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astronomy, and the other arts, the very things which they had previously fled from. I teach them what they come to learn, viz., how they may best manage their own families, and how best to speak and act in the affairs of the state.-You teach politics then, and profess to make men good citizens-I do so.-You possess an admirable art, if you do indeed possess it, which I know not how to disbelieve. But hitherto I had imagined that what you profess to teach is not capable of being taught, or delivered from men to men. For the Athenians, who are a wise people, if in their assembly they are deliberating on ship-building, send for the ship-builders to advise them, and will hear nobody else; if about building a house, they will listen to nobody but architects; and if any one else, however noble or rich, attempt to speak, they scoff and drive him away. But when the discussion is upon anything which concerns the general management of the state, they listen to persons of all ranks and professions without distinction, and never think of reproaching any man for presuming to advise on the subject when he has never studied it, or learned it of a master. It is evident, therefore, that they do not think it capable of being taught; and the best and wisest citizen, as Pericles for example, though he teaches his sons excellently whatever a master can teach, cannot succeed in teaching them the wisdom and virtue in which he himself excels; in this they are no better than ordinary individuals. For these reasons, says Socrates, I have hitherto doubted that virtue can be taught; but if Protagoras can prove the possibility, I beseech him to do so.

Protagoras consents, and asks whether he shall teach by a μūlos, (which I am inclined to translate a legend,) like an old man instructing the young*, or by a discourse (oyos.) They give him his choice, and he prefers to tell them a story. If, as this circumstance would indicate, it was a frequent mode with the Sophists to deliver their doctrines in this way, it would account for the μooo which are scattered through the writings of Plato, and which, appearing to be related half in jest, half in earnest, it is not very easy otherwise to explain.

The story is, that when the gods made men and animals, they gave it in charge to Prometheus and Epimetheus to endow them; that Epimetheus solicited the task from his brother, and having obtained it, proceeded to distribute the endowments of strength, swiftness, &c., among the various animals, on the principle of compensation; but when he had exhausted all the endowments which he had to give, he found that man was left unprovided for. Prometheus, to remedy this blunder, stole rY EVTEXVOV Topía (scientific wisdom) from heaven, and with it fire, without which it was of no use, and bestowed these upon man. On this account was it that man, being akin to the gods, alone of all animals acknowledged their existence; and, by means of art, acquired the faculty of speech, made to himself clothes and houses, and procured food. But as there were no towns, and no human society, for want of the art of Polity, the human race were in danger of being extirpated by wild beasts; when Jupiter, in compassion, sent Mercury from heaven to make a present to mankind of Shame and Justice, in order that there might be mutual bonds among men, and that society might be possible. Mercury asked whether he should confer these gifts upon all mankind, or whether, like

benefit of all. Jupiter ordered him to give them to all; for if a few only possessed them, political society would be impossible; and bade him establish a law, as from Jupiter, that he who was incapable of shame and justice should, as a disease in the state, be extirpated.

For this reason,' continued Protagoras, 'the Athenians and others, who on architecture or any other manual art will hear only the few who possess it, are ready, when the subject is social virtue, which depends wholly upon justice and prudence, to listen to all advisers; because of this virtue all should be partakers, or states cannot exist.

And to prove that in reality all men do believe that justice and the other social virtues ought to belong to all, observe this: If a man pretends to be a good musician, and is not so, all men ridicule him, and his friends admonish him as a man out of his senses. But when justice and the social virtues are the matter in question, although they well know that a man is unjust, yet if he tells the truth and publicly avows it, what in the other case they considered to be good sense, is here thought madness; they maintain that all men should profess to be just, whether they are so or not, and that he who does not profess it is a madman, because the man who does not, in some degree, partake of the quality of justice, is unfit to live amongst mankind.

'It seems, then, that mankind in general think all persons qualified to advise concerning these virtues, since all are required to possess them. But further, they think that these virtues are not natural and spontaneous, but the result of study and of teaching. For those evils which are supposed to come upon men by nature or ill fortune, no man ever thinks of reproaching another for: who ever reprimanded, much less punished, another, for being of low stature, weak, or deformed? such evils are regarded as an object only of pity. Men admonish, and censure, and punish one another, for the absence of those good qualities only, which they deem to be acquired by study and art; and for this reason only it is that they so deal with the unjust. Let us but consider what punishment does, and we shall see that, in the opinion of mankind, virtue may be acquired. No man punishes another because he has done wrong; this would be the blind vengeance of the irrational animals. Rational punishment is not on account of the past act, which, having been done, cannot be undone; it is for the sake of the future; it is in order that this offender, and those who witness his punishment, may be warned against offending hereafter. The Athenians, therefore, and others, since they do punish the unjust man, do so with this intent; they do so because they think that virtue may be acquired, and that punishment is a means whereby men are induced to acquire it.

To the other argument of Socrates, that good men, although they teach to their children other things, fail of teaching them to be good, the following is the answer :-If it be true that there is something which, unless every member of the state possesses, the state cannot exist; and if this something be not architecture or pottery, or any mechanical art, but justice, prudence, holiness, in short, manly virtue; if all men, and women too, and children, whatever else they have, must have this, or be punished until they acquire it, or, if incapable of acquiring it, must be sent out of the country or put to death; and if, nevertheless, good men, teaching their children other things, do not teach them this, they are unworthy the name of good men. For that it can be taught we have

clearly shown. Is it credible, then, that men should teach their sons those things, to be ignorant of which carries with it no evil consequences, and not attempt to teach them that, which, if they do not learn, death, banishment, confiscation, destruction of their fortunes and prospects, will fall upon them? Not so. From infancy upwards they instruct their children in these things; they tell them what is just and unjust, honourable and dishonourable, holy and unholy; they bid them practise the one and avoid the other; and if they disregard the admonition, correct them by threats and blows. And in placing them with teachers, they enjoin care of the child's morals still more earnestly than of his learning; and the teachers make them read and commit to memory those passages of poets and other authors, by preference, which commend virtue and reprove vice. Music also is taught them, chiefly to soften the mind and accustom it to harmony, and order, and proportion; and they are delivered to the gymnast, in order that their bodies, being in good order, may be fitter to obey the commands of a well-ordered mind. When they leave school, the State requires them to learn its laws, and regulate their lives by them, as those who learn to write follow the copy which is set to them by the writing-master; and if they deviate from this rule they are punished; and the very name given to punishment indicates its objectit is termed correction.*

Nor is it wonderful, notwithstanding this, that good fathers should have sons of no particular merit. If there were any other branch of knowledge, the cultivation of which by every citizen were necessary to the being of the state; if society could not exist unless all could play on the flute, and if all were taught to play, and reproached if they played ill, instead of being envied for playing well-(as at present men are not envied for being just and virtuous, since it is every man's interest that others should be just and virtuous, for which reason we are all eager to teach justice and virtue to all men)-do you suppose that the sons of good flute-players would be better players than other men? Not so. Whoever had the best natural disposition for music would be the best player: a good player's son would often play ill-the son of a bad player, well; but all would be competent players, compared with those who knew nothing of music whatever. In like manner all civilized men, even the most unjust, if compared with men among whom there is no training, no tribunals, no laws, with the wild men of whom poets tell us, would appear a perfect master in virtue: and after mixing with such men, you would be delighted to meet with the greatest villains of our own country. But now you are fastidious, and because all are teachers of virtue, you will not allow that any are so just as if you were to inquire in this city who teaches Greek, you would find nobody; or if you sought somebody competent to teach the son of a mechanic his father's art, which he had learned in his father's shop as well as his father could teach it, you might find nobody; but of men who could teach those who were totally ignorant of the art, you would find abundance. It is thus with virtue: all men teach it; and we may think ourselves fortunate if we find one who is a little more capable than others of advancing men towards it. Such a man I profess to be; and I am willing that my scholars should judge of my pretensions. Accordingly, the terms

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THE RAJAH'S TOMB.

THIS is the spot! there needs no sculptur'd line!
No column marks the Rajah's lonely tomb;
But shadowing elms their drooping boughs incline,
And shroud his cold remains in sacred gloom.

Yes! far from Ganges' consecrated wave,

Beneath our pallid groves and northern skies,
A stranger's hand hath laid thee in thy grave,
And stranger-tears have wept thine obsequies!

A stranger? No! thy caste' was human-kind;
Thy home-wherever freedom's beacon shone,
And England's noblest hearts exulting shrined
The turban'd offspring of a burning zone.

Pure, generous mind! all that was just and true;
All that was lovely, holiest, brightest, best-
Kindled thy soul of eloquence anew,

And waked responsive chords in every breast.

Sons of the western main around thee hung,
While Indian lips unfolded freedom's laws,
And grateful Woman heard the Brahmin's tongue
Proclaim her worth, and plead her widowed cause.

Ah! why did fortune dash, with bitter doom,
That cup of high communion from thine hand,
And scatter, darkly withering o'er the tomb,
The blessings gathered for thy native land?

Be hushed our murmurs! He, whose voice had won
Thee, heaven-bound trav'ller, forth from Pagan night,
In mercy called the trusting spirit on,

And bade it dwell with Uncreated Light.

Perchance, when o'er thy loved paternal bower
The Sun of Righteousness shall healing rise,
When India's children feel his noon-day power,
And mingle all in Christian sympathies,-

Hither their pilgrim footsteps duly bound,

With fervent zeal these hallow'd haunts shall trace,
And sweetly solemn tears bedew the ground
Where sleeps the friend and prophet of their race!

M.A.

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