bly.

Soc. Which is equally true of the others. (8) And that is just what
rouses my astonishment, that you who can cope so easily with these
lordly people (when guilty of ridicule) should persuade yourself that
you cannot stand up against a set of commoners. (9) My good fellow, do
not be ignorant of yourself! (10) do not fall into that commonest of
errors--theirs who rush off to investigate the concerns of the rest of
the world, and have no time to turn and examine themselves. Yet that is
a duty which you must not in cowardly sort draw back from: rather must
you brace ourself to give good heed to your own self; and as to public
affairs, if by any manner of means they may be improved through you, do
not neglect them. Success in the sphere of politics means that not only
the mass of your fellow-citizens, but your personal friends and you
yourself last but not least, will profit by your action.

(8) {oi eteroi}, i.e. "the foremost statesmen" mentioned before. Al.
"the opposite party," the "Tories," if one may so say, of the
political clubs.

(9) Lit. "those... these."

(10) Ernesti aptly cf. Cic. "ad Quint." iii. 6. See below, III. ix. 6;
IV. ii. 24.

VIII

Once when Aristippus (1) set himself to subject Socrates to a
cross-examination, such as he had himself undergone at the hands of
Socrates on a former occasion, (2) Socrates, being minded to benefit
those who were with him, gave his answers less in the style of a debater
guarding against perversions of his argument, than of a man persuaded of
the supreme importance of right conduct. (3)

(1) For Aristippus see above, p. 38; for the connection, {boulomenos
tous sunontas ophelein}, between this and the preceeding chapter,
see above, Conspectus, p. xxvi.

(2) Possibly in reference to the conversation above. In reference to
the present dialogue see Grote, "Plato," I. xi. p. 380 foll.

(3) For {prattein ta deonta} cf. below, III. ix. 4, 11; Plat. "Charm."
164 B; but see J. J. Hartman, "An. Xen." p. 141.

Aristippus asked him "if he knew of anything good," (4) intending in
case he assented and named any particular good thing, like food or
drink, or wealth, or health, or strength, or courage, to point out
that the thing named was sometimes bad. But he, knowing that if a thing
troubles us, we immediately want that which will put an end to our
trouble, answered precisely as it was best to do. (5)

(4) See Grote, "Plato," ii. 585