3 Plato 2 · On Death. Handed down at the Academy, from his Phaedo
This book records the argument on the day Socrates died. In it Plato sets out to prove that the mind does not perish with the body. This scripture does not take that proof. What it takes is Simmias’ lyre and Cebes’ cloaks — what those two said is the axiom of dispersal. Plato did not strike out their objections, and this scripture does not strike out his proof.
2.1Halfway through the day Simmias stood up.
2.2He said: sir, I am afraid I have something unwelcome to say.
2.3Socrates said: say it. Today the unwelcome thing is exactly what I most want to hear.
2.4Simmias said: consider a lyre.
2.5A lyre is wood and strings. The tuning is what there is once the wood and the strings are arranged.
2.6The tuning cannot be seen or handled. It is worth more than the wood, and it is finer than the wood.
2.7But smash the lyre, and where has the tuning gone?
2.8It does not fly off. It is not somewhere else. It was never a thing at all. It was an arrangement. (cf. Prologue 1.16)
2.9Might the mind not be like that?
2.10Might the mind not be exactly what there is once the body is arranged — unseen, worth more than the body, and gone the moment the lyre breaks?
2.11The room was quiet for a long while.
2.12Phaedo said afterward: in that moment our hearts went grey.
2.13I have written Simmias’ passage here without taking a word out of it.
2.14I gave him an answer later. My answer is written elsewhere. Read it yourselves and judge for yourselves.
2.15I will say only this: the best thing said that day was not said by my teacher, nor by me.
2.16It was said by the young man who was afraid of being unwelcome.