苏格拉底讲述时间的故事

Furthermore, Socrates sees imitative poetry as appealing to the inferior, irrational part of the soul, rather than the nobler, rational part of the soul, the part more concerned with truth (605a-605b). “Poetic imitation… establishes [desires, pleasures, and pains] as rulers in us when they ought to wither and be ruled” by the rational part of the soul, “for that way we’ll become better and happier rather than worse and more wretched” (606d).

Socrates also views poetry as playing a harmful role in the upbringing of the young of a society, which should always be aimed at truth. The “opinions [children] absorb at that age are hard to erase and apt to become unalterable. For these reasons, then, we should probably take the utmost care to insure that the first stories they hear about virtue are the best ones for them to hear” (378d-378e), rather than stories that give “a bad” —and untrue— “image of what the gods and heroes are like” (377d) and falsely imply that “committing the worst crimes” is “doing the same as the first and greatest of the gods” (378b).

Although he holds imitative poetry and truth as mutually exclusive, Socrates uses many allegories and myths throughout The Republic: the metaphor of the cave in Book VII, the three comparisons in Book VI involving the ship, the sun and the broken line, the image of the multi-headed beast in Book IX, and the Myth of Er in Book X to name a few. Socrates is not exaggerating when he calls himself “greedy for images” (488a). Such heavy use of images like these, when considered in light of his distrust of poetry, may seem to be another contradiction on the part of Socrates. However, a closer examination of the style and intention of these stories shows us that these stories actually do not possess the qualities of imitative poetry discussed previously and that Socrates is justified in using them.

First, we should consider the intention behind all of these images. While all the poetry Socrates denounces is said to consort “with a part of us that is far from reason” (603a), Socrates’ images all serve to elucidate his arguments; they appeal to the rational part of the soul and, therefore, truth. The “image of the soul in words” is fashioned so that the listeners “will know” the truth (588c), and the sun simile is the “child and offspring of the good”. In fact, Socrates takes care that he doesn’t “somehow deceive [his listeners] unintentionally” (507a). These stories are a significant departure from the type of poetry discussed earlier and are completely consistent with Socrates’ ideal of truth in all things.

Secondly, it is important to consider the style in which Socrates’ stories are written: imitative or narrative. All of the poetry that Socrates finds objectionable is of the imitative type, written in the first person. Socrates’ images, on the other hand, are all written in the third person, keeping them safely within the realm of narrative poetry discussed from 392d to 395a. The exception to this is the Myth of Er, which does contain dialogue spoken by several disembodied souls. The soul speaking from 615d to 616a speaks in the narrative style itself, therefore not violating the restrictions on the imitative style. The Speaker who talks from 617d to 617e and in 619b does not speak in the narrative style, however. This problem can be solved, however, by considering 396c-396d, which suggests that it is acceptable to “imitate [a] good man… when he’s acting in a faultless and intelligent manner,” which the Speaker in the Myth of Er certainly is as he addresses the congregation of souls. The same argument can account for The Republic itself, the entire body of which is spoken only by Socrates in a very rational, levelheaded manner.

It is clear that what Socrates values is not simple factual accuracy, but the ability to cultivate truth in the long term on both the personal and societal levels. It is to these ends that the conditions in his imaginary city and the dialogue between the characters in The Republic itself aim. When we realize this, we see that Plato, in writing The Republic, wanted to instill in us the same values – he wants us to be philosophers.