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13 - Phaedrus - Plato · The Philosophy Insights Collection

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  Section thirteen. Enough appears to have been said by us of a true and
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  false art of speaking, certainly, but there is something yet to be said
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  of propriety and impropriety of writing. Yes, do you know how you can
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  speak or act about rhetoric in a manner which will be acceptable to God?
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  No? Indeed, do you I have heard a tradition of the ancients?
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  Whether true or not? They only know, Although if we had found the
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  truth ourselves, do you think that we should care much about the opinions of
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  men? Your question needs no answer, But I wish that you would tell
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  me what you say that you have heard. At the Egyptian city of Naukratis
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  there was a famous old god whose name was Theuth. The bird which is
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  called the Ibis is sacred to him, and he was the inventor of many
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  arts, such as arithmetic and calculation, and geometry, and astronomy, and
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  drafts and dice. But his great discovery was the use of letters. Now,
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  in those days, the god Thamus was king of the whole country of
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  Egypt, and he dwelt in that great city of Upper Egypt, which the
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  Hellenes call Egyptian Thebes, and the god himself is called by them Ammon.
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  To him came youth and showed his inventions, desiring that the other Egyptians might
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  be allowed to have the benefit of them. He enumerated them, and Thamos
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  inquired about their several uses, and praised some of them and censured others,
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  as he approved or disapprov'd of them. It would take a long time to
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  repeat all that Thamos said to theuth in praise or blame of the various arts.
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  But when they came to letters, this said youth will make the Egyptians
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  wiser and give them better memories. It is a specific both for the memory
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  and for the wit. Thamos replied, oh, most ingenious youth, the
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  parent or inventor of an art is not always the best judge of the utility
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  or inutility of his own inventions to the users of them. And in this
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  instance, you, who are the father of letters, from a paternal love
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  of your own children, have been led to attribute to them a quality which
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  they cannot have. For this discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the learner's
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  souls, because they will not use their memories. They will trust to the
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  external written characters, and not remember of themselves. The specific which you have
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  discovered is an aid not to memory but to reminiscence. And you give your
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  disciples not truth, but only the semblance of truth. They will be the
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  hearers of many things and will have learned nothing. They will appear to be
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  omniscient, and will generally know nothing. They will be tiresome company, having
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  the show of wisdom without the reality. Yes, Socrates, you can easily
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  invent tales of Egypt or of any other country. There was a tradition in
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  the temple of Dodona that oaks first gave prophetic utterances. The men of old,
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  unlike in their simplicity to young philosophy, determined that if they heard the
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  truth, even from oak or rock, it was enough for them. Whereas
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  you seem to consider not whether a thing is or is not true, but
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  who the speaker is and from what country the tale comes. I acknowledge the
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  justice of your rebuke, and I think that the theban is writing his view
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  about letters. Hmm. He would be a very simple person, and quite
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  a stranger to the oracles of Thamos or Ammon. Who should leave in writing
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  or receive in writing any art under the idea that the written word would be
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  intelligible or certain, or who deemed that writing was at all better than knowledge
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  and recollection of the same matters. That is most true. I cannot help
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  feeling fightrus that writing is unfortunately like painting, For the creations of the painter
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  have the attitude of life, and yet if you ask them a question,
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  they preserve a solemn silence. And the same may be said of speeches.
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  You would imagine that they had intelligence. But if you want to know anything
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  and put a question to one of them, the speaker always gives one unvarying
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  answer. And when they have been once written down, they are tumbled about
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  anywhere among those who may or may not understand them, and know not to
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  whom they should reply, to whom not. And if they are maltreated or
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  abused, they have no parent to protect them, and they cannot protect or
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  defend themselves. That again is most true. Is there not another kind of
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  word or speech far better than this, and having far greater power? A
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  son of the same family, but lawfully begotten. Whom do you mean and
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  what is his origin? I mean an intelligent word graven in the soul of
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  the learner, which can defend itself, and knows when to speak and when
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  to be silent. You mean the living word of knowledge, which has a
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  soul, and of which the written word is properly no more than an image.
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  Yes, of course, that is what I mean. And now may
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  I be allowed to ask you a question. Would a husbandman who is a
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  man of sense take the seeds which he values and which he wishes to bear
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  fruit, and in sober seriousness plant them during the heat of summer in some
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  garden of a dunis, that he may rejoice when he sees them in eight
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  days appearing in beauty. At least, he would do so, if at
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  all only for the sake of amusement and pastime. But if he is in
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  earnest, he sows in fitting soil and practices husbandry, and is satisfied if
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  in eight months the seeds which he has sown arrive at perfection. Yes,
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  Socrates, that will be his way. When he is in earnest, he
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  will do the other, as you say, only in play. And can
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  we suppose that he who knows the just and good and honorable has less understanding
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  than the husbandman about his own seeds? Certainly not? Then he will not
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  seriously incline to write his thoughts in water with pen and ink, sowing words
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  which can neither speak for themselves nor teach the truth adequately to others. No,
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  that is not likely. No, that is not likely. In the
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  garden of letters he will sow and plant, but only for the sake of
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  recreation and amusement. He will write them down as memorials, to be treasured
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  against the forgetfulness of old age, by himself or by any other old man
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  who is treading the same path. He will rejoice in beholding their tender growth,
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  And while others are refreshing their souls with banqueting and the like, this
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  will be the past time in which his days are spent. A pastime Socrates,
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  as noble as the other is ignoble. The pastime of a man who
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  can be amus'd by serious talk, and can discourse merrily about justice and the
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  like. True, fidrous, but nobler far is the serious pursuit of the
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  dialectician, who, finding a congenial soul by the help of science. Souls
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  and plants therein words which are able to help themselves and him who planted them,
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  and are not unfruitful, but have in them a seed which others brought
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  up indifferent soils render immortal, making the possessors of it happy to the utmost
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  extent of human happiness. Far Lobler certainly. End of Section thirteen.