(4th tetralogy : The Soul - 2nd dialogue of trilogy)

Foreword: this page is not the translation into English of its counterpart in French. It is an html version of my translation into English of this section of the Republic directly from the Greek found in the pdf file Plato (the philosopher) : User's Guide and it doesn't include a translation of the numerous notes found in the French version. That will come later.

(to previous section: The Good and the Sun)

[509c]...
And no way indeed, he said, you shall stop here but at least, this likeness concerning the sun, expound it again, in case you omit [something] one way or another.
But of course, I said, I’m certainly omitting many [things]!
Well then, he said, don’t leave aside the smallest bit of it.
I think, said I, [it will] still [be] a lot. Nevertheless, in so far as [it is] presently possible, I won’t willingly omit anything.
Don’t indeed, he said.
[509d] Then conceive them, said I, as we were saying, as being two and reigning, the one over the intelligible (noèton) family (genos) and place (topos), the other in turn over the visible (horaton) [family and place] – [I say “visible" (horatou)] so that I don’t seem to you, in saying“heaven (ouranou)”, to behave like a sophist about the word. But then, do you grasp those two appearances (eidè), (1) visible, intelligible?
I grasp.
Well then, taking for instance a line segmented into two unequal segments, segment anew each one of the two segments according to the same ratio(nale) (ana ton auton logon), that of the seen (horômenon) family (genous) and that of the thought (nooumenon) one, and you will have, based on the [relative] clearness and lack of clearness of the ones compared to the others, on the one hand in the seen, [509e] on the one hand one of the two segments: images (eikones) –I call indeed images, first [510a] shadows, then reflections (phantasmata) on waters and on [other things] insofar as they are by design at the same time compact, smooth and bright, and everything of that kind, if you understand [what I mean].
But [of course] I understand.
Then place the other one, to which this one is similar: the living creatures around us, and all that is planted and the whole family of what is fabricated.
I place it, he said.
Would you then be willing to say about it, said I, that it is divided with regard to truth (alètheia) and its absence [according to the following ratio(nale)]: as the opined [is] to the known, so what is made similar (to homoiôthèn) [to something is] to what it has been made similar to (to hôi hômoiôthè)?
[510b] Yes indeed, he said, absolutely.
Consider then also in turn the segmentation of the intelligible, how it is segmented.
How?
The [first segment] of it [is] where, using the [things] formerly imitated as images, a soul is constrained / constrains itself to investigate from foundations (ex hupotheseôn), driven / advancing, not toward a (guiding) principle (archè), but toward an end (teleutè), while the other on the contrary [is] the [one where it is] by going toward a (guiding) principle [which is] not [itself] set to support [something else] (archè anupothetos) from a foundation (ex hupotheseôs) and without the images [revolving] around that, building with the appearances (eidè) themselves its own approach (methodos) through them.
Those [things] you say, he said, I don’t quite understand.
[510c] One more time, then! Said I. This way, you’ll understand more easily what was said before. I think indeed that you know that those who busy themselves in geometry and computation and the like, setting as foundations (hupothemenoi) the odd and the even and the [various] figures and three appearances (eidè) of angles and other [things] akin to these according to each one’s approach (methodos), those [things] on the one hand, [behaving] as knowledgeable [persons], using them as foundations (hupotheseis), they don’t think fit to give any further explanation (logon didonai) about them either to themselves or to others, [510d] as if [it were] completely evident, starting from these on the other hand, going through all the rest in great details, they end up in a consistent way on what they had set their investigation in motion upon.
Of course indeed, he said, that at least I know!
Thus also that besides, they also make use of the seen appearances (horômena eidè) and develop their reasoning (logous poiountai) on them thinking not about them but about those they resemble, developing their reasoning for the sake of the square itself, of the diagonal itself, and not [510e] of the one they draw, and same [thing] in the other cases, those very [things] they draw and mold, of which there are shadows and reflections in waters, using them in turn as images, but attempting [511a] to see (idein) what cannot be seen otherwise than by thought (dianoia).
You tell the truth, he said.
So I indeed said intelligible this appearance (noèton to eidos), but the soul constrained / constraining itself to make use of foundations (hupothesesi) in its investigation about it, not going toward a (guiding) principle (archè), as if unable to rise higher than the foundations, but using as images the very [things] that are copied by those below, and the former in comparison with the latter because, [being] dazzling, [they are] held in esteem and honored.
[511b] I get it, he said, that you are talking about that [which falls] under the scope of geometry and the arts akin to it.
Get it then about the other segment of the intelligible, when I talk about what logos itself can reach through the power of dialoguing (hè tou dialegesthai dunamis), using foundations not as (first) principles, but really as [mere] foundations (hupotheseis), like stepping stones and springboards, so that, going all the way to what [is] not [itself] set to support [something else] (to anupotheton), toward the (leading) principle of the whole (hè tou pantos archè), having grasped it, deriving in return from it all that can be derived, it thus follows a downward path toward an end [511c] without making also use in any way of anything sensible, but with appearances (eidè) themselves, through them, into them, it ends also into appearances (eidè).
I get it, he said, though definitely not sufficiently, for you seem to me to be talking about a long-term work, but at least that you want to distinguish as being clearer what, among what is and [is] intelligible, is examined under the guidance of the science of dialoguing (hè tou dialegesthai epistèmè) from what [is examined] under that of what is called “arts / techniques” (technai), where foundations [are] (first) principles and those who examine are indeed constrained / indeed constrain themselves to examine these through thought (dianoia) rather than through senses, but because they don’t investigate by going back up to a (guiding) principle [511d] but from foundations (hupotheseis), they seem to you not to have intelligence (noun ischein) about those [things], despite their being intelligible with the help of a (guiding) principle. And it seems to me that you are calling“thought" (dianoia) the habit of mind of those dealing with geometry and that of those dealing with similar [things] rather than “intelligence” (noûs), considering thought as intermediate between opinion (doxa) and intelligence (noûs).
You have most sufficiently followed, said I. And now, receive from me over the four segments, those four affections (pathèmata) produced in the soul, intellection (noèsis) first over the highest, thought (dianoia) [511e] then over the second, to the third one then assign belief / faith (pistis) and to the last conjecture / imagination (eikasia), and order them according to this ratio(nale) (ana logon), thinking that as what it is about partakes of truth, so these partake of clearness.
I get it, he said, and I concur and order them as you say.

(to next section : The Allegory of the Cave)

(1) In the ensuing translation of the analogy of the line, I decided to always translate the word eidos by the same English word, “appearance”, which is one possible translation (along with “form”, “shape” or “figure”) of its original meaning from which all others are derived: thus for instance, the sense of “kind, species”, which might fit here, to designate sets of “things” having the same “look / appearance”.(<==)