r a profession which is above them and of
which they are unworthy, and then, by their manifold inconsistencies,
bring upon philosophy, and upon all philosophers, that universal
reprobation of which we speak.

What are these corruptions? he said.

I will see if I can explain them to you. Every one will admit that a
nature having in perfection all the qualities which we required in a
philosopher, is a rare plant which is seldom seen among men.

Rare indeed.

And what numberless and powerful causes tend to destroy these rare
natures!

What causes?

In the first place there are their own virtues, their courage,
temperance, and the rest of them, every one of which praiseworthy
qualities (and this is a most singular circumstance) destroys and
distracts from philosophy the soul which is the possessor of them.

That is very singular, he replied.

Then there are all the ordinary goods of life--beauty, wealth, strength,
rank, and great connections in the State--you understand the sort of
things--these also have a corrupting and distracting effect.

I understand; but I should like to know more precisely what you mean
about them.

Grasp the truth as a whole, I said, and in the right way; you will then
have no difficulty in apprehending the preceding remarks, and they will
no longer appear strange to you.

And how am I to do so? he asked.

Why, I said, we know that all germs or seeds, whether vegetable or
animal, when they fail to meet with proper nutriment or climate or soil,
in proportion to their vigour, are all the more sensitive to the want of
a suitable environment, for evil is a greater enemy to what is good than
to what is not.

Very true.

There is reason in supposing that the finest natures, when under alien
conditions, receive more injury than the inferior, because the contrast
is greater.

Certainly.

And may we not say, Adeimantus, that the most gifted minds, when they
are ill-educated, become pre-eminently bad? Do not great crimes and
the spirit of pure evil spring out of a fulness of nature ruined by
education rather than from any inferiority, whereas weak natures are
scarcely capable of any very great good or very great evil?

There I think that you are right.

And our philosopher follows the same analogy--he is like a plant which,
having proper nurture, must necessarily grow and mature into all virtue,
but, if sown and planted in an alien soil, becomes the most noxious of
all weeds, unless