Discourses - Book II   

benefit others, will speak skillfully: but he who is rather damaged by
speaking and does damage to others, will he be unskilled in this art
of speaking? And you may find that some are damaged and others
benefited by speaking. And are all who hear benefited by what they
hear? Or will you find that among them also some are benefited and
some damaged? "There are both among these also," he said. In this case
also, then, those who hear skillfully are benefited, and those who
hear unskillfully are damaged? He admitted this. Is there then a skill
in hearing also, as there is in speaking? "It seems so." If you
choose, consider the matter in this way also. The practice of music,
to whom does it belong? "To a musician." And the proper making of a
statue, to whom do you think that it belongs? "To a statuary." And the
looking at a statue skillfully, does this appear to you to require the
aid of no art? "This also requires the aid of art." Then if speaking
properly is the business of the skillful man, do you see that to
hear also with benefit is the business of the skillful man? Now as
to speaking and hearing perfectly, and usefully, let us for the
present, if you please, say no more, for both of us are a long way
from everything of the kind. But I think that every man will allow
this, that he who is going to hear philosophers requires some amount
of practice in hearing. Is it not so?
Tell me then about what I should talk to you: about what matter
are you able to listen? "About good and evil." Good and evil in
what? In a horse? "No." Well, in an ox? "No." What then? In a man?
"Yes." Do know then what a man is, what the notion is that we have
of him, or have we our ears in any degree practiced about this matter?
But do you understand what nature is? or can you even in any degree
understand me when I say, "I shall use demonstration to you?" How?
Do you understand this very thing, what demonstration is, or how
anything is demonstrated, or by what means; or what things are like
demonstration, but are not demonstration? Do you know what is true
or what is false? What is consequent on a thing, what is repugnant
to a thing, or not consistent, or inconsistent? But must I excite
you to philosophy, and how? Shall I show to you the repugnance in
the opinions of most men, through which they differ about things
good and evil, and about things which are profitable and unprofitable,
when you know not this very thing, what repugnance is? Show me then
what I shall accomplish by discoursing with you; excite my inclination
to do this. As the grass which is suitable, when it is presented to
a sheep, moves its inclination to eat, but if you present to it a
stone or bread, it will not be moved to eat; so there are in us
certain natural inclinations also to speak, when the hearer shall
appear to be somebody, when he himself shall excite us: but when he
shall sit by us like a stone or like grass, how can he excite a
man's desire? Does the vine say to the husbandman, "Take care of
me?" No, but the vine by showing in itself that it will be
profitable to the husbandman, if he does take care of it, invites
him to exercise care. When children are attractive and lively, whom do
they not invite to play with them, and crawl with them, and lisp
with them? But who is eager to play with an ass or to bray with it?