Music

Use in the book

Lyre-playing stands among the familiar performances invoked against quietness. Socrates asks whether playing quickly is finer than playing slowly, and Charmides agrees. The passage uses a recognized skill to challenge a universal identification of temperance with quiet behavior. It does not offer an independent treatise on tempo or prove that every musical work should be played as fast as possible.

The lyre-master then appears beside the letter-master in the examples of understanding instruction. This links performance to a teachable art and provides a setting for the supposed fineness of quick comprehension. At 170c music receives a new philosophical role: one knows the harmonious by music, not by knowledge of knowledge. Its determinate content exemplifies why the general recognition that there is knowledge does not establish what someone knows.

The occurrences therefore connect education with epistemic specialization. Familiarity with a cultivated skill makes the earlier examples accessible, but the later distinction refuses to let unspecified intellectual authority substitute for the skill's own domain.

Places to read

1. 159cLyre-playing is used as an example in the refutation of quietness
2. 160aUnderstanding at the lyre-master’s exemplifies quick comprehension
3. 170cThe harmonious is known by music rather than by the higher-order knowledge alone

Translation in this edition

“Lyre” gives a readable name for the instrument-family without claiming that the text identifies a particular surviving instrument. “The harmonious” at 170c keeps the object distinct from the expertise that knows it.

ἁρμονικός

Attested: ἁρμονικὸν (harmonikon). The harmonious, or the domain of harmony; identifies the object of musical expertise. References: 170c. Lexical identification: lemma: ἁρμονικός. See Lyre and music.

κιθαρίζω

Attested: κιθαρίζειν (kitharizein). To play the lyre; a schoolroom skill in which quick performance is preferred to slow, quiet performance. References: 159c. Lexical identification: lemma: κιθαρίζω. See Lyre and music.

κιθαριστής

Attested: κιθαριστοῦ (kitharistou). The lyre teacher or master; his lessons join those of the letter-master as settings where quick understanding is praised. References: 160a. Lexical identification: lemma: κιθαριστής. See Lyre and music.

μουσική

Attested: μουσικῇ (mousikēi). Musical expertise; it knows what concerns harmony, a specific subject matter not supplied by knowledge of knowledge alone. References: 170c. Lexical identification: lemma: μουσική. See Lyre and music.

Use in the book

Alcibiades learned lyre-playing but refused the pipes (106e). At 108a–e2 Socrates combines accompanying a song on the lyre with singing and stepping at the correct time and to the right extent. Asked to name the art containing these actions, Alcibiades needs the clue of the Muses before identifying music. The exchange distinguishes possession of familiar accomplishments from the ability to articulate the standard governing them. “Musically” then provides the parallel to “gymnastically” in the search for what better war-making would be.

At 118c–d music teachers furnish examples of experts who can impart their knowledge. At 125c–e2 music reappears in a specifically directive form: pipers lead people in song and employ dancers, while chorus-training supplies the relevant ruling competence. This is why simply defining political excellence as ruling people who use other people fails. Coordinated human activity already occurs within a chorus.

At 129c–e2 the lyre-player and what he plays with exemplify the distinction between a user and instruments; the generalization extends to the hands and eyes with which craftsmen work. The musical art thus participates in three different arguments: correct performance, the organization of participants, and the difference between agent and means. These functions should not be merged into a claim that music itself supplies the political or self-directed knowledge under investigation.

Places to read

1. 106e–107a2Lyre lessons and refusal of pipes mark Alcibiades’ actual schooling
2. 108a–108e2Song, lyre, and step belong to the musical craft and its standard of correctness
3. 118c–118dThe lyre teacher illustrates transmissible expertise
4. 125c–125e2Chorus-training directs participants, testing a proposed description of civic rule
5. 129c–129e2The lyre-player is distinguished from instruments and bodily means

Translation in this edition

The edition's note explains that mousikē is wider than modern instrumental music alone. At 125d “the virtue of chorus-training” answers “the virtue of piloting”; suppressing the repeated excellence-language would weaken the comparison.

ᾄδω / ᾠδή

Attested: ᾄδειν (aidein; 108c); ᾠδῆς (ōidēs; 125d). At 108c: To sing correctly as part of music. At 125d: Song in which participants are directed by the chorus-training expertise. Lexical identification: family label: ᾄδω / ᾠδή. See Music and chorus-training.

αὐλέω / αὐλητής

Attested: αὐλεῖν (aulein; 106e); αὐλητῶν (aulētōn; 125c). At 106e: Playing the pipes, the subject Alcibiades refused to learn. At 125c: Pipers who lead song and employ dancers in the example of organized human activity. Lexical identification: family label: αὐλέω / αὐλητής. See Music and chorus-training.

βαίνω / ἐμβαίνω

Attested: ἐμβαίνειν (embainein; 108c). At 108c: To step correctly as part of the musical activity. Lexical identification: family label: βαίνω / ἐμβαίνω. See Music and chorus-training.

κιθαρίζω / κιθαριστής

Attested: κιθαρίζειν (kitharizein; 106e); κιθαριστὴς (kitharistēs; 129c). At 106e: Playing the lyre, a subject Alcibiades has learned. At 129c: The lyre-player distinguished from the things used in playing. Lexical identification: family label: κιθαρίζω / κιθαριστής. See Music and chorus-training.

μουσική / μουσικός

Attested: Μουσικήν (mousikēn; 108d); Μουσικῶς (mousikōs; 108d). At 108d: The Muses’ craft encompassing lyre, song, and step. At 108d: Musically, the manner of performing correctly according to this craft. Lexical identification: family label: μουσική / μουσικός. See Music and chorus-training.

χορευτής

Attested: χορευταῖς (choreutais; 125d). At 125d: Dancers or chorus members used by the leading performers. Lexical identification: lemma: χορευτής. See Music and chorus-training.

χοροδιδασκαλία / χοροδιδασκαλικός

Attested: Χοροδιδασκαλικὴ (chorodidaskalikē; 125d); χοροδιδασκαλία (chorodidaskalia; 125e). At 125d: The particular excellence governing coordinated choral performance. At 125e: Knowledge enabling direction of participants in song. Lexical identification: family label: χοροδιδασκαλία / χοροδιδασκαλικός. See Music and chorus-training.

Use in the book

The cultured lover makes philosophy a mark of personal standing. He rebukes Socrates for even asking an athlete’s opinion and declares, loudly before his beloved, that he would not consider himself a man if he thought philosophizing shameful. When asked what philosophy is, he answers with a verse of Solon. The answer shows literary resources at work, but possession of a quotation does not settle what follows from it. Socrates restates the claim as “much learning” and tests it by comparison with bodily training.

His culture is not depicted as wholly empty. He can follow questions, offer distinctions, and concede a point against his public interest. Yet it repeatedly serves comparison with others: he wants reputation, the appearance of accomplishment, and victory over his rival. The criticism falls on turning cultivation into a sufficient account of philosophy.

The article’s label must not settle disputed identity. The edition reports a later conditional suggestion that the unnamed speaker concerned with the pentathlete image could be Democritus. That external suggestion does not override the dialogue’s decision to leave its cultured interlocutor unnamed.

Places to read

1. 132dπερὶ μουσικὴν διατετριφώς — The narrator identifies the man’s sphere of cultivation.
2. 133cΤί δ’ ἄλλο γε ἢ κατὰ τὸ Σόλωνος; — His definition is introduced through the authority of a poet.

Translation in this edition

The note at 132d is brief but decisive: mousikē meant “poetry, song and letters, not music alone.” The introduction accordingly calls the man a lover of music and letters and sometimes “the musician.” Its interpretation should be kept distinct from details not supplied: no curriculum, teacher, instrument, or profession is given. The opening apparatus also records sophōteron, “wiser,” in T against sophōtaton, “wisest,” in B; Burnet’s edited text follows the comparative, strengthening the need to distinguish a claim to superiority from established wisdom.

Use in the book

The account of nature’s combination of opposites compares painting, music, and writing. Music joins high and low pitches and long and short durations into one harmony. The example presents contrast as a condition of ordered unity, with pitch and duration contributing different kinds of difference.

Places to read

1. I.40.1.58Music combines contrasting pitches and durations into harmony.

Translation in this edition

“Music” is sufficient here, provided pitch and duration remain distinct in the explanation.

Use in the book

The chiaroscuro note treats increasing and diminishing sound through gradations, shades and semitones as a musical art. Beaunier separately attributes a series of these notes to de Brosses; the lexicon must not erase that source layer. A reported judgment about modern music distinguishes better-made accompaniments from more beautiful airs, separating increased technique from beauty. Music may sound good without saying something, unlike verse in the explicit comparison. When music is placed in the soul, it marks the poetic quality distinguished from the just and wise quality called harmony.

Places to read

1. I, p. 321, entry 9, ¶1Musical gradation is compared with visual chiaroscuro.
2. II, p. 599, entry 8, ¶1Accompaniment technique is separated from the beauty of airs.
3. II, p. 654, entry 10, ¶1Music’s stated sufficiency differs from verse’s requirement to say something.
4. II, p. 746, entry 14, ¶1Music in the soul is specifically poetic.

Translation in this edition

The English translation renders bruit as sound in the musical-gradation context and preserves semitones and chiaroscuro. The historical report on music’s improvement remains attributed to some connoisseurs, not verified as a survey.

Use in the book

Its value cannot be separated from the life and relations it animates. In the dining-room memory, music accompanies the people whose presence converts dead splendour into enjoyment. The lesson later drawn concerns affection rather than luxurious entertainment alone.

Music also belongs among the arts whose relevance to felicity becomes visible through university learning. Traherne can thus criticize a child’s rattle being falsely magnified while preserving the larger discipline as a genuine good. The distinction turns on proportion and understanding. A pleasing sound becomes false wealth when it displaces greater goods; musical art becomes a treasure when its capacities are understood within the whole of human enjoyment.

Places to read

1. III.11A rattle’s supposed music exemplifies disproportionate valuation in childhood teaching.
2. III.22Music and dancing participate in the transformation of an empty room by living company.
3. III.36Music belongs among the disciplines later understood as serving felicity.

In this edition

Do not infer opposition to music from the criticism of the rattle. The text criticizes an educational valuation while explicitly retaining music among valuable arts.

Use in the book

The young René cultivates the Muses, and morning life is full of images and harmonies. Poets later appear as divinely gifted singers who join religion, laws and the dead in communal memory. Their gift offers an outward use of heightened feeling, although their practical childlikeness also limits the ideal.

The shepherd's melancholy song produces the claim that human song is sad even when it expresses happiness. René explains this through the heart as an instrument missing strings: joy must be sounded on the tones assigned to sighs. This is his generalization from an encounter, not a scientific account of all music. It captures the narrative's own mixing of delight and sorrow.

Sacred chant then participates in real communal practices. Amélie's profession and the convent's night prayers turn voices toward an altar and a common rhythm. René listens outside, mixing the fading canticles with the sea. His experience is both devotion and aesthetic transport. Hearing beautiful religion is consequential, but it does not yet establish the steadier life of service Souël demands.

Places to read

1. p. 144plein de pureté, d'images et d'harmonies — Youth is defined through receptive and creative plenitude.
2. p. 150qui chantent les dieux sur la lyre — Poetic song connects divinity to civic and memorial order.
3. p. 162une lyre où il manque des cordes — The incomplete instrument explains mixed affect.
4. p. 184les derniers sons des cantiques — René hears communal religious practice from outside its walls.

Translation in this edition

The source renders lyre and harp separately. David's harp, Ossian's harp and the heart's incomplete lyre should not be treated as the same literal instrument. Their comparisons work through shared music while preserving different traditions and functions.

Use in the book

Mon cœur mis à nu XCIII places its reflection on space after an aggressive opposition between art and sexual animality. The transition is abrupt: artistic cultivation, self-containment, number, and space stand together without a supplied chain of proof. The aphorism about all arts suggests shared formal powers, but the notebook names no philosophical authority for it.

Mon cœur mis à nu XCI joins wandering to the cult of multiplied sensation expressing itself in music and says to refer to Liszt. The reminder gives a direction for inquiry, not the title of a quoted work. The translator's note offers Liszt's writing about Romani music as context while leaving the intended reference open.

Fusées VIII's music digging into heaven gives a more imagistic companion to the abstract space-claim. One phrase produces depth by a physical action; the other describes an idea mediated by number. Read together, they present musical experience as an enlargement of perceived dimensions. They do not require collapsing each formulation into a single metaphysical scheme.

Places to read

1. Mon cœur mis à nu XCIIILa musique donne l’idée de l’espace. — The principal statement concerns an idea produced by music.
2. Mon cœur mis à nu XCIIIle nombre est une traduction de l’espace. — Translation becomes a metaphor for relations among forms.
3. Mon cœur mis à nu XCICulte de la sensation multipliée — Musical expression is placed beside intensified experience.
4. Fusées VIIILa Musique creuse le ciel. — A spatial action figures music’s power in Fusées.

Translation in this edition

‘Number’ retains the source's abstraction; the edition notes that its first occurrence in Mon cœur mis à nu XCIII is italicized and its repetition is not. ‘Bohemianism’ leaves open the relation of artistic wandering to the historical image invoked around Liszt. No theory of musical harmony or named school is added to fill the fragment's gaps. See notes 83 and 862.