Introduction
The Clitophon is a curious little thing. It is unusually brief and, at first blush, unusually critical of Socrates. Its peculiarity has led some to doubt its authenticity and others to ignore it altogether. In fact, as I hope to show, its brevity belies its sophistication. A close reading of the Clitophon reveals a subtle text which dramatises and scrutinises one particular (erroneous) way of engaging with Socrates and Socratic methodology.
Three issues dominate scholarship on the Clitophon. The first is its authenticity.Footnote 1 This seems to have gone undoubted in antiquity.Footnote 2 More recently, it has been doubted on philological and stylistic grounds. It is now, at the very least, generally accepted as a genuine product of the fourth century BC, written in a style remarkably close to Plato's own.Footnote 3 Indeed, the consensus is that there are no compelling philological reasons for denying that Plato wrote the Clitophon.Footnote 4
The second issue is the nature of the relationship between the Clitophon and Plato's Republic or, more specifically, Republic 1.Footnote 5 That there is some relation between the two texts is clear: Clitophon, son of Aristonymus, has a brief speaking part in Republic 1. There he appears as an associate of Thrasymachus, with whom he is also associated in the Clitophon itself. The main concern here is whether the Clitophon is drawing on the Republic or vice versa.Footnote 6 One suggestion is that Republic 1 is an expansion or reworking of the Clitophon.Footnote 7
The third issue is the so-called ‘Riddle of the Clitophon’.Footnote 8 Why does it end as it does? The dialogue opens with Socrates' claim that someone has told him that Clitophon has been criticising his encounters with Socrates and praising his engagement with Thrasymachus. The bulk of the text is taken up by Clitophon's clarification and justification of his opinion of Socrates. Clitophon concludes (410e5–8) that Socrates is marvellously useful for exhorting people to care about virtue. However, for those who have come to care about virtue and who now wish to pursue it, Socrates is not merely useless, he is actually a hindrance. The question here is why Socrates offers no defence against this charge of obstruction. Is the Clitophon a seriously intended attack on Socrates?Footnote 9 Is it the case that some defence was intended but that the text is unfinished?Footnote 10 Or is the content of the criticism so slight that no defence is considered necessary?Footnote 11
These three issues are clearly connected. If one thinks the Clitophon to be a serious attack on Socrates, one may be rather less inclined to think that it is by Plato.Footnote 12 If it is an unfinished draft, lacking the intended defence and abandoned in favour of Republic 1, then it is, of course, by the author of Republic 1. All three of these issues will feature in the discussion of the Clitophon below. My main concern, however, is to answer the riddle. Why does Socrates offer no defence?
In the course of trying to answer this question, I will focus on an aspect of the Clitophon that seems to have been overlooked, namely the way that Clitophon presents himself and his engagement with Socrates. Discussions of this dialogue tend to focus on the accuracy of the content of Clitophon's criticisms. Although I do have something to say about the content, my main concern is with the form of his critique. There is, I think, something suspicious about Clitophon's representation of Socrates and, further, about his representation of himself as someone au fait with Socratic methodology. Towards the end of the dialogue (410c6–8), Clitophon states that his experiences with Socrates have brought him to aporia. He says that, because Socrates has offered no satisfactory answers about the nature of justice, he finds himself with no choice but to go to Thrasymachus. In fact, as I will argue, Clitophon's proclamation of aporia is misguided, based as it is on a misunderstanding of Socratic methodology. It is a pseudo-aporia that results from the pseudo-elenchus in which Clitophon has been engaged. The Clitophon is not a Socratic dialogue, it is a pseudo-Socratic dialogue. This need not, of course, imply that it is also pseudo-Platonic.
In assessing the justice of his critique, some scholars have assumed that Clitophon acts as a mouthpiece for the author of the Clitophon. Thus Clitophon and the Clitophon stand or fall as one. If Clitophon's criticisms are fair, then the Clitophon, as the vehicle of those criticisms, can be deemed a success. If Clitophon misses the mark, so too does the Clitophon. The worry that Clitophon might be misrepresenting Socrates has added fuel to the fire of those agitating against its authenticity. For if Clitophon's clumsy attack on Socrates represents the views of the author, then that author surely cannot be Plato.Footnote 13 There is, of course, an alternative position: the voice of the character Clitophon can be divorced from that of its author.Footnote 14 I will argue that the author of the Clitophon intends Clitophon to be recognised as an example of one type of person who misunderstands Socrates.Footnote 15 In the most extensive treatment of the Clitophon to date, Slings argues that it is an attack on a genre of explicit Socratic protreptic and a defence of the implicit protreptic of the Socratic elenctic dialogue. I think that there is another implicit/explicit dichotomy at work here. The explicit criticism of Socrates should be read as implicitly critical of people like Clitophon.Footnote 16
In what follows I will argue that Clitophon's interest in Socrates seems to be motivated more by his desire to find a source of authority than by his interest in personal intellectual engagement with what Socrates has to say. I will demonstrate that Clitophon habitually misrepresents and misunderstands Socrates, just as he seems to misunderstand another possible source of authority, Thrasymachus, in the Republic. As someone who just wants to be told what to think, Clitophon is not an appropriate interlocutor for Socrates, for all that he may proclaim himself to be an expert in Socrates and his views. I will conclude that Clitophon is presented as an example of the kind of young man who goes to Socrates (or Thrasymachus vel sim.) looking for straightforward answers and who fails to see that philosophical progress requires engaging oneself and one's own beliefs in elenctic discussion.
There is a warning here. If one attempts to engage with Socrates in a certain way, one will inevitably end up in the pseudo-aporetic impasse in which Clitophon finds himself. In conclusion, I will suggest that, once we recognise the implicit criticism of Clitophon within the dialogue, the grounds for doubting its authenticity seem to fall away.
Reportage and interpretation in the Clitophon
The opening of the Clitophon is typically idiosyncratic:Footnote 17
Κλειτοφῶντα τὸν Ἀριστωνύμου τις ἡμῖν διηγεῖτο ἔναγχος, ὅτι Λυσίαι διαλεγόμενος τὰς μὲν μετὰ Σωκράτους διατριβὰς ψέγοι, τὴν Θρασυμάχου δὲ συνουσίαν ὑπερεπαινοῖ.Footnote 18
Someone recently filled us in about Clitophon, son of Aristonymus, that, in conversation with Lysias, he criticised the times he had spent with Socrates, but was full of praise for his discussion with Thrasymachus.
Rather than being addressed with the vocative most frequently found at the opening of a Platonic dialogue, Clitophon is named in the accusative, as the subject of some other reported conversation.Footnote 19 Socrates refers to himself with the formal plural (ἡμῖν) and, more strikingly, in the third person (Σωκράτους).Footnote 20 It is not immediately clear who is speaking, nor to whom.Footnote 21 It is only through Clitophon's response that we learn that he has been addressed by Socrates. This gambit is illustrative of the Clitophon's general theme of the dangers and difficulties of reporting and interpreting the views of others. This theme is clear not just in the form of the opening, but in its content. For Socrates' introduction is a report (by Socrates) of a report (by some anonymous source, τις) of a conversation Clitophon has had with Lysias about Socrates and Thrasymachus.Footnote 22 Clitophon's response makes clear the dangers of relying on hearsay:
ὅστις, ὦ Σώκρατες, οὐκ ὀρθῶς ἀπεμνημόνευέ σοι τοὺς ἐμοὶ περὶ σοῦ γενομένους λόγους πρὸς Λυσίαν· τὰ μὲν γὰρ ἔγωγε οὐκ ἐπήινουν σε, τὰ δὲ καὶ ἐπήινουν. ἐπεὶ δὲ δῆλος εἶ μεμφόμενος μέν μοι, προσποιούμενος δὲ μηδὲν φροντίζειν, ἥδιστ' ἄν σοι διεξέλθοιμι αὐτοὺς αὐτός, ἐπειδὴ καὶ μόνω τυγχάνομεν ὄντες, ἵνα ἧττόν με ἡγῆι πρὸς σὲ φαύλως ἔχειν. νῦν γὰρ ἴσως οὐκ ὀρθῶς ἀκήκοας, ὥστε φαίνει πρὸς ἐμὲ ἔχειν τραχυτέρως τοῦ δέοντος εἰ δέ μοι δίδως παρρησίαν, ἥδιστα ἂν δεξαίμην καὶ ἐθέλω λέγειν.Footnote 23
Someone, Socrates, who gave a false report to you of what was said by me about you to Lysias. For I didn't praise some things about you, but some I did. But since you are clearly taking issue with me, whilst pretending not to mind, I shall gladly spell things out for you, especially since we are alone, so that you'll be less inclined to believe that I think poorly of you. For at present you have perhaps not heard an accurate account, so that you seem to be harder on me than I deserve. But, if you grant me freedom of speech, I'll gladly take it since I want to tell you.
Two things are immediately striking here. The first is Clitophon's claim to have been misrepresented (οὐκ ὀρθῶς ἀπεμνημόνευε) to Socrates by someone who has, at best, reported only the critical half of his conversation with Lysias. The second is that Clitophon is encouraged to give his own account by the fact that he and Socrates are alone (ἐπειδὴ καὶ μόνω τυγχάνομεν ὄντε).Footnote 24 In this case, unlike his conversation with Lysias, there is no one present to misreport his views at a later date.
Clitophon's worries about misrepresentation are repeated towards the end of his speech. At 410d5–e3, he summarises his case for Socrates:
θὲς τὸν Κλειτοφῶντα ὁμολογοῦντα ὡς ἔστιν καταγέλαστον τῶν μὲν ἄλλων ἐπιμέλειαν ποιεῖσθαι, ψυχῆς δέ, ἧς ἕνεκα τἆλλα διαπονούμεθα, ταύτης ἠμεληκέναι· καὶ τἆλλα πάντα οἴου με νῦν οὕτως εἰρηκέναι τὰ τούτοις ἑξῆς, ὡς καὶ νυνδὴ διῆλθον.Footnote 25
Take it that Clitophon agrees that it is ridiculous to take care of other things, but not to take care of the soul, for the sake of which we go to all the other troubles. And believe that, beyond this, all the other things I said I meant in this way, as I have just made clear.
Just as Clitophon opens with an expression of his desire to correct Socrates' understanding of someone else's account of his own view, so he concludes with an attempt to straighten out Socrates' understanding of his own account of his view. From start to finish, Clitophon is at pains to ensure that his position is reported accurately and that it is properly understood by Socrates.Footnote 26 The expression of his concerns along with the hearsay reported by Socrates provides a frame for the dialogue that serves to emphasise the potential pitfalls of attempting to report and represent the opinions of others or even, perhaps, the difficulties of representing one's own views.
Clitophon representing Socrates
From the outset, Clitophon presents himself as someone who understands Socrates. The first indication of this is his willingness to pass judgement on Socrates, as in both his reported conversation with Lysias and his current encounter with Socrates. Further hints of this assumed understanding are to be found throughout his speech. As we have seen, at 406a7–11, in responding to Socrates' charge, Clitophon suggests that Socrates is hiding his true feelings:
But since you are clearly taking issue with me, whilst pretending not to mind, I shall gladly spell things out for you, especially since we are alone, so that you'll be less inclined to believe that I think poorly of you.
Clitophon believes he knows what Socrates really thinks, no matter that Socrates may try to dissemble. In fact, with his last words in the dialogue, Socrates seems to admit the possibility that Clitophon may know him better than he knows himself:
ἀλλ' αἰσχρὸν μὴν σοῦ γε ὠφελεῖν με προθυμουμένου μὴ ὑπομένειν· δῆλον γὰρ ὡς γνοὺς ὅπηι χείρων εἰμὶ καὶ βελτίων, τὰ μὲν ἀσκήσω καὶ διώξομαι, τὰ δὲ φεύξομαι κατὰ κράτος.Footnote 27
Well, it would be shameful for me not to submit to you when you are so keen to help me. For clearly, once I have come to know my faults and my good points, I shall practise and pursue the one and avoid the other as far as I can.
Socrates' response here is reminiscent of his submission to Euthyphro:
ἆρ' οὖν μοι, ὦ θαυμάσιε Εὐθύφρων, κράτιστόν ἐστι μαθητῇ σῷ γενέσθαι, καὶ πρὸ τῆς γραφῆς τῆς πρὸς Μέλητον αὐτὰ ταῦτα προκαλεῖσθαι αὐτόν, λέγοντα ὅτι ἔγωγε καὶ ἐν τῷ ἔμπροσθεν χρόνῳ τὰ θεῖα περὶ πολλοῦ ἐποιούμην εἰδέναι, καὶ νῦν ἐπειδή με ἐκεῖνος αὐτοσχεδιάζοντά φησι καὶ καινοτομοῦντα περὶ τῶν θείων ἐξαμαρτάνειν, μαθητὴς δὴ γέγονα σός.Footnote 28
It's certainly vital, my excellent Euthyphro, for me to become your pupil and, on the matter of the indictment, to challenge Meletus himself about these same things, saying that even before now I thought it most important to know about divine matters and, now, when he says that I am at fault in improvising and innovating, I have actually become your pupil.
In the Euthyphro, Socrates' submission, whether wholly sincere or not, is prompted by Euthyphro's claim to expertise in matters pious (4e9–5a2). Similarly, Socrates' deference to Clitophon about his own character is, I take it, a response to Clitophon's assumption of understanding about matters Socratic.Footnote 29
Clitophon opens his apology with the claim that he finds Socratic protreptic most agreeable. In Socrates' company, he has often been stunned (πολλάκις ἐξεπληττόμην) by what the older man has had to say. Clitophon goes on (407a8–b2) to demonstrate his familiarity with these exhortations by offering an impersonation of Socrates ‘censuring mankind with hymns like a tragic deus ex machina’ (ὁπότε ἐπιτιμῶν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ὥσπερ ἐπὶ μηχανῆς τραγικῆς θεός ὕμνοις). From the outset, Clitophon presents himself as someone who understands Socrates and the kind of thing Socrates tends to say.
Having given his impersonation of Socratic protreptic, Clitophon describes how, once Socrates had interested him in virtue, he tried to find out what was coming next by questioning Socrates' companions. Here Clitophon makes clear that he is sensitive to Socrates' unusual relationship to his circle:
προσεῖχον δὴ τὸν νοῦν τὸ μετὰ ὡς ἀκουσόμενος, ἐπανερωτῶν οὔ τι σὲ τὸ πρῶτον, ὦ Σώκρατες, ἀλλὰ τῶν ἡλικιωτῶν τε καὶ συνεπιθυμητῶν ἢ ἑταίρων σῶν, ἢ ὅπως δεῖ πρὸς σὲ περὶ αὐτῶν τὸ τοιοῦτον ὀνομάζειν.Footnote 30
I paid attention so as to hear what would come next, questioning first not you, Socrates, but your contemporaries and fellows in enthusiasm or companions, or however one is supposed to describe their relationship to you.
Clitophon proceeds to give an account of his discussions with Socrates' comrades and, once again, he claims familiarity with Socratic methodology:
τούτων γὰρ τοὺς τὶ μάλιστα εἶναι δοξαζομένους ὑπὸ σοῦ πρώτους ἐπανηρώτων, πυνθανόμενος τίς ὁ μετὰ ταῦτ' εἴη λόγος, καὶ κατὰ σὲ τρόπον τινὰ ὑποτείνων αὐτοῖς.Footnote 31
I began by questioning those thought by you to be really something, asking what argument would be next and making suggestions to them, roughly as you do.
Clitophon presents himself as someone capable of conducting elenchus (more or less) in the manner of Socrates.Footnote 32 But he does not limit himself to asking questions like Socrates; he even feels able to answer for Socrates, as he makes clear at 408e10–409a2:
εἰ δ' ἐπανηρόμεθα τὸν ταῦθ' ἡμᾶς προτρέποντα ‘Λέγεις δὲ εἶναι τίνας ταύτας τὰς τέχνας;’ εἶπεν ἂν ἴσως ὅτι γυμναστικὴ καὶ ἰατρική.
And, if we asked the one exhorting us to these things ‘What do you say these crafts are?’, he would perhaps say that they are physical training and medicine.
A final indication of Clitophon's assumed understanding of Socrates comes towards the end of his speech. At 410b4–c6, he expresses the true source of his dissatisfaction with Socrates. Someone may well be able to eulogise any craft without actually being a practitioner of the craft:
ταὐτὸν δὴ καὶ σοί τις ἐπενέγκοι τάχ' ἂν περὶ δικαιοσύνης, ὡς οὐ μᾶλλον ὄντι δικαιοσύνης ἐπιστήμονι, διότι καλῶς αὐτὴν ἐγκωμιάζεις. οὐ μὴν τό γε ἐμὸν οὕτως ἔχει, δυοῖν δὲ θάτερον, ἢ οὐκ εἰδέναι σε ἢ οὐκ ἐθέλειν αὐτῆς ἐμοὶ κοινωνεῖν.
Someone could reproach you in just the same way about justice, that you have no more knowledge of justice for being able to praise it well. Although I don't think this, but one of the two must be true, either you don't know or you are not willing to share your knowledge of it with me.
Clitophon claims that, on the basis of Socrates' apparent lack of firmly pronounced doctrine, people might well conclude that he simply does not have any real knowledge about justice; he's only good for exhortation. Clitophon, however, knows better (οὐ μὴν τό γε ἐμὸν οὕτως ἔχει), for there is an alternative to thinking that Socrates knows nothing at all: it may be that he is unwilling to share the knowledge he does have. Above, I noted that Clitophon opens his defence with the suggestion that Socrates is withholding his true feelings. Here, the accusation is that Socrates is withholding his knowledge about justice. In both cases, Clitophon presents himself as someone able to see through Socrates' pretence. Indeed, at this point, Clitophon sets his own criticism of Socrates against the charge that could be brought against him by others.Footnote 33 Not only does he understand Socrates, but, it seems, he understands him better than most.
Clitophon presents himself as someone with a special insight into Socrates. He claims that he can see through Socrates' attempts at dissemblance, first in pretending not to be annoyed with Clitophon and second, in withholding his knowledge of justice. Clitophon also sets himself up as someone who has mastered Socratic methodology: he can mimic both Socratic protreptic and Socratic elenchus. He can even suppose the answers that Socrates would give when pressed. I shall argue below that there is something distinctly fishy about Clitophon's version of Socrates. First, it is worth taking the time to consider a passage that is, I think, intended to make us reconsider the value of Clitophon's account.
Representing Socrates' circle
From 408c7–410a6, Clitophon recounts his questioning of Socrates' companions. I have suggested that Clitophon is particularly sensitive to the possibility of being misreported (as he claims he has been) or misunderstood (something he tries to avoid by clarifying his view at 410d5–e3). Such hermeneutic concerns are strikingly absent from his summary of his conversations with others. Throughout his report, Clitophon recounts his own side of the conversation in oratio recta; the contributions of his interlocutors, meanwhile, are more or less exclusively reported in oratio obliqua.Footnote 34 So, for example, Clitophon quotes himself addressing Socrates' circle at 408d1 ff., summarises the answers he received in indirect speech from 409a4 ff. and then quotes himself again from 409b7. In addition, the interlocutors remain anonymous throughout.Footnote 35 In fact, at one point, Clitophon does not seem altogether sure who said what:
οὗτος μέν ὡς οἶμαι τὸ συμφέρον ἀπεκρίνατο, ἄλλος δὲ τὸ δέον, ἕτερος δὲ τὸ ὠφέλιμον, ὁ δὲ τὸ λυσιτελοῦν.Footnote 36
This man, I think, answered ‘what is useful’, another ‘what is fitting’, yet another ‘what is beneficial’, and yet another ‘what is profitable’.
At 410a7–b3, Clitophon recounts Socrates' own answer to his questioning, again in indirect speech and, notably, with the final conclusion attributed to no one at all:Footnote 37
ταῦτα ὦ Σώκρατες ἐγὼ τελευτῶν καὶ σὲ αὐτὸν ἠρώτων, καὶ εἶπές μοι δικαιοσύνης εἶναι τοὺς μὲν ἐχθροὺς βλάπτειν τοὺς δὲ φίλους εὖ ποιεῖν. ὕστερον δὲ ἐφάνη βλάπτειν γε οὐδέποτε ὁ δίκαιος οὐδένα· πάντα γὰρ ἐπ' ὠφελίαι πάντας δρᾶν.
So finally, Socrates, I asked you yourself about these things, and you told me that justice is harming one's enemies and helping one's friends. But later it transpired that the just man never harms anyone, for everything he does to anyone is for their benefit.
The uneven nature of Clitophon's report of his elenchus indicates two things. First, his concern for the accurate and detailed representation of his own opinions does not extend to the views of others. Clitophon's defence is framed by his concern that his own view should not be misunderstood. Notwithstanding this concern, his apology is founded upon an account of conversations in which the views of his interlocutors are filtered through indirect speech, whilst Clitophon's own words are more or less set in stone. If, as Clitophon implies at the opening of the dialogue, accurate representation comes via a direct and detailed report, what value is there in Clitophon's vague and brief account of what the others had to say?
There is one point at which Clitophon does report the other side of the conversation with a snippet of direct speech. At 409a4–6, he repeats one of the answers prompted by his questioning:
ὁ δὴ δοκῶν αὐτῶν ἐρρωμενέστατος εἶναι πρὸς ταῦτα ἀποκρινόμενος εἶπέν μοι ταύτην τὴν τέχνην εἶναι, ἥνπερ ἀκούεις σὺ λέγοντος ἔφη Σωκράτους, οὐκ ἄλλην ἢ δικαιοσύνην.
The one thought to be the most formidable gave an answer to this and told me that this craft ‘which’, he said ‘you hear Socrates talking about’ is none other than justice.
It is telling that what Clitophon reports directly here is not the substance of his interlocutor's answer but rather the reference to Socrates.Footnote 38 I argued above that Clitophon presents himself as having a special understanding of Socrates and Socratic methodology. I take the present passage to indicate that Clitophon's primary interest is in Socrates and Socrates' opinions.Footnote 39 Below, I will argue that Clitophon's preoccupation with Socrates is symptomatic of his general misunderstanding of Socratic methodology. At this point, however, I turn to Clitophon's brief appearance in Republic 1. For there too, he is characterised as someone who claims, but fails, to understand someone else's view.
Representing Thrasymachus
At Republic 1 328b4–c4, Clitophon is named as one of the crowd gathered at Polemarchus' house (as is Lysias). He has nothing to say until 340a3–b8. Socrates has been questioning Thrasymachus about the nature of justice and Thrasymachus has suggested that ‘justice is the advantage of the established rule’ (338b6–339a4), that is, ‘the advantage of the stronger’. He has also agreed (339b7–8) that it is just to obey those who rule. Further, he has agreed that rulers sometimes make laws ‘incorrectly’ (339c4–5), i.e. they sometimes make laws to their disadvantage. At 339e1–8, Socrates notes that there appears to be an inconsistency in Thrasymachus' position: if it is always just to obey laws, and some laws are to the disadvantage of the rulers who make those laws, then Thrasymachus seems to have ‘agreed that it is just to do what is disadvantageous to the rulers and those who are stronger’. It is at this point that Polemarchus and Clitophon break into the conversation:Footnote 40
By Zeus, Socrates, that's absolutely clear, said Polemarchus.
If you are to act as his witness, interrupted Clitophon (Ἐὰν σύ γ', ἔφη, αὐτῷ μαρτυρήσῃς, ὁ Κλειτοφῶν ὑπολαβών).
Who needs a witness? Polemarchus said. For Thrasymachus himself agrees (αὐτὸς γὰρ Θρασύμαχος ὁμολογεῖ) that the rulers sometimes order what is bad for them and that it is just for others to do those bad things.
That, Polemarchus, is because Thrasymachus proposed (ἔθετο Θρασύμαχος) that it is just to do what is ordered of the rulers.
He also proposed (ἔθετο), Clitophon, that the advantage of the stronger is just. Having proposed both these things, he then agreed that (ταῦτα δὲ ἀμφότερα θέμενος ὡμολόγησεν), sometimes, the stronger order the weaker and those who are ruled to do what is to the disadvantage of the stronger. With these things being agreed, the advantage of the stronger would be no more just than what is not to their advantage.
But, said Clitophon, he meant (ἔλεγεν) that the advantage of the stronger is what the stronger believes to be to their advantage. This is what must be done by the weaker, and this is what he proposed to be just.
But that's not how he put it, replied Polemarchus. (Ἀλλ' οὐχ οὕτως, ἦ δ' ὃς ὁ Πολέμαρχος, ἐλέγετο.)
It makes no difference (Οὐδέν…διαφέρει), Polemarchus, I said. But, if Thrasymachus now says this, let's accept it from him (ἀλλ' εἰ νῦν οὕτω λέγει Θρασύμαχος, οὕτως αὐτοῦ ἀποδεχώμεθα). Tell me, Thrasymachus, was this what you wanted to say: that the just is, namely, what the stronger believes to be to his advantage, whether it is to his advantage or not? Should we say that you mean this? (οὕτω σε φῶμεν λέγειν;)
Not in the least (Ἥκιστά γε), Thrasymachus said.
Here, we see Clitophon up to much the same sort of thing as in the Clitophon. He implies that Socrates' refutation is not as straightforwardly successful as Polemarchus claims (‘if you are to act as his witness’) and then attempts to clarify and defend Thrasymachus' position. In his brief appearance in the Republic, as in the Clitophon, Clitophon is characterised as alert to a potential misrepresentation and keen to offer his own interpretation. But, as both Polemarchus (‘that's not how he put it’) and Thrasymachus (‘not in the least’) make clear, he actually misrepresents Thrasymachus' argument. In the next section, I will argue that Clitophon's representation of Socrates in the Clitophon also misses the mark.
I have claimed that Clitophon's primary interest in the Clitophon is in Socrates and Socrates' own opinions. Something similar can be said about his Republican incarnation: on the one occasion that Clitophon speaks in the Republic, it is not to give his own opinion, but to rather to clarify Thrasymachus' view. Now, it has been suggested that, when Clitophon speaks to defend Thrasymachus, he is really trying to push forward his own view of justice.Footnote 41 But, even if this legal positivism is his own position, Clitophon does not admit that it is such. He is explicit in claiming that this is what Thrasymachus was getting at (ἔλεγεν) and, of course, Thrasymachus dismisses Clitophon's version as a misrepresentation. The line that Clitophon suggests is pursued no further and he does not speak again.
As I noted in my introduction, the nature of its relation to the Republic has been a dominant theme of literature on the Clitophon. My concern here is simply to emphasise the similarities in Clitophon's hermeneutic behaviour in both dialogues. For this purpose, it is more or less immaterial whether the Clitophon is drawing on the Republic or vice versa. For what it is worth, I find it more plausible that the author of the Clitophon was working with the episode from the Republic 1 than that Plato, for whatever reason, dropped his (or someone else's) ready-made character from the Clitophon into the Republic for this single episode of misinterpretation. Of course, it is quite possible that the historical Clitophon was renowned for misunderstanding what people said.Footnote 42 What is most significant for my case is that, in the Republic, Clitophon gets Thrasymachus wrong. This is because, as I will argue in the next section, more than once in our dialogue Clitophon gets Socrates wrong.
Misrepresenting Socrates
Clitophon presents himself as someone with a special understanding of Socrates. However, as I hope to show, several aspects of his representation of Socrates seem to be something more like misrepresentations.Footnote 43 I will begin by considering the views he attributes to Socrates. Here I will concentrate on Clitophon's account of Socratic exhortation (407b2–408b5) and his description of the answers given by Socrates to Clitophon's questioning (4107–b3).Footnote 44 I will then turn to Clitophon's representation of Socratic methodology, in particular his description of Socratic protreptic and the manner in which he goes about Socratic elenchus. In both cases, Clitophon's impersonation of Socrates seems to miss its mark.
At the beginning of his speech, Clitophon makes clear that ‘I didn't praise some things about you, but some I did’ (406a6–7). He reserves his approbation for Socrates' paraenetic activities. From 407b2–408b5, he describes the kind of exhortation he has heard from Socrates. He begins by giving a direct impersonation of a Socratic protreptic speech (from 407b2–e2) before lapsing into a summary in oratio obliqua (from 407e3–408b5).
Clitophon's Socratic speech is replete with elements that have an authentically Socratic ring.Footnote 45 However, both the expression and the combination of these elements are somewhat awkward.Footnote 46 So, for example, there is something hasty about b2–8:
οἵτινες χρημάτων μὲν πέρι τὴν πᾶσαν σπουδὴν ἔχετε ὅπως ὑμῖν ἔσται, τῶν δ' ὑέων οἷς ταῦτα παραδώσετε ὅπως ἐπιστήσονται χρῆσθαι δικαίως τούτοις,Footnote 47 οὔτε διδασκάλους αὐτοῖς εὑρίσκετε τῆς δικαιοσύνης, εἴπερ μαθητόν, εἰ δὲ μελετητόν τε καὶ ἀσκητόν, οἵτινες ἐξασκήσουσιν καὶ ἐκμελετήσουσιν ἱκανῶς, οὐδέ γ' ἔτι πρότερον ὑμᾶς αὐτοὺς οὕτως ἐθεραπεύσατε.
You expend all your effort on the acquisition of wealth, but none on whether your sons, to whom you will leave that wealth, will know how to use it with justice, nor do you find teachers of justice for them (if it can be taught), or, if it can be learned via training or practice, men up to the task of training or drilling them. And you've yet even to take care of yourselves in this respect.
Clitophon runs together several Socratic motifs to produce this exhortation. The whole passage is reminiscent of Socrates' account of his exhortations to the Athenians at Apology 29d8–e3:
χρημάτων μὲν οὐκ αἰσχύνῃ ἐπιμελούμενος ὅπως σοι ἔσται ὡς πλεῖστα, καὶ δόξης καὶ τιμῆς, φρονήσεως δὲ καὶ ἀληθείας καὶ τῆς ψυχῆς ὅπως ὡς βελτίστη ἔσται οὐκ ἐπιμελῇ οὐδὲ φροντίζεις;
Aren't you ashamed to be so preoccupied with the acquisition of wealth, and of reputation and honour, without any concern or thought for wisdom and truth and the perfection of your soul?
Clitophon's expression of doubts about whether there are teachers of justice is also familiar from, among other dialogues, the Meno.Footnote 48 Parallels for both the worry about leaving wealth rather than justice to one's children and the suggestion that one should have not just one's children but also oneself instructed in justice can be found in the Euthydemus.Footnote 49
This passage certainly hits several Socratic notes, but the tune they produce is more of a jingle than an anthem. So, for example, Clitophon's Socrates draws not the Apologetic contrast between care for wealth and care for wisdom, truth and the soul, but the rather less forceful contrast between care for wealth and care for one's sons' ability to use that wealth justly.Footnote 50 Further, whilst this Socrates does express doubts about whether justice can be taught or acquired by exercise or training, these doubts are parenthetical in both expression and thought.Footnote 51 Having berated his audience for failing to seek teachers of justice for their sons, Socrates admits some uncertainty. At 407c5–7, however, he appears to assume the existence of teachers of justice:Footnote 52
πῶς οὐ καταφρονεῖτε τῆς νῦν παιδεύσεως οὐδὲ ζητεῖτε οἵτινες ὑμᾶς παύσουσι ταύτης τῆς ἀμουσίας;
How can you not despise the present education system and not seek out men to put a stop to this philistinism?
Indeed, at 408b5–c1, Clitophon explicitly praises the suggestion that virtue can be taught, an assertion he claims to have found in Socrates' exhortations. Clitophon has heard Socrates questioning whether virtue can be taught but he has also, it seems, heard Socrates asserting that it can be taught and it is the latter point that has left a lasting impression.
A similar assessment can be made of Clitophon's summary from 407e3–408b5. Again, many of the points listed sound authentically Socratic although, again, they are rather imprecisely assembled. The final section (408a3–b5) of Clitophon's account of Socratic protreptic is significant:
καὶ τελευτᾶι δὴ καλῶς ὁ λόγος οὗτός σοι, ὡς ὅστις ψυχῆι μὴ ἐπίσταται χρῆσθαι, τούτωι τὸ ἄγειν ἡσυχίαν τῆι ψυχῆι καὶ μὴ ζῆν κρεῖττον ἢ ζῆν πράττοντι καθ' αὑτόν εἰ δέ τις ἀνάγκη ζῆν εἴη, δούλωι ἄμεινον ἢ ἐλευθέρωι διάγειν τῶι τοιούτῶι τὸν βίον ἐστὶν ἄρα, καθάπερ πλοίου παραδόντι τὰ πηδάλια τῆς διανοίας ἄλλωι, τῶι μαθόντι τὴν τῶν ἀνθρώπων κυβερνητικήν, ἣν δὴ σὺ πολιτικήν, ὦ Σώκρατες, ἐπονομάζεις πολλάκις, τὴν αὐτὴν δὴ ταύτην δικαστικήν τε καὶ δικαιοσύνην ὡς ἔστιν λέγων.
And so your speech produces the fine conclusion that whoever lacks knowledge of how to use his soul would do better to leave his soul in peace and not to live than to live doing whatever he fancied. But if he must live, it is better that he pass his life as a slave than as a free man, handing over the rudder of his thinking, like that of a ship, to another who has learned the art of steering men, which you frequently call ‘the political art’, Socrates, claiming that it is the same as the art of judging and justice.
Clitophon has incorporated several Socratic motifs familiar from other dialogues, most prominently from the Republic.Footnote 53 The lesson he has gleaned from his encounters with Socrates is that he should subjugate himself to someone with superior knowledge. This is particularly telling because, as his account of his elenchus and his general attitude to Socrates throughout the dialogue make clear, he has chosen to ‘hand over the rudder of his thinking’ to Socrates. Clitophon has understood Socratic protreptic as a promise of Socratic authority.
It is notable that at no point in his imitation and paraphrase (and, indeed, at no point in the entire speech) does Clitophon attempt to represent a Socratic profession of ignorance.Footnote 54 Such professions are not obviously incompatible with exhortation.Footnote 55 In Alcibiades 1, an explicitly protreptic text, Socrates reminds Alcibiades that he is as much in need of help as the younger man:
ἀλλὰ γὰρ κοινὴ βουλὴ ὧιτινι τρόπωι ἂν ὅτι βέλτιστοι γενοίμεθα. ἐγὼ γάρ τοι οὐ περὶ μὲν σοῦ λέγω ὡς χρὴ παιδευθῆναι, περὶ ἐμοῦ δὲ οὔ· οὐ γὰρ ἔσθ' ὅτωι σου διαφέρω πλήν γ' ἑνί.Footnote 56
But let's put our heads together about how we can become as good as possible. For what I said about needing to be educated I said not just about you but about me too. For, except in one way, I am no better than you are.Footnote 57
As I have noted, Clitophon concludes his speech by drawing a contrast between his own view that Socrates is withholding knowledge and the opinion of those who think Socrates is simply ignorant. It seems that Clitophon has taken Socratic protreptic to be a promise of indoctrination and, in this, he has been disappointed. This disappointment is founded on his misunderstanding of Socrates, a misunderstanding signalled by the way in which he chooses to emphasise certain aspects of Socratic exhortation and to omit others altogether.
There is something equally intriguing about Clitophon's account of his attempt at questioning Socrates himself at 410a7–b3:
So finally, Socrates, I asked you yourself about these things, and you told me that justice is harming one's enemies and helping one's friends. But later it transpired that the just man never harms anyone, for everything he does to anyone is for their benefit.
The definition of justice as helping one's friends and harming one's enemies is mooted and refuted in Republic 1 but there it is, of course, presented as Polemarchus' view. If, as I suspect is the case, the Clitophon postdates the Republic, Clitophon's attribution of this view to Socrates is grist to my mill. Clitophon would then be misattributing to Socrates a view he has, at Republic 332c ff., heard Socrates describe as Polemarchus' interpretation of Simonides poetry. This would, I take it, be further evidence of his tendency to misrepresent the views of others. Even if this is not a direct allusion to the Republic, Clitophon is attributing to Socrates a definition of justice that both Plato and Xenophon suggest is un-Socratic.Footnote 58 On either reading, Clitophon is misrepresenting Socrates.Footnote 59 In fact, his misrepresentation of Socrates' view of justice parallels his distortion of Thrasymachus' view at Republic 340a3–b8.
Clitophon's misrepresentation is not limited to the views he attributes to Socrates. There is also something suspicious about Clitophon's version of Socratic methodology. It is worth considering the way that Clitophon introduces his impression of Socrates' exhortative speeches at 407a5–b2. He has, he says, been deeply impressed with Socrates ‘whenever you censure mankind with hymns like a tragic deus ex machina’ (ὁπότε ἐπιτιμῶν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ὥσπερ ἐπὶ μηχανῆς τραγικῆς θεός ὕμνοις λέγων). He begins the exhortation itself with the words ‘Whither are you going, human beings?’ (ποῖ φέρεσθε, ὤνθρωποι;). Now, Slings suggests that ‘what is really un-Platonic is his addressing this speech to a crowd’ for, in the Apology, ‘Plato takes great care to stress that the exhortations are directed at individuals.’Footnote 60 At Apology 36b5–d1, for example, Socrates says that he goes to each person individually (ἰδίαι).Footnote 61 In fact, Xenophon does have Socrates addressing crowds: Memorabilia 1.7 presents a speech to Socrates' associates (τοῦς συνόντας), whilst the speech of 1.5 is addressed to ‘men’ in general (ὦ ἄνδρες). In neither case, however, does Socrates achieve the register of ὤνθρωποι.Footnote 62 Clitophon has Socrates address ‘mankind’ in general. This is, of course, in keeping with his comparing Socrates to a deus ex machina. The implication is that Socrates speaks from a position of superior understanding, a charge that Clitophon will make explicitly at the end of his speech in accusing Socrates of withholding knowledge.
If this is the implication of likening Socrates to a god, then Clitophon may well have hit on something important. For the extent and nature of the knowledge that Socrates is prepared to claim or disavow is a notoriously thorny issue. Presenting it as he does, however, Clitophon seems once again to miss the mark, for one thing the Apology makes clear is that, whatever knowledge or wisdom Socrates is prepared to admit to, it certainly is not divine wisdom. Thus, at Apology 20d6–e3, Socrates admits the possibility that his unfortunate reputation may have been caused by some kind of wisdom, but insists that it could be no more than human wisdom (ἀνθρωπίνα σοφία). In fact, he claims that it would be slander to suggest that he possesses anything more. To this extent, then, Clitophon is once again misrepresenting Socrates. For Clitophon's Socrates exhorts from a position of special and superior knowledge, rather than as someone who, whilst committed to the idea that thinking about how to be good is important, still claims to be trying to work out for himself what being good actually entails.
What of Clitophon's version of Socratic elenchus? There is something odd here too. Clitophon claims to have questioned Socrates' companions in a Socratic fashion (κατὰ σὲ). There are, however, two aspects of Clitophon's elenchus that encourage me to classify it as a misrepresentation. The first is the uneven nature of the exposition, as discussed above. Insofar as Clitophon privileges his own side of the engagement, he does not seem to be representing a conversation as such. The second is the fact that Clitophon goes in the first instance to Socrates' companions in order to find out how they interpret Socrates, rather than going straight to Socrates. Of course, it is not uncommon for Socrates to engage in conversation with the pupils of sophists. So, in the Meno, Meno is a pupil of Gorgias and, as they launch into their investigation of virtue (71c8–d8), Socrates asks Meno to ‘remind me of what he [Gorgias] said’ but, even here, Socrates is interested in Gorgias' thought only insofar as it is what Meno thinks too:
ἐκεῖνον μὲν τοίνυν ἐῶμεν, ἐπειδὴ καὶ ἄπεστιν· σὺ δὲ αὐτός, ὦ πρὸς θεῶν, Μένων, τί φῂς ἀρετὴν εἶναι;
Let's leave Gorgias out of it, since he's not here. But Meno, for god's sake, what do you yourself say virtue is?
If Socratic elenchus is questioning individuals about the beliefs to which they themselves are committed, then Clitophon has started his investigation in the wrong place. He has gone wrong in asking others what Socrates thinks rather than in asking Socrates himself because elenchus, properly conducted, should be the scrutiny of an individual regarding their own beliefs.
Misrepresenting aporia
Finally, I turn to Clitophon's assertion at the end of his speech that he has been brought to aporia (410c6–8). But before I do so, it worth restating the so-called ‘Riddle of the Clitophon’: why does Socrates remain silent in the face of Clitophon's criticisms? One recent suggestion is that the Clitophon is an aporetic dialogue.Footnote 63 On this line of interpretation, insofar as Socrates, i.e. the Socrates of the aporetic dialogues, has succeeded in bringing Clitophon to aporia, there is nothing left to say. Only a Socrates with doctrinal commitments could offer Clitophon the kind of answers he is seeking. I have suggested that Clitophon repeatedly misrepresents Socrates and that his attempt at elenchus, although claimed to be undertaken in a Socratic manner, is not a genuinely Socratic elenchus. It is, at best, a pseudo-elenchus and so, I think, it necessarily ends in no more than a pseudo-aporia. All Clitophon's elenctic efforts are focused on attempting to work out what Socrates thinks about justice, rather than what he, Clitophon, thinks. As a result, his aporia is not comparable to that claimed by, for example, Theaetetus or Meno. The latter pair answer for themselves and the aporia that results is a genuinely felt confusion, brought about by the recognition of some problem within their own set of beliefs. It is as if Clitophon knows that the right thing to tell Socrates is that he has become confused, but this confusion falls short of Socratic aporia. In fact, it seems that Clitophon is not even as confused as he claims to be:
διὰ ταῦτα δὴ καὶ πρὸς Θρασύμαχον οἶομαι πορεύομαιFootnote 64 καὶ ἄλλοσε ὅποι δύναμαι, ἀπορῶν·
That's why, I think, I go to Thrasymachus and whoever else I can, because I am at a loss.
Clitophon explicitly states that it is because he is at a loss (ἄπορος) that he goes (πορεύομαι) to Thrasymachus and beyond. So, in the same breath, he claims both that he cannot find a way out and that Thrasymachus et alii offer a way out. As he makes clear in what follows, he just wants to be told what to think. He is, as Rutherford has it, someone who is determined to find ‘“Truth” on a plate’.Footnote 65 If Socrates will not serve it up, he will go off and dine with another.
This, I think, is the answer to the riddle. It is not that Socrates, having brought Clitophon to aporia, has finished his work, but that there was no work to be done with Clitophon in the first place. At no point in the dialogue has Clitophon committed himself to a belief, beyond his opinion of Socrates and his approval of Socratic protreptic. I suggested that something similar was the case for his appearance in the Republic, where his interjection is presented as defence of Thrasymachus' view, rather than as an original thought. Clitophon is, it seems, precisely the sort of person Socrates describes at Theaetetus 151b2–6:
ἐνίοις δέ, ὦ Θεαίτητε, οἳ ἄν μοι μὴ δόξωσί πως ἐγκύμονες εἶναι, γνοὺς ὅτι οὐδὲν ἐμοῦ δέονται, πάνυ εὐμενῶς προμνῶμαι καί, σὺν θεῷ εἰπεῖν, πάνυ ἱκανῶς τοπάζω οἷς ἂν συγγενόμενοι ὄναιντο· ὧν πολλοὺς μὲν δὴ ἐξέδωκα Προδίκῳ, πολλοὺς δὲ ἄλλοις σοφοῖς τε καὶ θεσπεσίοις ἀνδράσι.
But sometimes, Theaetetus, there are some who don't seem to be to be pregnant. Realising that they have no need of me and wishing them all the best, I match them up, and, touch wood, I think I do quite well at working out with whom they would benefit from spending time. I've sent many of them to Prodicus, and many others to other wise and inspired chaps.
There is no pregnancy in Clitophon to which Socrates can tend, for Clitophon seems to have no thoughts of his own. As a result, Socrates lets him go off to Thrasymachus, as he says in the Theaetetus that he has let the empty-headed young men go off to Prodicus and the others. Socrates makes no response to Clitophon because to do so would be to engage in elenchus and a prerequisite of elenchus is that the interlocutor has some thoughts to offer up for scrutiny. Clitophon is characterised as someone unprepared to take ownership of his own beliefs. As such, genuine Socratic elenchus and genuine aporia are beyond him. On this reading, the Clitophon is not aporetic, it is pseudo-aporetic.
Misrepresenting Clitophon?
Some may feel that I am too hard on Clitophon. For all that the formulation of his critique may be somewhat awkward, it may be felt that he has hit upon something important about Socratic methodology or that his misunderstanding is not quite as extensive as I have claimed. After all, he seems to have learned to care about virtue and perhaps for that, at least, he deserves some credit. In fact, as I have suggested, I think Clitophon cares more about finding out what Socrates thinks than about discovering the nature of virtue. Clitophon is looking for someone to tell him what to think, irrespective of whether this is the right thing to think. His focus is on finding an answer, but he seems to be determined to look for that answer anyhow other than by scrutinising his own beliefs. Of course, some may think that this, in itself, is a rather successful representation of Socratic methodology. It is hardly unheard of for Socrates, having claimed to be ignorant of the matter at hand, to ask others to offer up their beliefs for scrutiny. Perhaps, in this respect at least, Clitophon has captured an essential aspect of Socratic elenchus. However, as I have already emphasised, Clitophon approaches Socrates' companions before he engages with Socrates himself. So, although he seems to want to engage with Socrates' beliefs, he approaches them via a perversely circuitous route. Further, his engagement with those beliefs as represented by Socrates' companions is a mere shadow of the kind of testing to which Socrates puts his interlocutors in the elenctic dialogues.
Others may want to defend Clitophon on the grounds that he has, at least, come to care for virtue. They may want to claim that, in the end, there is nothing more that he could have learned from Socrates. Either, as he claims, Socrates is withholding his knowledge of virtue or, as others think, he lacks knowledge of virtue altogether. If Clitophon has been encouraged to care for virtue by Socrates then maybe he has succeeded in learning all that he could have. Without doubt, Clitophon represents himself as someone who has come to care for virtue, but, as he demonstrates throughout his speech, his primary concern is that he should be taught the nature of virtue. If we want to ask what it is Clitophon has failed to learn from Socrates, it is that real learning involves thinking for oneself.
Misrepresenting Plato?
I have argued that Clitophon presents himself as someone with a special understanding of Socrates and Socratic methodology. I hope to have demonstrated that his representation of Socrates is, in several ways, a misrepresentation. Clitophon is misguided both in what he thinks Socrates does and in what he thinks Socrates can do for him. Clitophon is a bad ‘reader’ of Socrates. He is also, I have argued, someone well aware of the possibility that what one says can be misrepresented and misinterpreted especially, although by no means exclusively, when it is reported by some third party.
I conclude with a tentative suggestion for the broader implications of this characterisation of Clitophon. On the reading I have offered, Clitophon's plight can serve as a cautionary tale about what happens when one puts all one's efforts into trying to work out what someone else thinks. Such endeavours are conducive to neither philosophical nor ethical progress, not even progress towards the painful but necessary stage of aporia. This problem is spelled out in the Clitophon as the result of an obsession with Socrates. But perhaps something more is happening here. In a sense, Clitophon is, during the course of his defence, writing his own dialogue about justice. It is not a very good dialogue, because only one side is adequately reported. One might even call it a ‘pseudo-dialogue’. This is despite the fact that Clitophon is aware of the difficulties inherent in working out what someone thinks from what others say they think. My proposal is that the Clitophon is, in a sense, a dialogue about the dangers of relying on the genre of philosophical dialogue to gain insight into the views of some particular philosopher. I want to suggest that the Clitophon is a reflection on the difficulties faced by someone reading philosophical dialogues.
This suggestion can be expanded in two ways. The first is as a genuinely intended criticism of philosophical dialogues. On this reading, the Clitophon is an attack on the dialogue form on the grounds that such works encourage us to mine the reported speech for easy answers, rather than to think for ourselves. In this case, Clitophon's obsession with things Socratic might be symptomatic of what the author thinks is the inevitable distraction caused by relying on a character as seductive as Socrates. The criticism could be that, if faced with a dialogue in which clever old Socrates talks about x, one will inevitably attempt to work out what clever old Socrates (or Plato) thinks about x. The dialogue form makes Clitophons of us all.
The second and, to my mind, more attractive possibility is that the Clitophon is not a criticism, but an admission and a warning. It is an admission that Socrates is indeed seductive and that there is a great temptation to attempt to work out what he (or Plato) thinks about x from what he says about x. But it is also warning that this is not how one should go about reading dialogues. If one tries to find easy answers within the texts, one will end up like Clitophon. Should that happen, there is nothing Socrates or Plato can do to help.
If the Clitophon is authentic, the second option seems a rather more plausibly Platonic position. Against authenticity, it has been objected that Clitophon's speech is clumsily put together and that it alludes too obviously and extensively to the corpus to be Platonic. On my reading, however, the clumsiness and the allusiveness are Clitophon's. Clitophon is explicitly a bad reader of Socrates and implicitly a bad reader of Plato; I see no reason to attribute those faults to his creator. In fact, once we recognise that Clitophon is deliberately characterised as a clumsy imitator of Socrates, what remains of the case against authenticity rather seems to collapse. For Clitophon's hotchpotch of Socratic philosophy has been deliberately composed as such and should not be held in the balance as evidence against the skill of its author. Quite the opposite, in fact. Some may continue to want to hypothesise an unknown author, capable of writing such a subtle and allusive dialogue in the period and style of Plato. For my money, however, to do so seems rather extravagant when we already have Plato himself.
