Key Arguments

• Temperance consists chiefly in obedience to commanders and self-control in sensual pleasures; thus approve Homeric lines modeling disciplined obedience.
• Insulting rulers (‘eyes of a dog … heart of a stag’) may amuse but undermines temperance in youth and so must be banned.
• Verses praising lavish feasting and fearing hunger cultivate appetitive excess, not self-mastery.
• Myths of Zeus’s overpowering lust and Hephaestus chaining Ares and Aphrodite normalize intemperance; such stories should not be heard by the young.
• By contrast, tales and deeds of endurance should be seen and heard to habituate steadfastness.

Source Quotes

Certainly. Are not the chief elements of temperance, speaking generally, obedience to commanders and self-control in sensual pleasures? True.

True. Then we shall approve such language as that of Diomede in Homer, 'Friend, sit still and obey my word,' and the verses which follow, 'The Greeks marched breathing prowess, … in silent awe of their leaders,' and other sentiments of the same kind. We shall.

We shall. What of this line, 'O heavy with wine, who hast the eyes of a dog and the heart of a stag,' and of the words which follow? Would you say that these, or any similar impertinences which private individuals are supposed to address to their rulers, whether in verse or prose, are well or ill spoken?

Yes. And then, again, to make the wisest of men say that nothing in his opinion is more glorious than 'When the tables are full of bread and meat, and the cup-bearer carries round wine which he draws from the bowl and pours into the cups,' is it fit or conducive to temperance for a young man to hear such words? Or the verse 'The saddest of fates is to die and meet destiny from hunger?'

Or the verse 'The saddest of fates is to die and meet destiny from hunger?' What would you say again to the tale of Zeus, who, while other gods and men were asleep and he the only person awake, lay devising plans, but forgot them all in a moment through his lust, and was so completely overcome at the sight of Here that he would not even go into the hut, but wanted to lie with her on the ground, declaring that he had never been in such a state of rapture before, even when they first met one another 'Without the knowledge of their parents;' or that other tale of how Hephaestus, because of similar goings on, cast a chain around Ares and Aphrodite? Indeed, he said, I am strongly of opinion that they ought not to hear that sort of thing.

Indeed, he said, I am strongly of opinion that they ought not to hear that sort of thing. But any deeds of endurance which are done or told by famous men, these they ought to see and hear; as, for example, what is said in the verses, 'He smote his breast, and thus reproached his heart, Endure, my heart; far worse hast thou endured!' Certainly, he said.

Key Concepts

• Are not the chief elements of temperance, speaking generally, obedience to commanders and self-control in sensual pleasures?
• 'Friend, sit still and obey my word,'
• 'The Greeks marched breathing prowess, … in silent awe of their leaders,'
• 'O heavy with wine, who hast the eyes of a dog and the heart of a stag,'
• 'When the tables are full of bread and meat, and the cup-bearer carries round wine which he draws from the bowl and pours into the cups,'
• he would not even go into the hut, but wanted to lie with her on the ground, declaring that he had never been in such a state of rapture before, even when they first met one another 'Without the knowledge of their parents;'
• 'He smote his breast, and thus reproached his heart, Endure, my heart; far worse hast thou endured!'

Context

Book III: Positive and negative curriculum for sôphrosynê through selective approval and exclusion of Homeric material.

Perspectives

Plato

Fashions mousikê to subordinate appetite to reason and law; poetry should model obedience and endurance.

Socrates

Chooses exempla that train youths to revere command and restrain appetite, removing subversive or hedonistic scripts.