bably as it does to you with
respect to these matters, that to know them clearly in the present life
is either impossible or very difficult: on the other hand, however, not
to test what has been said of them in every possible way, so as not to
desist until, on examining them in every point of view, one has
exhausted every effort, is the part of a very weak man. For we ought,
with respect to these things, either to learn from others how they stand
or to discover them for one's self; or, if both these are impossible,
then, taking the best of human reasonings and that which is the most
difficult to be confuted, and embarking on this, as one who risks
himself on a raft, so to sail through life, unless one could be carried
more safely, and with less risk, on a surer conveyance, or some divine
reason. 79. I, therefore, shall not now be ashamed to question you,
since you bid me do so, nor shall I blame myself hereafter for not
having now told you what I think; for to me, Socrates, when I consider
the matter, both with myself and with Cebes, what has been said does not
appear to have been sufficiently proved."

Then said Socrates, "Perhaps, my friend, you have the truth on your
side; but tell me in what respect it was not sufficiently proved."

"In this," he answered, "because any one might use the same argument
with respect to harmony, and a lyre, and its chords, that harmony is
something invisible and incorporeal, very beautiful and divine, in a
well-modulated lyre; but the lyre and its chords are bodies, and of
corporeal form, compounded and earthly, and akin to that which is
mortal. When any one, then, has either broken the lyre, or cut or burst
the chords, he might maintain from the same reasoning as yours that it
is necessary the harmony should still exist and not be destroyed; for
there could be no possibility that the lyre should subsist any longer
when the chords are burst; and that the chords, which are of a mortal
nature, should subsist, but that the harmony, which is of the same
nature and akin to that which is divine and immortal, should become
extinct, and perish before that which is mortal; but he might say that
the harmony must needs subsist somewhere, and that the wood and chords
must decay before it can undergo any change. 80. For I think, Socrates,
that you yourself have arrived at this conclusion, that we consider the
soul to be pretty much of this kind--namely, that our body being
compacted and held togeth