on.

LACHES: Then examine for yourself, Socrates.

SOCRATES: That is what I am going to do, my dear friend. Do not,
however, suppose I shall let you out of the partnership; for I shall
expect you to apply your mind, and join with me in the consideration of
the question.

LACHES: I will if you think that I ought.

SOCRATES: Yes, I do; but I must beg of you, Nicias, to begin again. You
remember that we originally considered courage to be a part of virtue.

NICIAS: Very true.

SOCRATES: And you yourself said that it was a part; and there were many
other parts, all of which taken together are called virtue.

NICIAS: Certainly.

SOCRATES: Do you agree with me about the parts? For I say that justice,
temperance, and the like, are all of them parts of virtue as well as
courage. Would you not say the same?

NICIAS: Certainly.

SOCRATES: Well then, so far we are agreed. And now let us proceed a
step, and try to arrive at a similar agreement about the fearful and the
hopeful: I do not want you to be thinking one thing and myself another.
Let me then tell you my own opinion, and if I am wrong you shall set me
right: in my opinion the terrible and the hopeful are the things which
do or do not create fear, and fear is not of the present, nor of the
past, but is of future and expected evil. Do you not agree to that,
Laches?

LACHES: Yes, Socrates, entirely.

SOCRATES: That is my view, Nicias; the terrible things, as I should say,
are the evils which are future; and the hopeful are the good or not evil
things which are future. Do you or do you not agree with me?

NICIAS: I agree.

SOCRATES: And the knowledge of these things you call courage?

NICIAS: Precisely.

SOCRATES: And now let me see whether you agree with Laches and myself as
to a third point.

NICIAS: What is that?

SOCRATES: I will tell you. He and I have a notion that there is not one
knowledge or science of the past, another of the present, a third of
what is likely to be best and what will be best in the future; but
that of all three there is one science only: for example, there is one
science of medicine which is concerned with the inspection of health
equally in all times, present, past, and future; and one science of
husbandry in like manner, which is concerned with the productions of the
earth in all times. As to the art of the general, you yourselves will be
my witnesses that he has an excellent foreknowledge of the future, and
that he claims