Imagination is often at war with reason and fact. The concentration of the mind on a single object, or on a single aspect of human nature, overpowers the orderly perception of the whole. Yet the feelings too bring truths home to the minds of many who in the way of reason would be incapable of understanding them. Reflections of this kind may have been passing before Plato's mind when he describes the poet as inspired, or when, as in the Apology, he speaks of poets as the worst critics of their own writings—anybody taken at random from the crowd is a better interpreter of them than they are of themselves. They are sacred persons, 'winged and holy things' who have a touch of madness in their composition (Phaedr.), and should be treated with every sort of respect (Republic), but not allowed to live in a well-ordered state. Like the Statesmen in the Meno, they have a divine instinct, but they are narrow and confused; they do not attain to the clearness of ideas, or to the knowledge of poetry or of any other art as a whole.
In the Protagoras the ancient poets are recognized by Protagoras himself as the original sophists; and this family resemblance may be traced in the Ion. The rhapsode belongs to the realm of imitation and of opinion: he professes to have all knowledge, which is derived by him from Homer, just as the sophist professes to have all wisdom, which is contained in his art of rhetoric. Even more than the sophist he is incapable of appreciating the commonest logical distinctions; he cannot explain the nature of his own art; his great memory contrasts with his inability to follow the steps of the argument. And in his highest moments of inspiration he has an eye to his own gains.
The old quarrel between philosophy and poetry, which in the Republic leads to their final separation, is already working in the mind of Plato, and is embodied by him in the contrast between Socrates and Ion. Yet here, as in the Republic, Socrates shows a sympathy with the poetic nature. Also, the manner in which Ion is affected by his own recitations affords a lively illustration of the power which, in the Republic, Socrates attributes to dramatic performances over the mind of the performer. His allusion to his embellishments of Homer, in which he declares himself to have surpassed Metrodorus of Lampsacus and Stesimbrotus of Thasos, seems to show that, like them, he belonged to the allegorical school of interpreters. The circumstance that nothing more is known of him may be adduced in confirmation of the argument that this truly Platonic little work is not a forgery of later times.
Ion
Persons of the Dialogue: Socrates; Ion.
SOCRATES: Welcome, Ion. Are you from your native city of Ephesus?
ION: No, Socrates; but from Epidaurus, where I attended the festival of Asclepius.
SOCRATES: And do the Epidaurians have contests of rhapsodes at the festival?
ION: O yes; and of all sorts of musical performers.
SOCRATES: And were you one of the competitors—and did you succeed?
ION: I obtained the first prize of all, Socrates.
SOCRATES: Well done; and I hope that you will do the same for us at the Panathenaea.
ION: And I will, please heaven.
SOCRATES: I often envy the profession of a rhapsode, Ion; for you have always to wear fine clothes, and to look as beautiful as you can is a part of your art. Then, again, you are obliged to be continually in the company of many good poets; and especially of Homer, who is the best and most divine of them; and to understand him, and not merely learn his words by rote, is a thing greatly to be envied. And no man can be a rhapsode who does not understand the meaning of the poet. For the rhapsode ought to interpret the mind of the poet to his hearers, but how can he interpret him well unless he knows what he means? All this is greatly to be envied.
ION: Very true, Socrates; interpretation has certainly been the most laborious part of my art; and I believe myself able to speak about Homer better than any man; and that neither Metrodorus of Lampsacus, nor Stesimbrotus of Thasos, nor Glaucon, nor any one else who ever was, had as good ideas about Homer as I have, or as many.
SOCRATES: I am glad to hear you say so, Ion; I see that you will not refuse to acquaint me with them.
ION: Certainly, Socrates; and you really ought to hear how exquisitely I render Homer. I think that the Homeridae should give me a golden crown.
SOCRATES: I shall take an opportunity of hearing your embellishments of him at some other time. But just now I should like to ask you a question: Does your art extend to Hesiod and Archilochus, or to Homer only?
ION: To Homer only; he is in himself quite enough.
SOCRATES: Are there any things about which Homer and Hesiod agree?
ION: Yes; in my opinion there are a good many.
SOCRATES: And can you interpret better what Homer says, or what Hesiod says, about these matters in which they agree?
ION: I can interpret them equally well, Socrates, where they agree.
SOCRATES: But what about matters in which they do not agree?—for example, about divination, of which both Homer and Hesiod have something to say,—
ION: Very true:
SOCRATES: Would you or a good prophet be a better interpreter of what these two poets say about divination, not only when they agree, but when they disagree?
ION: A prophet.
SOCRATES: And if you were a prophet, would you not be able to interpret them when they disagree as well as when they agree?
ION: Clearly.
SOCRATES: But how did you come to have this skill about Homer only, and not about Hesiod or the other poets? Does not Homer speak of the same themes which all other poets handle? Is not war his great argument? and does he not speak of human society and of intercourse of men, good and bad, skilled and unskilled, and of the gods conversing with one another and with mankind, and about what happens in heaven and in the world below, and the generations of gods and heroes? Are not these the themes of which Homer sings?
ION: Very true, Socrates.
SOCRATES: And do not the other poets sing of the same?
ION: Yes, Socrates; but not in the same way as Homer.
SOCRATES: What, in a worse way?
ION: Yes, in a far worse.
SOCRATES: And Homer in a better way?
ION: He is incomparably better.
SOCRATES: And yet surely, my dear friend Ion, in a discussion about arithmetic, where many people are speaking, and one speaks better than the rest, there is somebody who can judge which of them is the good speaker?
ION: Yes.
SOCRATES: And he who judges of the good will be the same as he who judges of the bad speakers?
ION: The same.
SOCRATES: And he will be the arithmetician?
ION: Yes.
SOCRATES: Well, and in discussions about the wholesomeness of food, when many persons are speaking, and one speaks better than the rest, will he who recognizes the better speaker be a different person from him who recognizes the worse, or the same?
ION: Clearly the same.
SOCRATES: And who is he, and what is his name?
ION: The physician.
SOCRATES: And speaking generally, in all discussions in which the subject is the same and many men are speaking, will not he who knows the good know the bad speaker also? For if he does not know the bad, neither will he know the good when the same topic is being discussed.
ION: True.
SOCRATES: Is not the same person skilful in both?
ION: Yes.
SOCRATES: And you say that