness and worship motivate the argument for a good beyond bodily death.
3. I.1.7Soul’s blessedness is linked to entry into divine things.
4. I.6.6Supreme blessedness requires complete self-presence and self-enjoyment.

Translation in this edition

The superlatives and comparatives are argumentative: “more blessed” after bodily death and “most miserable” in the opening have specified conditions. I.6.6’s self-enjoyment is tested within a rejected composite-God hypothesis, not an assertion of actual divine bodily members.

beatitudo / felicitas

beatitudo / felicitas. Printed forms: beatior; beatitudinem; beatitudinis; felicitas; infelicius.

Blessedness, happiness and their opposites. The Proem links happiness to knowledge and life-ordering; the opening argues that nearness to God in worship cannot culminate in humanity’s being most miserable. References: Proem.6, I.1.1, I.1.3. See Blessedness.

fruor

fruor. Printed forms: fruetur.

To enjoy or have fulfilled possession of. Divine blessedness is tested through full self-enjoyment: composition would prevent the whole from being present in each supposed member. References: I.6.6. See Blessedness.

insinuo

insinuo. Printed forms: insinuat.

To enter closely or intimately into. The reflexive expression describes the soul’s participation in divine things and its blessedness, not a bodily insertion into a place. References: I.1.7. See Blessedness.