r his stupidity,
if, as is said, Homer was greatly neglected by him and others in his own
day when he was alive?

Yes, I replied, that is the tradition. But can you imagine, Glaucon,
that if Homer had really been able to educate and improve mankind--if he
had possessed knowledge and not been a mere imitator--can you imagine,
I say, that he would not have had many followers, and been honoured and
loved by them? Protagoras of Abdera, and Prodicus of Ceos, and a host of
others, have only to whisper to their contemporaries: 'You will never be
able to manage either your own house or your own State until you appoint
us to be your ministers of education'--and this ingenious device of
theirs has such an effect in making men love them that their companions
all but carry them about on their shoulders. And is it conceivable that
the contemporaries of Homer, or again of Hesiod, would have allowed
either of them to go about as rhapsodists, if they had really been able
to make mankind virtuous? Would they not have been as unwilling to part
with them as with gold, and have compelled them to stay at home with
them? Or, if the master would not stay, then the disciples would have
followed him about everywhere, until they had got education enough?

Yes, Socrates, that, I think, is quite true.

Then must we not infer that all these poetical individuals, beginning
with Homer, are only imitators; they copy images of virtue and the like,
but the truth they never reach? The poet is like a painter who, as
we have already observed, will make a likeness of a cobbler though he
understands nothing of cobbling; and his picture is good enough for
those who know no more than he does, and judge only by colours and
figures.

Quite so.

In like manner the poet with his words and phrases may be said to lay on
the colours of the several arts, himself understanding their nature only
enough to imitate them; and other people, who are as ignorant as he is,
and judge only from his words, imagine that if he speaks of cobbling,
or of military tactics, or of anything else, in metre and harmony and
rhythm, he speaks very well--such is the sweet influence which melody
and rhythm by nature have. And I think that you must have observed again
and again what a poor appearance the tales of poets make when stripped
of the colours which music puts upon them, and recited in simple prose.

Yes, he said.

They are like faces which were never really beautiful, but only