[654a]
and lead our choirs, linking us one with another by means of songs and dances; and to the choir they have given its name from the “cheer” implanted therein.1 Shall we accept this account to begin with, and postulate that education owes its origin to Apollo and the Muses?Clinias
Yes.Athenian
Shall we assume that the uneducated man is without choir-training,
[654b]
and the educated man fully choir-trained?Clinias
Certainly.Athenian
Choir-training, as a whole, embraces of course both dancing and song.Clinias
Undoubtedly.Athenian
So the well-educated man will be able both to sing and dance well.Clinias
Evidently.Athenian
Let us now consider what this last statement of ours implies.Clinias
Which statement?Athenian
Our words are,—” he sings well and dances well”:
[654c]
ought we, or ought we not, to add,—“provided that he sings good songs and dances good dances”?Clinias
We ought to add this.Athenian
How then, if a man takes the good for good and the bad for bad and treats them accordingly? Shall we regard such a man as better trained in choristry and music when he is always able both with gesture and voice to represent adequately that which he conceives to be good, though he feels neither delight in the good nor hatred of the bad,—or when, though not wholly able to represent his conception rightly by voice and gesture,
[654d]
he yet keeps right in his feelings of pain and pleasure, welcoming everything good and abhorring everything not good.Clinias
There is a vast difference between the two cases, Stranger, in point of education.Athenian
If, then, we three understand what constitutes goodness in respect of dance and song, we also know who is and who is not rightly educated but without this knowledge we shall never be able to discern whether there exists any safeguard for education
[654e]
or where it is to be found. Is not that so?Clinias
It is.Athenian
What we have next to track down, like hounds on the trail, is goodness of posture and tunes in relation to song and dance; if this eludes our pursuit, it will be in vain for us to discourse further concerning right education, whether of Greeks or of barbarians.Clinias
Yes.Athenian
Well then, however shall we define goodness of posture or of tune? Come, consider: when a manly soul is beset by troubles,
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Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vols. 10 & 11 translated by R.G. Bury. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1967 & 1968.
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