ad of sorrow at the sight of our friends'
misfortunes--is not that wrong?

PROTARCHUS: Undoubtedly.

SOCRATES: Did we not say that ignorance was always an evil?

PROTARCHUS: True.

SOCRATES: And the three kinds of vain conceit in our friends which we
enumerated--the vain conceit of beauty, of wisdom, and of wealth, are
ridiculous if they are weak, and detestable when they are powerful: May
we not say, as I was saying before, that our friends who are in this
state of mind, when harmless to others, are simply ridiculous?

PROTARCHUS: They are ridiculous.

SOCRATES: And do we not acknowledge this ignorance of theirs to be a
misfortune?

PROTARCHUS: Certainly.

SOCRATES: And do we feel pain or pleasure in laughing at it?

PROTARCHUS: Clearly we feel pleasure.

SOCRATES: And was not envy the source of this pleasure which we feel at
the misfortunes of friends?

PROTARCHUS: Certainly.

SOCRATES: Then the argument shows that when we laugh at the folly of our
friends, pleasure, in mingling with envy, mingles with pain, for envy
has been acknowledged by us to be mental pain, and laughter is pleasant;
and so we envy and laugh at the same instant.

PROTARCHUS: True.

SOCRATES: And the argument implies that there are combinations of
pleasure and pain in lamentations, and in tragedy and comedy, not only
on the stage, but on the greater stage of human life; and so in endless
other cases.

PROTARCHUS: I do not see how any one can deny what you say, Socrates,
however eager he may be to assert the opposite opinion.

SOCRATES: I mentioned anger, desire, sorrow, fear, love, emulation,
envy, and similar emotions, as examples in which we should find a
mixture of the two elements so often named; did I not?

PROTARCHUS: Yes.

SOCRATES: We may observe that our conclusions hitherto have had
reference only to sorrow and envy and anger.

PROTARCHUS: I see.

SOCRATES: Then many other cases still remain?

PROTARCHUS: Certainly.

SOCRATES: And why do you suppose me to have pointed out to you the
admixture which takes place in comedy? Why but to convince you that
there was no difficulty in showing the mixed nature of fear and love
and similar affections; and I thought that when I had given you the
illustration, you would have let me off, and have acknowledged as a
general truth that the body without the soul, and the soul without
the body, as well as the two united, are susceptible of all sorts of
admixtures of pleasures