Echec. How was that?

Phaed. I will tell you:  I happened to be sitting at his right hand, near the bed, upon a low seat, but he himself sat much higher than I. Stroking my head, then, and laying hold of the hair that hung on my neck—­for he used, often, to play with my hairs—­“To-morrow,” he said, “perhaps, Phaedo, you will cut off these beautiful locks?”

“It seems likely, Socrates,” said I.

87.  “Not if you are persuaded by me.”

“Why so?” I asked.

“To-day,” he replied, “both I ought to cut off mine and you yours, if our argument must die, and we are unable to revive it.  And I, if I were you, and the arguments were to escape me, would take an oath, as the Argives do, not to suffer my hair to grow until I had renewed the contest, and vanquished the arguments of Simmias and Cebes.”

“But,” I said, “even Hercules himself is said not to have been a match for two.”

“Call upon me, then,” he said, “as your Iolaus, while it is yet day.”

“I do call on you, then,” I said, “not as Hercules upon Iolaus, but as Iolaus upon Hercules.”

“It will make no difference,” he replied.  “But, first of all, we must beware lest we meet with some mischance.”

“What?” I asked.

“That we do not become,” he answered, “haters of reasoning, as some become haters of men; for no greater evil can happen to any one than to hate reasoning. 88.  But hatred of reasoning and hatred of mankind both spring from the same source.  For hatred of mankind is produced in us from having placed too great reliance on some one without sufficient knowledge of him, and from having considered him to be a man altogether true, sincere, and faithful, and then, after a little while, finding him depraved and unfaithful, and after him another.  And when a man has often experienced this, and especially from those whom he considered his most intimate and best friends, at length, having frequently stumbled, he hates all men, and thinks that there is no soundness at all in any of them.  Have you not perceived that this happens so?”

“Certainly,” I replied.

“Is it not a shame?” he said “And is it not evident that such a one attempts to deal with men without sufficient knowledge of human affairs?  For if he had dealt with them with competent knowledge, as the case really is, so he would have considered that the good and the bad are each very few in number, and that those between both are most numerous.”

89.  “How say you?” I asked.

“In the same manner,” he replied, “as with things very little and very large Do you think that any thing is more rare than to find a very large on a very little man, or dog, or any thing else? and, again, swift or slow, beautiful or ugly, white or black?  Do you not perceive that of all such things the extremes are rare and few, but that the intermediate are abundant and numerous?”

“Certainly,” I replied.