THE SHIP OF STATE 407
he is like a plant which, having proper nurture, must necessarily grow and mature into all virtue, but, if sown and planted in an alien soil, becomes the most noxious of all weeds, unless he be preserved by some divine power. Do you really think, as people so often say, that our youth are corrupted by Sophists, or that private teachers of the art corrupt them in any degi'ee worth speaking of ? Are not the public who say these things the greatest of all Sophists? And do they not educate to perfection young and old, men and women alike, and fashion them after their own hearts ?
WTben is this accomplished ? he said.
When they meet together, and the world sits down at an assembly, or in a court of law, or in a theatre, or a camp, or in any other popular resort, and there is a great uproar, and they praise some things which are being said or done, and blame other things, equally exaggerating both, shouting and clapping their hands, and the echo of the rocks ^ and the place in which they are assembled redoubles the sound of the praise or blame — at such a time will not a young man's heart, as they say, leap within him ? Will any pri- vate training enable him to stand firm against the overwhelming flood of popular opinion ? or, will he be carried away by the stream ? AVill he not have the notions of good and evil which the public in general have — he will do as they do, and as they are, such will he be ?
Yes, Socrates, necessity will compel him.
And yet, I said, there is a still greater necessity, which has not been mentioned.
1 The great theatre at Athens was at the foot of the Acropolis, on the southeastern slope.
