Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Gorgias, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Practice and Goal of Oratory
Justice, Injustice, and the Treatment of the Soul
The Pleasant Life vs. the Good Life
Philosophy vs. Politics
Summary
Analysis
Callicles is frustrated with Socrates’s talk of “shoemakers and cleaners, cooks and doctors,” arguing that he’s not referring to such people, but to those with the intelligence to manage a city. Socrates points out that while Callicles is accusing him of being slippery with his words, Callicles is actually doing the same thing: never saying the same thing about the same subjects. Even if it’s granted that supposedly superior people should be the rulers of the city, what about those people’s rule of themselves—their self-control over their desires and pleasure-seeking tendencies?
Callicles objects to, or misses the point of, Socrates’s practice of drawing examples from everyday life. He sees this as confusing the issue, but Socrates turns things around on Callicles, charging that it’s actually Callicles who’s not being precise enough in his meaning. He then brings the discussion to its next major point: rule over others is one thing, but what about rule of oneself?
Themes
Callicles finds this amusing—someone who is self-controlled is simply stupid. Someone who wants to live in the right way, he argues, should let his appetites grow as big as possible and not try to restrain them—in fact, he should dedicate himself to fulfilling his appetites as much as possible. People who criticize such a life are just ashamed of their own impotence, and they restrain better people because they can’t satisfy themselves. It’s shameful for naturally superior people to subject themselves to the criticism of others, adhering to supposedly admirable rules of justice and self-control. In Callicles’s view, forgoing discipline leads to a better, happier life.
Hearkening back to Callicles’s preference for nature over law, he believes that someone who practices self-control is behaving unnaturally. On the contrary, it’s natural—therefore better—for someone to do exactly what he wants, as much as he wants. If people object to that, it just means they don’t have the power to do what they want, meaning that they’re inferior. A good life, in Callicles’s view, is an unrestrained life in which someone pursues what they want, not worrying about other people’s definitions of what’s good.
Themes
Socrates asks Callicles if he really means that it’s wrong to claim that those who have no need of anything are happy. Callicles agrees, because if that were so, then inanimate objects and dead people would be the happiest. To the contrary, Socrates wants to persuade Callicles that living in a disciplined manner and being satisfied with one’s circumstances is always preferable an indulgent, undisciplined life.
In Callicles’s view, someone who doesn’t need or desire anything is as good as dead—there’s no point in life for such a person. Socrates believes the opposite: satisfaction with what one has is always better than never being satisfied. The two have fundamentally different views of what constitutes a good life.
Themes
Socrates gives various examples, like someone who continuously scratches an itch, or the life of a catamite, to challenge Callicles. When Callicles objects to this shameful comparison, Socrates argues that this is what happens when one defines happiness as enjoying oneself, without discriminating between “pleasant” and “good.” Are there pleasures that aren’t good? Put another way, is goodness something other than “unrestricted enjoyment”?
In Ancient Greece, catamites were boys with whom young men engaged in sexual relationships. Though this was a widely accepted practice, Callicles finds it unseemly for Socrates to use such a blunt comparison. Socrates’s point, though, is that just because something’s enjoyable does not make it “good,” or worth pursuing indefinitely.
Themes
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Callicles resists Socrates’s point, so Socrates tries another tack. Would Callicles say that knowledge and bravery are the same thing? Callicles says that they’re different. Socrates thinks Callicles will come to realize that, in fact, this isn’t what he really thinks. He argues that someone who does well has the opposite experience from someone who does badly. Similarly, health and sickness are opposite experiences. Doesn’t this mean, then, that thirst and drinking are opposite experiences—that is, thirst is pain and drinking is enjoyment? In other words, it’s possible to experience pain and enjoyment at the same time—meaning that feeling enjoyment isn’t the same thing as doing well, suggesting, in turn, that what’s pleasant isn’t the same as what’s good.
Socrates contrasts two different types of experiences—doing well or badly, or being healthy or sick. This leads him to the assertion that pain and enjoyment are likewise opposites. Since pain and enjoyment can be experienced simultaneously (like thirst and quenching thirst), this suggests that enjoyment can’t be simply equated with the experience of “doing well” (one can be enjoying oneself while actually doing poorly). Just because something is pleasurable doesn’t mean it is good.
Themes
Socrates then tries another approach. Wouldn’t Callicles agree that he calls people good because of the presence of good things in them? If that’s true, would he call foolish and cowardly people good? Then has Callicles ever seen a foolish person feeling enjoyment, or an intelligent person feeling pain? When Callicles acknowledges that he has, Socrates asks whether intelligent or foolish people feel pain or enjoyment more. Callicles says that there’s little difference. Callicles also agrees that, in the event of an enemy retreat, both cowardly and brave soldiers feel enjoyment to about the same degree. This means that good people (the intelligent and brave) experience enjoyment and pain to about the same degree as the bad (the foolish and cowardly).
Socrates means that a good person can experience enjoyment and pain to about the same degree that a bad person does. In other words, just because someone is experiencing pleasure doesn’t make him good, and by the same token, just because someone is experiencing pain doesn’t make him bad. Again, pleasure and goodness aren’t the same things.
Themes
Moving on, Socrates points out that if good people are good and bad people are bad because of the presence of good or bad things in them—as Callicles had claimed earlier—then this means that both good things (pleasures) and bad things (pains) are present in the good person, and the same is true for the bad person. Then isn’t Callicles saying that the bad person is both good and bad to the same degree as the good person?
Socrates restates his argument that pleasures and pains are present both in those whom Callicles would call “good” and those he would call “bad.” In other words, Callicles’s definitions of good and bad are too simplistic.
Themes
Callicles dodges these questions. Socrates continues, saying that good things are beneficial and bad things are harmful. Then wouldn’t this mean that some pains are beneficial and some pleasures are harmful? When Callicles agrees, Socrates reminds him that we should do all things for the sake of what’s good—including pleasant things for the sake of good things, but not good things for the sake of pleasant things.
Socrates complicates the definitions of good and bad. He defines “good” as beneficial and “bad” as harmful—but pains can be beneficial, and pleasures can be harmful. So, by these definitions, living a good life might very well involve acceptance of pain and restraint of pleasure. The measure of goodness, then, is the object for the sake of which we do things (such as improvement of the soul, for example).
Themes
Then, Socrates goes on, can everyone decide what pleasures are good and which are bad, or is a craftsman needed to discern this? Callicles agrees that a craftsman is required. Socrates then reminds him of the knack of pastry baking, which is concerned only with pleasure, and the craft of medicine, which is concerned with what’s good. Doesn’t Callicles see that this whole discussion is about the way people are supposed to live? Are we supposed to make speeches and engage in active political life, or engage in philosophy? What distinguishes these two ways of life?
Socrates’s point is that since pleasures aren’t necessarily good—some only aiming at immediate indulgence of one’s desires—one needs a craftsman to help determine which are good and which are bad. In other words, one doesn’t just need the equivalent of a pastry baker for the soul (who merely flatters), but the equivalent of a doctor (who genuinely treats). All this comes down to a distinction between two different ways of life—one that’s geared toward pleasure and flattery of the soul (politics) and one that’s guided by what’s genuinely beneficial to it (philosophy).
Themes
If the pleasant is different from the good, there must be a procedure for obtaining both the pleasant and the good, respectively. Socrates then returns to the knack of pastry baking and the craft of medicine—the former is irrational, not needing to consider the nature or cause of pleasure, whereas the latter necessarily investigates both. If these things are true in the case of the body, then do a similar knack and craft apply in the case of the soul? In other words, is there a form of mere flattery, or gratification, that applies to the soul just as pastry baking “flatters” the body?
Socrates reiterates the difference between a knack and a craft in the case of the body and in the case of the soul. A knack doesn’t need to have any higher understanding of its subject (it only needs to know what’s desired), whereas a craft needs a careful and sensitive understanding of the subject, as well as what truly benefits it.
Themes
Callicles agrees to this, so Socrates gives some examples and asks Callicles to identify them as either flattery or not. They agree that fluteplaying, lyreplaying, trained choruses, and tragedies merely serve to gratify spectators by giving pleasure. Socrates points out that if melody, rhythm, and meter were stripped away from these things, only speeches would be left—a kind of popular oratory that’s indiscriminately addressed to men, women, children, slave, and free. Callicles agrees.
While there’s nothing inherently wrong with things like listening to musical performances or watching tragic plays, these things don’t have any higher aim, according to Socrates—their only goal is pleasure. Socrates then points out that the most common and sought-after form of oratory is really no different—its only goal is to appeal to an audience, with no regard for the nature of that audience or what their needs are.
Themes
If Socrates and Callicles agree that this sort of oratory is mere flattery, what about the sort that’s addressed to free citizens? Do such orators speak with the goal of making the best possible citizens? Or do they only seek to gratify their hearers and to pursue their own private good instead of the common good? If a beneficial type of oratory really exists, has Callicles ever seen it?
Socrates next turns to the question of whether there’s any difference between popular oratory and the supposedly higher kind that’s used in Athens’s political institutions. What is its goal, in other words—does it even have one? It’s theoretically possible for a beneficial kind of oratory to exist, so the question is whether oratory has ever actually been practiced in a non-flattering way that was intended for the betterment of its audience.
Themes
Callicles can’t think of any contemporary orators who fit this bill. For historical examples, he names Themistocles and Pericles, among others. Socrates decides to examine these figures to see if Callicles is correct. First, he explains that a craftsman will keep his ultimate goal in view rather than just applying techniques randomly. For example, a painter, shipwright, or other craftsman goes about his craft in a specific order. The same holds true with doctors.
Themistocles was a leading Athenian statesman in the early fifth century B.C.E.; among his achievements was building up the Athenian navy. Pericles was prominent in the middle part of the same century, especially notable for his role in strategy against Sparta during the Peloponnesian War. To assess such figures as orators, Socrates first reviews the general procedure of a craftsman.
Themes
So, if all that’s true, what about the soul—shouldn’t it, too, be properly organized? Callicles agrees. Socrates applies the term “healthy” to bodily excellence and applies “lawful” to the orderly soul, which is characterized by justice and self-control. Callicles agrees to that, too. So, the latter things are what a good orator should consider when he’s applying his speeches to people’s souls. After all, a doctor wouldn’t let a sick person indulge his or her appetites indiscriminately. Likewise, an undisciplined soul shouldn’t be permitted to indulge corrupt appetites.
Socrates believes that the craftsmanship of the soul should be just as organized as the procedure for shipbuilding, medicine, or any other craft. If an orator is a genuine craftsman, his goal will be to instill justice and self-control in the souls of his listeners and to discourage the indulgence of mere appetites.
Themes
Callicles has grown weary of Socrates’s relentless questions, so Socrates carries on by questioning and answering himself. He reviews the points he and Callicles have agreed upon so far and concludes that it’s the possession of justice and self-control that makes people happy, and the possession of evil that makes people miserable. Then he turns to Callicles’s criticism of him, that Socrates would find himself helpless if he faced exile, confiscation, or death—what Callicles deemed the most shameful position of all. Socrates restates his belief that the person who commits injustice is in a more shameful position than the person who suffers as a result of injustice.
For Socrates, justice and self-control are the key to the good life. Having demonstrated this point, Socrates reconsiders Callicles’s earlier charge that Socrates, because of his alleged inexperience with public life, wouldn’t be able to defend himself in court. In response, Socrates points out that having such injustice committed against himself really would be less shameful than committing it would be. That’s because he believes the good life is lived in adherence to just law, in contrast to Callicles’s belief in “nature.”
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