From: Gorgias 506c4-507a2
Soc: Then hear me as I take up the argument from the beginning.
Are the pleasant and the good the same?
They are not the same, as Callicles and I have agreed.
Is the pleasant enacted for the sake of the good or the good for the sake of the pleasant?
The pleasant for the sake of the good.
506D Is pleasure that from which, when it has arisen, we are pleased; and is good that from which, when it is present, we are good?
Very much so.
But of course we are good, and so too is everything else that is good, from some excellence that arises.
I think this is necessarily the case, Callicles.
And yet the excellence of anything, of an implement, the body, or indeed the soul, or of each living creature, does not best arise in a random manner, but through organisation, correctness and a skill that has been assigned to each; is this the case?
Yes, I agree.
506E So is the excellence of each, an arrangement and an ordering due to organisation?
I would say so.
Then each of the things that are, is rendered good by a certain order engendered in each and particular to each.
So it seems to me anyway.
Then is a soul, too, possessing her own order, better than a disordered one?
She must be.
But, of course, the one possessed of order is orderly?
How could she not be?
507A And the orderly is self-controlled?
Most necessarily.
So the self-controlled soul is good.
Now dear friend, Callicles, I have nothing else to say in opposition to all this, however, if you have, teach it.
Image: Thijs van der Vossen