CHAPTER XXXI
The rest of the poem is now expounded and the theory that no
man sins willingly discovered in it.
3.
δηλοῖ (sc.
εἰρημένα) is used as in Soph.
Ant. 242
δηλοῖς δ᾽
ὥς τι σημανῶν κακόν.
5.
κενεάν goes proleptically with
μοῖραν αἰῶνος.
7.
πανάμωμον ἄνθρωπον in apposition to
τὸ μὴ γενέσθαι
δυνατόν. Krosche compares Semonid. Amorg.
πάμπαν δ᾽ ἄμωμος
οὔτις οὐδ᾽ ἀκήριος (Frag. 4).
εὐρυεδοῦς ὅσοι—χθονός.
Hom. Il. VI. 142 βροτῶν οἳ
ἀρούρης καρπὸν ἔδουσιν,
Hom. Od. II. 14. 10 ‘quicumque terrae
munere vescimur’ (Heindorf).
9.
ἐπί θ᾽ ὑμῖν εὑρὼν ἀπαλλελέω: after Bergk's emendation for the
ἔπειθ᾽ ὑμῖν of the MSS., which cannot be made to
scan: see Appendix I, p. 217. It might be possible (in view
especially of
φησίν in the next line) to regard
ἔπειτα here as no
part of the poem, were it not for
346D where it must be part.
ἐπί θ᾽ ὑμῖν is the most probable of the many emendations proposed and accounts by far the most easily for the reading of the
MSS.
ἐπί is to be taken with
εὑρών, and
τε is like the quasignomic
τε in Homer, e.g.
Il. I. 218 ὅς κε θεοῖς ἐπιπείθηται, μάλα
τ᾽ ἔκλυον αὐτοῦ. Translate ‘“trust me, I will tell you when I've
found your man”, says he’.
ὑμῖν (a kind of ethic dative) does
not belong so much to
ἀπαλλελέω as to
ἐφευρών. What Simonides
himself wrote was no doubt
ἐπί τ᾽ ὔμμιν (availing himself of the
Aeolic form as in the next line); this Plato put in Attic as
ἐπί θ᾽
ὑμῖν, from which to
ἔπειθ᾽ ὑμῖν the step was easy. Sauppe's
ἐπὶ
δή μιν εὑρών and Kroschel's
ἐπεὶ οὔτιν᾽ εὑρών are hardly happy.
10.
φησίν applies only to the last line: the former
φησὶ γάρ
covers the first sentence.
12.
πάντας ὅστις: so below in l. 16
ὥστε τούτους φάναι ἐπαινεῖν ὃς ἄν and in l. 23
ὃς ἂν—τούτων: see also note on
319D
14.
ἀνάγκῃ δ᾽ οὐδὲ θεοὶμάχονται. Proverbial: cf.
Laws, VII.
818B
ἔοικεν ὁ τὸν θεὸν πρῶτον παροιμιασάμενος—εἰπεῖν ὡς οὐδὲ
θεὸς ἀνάγκῃ μή ποτε φανῇ μαχόμενος. Aars quotes the words of
Agamemnon in
Il. XIX. 86 ἐγὼ δ᾽ οὐκ αἴτιός εἰμι, ἀλλὰ Ζεὺς καὶ
Μοῖρα καὶ ἠεροφοῖτις Ἐρινύς.
17.
ὃς ἂν ἑκὼν—ποιῇ: but
ἑκὼν ὅστις ἕρδῃ without
ἄν above,
as often in poetry: Goodwin,
M.T. p. 208, § 540.
19.
οὐδεὶς τῶν σοφῶν—ἑκόντα ἐξαμαρτάνειν. The
doctrine that no one sins willingly—a corollary of the view that
vice is only ignorance—is characteristic of the ethical teaching
both of Socrates and Plato (compare note on
324Aand on
Euthyphr. 2C), but not of all Greek sages, and it is only by the
most perverse sophistry that Socrates here reads it into
Simonides, ignoring entirely the words
ἀνάγκῃ δ᾽ οὐδὲ θεοὶ
μάχονται.
23.
καὶ δὴ καί: see on
343Babove.
26.
καλὸν κἀγαθόν: see on
Apol. 21D.
27.
καὶ ἐπαινέτην. The words
φιλεῖν καὶ ἐπαινεῖν which
follow in the MSS. were ejected by Heindorf.
28.
μητέρα ἢ πατέρα ἀλλόκοτον. Sauppe remarks that from
Homer onwards
μήτηρ generally comes first in such enumerations—an interesting survival, perhaps, of the greater importance assigned to the mother in primitive Greece.
ἀλλόκοτον
(‘eccentric’ as in
Rep. VI. 487D) from
ἄλλος (in its sinister sense)
and
κότος (i.q.
τρόπος, ἦθος, ὀργή) according to Phrynichus
(quoted by Kroschel).
29.
ἢ πατρίδα: see
Crito, 50E-51C.
34.
ἔτι μᾶλλον: not =
μᾶλλον ἢ κατ᾽ ἀξίαν, but—as is
presently explained—because they ‘add voluntary feuds to those
which they cannot avoid’.
36.
ἀναγκαίαις: Heusde's correction for
ἀνάγκαις of MSS.
ἐπικρύπτεσθαι—ἀναγκάζεσθαι. Plato is probably thinking of Socrates after his trial as he depicts him in the
Crito.
ἀναγκάζεσθαι ‘are constrained’ is of course passive.
39.
παραμυθεῖσθαι, like
mulcere, as often. Sauppe quotes
Hor.
Epod. XIII. 18 ‘deformis aegrimoniae dulcibus
alloquiis’.
41.
ἡγήσατο—ἀναγκαζόμενος: ‘believed—that he had
praised, etc.’ Plato deals a sly thrust at Simonides' notorious
avarice, as Pindar (quoted by Sauppe) does in
Isthm. 11. 6
ἁ
Μοῖσα γὰρ οὐ φιλοκερδής πω τότ᾽ ἦν οὐδ᾽ ἐργάτις. The words
ἀλλ᾽
ἀναγκαζόμενος contain the sting; for the life of the
χρηματιστής
is
βίαιος (Ar.
Eth. Nic. 1. 3. 1096
a. 5).
46.
ἔμοιγ᾽ ἐξαρκεῖ κτλ. See Appendix I, pp. 214 ff. for the
arrangement of this part of the poem.
48.
γ᾽ ὀνησίπολιν. The MSS. read
γ᾽ ὀνήσει πόλιν, which
G. Hermann emended to
τ᾽ ὀνησίπολιν, Bergk to
ὀνασίπολιν.
49.
οὐ μήν: so the MSS., and so, most probably, Plato; but
Simonides can hardly have written this, which will not scan;
see Appendix I, p. 217.
51.
οὐ γάρ εἰμι φιλόμωμος probably belongs to an earlier
part of the poem (before
ἔμοιγ᾽ ἐξαρκεῖ: cf.
οὐ διὰ ταῦτά σε
ψέγω, ὅτι εἰμὶ φιλόψογος in line 45): see Appendix I, p. 217.
53.
γενέθλα is Stephanus' correction for
γένεθλα of the MSS.,
a mistake due to supposing that
ἀπείρων (not from
ἄπειρος) went
with
ἠλιθίων: it belongs to
γενέθλα.
56.
πάντα τοι καλά—μέμικται sums up the whole moral
teaching of the poem.
60.
καὶ οὐ ζητῶ κτλ. Socrates recapitulates part of the
poem by way of interpreting the final text: see note on
τὸ δ᾽
ἐστὶν γενέσθαι κτλ. in
344Eabove and Appendix I, p. 214.
62.
τούτου γ᾽ ἕνεκα: ‘si hoc spectetur s. requiratur,
τὸ πανάμωμον εἶναι’ (Heindorf): cf.
Phaed. 85B
ἀλλὰ τούτου γ᾽ ἕνεκα
λέγειν τε χρὴ καὶ ἐρωτᾶν ὅ τι ἂν βούλησθε. The sense is: if I must
wait for perfection before beginning to praise, I shall never
praise anyone.
66.
ὡς πρὸς Πιττακὸν λέγων: not serious, of course, nor
true.
67.
διαλαβεῖν: i.e. make a division, ‘pause’, virtually ‘punctuate’. The editors compare the use of
διαστίξαι in Ar.
Rhet. III.
5. 1407
b. 14
τὰ γὰρ Ἡρακλείτου διαστίξαι ἔργον διὰ τὸ ἄδηλον
εἶναι ποτέρω̣ πρόσκειται.
68.
ἄκων δ᾽ ἔστιν οὕς: see on
344B
70.
νῦν δὲ—σφόδρα γάρ. Cf.
Apol. 38B νῦν δὲ—οὐ γὰρ ἔστιν
and note
in loc. Here
διὰ ταῦτα sums up the clause
σφόδρα γὰρ—
λέγειν.