Few Are The Worthy Disciples of Philosophy According to Socrates

The worthy disciples of philosophy are few in number.

Some are well-educated nobles who live afar off because they were exiled.

Some are lofty souls who condemn and neglect politics but live undetected because of the madness of the multitude.

Some are gifted but renounce their arts and despise those very arts for philosophy's sake.

Some pursue philosophy because ill-health checks them and keeps them away from politics.

They know that no politician is honest.

They know there is no champion of justice at whose side they may fight and be saved.

They will not join in the wickedness of their fellows, who act like animals and beasts.

They know they cannot resist all these single-handedly, so they hold their peace, and go their own way.

The worthy disciple of philosophy is like one who, in the storm of dust and sleet which the driving wind hurries along, retires under the shelter of a wall.

He is content, if only he can live his own life and be pure from evil or unrighteousness, and depart in peace and good-will, with bright hopes.

For many are called, but few are chosen

"[T]he worthy disciples of philosophy will be but a small remnant."

-- Socrates, Plato's Republic, Book 6

πάνσμικρον δή τι, ἔφην ἐγώ, ὦ Ἀδείμαντε, λείπεται τῶν κατ᾽ ἀξίαν ὁμιλούντων φιλοσοφίᾳ

"Because strait [is] the gate, and narrow [is] the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."

-- Matthew 7:14

 ὅτί στενὴ ἡ πύλη καὶ τεθλιμμένη ἡ ὁδὸς ἡ ἀπάγουσα εἰς τὴν ζωήν, καὶ ὀλίγοι εἰσὶν οἱ εὑρίσκοντες αὐτήν

Socrates on Obama

"[W]eak natures are scarcely capable of any very great good or very great evil."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6 

Socrates on Democracy

"[T]he corruption of the majority is also unavoidable."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Socrates on Election Campaigns

"The ruler who is good for anything ought not to beg his subjects to be ruled by him."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Socrates on Pleasure

"A true philosopher . . . will hardly feel bodily pleasure."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

"A prophet is not without honour, but in his own country."

"[P]hilosophers have no honour in their cities . . . their having honour would be far more extraordinary. ... [T]he best votaries of philosophy [are] useless to the rest of the world."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

The Philosophical Observer

"[H]e who has magnificence of mind and is the spectator of all time and all existence, [cannot] think much of human life."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Philosophical Minds Always Love Knowledge Which Shows Them The Eternal Nature

"[H]e whose nature is amorous of anything cannot help loving all that belongs or is akin to the object of his affections."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Antonyms To Ponder This Day

". . . the great conflict between the ironic mind and the literal mind, the experimental and the dogmatic, the tolerant and the fanatical . . .."

Seen here.

Garry Wills: Public Intellectual, Ideologue, Leftist, Utopian, But Above All, Anachronist

Mr. James Bowman strikes a blow for historicism, here:

In short, “Shakespeare looks below and behind the poses of honor with which this play is filled. The vices of Rome poison even the traces of nobility left in friendship.” This is a familiar point of view to us, but it would not have been to Shakespeare’s contemporaries, who took the ancient idea of honor very seriously. It is possible, of course, that Shakespeare anticipated a point of view that was not common until three centuries after his death, but I don’t think Mr. Wills is well-advised simply to take that for granted.

Yet taking such things for granted is more or less the stock in trade of the public intellectual. The scholar tells us how people of the past thought; the intellectual takes that thought and attempts to fit it anachronistically into an ideological system very much of the present day.