LYSIMACHUS: That is very high praise which is accorded to you, Socrates,
by faithful witnesses and for actions like those which they praise. Let
me tell you the pleasure which I feel in hearing of your fame; and I
hope that you will regard me as one of your warmest friends. You ought
to have visited us long ago, and made yourself at home with us; but now,
from this day forward, as we have at last found one another out, do as I
say--come and make acquaintance with me, and with these young men, that
I may continue your friend, as I was your father's. I shall expect you
to do so, and shall venture at some future time to remind you of your
duty. But what say you of the matter of which we were beginning to
speak--the art of fighting in armour? Is that a practice in which the
lads may be advantageously instructed?
SOCRATES: I will endeavour to advise you, Lysimachus, as far as I can in
this matter, and also in every way will comply with your wishes; but as
I am younger and not so experienced, I think that I ought certainly to
hear first what my elders have to say, and to learn of them, and if I
have anything to add, then I may venture to give my opinion to them as
well as to you. Suppose, Nicias, that one or other of you begin.
NICIAS: I have no objection, Socrates; and my opinion is that the
acquirement of this art is in many ways useful to young men. It is an
advantage to them that among the favourite amusements of their leisure
hours they should have one which tends to improve and not to injure
their bodily health. No gymnastics could be better or harder exercise;
and this, and the art of riding, are of all arts most befitting to a
freeman; for they only who are thus trained in the use of arms are
the athletes of our military profession, trained in that on which the
conflict turns. Moreover in actual battle, when you have to fight in a
line with a number of others, such an acquirement will be of some use,
and will be of the greatest whenever the ranks are broken and you have
to fight singly, either in pursuit, when you are attacking some one who
is defending himself, or in flight, when you have to defend yourself
against an assailant. Certainly he who possessed the art could not meet
with any harm at the hands of a single person, or perhaps of several;
and in any case he would have a great advantage. Further, this sort of
skill inclines a man to the love of other noble lessons; for every man
who has learned how to fight in armour will desire to learn the proper
arrangement of an army, which is the sequel of the lesson: and when he
has learned this, and his ambition is once fired, he will go on to learn
the complete art of the general. There is no difficulty in seeing that
the knowledge and practice of other military arts will be honourable and
valuable to a man; and this lesson may be the beginning of them. Let me
add a further advantage, which is by no means a slight one,--that this