MODERATION AND SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN

XENOPHON’S MEMORABILIA

Benjamin Lorch1

Abstract: This essay examines the first stage of the positive part of the Socratic edu-
cation in Xenophon’s Memorabilia, whose subject is moderation concerning the gods.
This stage of the Socratic education investigates whether providential gods exist and
whether it is moderate to be pious. Socrates does not accept either one of the two teleo-
logical arguments in favour of the existence of providential gods that he advances in
the Memorabilia. Instead, he holds that human beings cannot know whether or not the
gods exist, and moderation refers to the manner in which Socrates deems it reasonable
to proceed in light of this uncertainty. Socrates suggests that the moderate alternative
to piety is justice, and this essay concludes by considering why justice is moderate but
piety is not.

Introduction
Xenophon devotes the major part of the fourth book of the Memorabilia to the
Socratic education to virtue. The conversations in Book Four present Socrates
teaching the subjects that he holds that his students should learn, in the spe-
cific order in which he holds that these subjects should be learned.2 With
regard to the order of the education, Socrates holds that once a student is
persuaded that he is in need of an education, the first subject that he should
learn is moderation, beginning with ‘moderation concerning the gods’ (IV
2.40–3.2).3 This essay will investigate this first stage of the positive part of the
Socratic education: what moderation concerning the gods is, and what contri-
bution the instruction in moderation makes to the Socratic education as a
whole and in particular to the investigation of justice which is at the heart of
that education (see IV 8.4).
Xenophon begins the discussion of moderation concerning the gods by
explaining why Socrates holds moderation to be the first subject that a student
should learn after the preliminary, protreptic stage of his education. Accord-
ing to Xenophon, the reason is that if the student continues his education with-
out first becoming moderate then he is liable to become more unjust and
capable of evil (IV 3.1). The danger to which Xenophon refers arises because
of the manner in which Socrates convinces potential students that they are in

1 Center for the Study of Core Texts and Ideas, University of Texas, Austin, TX
78712. Email: benjamin.lorch@gmail.com
2 See Leo Strauss, Xenophon’s Socrates (South Bend, 1998), pp. 95, 113.
3 References in parentheses refer to the Memorabilia. I use the Greek text edited by
Carolus Hude (Leipzig, 1934) and the excellent English translation by Amy Bonnette
(Memorabilia, trans. A. Bonnette (Ithaca, 1994)).
POLIS. Vol. 26. No. 2, 2009
186 B. LORCH

need of an education.4 Socrates accomplishes this by undermining the moral

constraints by which the students believe that they are bound (IV 2.11–23).
The instruction in moderation aims to avert the danger that a student may
interpret the undermining of his moral convictions as the license to pursue the
good by whatever means he pleases.
But according to Xenophon’s presentation of the preliminary stage of the
Socratic education, the best students are not in danger of interpreting the dis-
covery that their moral convictions are incoherent as a license to commit
injustice. For these students realize that their ignorance of justice leaves them
at a loss not only for the means by which they are permitted to pursue the good
but also and especially for the good that they should pursue (IV 2.30–36).
When such a student realizes that he does not know what justice is, the pur-
suits that he previously considered just lose some of their attraction, because
they lose the intrinsic worth that just actions possess by virtue of their justice,
and as a result they come to appear no more good than bad (cf. IV 2.34–35,
with IV 2.11; see III 8.2–5, 9.4–5). Such a student realizes that he is ignorant
not only of justice but also of the good, and so he is not tempted to pursue the
good unjustly. Xenophon explains the order of the Socratic education by ref-
erence to the students who need to be dissuaded from becoming unjust, but the
reader must also keep in mind the better students, who feel that their very hap-
piness depends on justice and who seek guidance, not only about the means by
which it is permitted to pursue the good, but also about the good itself.
In the instruction in moderation concerning the gods, the question of the
good arises in the form of the question of whether or not providential gods
exist. The relation between these two questions is established by the only
remark in the conversation that mentions moderation by name: ‘it would not
be moderate to hope for more from others than from those who are able to
benefit with respect to the greatest things, or to hope for this other than by
pleasing them’ (IV 3.17). According to this remark, moderation pertains not
only to the manner in which one should endeavour to fulfil one’s hopes,
which according to Socrates is by ‘pleasing’ those whose benefactions one
seeks, but also to the very content of one’s hopes, because it is not moderate to
expect greater happiness than one stands to receive from the most powerful
benefactors.5 The question of what happiness one has a right to hope for
depends on the question of who the greatest benefactors are, and in particular
on whether or not the greatest benefactors are gods.
4 The claims in this paragraph and the next one could only be substantiated by an
analysis of Memorabilia IV 2, which is beyond the scope of this article. The most
thorough analysis of this chapter is D. Johnson, ‘Xenophon at his Most Socratic (Memo-
rabilia 4.2)’, Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 29 (2005), pp. 39–73. I discuss John-
son’s analysis in note 8 below.
5 See Memorabilia III 9.4, which confirms that Socrates holds that moderation
entails the knowledge not only of the means by which one may seek the good but also of
the good itself.
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 187

The consideration of this question takes the form of a teleological argument

in favour of the existence of providential gods, which is the second one of two
teleological theologies that Xenophon attributes to Socrates in the Memora-
bilia. This essay will demonstrate that Socrates holds that both teleological
arguments are defective and in general that teleological reasoning cannot
establish whether or not providential gods exist, and whether or not one
should follow the guidance about how one ought to live that is attributed to the
gods.6 Based on this evidence, I will argue that Socrates does not hold that it is
moderate to believe in the gods and follow the guidance that is attributed to
them, and that the guidance at which the Socratic education aims is not divine
guidance.
Admittedly, the thesis that Socrates does not believe in the gods appears to
be contradicted by Socrates himself, who teaches his student Euthydemus that
human life is in the care of providential gods and who advises Euthydemus to
worship the gods in the manner that the law of the city prescribes (IV 3.16).
But this evidence is not decisive, because Xenophon also informs the reader
that his Socrates is in the habit of claiming to hold views that he actually con-
siders false. According to Xenophon, whenever Socrates presents an argu-
ment, he claims to hold the most conventional views, and he does not reveal
his true position unless his interlocutor contradicts him (IV 6.13–15).7 And in
the conversation that is explicitly devoted to the subject of moderation con-
cerning the gods, Euthydemus does not raise any objection to the advice that
Socrates gives him to worship the gods or to the teleological arguments with
which Socrates justifies this advice. The failure of Euthydemus to raise any
objection to the argument does not necessarily indicate that the argument is
incorrect; but taken together with Xenophon’s description of the manner in
which his Socrates converses, the ease with which Euthydemus is persuaded
indicates that the reader must evaluate the argument for himself.
Moreover, Xenophon indicates in other ways that Euthydemus fails to
grasp Socrates’ view of the gods. In his introduction to the conversation,
Xenophon suggests that the instruction in moderation is particularly demand-
ing, and that some students of Socrates are incapable of meeting these
demands. He stipulates that Socrates ‘tried’ to make his companions moderate
concerning the gods, which suggests that Socrates may fail to make some of
6 This thesis is denied by the leading scholarly interpretation of this part of the
Memorabilia: M. McPherran, The Religion of Socrates (University Park, 1996), pp.
272–91 (henceforth RS). McPherran notes that Xenophon’s ‘apologetic agenda’ occa-
sionally leads him to ‘foist’ pieces of ‘non-Socratic argumentation’ on his Socrates, but
he argues that the pious views that Xenophon attributes to his Socrates are Socrates’ true
views (RS, p. 279). I will consider McPherran’s interpretation in detail as I present the
corresponding parts of Socrates’ argument.
7 See C. Bruell, ‘Introduction: Xenophon and His Socrates’, in Memorabilia, trans.
Bonnette, p. xxi; and E. Buzzetti, ‘The Rhetoric of Xenophon and the Treatment of Jus-
tice in the Memorabilia’, Interpretation, 29.1 (2001), pp. 7–8.
188 B. LORCH

his companions moderate (IV 3.2). This suggestion may refer to the notori-
ously immoderate Critias and Alcibiades (see I 2.14–17), but the context
makes clear that it refers primarily to Euthydemus, for immediately before
this remark, Xenophon indicates that Euthydemus is not up to the demands of
the Socratic education by noting that the entire relationship between Socrates
and Euthydemus is based on Socrates’ awareness of Euthydemus’ limitations
as a student (IV 2.40).8 And right after stipulating that Socrates is unable to
teach moderation to some students, Xenophon emphasizes that he was present
personally at the conversation between Socrates and Euthydemus that he pro-
ceeds to report (IV 3.2). By calling attention to his presence at a conversation
between Socrates and an incompetent interlocutor, Xenophon suggests that
the considerations that arise in the conversation may make a different impres-
sion on him and other intelligent spectators than they make on Euthydemus
(cf. III 8.1, IV 4.5). While none of these indications proves conclusively that
Euthydemus is tricked into accepting an argument that Socrates considers
false, they establish that the only way to discover whether Socrates accepts
the conventionally pious view that he recommends to Euthydemus is by
evaluating the arguments that support this view for oneself.
But the reader who undertakes to evaluate Socrates’ arguments for himself
confronts an interpretive difficulty. Not only must he consider whether an
argument is sound or defective in itself; if the argument is defective, he must
prove in addition that the defect is apparent to Xenophon and to his Socrates.
For the fact that ‘Xenophon’s Socrates offers a crude “argument from design”
to prove the existence of “the divine”’ may mean that Xenophon’s Socrates is
8 The question of Euthydemus’ competence is surprisingly controversial, given the
clarity with which Xenophon stipulates that a fully qualified student must be exception-
ally intelligent (IV 1.2) and shows on numerous occasions that Euthydemus is exception-
ally unintelligent. At least two leading scholars of the Memorabilia maintain that
Euthydemus possesses all of the qualifications that a student of Socrates requires: John-
son, ‘Xenophon’, p. 47 n. 20; and D. Morrison, ‘Xenophon’s Socrates as Teacher’, in The
Socratic Movement, ed. P. Vander Waerdt (Ithaca, 1994), pp. 181–208, p. 185 n. 7. A full
discussion of this matter would require a complete interpretation of at least the first con-
versation between Socrates and Euthydemus, which is beyond the scope of this article,
and so I will only address the evidence with which Johnson supports his claim. (Morrison
offers no evidence at all.) First, Johnson points out that Xenophon’s Socrates claims to be
in love only with the ‘good natures’, and that Xenophon calls Euthydemus beautiful. But
Xenophon does not suggest that all beautiful people possess good natures, or that Socra-
tes is in love with all beautiful people or with Euthydemus in particular, and Johnson
admits that Socrates professes his love for the good natures ‘jokingly’ and that ‘there is
nothing overtly erotic about Socrates’ conversations with Euthydemus’. The second,
weightier piece of evidence is that Euthydemus cares about being just, which Xenophon
identifies as an essential qualification of the good natures. Johnson is correct to point out
that Euthydemus is superior in this respect to the other defective natures that Xenophon
describes at the beginning of Book Four. Yet this does not mitigate Euthydemus’ defi-
ciency in the intellectual qualities that Xenophon insists good students must have. See
Strauss, Xenophon’s Socrates, pp. 94, 100–1.
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 189

as simple-minded as Terence Irwin believes and that the discussion of piety in

the Memorabilia is not worth taking seriously.9 The solution to this interpre-
tive difficulty is furnished by the fact that the conversation with Euthydemus
is only one of two teleological arguments that Xenophon attributes to Socrates
in the Memorabilia. The presence of two different teleological arguments
helps the reader to identify the defects in each one, because each argument
contradicts claims that the other argument makes.
The two conversations about the gods in the Memorabilia are super-
ficially very similar in ways that encourage the reader to compare them with
one another.10 Not only do both conversations present teleological argu-
ments in favour of the existence of providential gods; both discuss the same
subjects in the same order. Both conversations begin by considering evi-
dence that the world has been designed with a view to the needs of living
creatures (I 4.4–9, IV 3.2–9); both proceed to consider whether the gods
care not only for animal life in general but also for the human species in par-
ticular (I 4.10–14, IV 3.10–12); and both conclude by considering whether
the gods advise human beings by means of divination (I 4.15–18, IV
3.12–14). The comparison between the two conversations reveals that each
one attributes to Socrates views that he claims or implies in the other
conversation that he does not hold. In the first part of one conversation, the
interlocutor rejects Socrates’ argument for reasons that Socrates tacitly
acknowledges to be valid and that apply equally to the argument that Socra-
tes advances in the corresponding part of the other conversation. In the sec-
ond part, Socrates presents evidence in one conversation which contradicts
the conclusion that he encourages the interlocutor in the other conversation
to draw. And in the third part, Socrates raises a consideration in one conver-
sation that disqualifies the advice that he gives to the interlocutor at the end
of the other conversation. These contradictions greatly simplify the task of
evaluating the case for piety that Socrates makes, because it is not a matter
of considering for oneself whether Socrates realizes that a defective argu-
ment is incorrect, but rather of deciding which one of the two contradictory
positions that Socrates claims to hold is the one that he actually holds. This
essay will show that Xenophon himself indicates which position Socrates
holds to be correct in each case, and that the correct argument and the view
of the gods that it supports depart substantially from both teleological argu-
ments and the pious views that Socrates claims they support.
In the following analysis, the major differences between the arguments of
the two conversations will be shown to arise from the differences between

9 T. Irwin, Review of L. Strauss, Xenophon’s Socrates, The Philosophical Review,

83.3 (1974), pp. 409–13, p. 410.
10 The comparison between the two conversations about piety is central to the inter-
pretation of this stage of the Socratic education by Strauss (Xenophon’s Socrates,
pp. 102–5).
190 B. LORCH

the dramatic scenarios of the conversations, and in the first place from the
differences between the interlocutors Euthydemus and Aristodemus. The
most important difference is that Aristodemus is far more sceptical and
demanding, and Euthydemus is far more credulous and uncurious. For
example, Euthydemus admits at the beginning of the conversation that he
has never thought about the care that the gods take for human beings,
whereas Aristodemus has already thought about this and has arrived at the
conclusion that animal life may not exist by design (gnÜmÂ) at all, but rather
by chance (tuchÂ) (IV 3.3, I 4.4). Since Aristodemus is a more demanding
interlocutor than Euthydemus, he forces Socrates to acknowledge that the
case for divine providence is weaker than Socrates will lead Euthydemus to
believe later in the Memorabilia. For example, Socrates maintains in the
conversation with Euthydemus that reason based on sense-perception can
discover that the gods advise people who consult divination, but he admits
to Aristodemus that this is not the case (IV 3.13, I 4.18). Yet the scepticism
of Aristodemus does not make Socrates more forthcoming in every respect.
For Socrates’ aim in the conversation with Aristodemus is to dissuade
Aristodemus from his conspicuous and therefore imprudent impiety (I 4.2,
19).11 Accordingly, even though Socrates is more honest in the conversation
with Aristodemus about the limitations of the evidence that providential
gods exist, he is extremely reticent in the same conversation about the
practical consequences of these limitations. He suggests that since human
reason cannot discover whether or not providential gods exist, the proper
course of action is to seek guidance about this matter from the very gods
whose existence is in doubt (I 4.18)! On the other hand, although the
conversation between Socrates and Euthydemus ends with Socrates advis-
ing Euthydemus to observe the conventional prescriptions concerning piety,
the aim of the conversation with Euthydemus is not to provide practical
guidance. Xenophon explicitly distinguishes between the instruction in
moderation that the conversation with Euthydemus illustrates and the
instruction in how to speak, behave and contrive (IV 3.1). The aim is rather
to teach Euthydemus the view of the gods that Socrates considers moderate,
to the extent that Euthydemus is capable of learning it. Accordingly, in
the conversation with Euthydemus, but not in the conversation with
Aristodemus, Socrates suggests what this view is.

11 McPherran notes Socrates’ motive for initiating the conversation with Aristodemus,
but he does not consider how this motive might affect the course of the conversation.
Instead, he assumes that the two conversations are in complete agreement with one
another and that one can discover Socrates’ view by making a list of all the individual
considerations and ‘scattered references’ that appear in the two chapters, and dismissing
as irrelevant the particular contexts in which the considerations are raised and the other
differences between the conversations (RS, pp. 276–7, 281).
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 191

The Argument from Design

In the first part of each conversation, Socrates argues that the world and the
beings that inhabit it were designed with a view to the happiness of living
beings and in particular to the happiness of humans. In the conversation with
Euthydemus, Socrates cites as evidence for this view the beneficial properties
of the sun, moon and stars, which provide human beings with light and dark-
ness; the elements, which provide the necessities of life; and the annual
motion of the sun, which is confined within limits that benefit human beings
(IV 3.3–9). In the conversation with Aristodemus Socrates refers, not to
the elements and heavenly bodies as he does in the conversation with
Euthydemus, but rather to the human and animal sense organs and the ‘signs
of forethought’ that they exhibit, because Aristodemus holds that the makers
of animate and sensitive beings are more impressive than the makers of inani-
mate and insensitive objects (I 4.4–6). Yet this evidence does not persuade
Aristodemus. He concedes only that the phenomena that Socrates enumerates
‘seem’ very much to be the work of some craftsman who is wise and a lover of
animals, and he repeats a second time that all these phenomena ‘certainly
seem’ to be the contrivances of someone who planned for animals to exist (I
4.7). By asserting twice, not that these phenomena are the work of a god but
only that they seem to be so, Aristodemus expresses a reservation about the
argument.
The reservation that Aristodemus expresses is a reasonable one, because
even though the phenomena that Socrates mentions serve the beneficial pur-
pose of perpetuating life, they may not have been brought into existence for
this purpose or indeed for any purpose at all. The natural phenomena that sus-
tain animal life may be the accidental result of chemical and physical proper-
ties of matter that are intrinsically indifferent to the difference between living
and inanimate beings and that would occur in exactly the same way even if no
biological life existed at all.12 Elsewhere in the Memorabilia Xenophon sug-
gests that Socrates shares this reservation and holds that it is impossible to dis-
cover ‘the necessities by which each of the heavenly things comes to be’
(I 1.11–13). But in the conversation with Aristodemus, Socrates attempts to
overcome this reservation by making the alternative to Socrates’ account that
Aristodemus has in mind, namely that the natural order exists by chance and

12 McPherran seems to have this possibility in mind when he notes that ‘in view of
our present understanding of physical law and evolutionary mechanisms it will seem
puzzling to many of us’ that Socrates holds that ‘everything that is clearly purposeful …
is the product of intelligible design’. McPherran solves the ‘puzzle’ by ascribing to Soc-
rates and Xenophon such a primitive scientific understanding that ‘all things considered,
this is a fairly impressive piece of philosophy’ (RS, pp. 274–5). McPherran does not
notice that this position ‘seems puzzling’ to Aristodemus himself. If Socrates really
holds the primitive views that McPherran ascribes to him, then Aristodemus is superior
to Socrates.
192 B. LORCH

not by design, appear as improbable as possible (I 4.8–9). It is unclear

whether or not Aristodemus is persuaded by these supplementary consider-
ations, because he raises an objection that implies that he would not be satis-
fied even if he were persuaded by the entire argument up to this point: ‘if I
held that the gods worried about human beings, I would not neglect them’ (I
4.11). The argument so far has attempted to convince Aristodemus that the
gods care for ‘all animals’, and that the whole intelligible world is the product
of a divine mind (I 4.6, 8–9). But Aristodemus demands to know whether the
gods bestow special care on human beings, over and above equipping them to
satisfy those needs and desires that human beings share with the other
animals. More precisely, he denies that this is the case.13
The first section of the conversation with Euthydemus culminates in the
same question of whether the gods care for human life over and above caring
for animal life in general. But Euthydemus and Aristodemus raise the same
question for opposite reasons. Aristodemus, we have seen, denies that the
gods care for human beings. Euthydemus, on the other hand, raises the ques-
tion because he is already inclined to believe that the gods bestow special care
on human beings, and he seeks confirmation for this belief. Not only does
Euthydemus not share the reservation about Socrates’ teleological argument
that Aristodemus raises; not only does he hold that the elements, the heavenly
bodies and their motions are products of ‘forethought’ and ‘love for human
beings’; he even inclines spontaneously to believe that the gods have no other
work besides caring for human beings, but he hesitates to draw this conclu-
sion, because the other animals share in the good things that Socrates has enu-
merated (IV 3.9). Euthydemus is dissatisfied with the argument, not because
he doubts the pious view that the argument claims to support, as Aristodemus
does, but rather because Euthydemus holds an even more pious view than the
one that the argument is supposed to support. Moreover, the objection that
Euthydemus raises to Socrates’ argument is not even valid, because at least
one of the phenomena to which Socrates refers in the first part of the conver-
sation is a benefit only to human beings and not to animals. According to Soc-
rates, one of the benefits that the gods bestow on human beings is fire, which
is ‘a coworker in every art’ (IV 3.7). The other animals may benefit from the
warmth and light that fire provides, but only human beings possess the arts,
and so Euthydemus is wrong to object that the other animals share in all of the
good things that Socrates has enumerated. But Socrates proceeds to respond
to Euthydemus’ objection as if it were valid, and to adduce further evidence
that the gods care specially for human beings. Later in the conversation, Soc-
rates introduces a consideration that explains why he does not reply to

13 I follow Dorion’s solution to the apparent contradiction between the agreement of

Aristodemus that the gods appear to care for animals (I 4.7) and his objection that they do
not care for human beings (I 4.11); see Xénophon: Mémorables, trans. L.-A. Dorion
(Paris, 2000), p. 143 n. 251.
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 193

Euthydemus by referring him to fire and the arts: the arts do not establish that
the gods care for human beings to the superlative degree that Euthydemus
holds that they do, because human beings are in need of greater assistance
than the arts can provide (IV 3.11–12).

The Human Species

The second section of each conversation considers whether the gods bestow
special care on human beings, beyond the care that they bestow on all animals.
In the conversation with Euthydemus, Socrates confirms Euthydemus’ belief
that the gods do nothing besides care for human beings by telling Euthydemus
that even the animals exist for the use and benefit of human beings, and so
even the benefits that the gods appear to bestow on the animals ultimately
serve human happiness. Euthydemus accepts this explanation, and the ques-
tion of whether the gods care for human beings seems to be settled for him (IV
3.10). Yet Socrates continues to present further evidence that the gods care for
human beings, even though no further evidence is necessary in order to con-
vince Euthydemus. This suggests that although Euthydemus may believe that
the matter is settled by the argument about the animals, Socrates holds that the
argument is insufficient. Indeed, the argument is defective: in order to show
that by providing for the animals the gods provide ultimately for human
beings, Socrates would have to establish that all animals for which the gods
provide are useful to human beings, but Socrates confines his examples to
domestic animals such as goats and sheep and remains silent about wild ani-
mals. The care that the gods appear to take for those species of animals that are
harmful to human beings contradicts the conclusion that the gods have no care
besides human happiness, which Euthydemus draws. Accordingly, Socrates
supplements the argument about the animals with additional evidence that the
gods care for human beings, consisting of three human faculties: perception,
through which we discern the different good and noble things; calculation,
through which we learn how each thing is advantageous and how we may
enjoy the good things and avoid the bad ones; and explanation, through
which, by teaching, we share with one another all of the good things and live
in common, and we set down laws and live politically. Euthydemus is of
course impressed by this further evidence that the gods care ‘in all ways’ for
human beings (IV 3.11–12). But the argument concerning the human faculties
relies tacitly on the same erroneous assumption as the argument concerning
the animals. The assumption is that just as the particular examples that Socra-
tes mentions are beneficial to human beings, so are all members of the class of
phenomena to which these examples belong. This assumption is false, and
just as the first argument fails to acknowledge that there are species of animals
that are not beneficial to human beings, so the second argument is silent about
those human faculties that attest to the vulnerability of human beings to death
and other natural evils. Most obviously, Socrates is silent about the human
194 B. LORCH

body, which is more evidently mortal than the soul. Man’s vulnerability to
death and other evils strongly suggests that the being that is responsible for
this vulnerability is indifferent to human happiness.14 While Euthydemus is
not aware of this problem, the conversation with Aristodemus proves that
Socrates is aware that the natural evils to which human beings are exposed
contradict the view of the gods that he encourages Euthydemus to hold. For in
the corresponding part of the conversation with Aristodemus, Socrates gives
an account of human life that refers explicitly to these natural evils, and based
on this account he advances a less optimistic view of the manner in which the
gods care for human beings than the view that he encourages Euthydemus to
hold.
According to Xenophon, Socrates aims in all of his conversations with
Euthydemus to disturb Euthydemus as little as possible (IV 2.40). In the
conversation about piety, this aim requires Socrates to avoid contradicting
Euthydemus’ view that the gods direct the whole world with a view to human
happiness. In the conversation with Aristodemus, on the other hand, Socrates
does not aim to support the extravagant view that the world exists solely for
the sake of human beings. His aim is only to refute Aristodemus’ equally
extravagant view that even if the gods care for animal life in general, as
Aristodemus concedes that they seem to do, they do not care specially for the
human species at all (I 4.7, 11). This aim does not require Socrates to deny
that there may be limits to the care that the gods take for human beings, as he is
required to do in order to support Euthydemus’ view. Instead, Socrates has the
more limited task of demonstrating to Aristodemus that the gods who care for
animal life also differentiate between human beings and the other animals,
and bestow special care on the human species over and above the care that
they bestow on animal life in general. As a result, Socrates speaks more
frankly about the human condition in the conversation with Aristodemus than
he does in the conversation with Euthydemus.
In the conversation with Aristodemus, Socrates begins his account of the
manner in which the gods care for human beings from the unique constitution
of the human body: he points out that only human beings possess upright pos-
ture, and explains at length how this physiological difference is responsible

14 Strauss, Xenophon’s Socrates, p. 103; D. Bolotin, An Approach to Aristotle’s

Physics with Particular Attention to the Role of his Manner of Writing (Albany, 1998),
pp. 45–6. McPherran argues that Socrates ignores the ‘“Problem of Evil” generated by
his moral theology of how his good and wise god(s) is (are) to be reconciled with the exis-
tence of natural disasters and moral evil’, and especially with the existence of ‘earth-
quakes, tyrants, and plague’ (RS, pp. 276–7). But it is rather McPherran who ignores the
indications that Socrates acknowledges a similar situation to what McPherran seems to
mean by the ‘Problem of Evil’.
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 195

for the differences between the human senses and those of the other animals.15
Next, Socrates turns to the human soul: the human soul is ‘the best one’,
because only human beings perceive that the gods exist and put in order the
greatest and noblest things; only the species or tribe of human beings serves
gods; and the human soul is the most able to guard against physical suffering
and to learn (I 4.11–13). This account differs from the conversation with
Euthydemus not only by beginning with the human body but also by referring
to the similarities between human beings and the other animals as well as to
the differences between them: the gods gave feet to all of the animals that
walk, but hands only to human beings; all animals have tongues, but only the
human tongue possesses articulate speech; and the human soul is ‘the best’,
better than any animal soul, because the other animals cannot perceive the
gods at all and are less able to learn and to guard against suffering. On the
other hand, in the conversation with Euthydemus Socrates emphasizes human
mastery over the other animals and does not refer to human kinship with the
animals at all (IV 3.10–11). These similarities between human beings and the
other animals do not contradict Socrates’ argument that Aristodemus is wrong
to believe that human life shows no evidence of receiving special care from
the gods. On the contrary, Socrates successfully refutes Aristodemus by
establishing that the human species is a privileged one, whose members are
open to more of the world than the other animals, live richer lives and are
superior in these respects to the other animals. But by referring to the human
species, not as the sole beneficiary of divine care but rather as one beneficiary
among many, the conversation with Aristodemus expresses a more sober
view of the superiority of the human species than the view that Socrates
encourages Euthydemus to hold. The most important similarity between
human beings and animals to which Socrates refers in the conversation with
Aristodemus is their vulnerability to suffering and death. Not only does Soc-
rates acknowledge this vulnerability by referring to the ability of the soul to
guard against suffering; he refers explicitly to the separation of the soul from
the body in the last part of his speech (I 4.14). The fact that human beings are
no better off than the other animals in the crucial respect that every living
thing dies, is the decisive proof that the gods do not care solely for human
beings, as Euthydemus holds that they do. For the permanent necessities that
govern the world do not aim solely at the benefit of any impermanent individ-
ual or species. The positions of Euthydemus and Aristodemus are two implau-
sible extremes, which both ignore massive facts about human life and which
are both refuted by the considerations that Socrates raises in the conversation
with Aristodemus.

15 For a persuasive modern version of the view of human physiology in the conversa-
tion with Aristodemus, see E. Straus, ‘The Upright Posture’, in Phenomenological Psy-
chology (New York, 1980), pp. 137–65, pp. 161–2.
196 B. LORCH

There is also a second major difference between these two accounts of the
manner in which the gods care for human beings, in addition to the fact that
Socrates acknowledges to Aristodemus but not to Euthydemus that human
beings are exposed to the same natural evils as all other living beings. The sec-
ond difference is that piety is a prominent feature of Socrates’ description of
the human species in the conversation with Aristodemus, but Socrates is silent
about piety in the corresponding part of the conversation with Euthydemus.
Socrates tells Aristodemus that upright posture, which only human beings
possess, allows them to ‘contemplate’ (theasthai) the things above; only the
human soul has the power of perceiving the gods; and only human beings
worship gods (I 4.11, 13). Piety is the only human trait or power that Socrates
mentions in this part of the conversation with Aristodemus that he does not
also ascribe to the animals, and in this sense it is the greatest advantage that
human beings enjoy over the animals. Yet Socrates does not refer to piety in
the corresponding part of the conversation with Euthydemus, where he claims
that human beings are superior to the animals to a much greater extent than he
claims that they are in the conversation with Aristodemus. The omission sug-
gests that the propensity to worship the gods does not support the more opti-
mistic view of the human situation that Socrates encourages Euthydemus to
hold. Rather, piety arises from human vulnerability and attests to a need that
human beings have for divine assistance.
The connection between piety and human vulnerability is illustrated dramati-
cally by the attitudes of the two interlocutors. Aristodemus, to whom Socrates
has said nothing about the constitution of the human species that mitigates his
fear that human affairs are ultimately abandoned to chance, demands personal
guidance from the gods about what to do and what not to do (I 4.14–15). But
Euthydemus, who never seriously considers the possibility that his happiness
is insecure, shows no spontaneous interest in the question of personal provi-
dence, either. Instead, Socrates himself introduces the subject in his conversa-
tion with Euthydemus, and he indicates in this way that the demand that
Aristodemus makes is a reasonable one; and since Euthydemus does not
believe that anything is lacking from the care that the gods take for the species
as a whole, Socrates explains to him why personal providence is needed in
addition. According to Socrates, human beings are unable to foresee which of
their endeavours will turn out advantageously for them in the future, and the
gods help them by foretelling the future and teaching how things might come
to pass in the best way (IV 3.12). Human beings seem to lack the intellectual
capacity to direct their other powers wisely, because human affairs are too
uncertain for the human mind to foresee whether a particular endeavour will
turn out well. Only a superhuman mind could know whether an endeavour
that demands great efforts for the sake of an uncertain outcome is worthwhile
(see I 1.7–9, II 1.28, IV 2.34–36). The aim of the divine guidance that
Aristodemus demands, and that Socrates suggests to Euthydemus that he
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 197

ought to demand, is to overcome the limits on the human intellect and help
human beings attain happiness that they cannot reasonably expect to attain
otherwise.

Personal Providence
The third part of each conversation considers whether the gods provide per-
sonal guidance to human beings. More precisely, Euthydemus has no doubt
that this is the case, and Socrates does not encourage him to consider whether
he is right but only tells him how he may confirm what he already believes.
According to Socrates, Euthydemus will discover that the gods advise human
beings if he does not wait to see the shapes of the gods, who are invisible, and
if the visible works of the gods furnish sufficient evidence to convince him
that he should revere and honour the gods (IV 3.13). Because the gods are
invisible, the only access that Euthydemus can have to the truth about them is
through their visible works. Socrates’ advice implies that the only medium
through which human beings can discover the truth about the gods is sense
perception, and the only knowledge of the gods that human beings can have
must be deduced from the visible phenomena on which Socrates’ teleological
arguments are based. As we have seen, Socrates holds that the empirical evi-
dence in favour of providential gods is inconclusive, whereas Euthydemus
believes wrongly that the empirical world furnishes conclusive evidence of
divine providence. Accordingly, we must look to the conversation with
Aristodemus in order to discover how Socrates advises someone who assesses
the evidence correctly to proceed.
Even in the conversation with Aristodemus, Socrates is prevented from
seriously entertaining the possibility that the gods do not advise human beings
by his aim of persuading Aristodemus to cease ridiculing people who consult
divination (I 4.2). This aim requires Socrates to attempt to persuade
Aristodemus that divination is a serious pursuit, and accordingly Socrates
concludes the conversation by exhorting Aristodemus to consult divination (I
4.18). But Aristodemus is too intelligent to accept this advice on the strength
of the empirical evidence that Socrates directs Euthydemus to consult.
Accordingly, Socrates does not base his exhortation solely on this evidence.
On the contrary, he concedes that the same finitude and weakness of the
human mind that renders human beings dependent on divine guidance also
renders them unable to discover whether or not such guidance is available.
But precisely because the empirical evidence is inconclusive and human
reason is inescapably ignorant of whether or not the gods direct human
affairs, Socrates argues, Aristodemus has no choice but to consult the gods
about this most important matter.
The crucial part of Socrates’ argument begins by referring to the weakness
of the human mind that renders human beings dependent on divine guidance,
and the attributes of the gods that render them capable of providing this
198 B. LORCH

guidance. Socrates points out that Aristodemus’ intelligence governs only

his own body, but the world-mind has this power over all things; and
Aristodemus’ eye can see over many stadia, but the eye of the god can see all
things. Next, Socrates advises Aristodemus to consult divination in order to
confirm these claims about the gods: just as Aristodemus serves people in
order to recognize who is willing to serve him in return, and he consults peo-
ple in order to learn who is prudent, so if he serves the gods in order to try to
find out whether they wish to counsel him about things that are not clear to
human beings, then he will recognize that the divine is omniscient and omni-
potent and that they attend to all things simultaneously (I 4.17–18). Socrates
refers Aristodemus for proof that the gods are capable of providing the guid-
ance that human beings require to the very guidance of the gods that is in
doubt. Human beings are in need of guidance from the gods concerning the
question of whether or not guidance from the gods is available to human
beings. The piety that Socrates recommends to Aristodemus is based, not on
the conviction that providential gods exist, but rather on the recognition that
the question of divine providence could only be settled if the answer were
revealed to human beings by the gods themselves.

Discussion
Socrates’ advice to Aristodemus to be open to the possibility of receiving
guidance from the gods contradicts his advice to Euthydemus to rely only on
what he can perceive. The contradiction may not be immediately apparent,
because the empirical investigation of the gods cannot rule out the possibility
that the gods may provide the guidance that Socrates directs Aristodemus to
seek. But although reason based on sense perception must accept the possibil-
ity that human beings may receive guidance from the gods, it cannot accept
any particular guidance that someone might actually receive from the gods. In
order to do so, it would be necessary to determine whether the particular guid-
ance that someone believes that he has received from the gods actually comes
from the gods, and whether the experience of the gods that affords this guid-
ance is a genuine religious experience or a delusion. But the attempt to make
this determination scientifically leads to the same inconclusive result as the
attempt to determine whether any other phenomenon is the work of a god.
Reason based on empirical observation finds as much ground for doubting
that the gods are responsible for one’s own immediate, personal religious
experiences as it finds for doubting that the gods are responsible for anything
else. If the gods provide guidance to human beings, as reason acknowledges
that they may do, then this guidance is addressed to the faculty of the human
soul that possesses the power to recognize divine revelation as divine, and this
faculty is not reason. The faculty of the soul by which the guidance that is
attributed to the gods may be discovered to be true is rather a faculty that
reason denigrates as a mere emotion, such as the feeling of awe or of being
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 199

loved by God.16 Since reason must acknowledge that the gods may provide
guidance to human beings, it must acknowledge that this emotion may afford
truer and more reliable guidance about how one ought to live than reason
itself does. The fact that reason cannot rule out the possibility of receiving
guidance from the gods does not mean that the limitations of human reason
may be surmounted by means of such guidance; rather, it means that human
beings are more deeply and thoroughly ignorant than it might otherwise seem.
Human beings lack the most elementary knowledge not only of the gods but
also of their own soul.17
Socrates refers to this conclusion in the conversation with Euthydemus. At
the end of the speech in which he maintains that all human knowledge is based
on sense perception, Socrates remarks that the human soul is invisible. In the
context, the claim that the soul cannot be seen implies that it cannot be known.
Moreover, Socrates refers specifically to the question of whether or not the
human soul has access to divine guidance: he maintains that the soul ‘is mani-
festly king in us and participates in the divine if any human thing does, but it,
too, is invisible’ (IV 3.14). The meaning of this enigmatic claim is revealed by
the consideration to which Socrates’ advice to Aristodemus has led. The pos-
sibility that the soul that is ‘king’ in the human being may ‘participate in the
divine’, if indeed the gods direct human affairs and ‘any human thing’
participates in the divine, is the very possibility that the conversation with
Aristodemus raises: the possibility that the human soul governs the human
being in accord with superhuman knowledge that the gods reveal to human
beings. Socrates claims that the soul is invisible and mysterious to itself
specifically with regard to this possibility. Human beings cannot know
whether or not their soul has the capacity to discover the truth by means of an
emotional religious experience, and whether such emotional experiences
supersede reason. If anything, this very fact seems to answer the question of
whether one should be guided by reason or by one’s emotions and passions in
favour of the latter alternative, for it suggests that the question cannot be
decided by reason and that human beings cannot live rationally.

Moderation, Piety and Law

Despite the care that Socrates takes to prevent these considerations from dis-
turbing Euthydemus, Euthydemus is disheartened, because he does not think
that he can ever repay the gods adequately for their kindness. Socrates encour-
ages Euthydemus by reminding him that the very gods whom Euthydemus
doubts that he can adequately repay, have revealed to human beings how they
may do this. But Socrates does not tell Euthydemus to seek guidance directly
16 See J. Carey, ‘The Act of Faith’, in Essays in Honor of Robert Bart, ed. C. Stickney
(Annapolis, 1993), pp. 87–101, pp. 98–100.
17 L. Strauss, ‘The Mutual Influence of Theology and Philosophy’, The Independent
Journal of Philosophy, 3 (1979), pp. 111–18, p. 112.
200 B. LORCH

from the gods, as he advises Aristodemus to do. Instead, Socrates himself tells
Euthydemus what the gods require: whenever someone asks the Delphic Ora-
cle how he should gratify the gods, Socrates explains, the answer is, ‘By the
law of the city’ (IV 3.15–16).
Socrates’ final remark in the conversation explains why he does not
direct Euthydemus to seek guidance directly from the gods, as he directs
Aristodemus to do: ‘it would not be moderate to hope for more from others
than from those who are able to benefit with respect to the greatest things, or
to hope for this other than by pleasing them’ (IV 3.17). This remark is suffi-
ciently ambiguous that Euthydemus may take it as an exhortation to piety, but
in fact it distinguishes between piety and moderation. It is not moderate to
hope for any happiness that one can only attain with the help of a god unless
the gods are ‘able to benefit’, and unless one obeys the guidance of the gods
and ‘pleases’ them. But as we have seen, even if the gods actually provide
guidance directly to human beings about how to please them, human beings
cannot discover whether this is the case, or whether they are actually pleasing
the gods by following the guidance that is attributed to them. Someone who
obeys the guidance that is attributed to the gods is not moderate because he
does not know whether he is worshipping the gods correctly or even whether
he is correct to worship the gods at all. The reason why Socrates does not
advise Euthydemus to seek guidance directly from the gods is that it is not
moderate to do so.
Instead, Socrates directs Euthydemus to worship the gods in the manner
that the law of the city prescribes, and he suggests in this way that it is not
immoderate to obey the law of the city concerning the gods, as it is to seek
guidance from the gods directly. The difference is that unlike the guidance
that is attributed to the gods, the law of the city does not depend for its validity
on whether the gods exist and reward obedience to the law. Indeed, according
to Xenophon, Socrates himself publicly obeys the law of the city concerning
the gods, even though he does not believe in the gods (I 1.2). Since the duty of
citizens to obey the law does not depend on whether the gods exist, the duty to
obey the law is not called into question by the limits on human knowledge that
have come to light.
Nor does Socrates simply direct Euthydemus to worship the gods in the
manner that the law prescribes. Instead, Socrates interprets the law himself:
according to Socrates, ‘the law everywhere’ is ‘surely’ that one should sacri-
fice to the gods according to one’s means (IV 3.15–16). Elsewhere in the
Memorabilia, Socrates explains why he is sure that this is what the law
requires: if the gods preferred large sacrifices to small ones, then they would
prefer the sacrifices of wealthy but bad people to those of poor but good
people, and life would not be worth living for human beings if the gods pre-
ferred the wicked to the good (I 3.3). Socrates suggests that justice determines
what the law requires and what one owes the gods, and that one’s true
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 201

obligation is not to the law of the city but to justice itself (see I 2.40–46). This
implies further that justice can be discovered without knowing whether or not
the gods exist and provide guidance to human beings. Someone who seeks the
guidance about how to live that the Socratic education aims to discover, and
who has pursued that education to the point of discovering that he is ignorant
of the most fundamental matters on which all other knowledge of human
affairs ultimately depends, can nevertheless discover the guidance that he
seeks. The ignorance of human beings about these fundamental matters does
not call into question the possibility of discovering what justice is. On the con-
trary, justice refers to the way in which human beings who are ignorant of
these matters ought to live.
Even though the view that one should obey the law of the city and not seek
guidance directly from the gods may not adequately express Socrates’ view of
the content of justice, it expresses the distinction between justice and piety
with perfect accuracy. Like the law of the city, but unlike the guidance that is
attributed to the gods, justice does not depend for its authority on the knowl-
edge of the gods and of human nature that human beings cannot attain. For
this knowledge pertains to the reward for obeying the law or being just, but
Socrates holds that precisely because human beings cannot attain this knowl-
edge it is immoderate to expect that the gods will reward the good and pun-
ish the wicked. Indeed, it seems to be immoderate even to strive for the
knowledge of whether or not such a reward is available. The desire for such
knowledge is itself an immoderate hope, not only for the happiness that
human beings might be able to attain with the help of this knowledge, but also
for the reassurance and comfort that the knowledge itself might provide (see I
1.15). The obligation to be just does not depend on this knowledge or permit
the just man to hope for the happiness that it would afford. On the contrary,
even though we cannot know whether or not the gods exist and govern human
affairs, and we cannot know why we should be just or what happiness we will
attain by being just, we know that we must be just. In this respect, justice is a
law: a standard of conduct that demands one’s unconditional obedience
regardless of the happiness that one may long for, and which promises
nothing in return besides the intrinsic consequences of satisfying one’s
obligation.

Conclusion
The key insight that the investigation of piety contributes to the Socratic edu-
cation as a whole pertains to the relation between the requirements of virtue
and the happiness at which they aim, between the noble and the good. Since
human beings cannot discover whether the gods exist, they also cannot deter-
mine whether virtue will enable them to achieve the happiness that they long
for but cannot attain by their own efforts (IV 3.12; see above). Accordingly,
the requirements of virtue do not depend for their validity on the prospect of
202 B. LORCH

attaining this happiness. Rather, the requirements of virtue determine not only
what one’s obligations are but also what happiness one may expect to attain
by fulfilling them. Virtue is the greatest good, not because it determines how
to achieve the greatest happiness that one longs for, whatever that happiness
might be, but because it reveals the limits on the happiness that human beings
have a right to hope for, and how this happiness may be achieved (see III
9.4–5). Socrates expresses this insight into the relation between virtue and
happiness by referring to virtue as a law, which one has an obligation to obey
regardless of the reward for obeying it.
The investigation of piety does not elaborate the content of this so-called
law (except for the requirement to observe the official Athenian religion). It
rather clarifies the obstacle to discovering what virtue is, and thereby suggests
how this obstacle may be overcome. The obstacle is the conviction that the
disparity between the happiness that one longs for and the happiness that one
can attain may be overcome through the performance of noble or virtuous
actions. Piety is the most extreme, and therefore most revealing, instance of
the tendency to err about one’s obligations out of an extravagant view of the
happiness that one hopes to gain by satisfying one’s obligations (cf. III 1–7).
True virtue can only be discovered by evaluating one’s moral convictions,
discovering and abandoning such immoderate beliefs about the noble and the
good, and thereby discovering what one truly owes to others and to oneself.
Such an examination of one’s moral convictions seems to be the necessary
next stage in the ongoing Socratic education to virtue, after the instruction in
moderation.
It is reasonable to expect that this next stage of the Socratic education is the
subject of the next chapter in the Memorabilia (IV 4), which is the only chap-
ter in the Memorabilia explicitly and entirely devoted to the subject of justice.
Although Socrates converses with a different interlocutor in the next chapter,
Xenophon indicates that the two conversations are closely related; indeed, the
very fact that Xenophon interrupts a series of conversations between Socrates
and Euthydemus in order to present the conversation between Socrates and
Hippias about justice suggests that the conversation about justice sheds
further light on the unresolved issues in the preceding conversation about
piety. The clearest indication of the connection between the two chapters is
that the view of virtue that Socrates develops in the conversation about justice
is the very same view to which the investigation of piety has led. The investi-
gation of piety culminates in the suggestion that virtue is properly understood
as the obligation to obey a law, and the conversation about justice elaborates
and defends the view that justice is obedience to law (IV 4.12). Further, in
both conversations Socrates begins by suggesting that the law that one has an
obligation to obey is the law of the city, and he presents his own view as a cor-
rection of this suggestion: just as Socrates interprets the law of the city for
himself in the conversation about piety, so he suggests in the conversation
 SOCRATIC EDUCATION IN XENOPHON 203

about justice that there is a more binding law than the law of the city (IV 3.16,
IV 4.13, 21). Moreover, Socrates elaborates the alternative to the law of the
city more fully in the conversation about justice than he does in the conversa-
tion about piety, or anywhere else in the Memorabilia. For these reasons, the
understanding of virtue at which the investigation of piety has arrived may be
expected to provide the key to interpreting Socrates’ view that justice is
obedience to the law in the next chapter, just as the examination of the view
that justice is the law may be expected to provide the further clarification that
this understanding of virtue requires.18

Benjamin Lorch UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS

18 For the financial support that enabled me to complete this paper, I am grateful to
the Department of Political Science at Boston College, the Center for the Study of Core
Texts and Ideas at the University of Texas at Austin, and the Jack Miller Center. For their
comments on earlier drafts of this paper, I am grateful to Wayne Ambler, Nasser
Behnegar, Robert Faulkner, Dustin Gish, Tom Pangle, Susan Shell and, above all, Chris-
topher Bruell.