Plato "Knowing Yourself" - Dialogue from Alkiviades I

From Plato's Dialogues - Alkiviades I
Socrates dialogue with Alkiviades - "Knowing yourself" (γνῶναι ἑαυτόν)

SOCRATES: But should we ever have known what art makes a shoe better, if we did not know a shoe?

ALCIBIADES: Impossible.

SO. Nor should we know what art makes a ring better, if we did not know a ring?

AL. That is true.

SO. And can we ever know what art makes a man better, if we do not know what we are ourselves?

AL. Impossible.

SO. And is self-knowledge such an easy thing, and was he to be lightly esteemed who inscribed the text on the temple at Delphi? Or is self-knowledge a difficult thing, which few are able to attain?

AL. At times I fancy, Socrates, that anybody can know himself; at other times the task appears to be very difficult.

SO. But whether easy or difficult, Alcibiades, still there is no other way; knowing what we are, we shall know how to take care of ourselves, and if we are ignorant we shall not know.

AL. That is true. (...)

SO. Practise yourself, sweet friend, in learning what you ought to know, before you enter on politics; and then you will have an antidote which will keep you out of harm's way.

AL. Good advice, Socrates, but I wish that you would explain to me in what way I am to take care of myself.

SO. Have we not made an advance? for we are at any rate tolerably well agreed as to what we are, and there is no longer any danger, as we once feared, that we might be taking care not of ourselves, but of something which is not ourselves.

AL. That is true.

SO. And the next step will be to take care of the soul, and look to that?

AL. Certainly.

SO. Leaving the care of our bodies and of our properties to others?

AL. Very good.

SO. But how can we have a perfect knowledge of the things of the soul?--For if we know them, then I suppose we shall know ourselves. Can we really be ignorant of the excellent meaning of the Delphian inscription, of which we were just now speaking?

AL. What have you in your thoughts, Socrates?

SO. I will tell you what I suspect to be the meaning and lesson of that inscription. Let me take an illustration from sight, which I imagine to be the only one suitable to my purpose.

AL. What do you mean?

SO. Consider; if some one were to say to the eye, 'See thyself,' as you might say to a man, 'Know thyself,' what is the nature and meaning of this precept? Would not his meaning be:--That the eye should look at that in which it would see itself?

AL. Clearly.

SO. And what are the objects in looking at which we see ourselves?

AL. Clearly, Socrates, in looking at mirrors and the like.

SO. Very true; and is there not something of the nature of a mirror in our own eyes?

AL. Certainly.

SO. Did you ever observe that the face of the person looking into the eye of another is reflected as in a mirror; and in the visual organ which is over against him, and which is called the pupil, there is a sort of image of the person looking?

AL. That is quite true.

SO. Then the eye, looking at another eye, and at that in the eye which is most perfect, and which is the instrument of vision, will there see itself?

AL. That is evident.

SO. But looking at anything else either in man or in the world, and not to what resembles this, it will not see itself?

AL. Very true.

SO. Then if the eye is to see itself, it must look at the eye, and at that part of the eye where sight which is the virtue of the eye resides?

AL. True.

SO. And if the soul, my dear Alcibiades, is ever to know herself, must she not look at the soul; and especially at that part of the soul in which her virtue resides, and to any other which is like this?

AL. I agree, Socrates.

SO. And do we know of any part of our souls more divine than that which has to do with wisdom and knowledge?

AL. There is none.

SO. Then this is that part of the soul which resembles the divine; and he who looks at this and at the whole class of things divine, will be most likely to know himself?

AL. Clearly.