ed opponent. And yet all the time he may be right. He may
know, in this very instance, that those who make philosophy the business
of their lives, generally turn out rogues if they are bad men, and fools
if they are good. What do you say?' I should say that he is quite right.
'Then how is such an admission reconcileable with the doctrine that
philosophers should be kings?'

I shall answer you in a parable which will also let you see how poor a
hand I am at the invention of allegories. The relation of good men to
their governments is so peculiar, that in order to defend them I must
take an illustration from the world of fiction. Conceive the captain
of a ship, taller by a head and shoulders than any of the crew, yet a
little deaf, a little blind, and rather ignorant of the seaman's art.
The sailors want to steer, although they know nothing of the art; and
they have a theory that it cannot be learned. If the helm is refused
them, they drug the captain's posset, bind him hand and foot, and take
possession of the ship. He who joins in the mutiny is termed a good
pilot and what not; they have no conception that the true pilot must
observe the winds and the stars, and must be their master, whether
they like it or not;--such an one would be called by them fool, prater,
star-gazer. This is my parable; which I will beg you to interpret for
me to those gentlemen who ask why the philosopher has such an evil name,
and to explain to them that not he, but those who will not use him, are
to blame for his uselessness. The philosopher should not beg of mankind
to be put in authority over them. The wise man should not seek the rich,
as the proverb bids, but every man, whether rich or poor, must knock at
the door of the physician when he has need of him. Now the pilot is
the philosopher--he whom in the parable they call star-gazer, and the
mutinous sailors are the mob of politicians by whom he is rendered
useless. Not that these are the worst enemies of philosophy, who is far
more dishonoured by her own professing sons when they are corrupted by
the world. Need I recall the original image of the philosopher? Did we
not say of him just now, that he loved truth and hated falsehood, and
that he could not rest in the multiplicity of phenomena, but was led by
a sympathy in his own nature to the contemplation of the absolute? All
the virtues as well as truth, who is the leader of them, took up their
abode in his soul. But as you were observing,