Summary

The version I read was translated by George Grube.

Shitty one-sentence summary

Meno is about virtue and knowledge.

Characters

• Socrates: the Athenian philosopher who is being put on trial
• Meno: an ancient Thessalian political figure; former student of Gorgias
• Anytus: Socrates's accuser on behalf of the craftsmen and politicians

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Major themes and concepts

No one knowingly desires bad things, meaning that everyone desires good things

The soul is immortal and knows everything, and only needs to recollect the things it knew before (knowledge is recollection)

The truth is always in our soul and we should always seek to recollect what you do not presently know

Virtue is neither an inborn quality nor is taught; rather, it comes as a gift from the gods

True opinion is just as good as knowledge in directing action

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Reading notes

Part 1: Can virtue be taught?

Meno (M): Can you tell me, Socrates, can virtue be taught?

• Socrates (S): If I don't know what something is, how could I know what qualities it possesses? Meno, what do you say virtue is?
• M: It is not hard to tell you. A man's virtue is being able to manage public affairs and thus benefit his friends and harm his enemies and ensure no harm comes to him. A woman's virtue is to manage the home and be submissive to her husband. There is a virtue for every action and every age.

Part 2: Firstly, what is the form of virtue?

S: But what is the form of virtue, What is common to all the virtues that you list?

• M: To be able to rule over people.
  • S: Is this true for a child or a slave? (M: No.)
  • S: Furthermore, you say that virtue is to be able to rule. Should we not add to this justly and not unjustly?
  • M: Yes, because justice is virtue.

Justice is a virtue

• S: Is it virtue of a virtue?
  • M: Justice is a virtue (and there are many others).
  • S: We've run into the same problem — we have found many virtues when we were looking for just one. What is the one that covers all the others?
  • M: I don't understand.
• S: For example, consider the word "shape." What is that to which the name "shape" applies? Let's suppose that shape is that which always follows color. Is this satisfactory to you?
  • M: That's foolish — if someone didn't know what color was, what would you say?
  • S: Okay, I claim that a shape is the limit of a solid.
  • M: And what do you say color is?
  • S: You are outrageous, Meno; you ask me these questions, yet you aren't willing to tell me what Gorgias says that virtue is. Let me do you a favor and answer in the same manner that he would.
• S: Do you say that there are effluvia of things, like Empedocles does? (M: Yes.)
  • And there are channels through which the effluvia make there way, and some effluvia fit some channels, and others are too small or too big? (M: Yes.)
  • And there is something called sight? (M: Yes.)
  • ⇒ Color is an effluvium from shapes that fits the sight and is perceived. (M: Great answer.)
  • Now, tell me the nature of virtue as a whole and stop making many out of one.

Part 3: Is virtue to desire beautiful things and have the power to secure them?

M: As the poet says, I think that virtue is "to find joy in beautiful things and have power" (to acquire them).

No one knowingly desires bad things, meaning that everyone desires good things

S: Does one who desire beautiful things desire good things? (M: Yes.)

• S: Do some desire bad things? (M: Yes.)
  • Do they believe the bad things to be good, or know they are bad and desire them? (M: Both.)
  • Do they think that the bad things benefit him, or does he know they harm him? (M: Both.)
  • Do you think those who believe the bad things benefit them know they are bad? (M: No.)
• ⇒ Those who do not know things to be bad do not desire what is bad, but rather they desire what they believe to be good things but are in fact bad.
• ⇒ These people desire good things.
• Then, those who desire bad things, do they know they will be harmed by them? (M: Yes.)
  • But does anyone wish to be harmed (i.e., miserable and unhappy?) (M: No.)
• ⇒ No one wants what is bad. ⏸️ ==objection: this assumes that people are always rational; there exist people who believe "bad" things benefit them and also know that they are bad==

Thus, virtue is having the power to secure good things.

S: If virtue is desiring good things and having the power to secure them, and all men are the same in desiring them, it must be the power to secure them that distinguishes a good from a bad man.

• ⇒ Virtue is the power to secure good things.

However, this acquisition of good things must be done with justice, which is a part of virtue. This amounts to saying that every action is virtuous if it is performed with a part of virtue.

S: What do you mean by "good things"?

• M: Health, wealth, gold, silver, honor, civil offices.
• S: According to the esteemed Meno, virtue is the acquisition of gold and silver. Must this acquisition be just and pious? (M: Yes.)
• ⇒ This acquisition must be accompanied by some part of virtue.
• ⇒ Failing to secure gold and silver when it would be just to do so would be the failure to secure virtue.
• ==?== ⇒ To provide these goods would not be virtue any more than to not, but rather whatever is done with justice is virtue, and whatever is not is wickedness.
• Didn't we just say that justice is a part of virtue? There you go again, bringing up virtue when I asked you to keep virtue as a whole:
  • You tell me that virtue is to be able to secure good things and with justice, and justice is a part of virtue.
  • ⇒ You say every action is virtue if it is performed with a part of virtue.
  • Then, what is virtue?
• M: Socrates, you are putting me under a spell; I am so confused! I don't know what virtue is anymore, despite having made many speeches on virtue in the past! You are a torpedo fish that makes my mind and tongue numb!
• S: I am only a torpedo fish if it itself is numb and makes others so as well. I myself do not have the answers when I perplex others; I am more perplexed than anyone. Now, I want to examine the nature of virtue with you.

Part 4: The soul is immortal and knows everything, and only needs to recollect the things it knew before (knowledge is recollection)

M: How will you search for something that you don't know?

• S: So, you are saying that a man cannot search for what he knows (for then there is no need to search), nor for what he does not know, since he wouldn't know what to look for. I will tell you why I think this is wrong:
  • I have heard many wise men and women say this thing I think is true and beautiful — that the human soul is immortal. At times it comes to an end, at times it is reborn, but it is never destroyed, so one must live as piously as possible.
  • Since the soul is immortal, there is nothing that it has not learned, so it can recollect the things it knew before.
  • So, nothing prevents a man from recalling (or "learning") everything for himself.
• M: What do you mean? Can you teach me?
  • S: You rascal! I just said that there is no teaching, only recollecting. Are you trying to make me contradict myself?
  • M: No, Socrates? Please show me that things are as you say.

Socrates induces knowledge of the relationship between the side lengths and the area of a square in Meno's slave

S: Fine. Call over one of your servants.

• Tell me, do you know that a square is a figure with 4 equal sides, and you can draw equal lines through the middle? (Servant (Se): Yes.)
  • If both sides were 2 feet, how many would the whole be? (Se: 4 feet.)
  • Now if both sides were 4 feet, how many feet would the whole be? (Se: 8 feet.)

    See Meno, I am not teaching him anything; all I do is question him. Now he things he knows but does not — watch him now recollect things in order, as one must.)

• So tell me, do you say that a figure double the size has sides that are double the length? (Se: Yes.)
  • (draws a figure with 4 foot sides) So this is the 8 foot square? And in it are four 4 foot squares? Would it then not be 4 times as big as the 4 foot square? (Se: Yes.)
  • Then a figure based on a line twice the length is not double but four times as big? (Se: Yes.)
• On how long a line is an 8 foot square based? The 8 foot square must be based on a line longer than the 4 foot square and shorter than the 16 foot square, no? How long a line do you think it is? (Se: 3 feet.)
  • If it were 3 feet, the whole figure would be 3 by 3 feet, which is? (Se: 9 feet.)
  • Then tell me what the 8 foot square is based on. (Se: I cannot.)

    See, Meno, at first he did not know, but thought he knew; now, he does not know neither thinks that he knows. So, he is better off now. Do you think that he would have tried to figure out what he thought he knew if he didn't become perplexed and realized what he didn't know? (M: No.)

• Let's say that we have a four 4 foot figures. How many times larger is this figure than the 4 foot figure? (Se: Four times as large.)
  • But we want one 2 times as large. This line from one corner to the other will cut these 4 foot figures in half. Then how many of these halves are in the center figure? (a diamond shape in the center of the 16 foot square) (Se: Four.)
  • How many in each of the 4 foot figures? (Se: Two.)
  • What is the relation of 4 to 2? (Se: Double.)
  • So how many feet are in the center? (Se: 8.)
  • Based on what line? (Se: The diagonal.)

    See, Meno, he has expressed the answer in opinions that were all his own, yet a short time ago, he did not know. So, these opinions were inside him, and they have been stirred up like a dream. ==but Socrates is feeding him the steps!!!==

Thus, the truth is always in our soul and we should always seek to recollect what you do not presently know

S: This is recollection.

• He must have acquired this knowledge sometime, or have had always possessed it.
  • But if he always had it, he always would have known.
  • If he acquired it, then it must not have been in this life.
  • ⇒ He learned it at some other time, when he was not a human being.
• ==?== If this is true, then wouldn't his soul have learned during all time? For it is clear that during all time he exists, either as a man or not.
• ⇒ If the truth is always in our soul, you should always seek to recollect what you do not presently know.

Part 5: Does virtue come by nature, or is it taught?

Virtue is a type of wisdom, and thus does not come by nature

S: Now, since we agree now that one should seek to find what one does not know, let's try to find out what virtue is.

• M: Yes. But first, can you answer if virtue is teachable or a natural gift?
• S: If it were up to me, we would not investigate this before we investigated what virtue itself is. But what can I do? Let's consider a hypothesis: "Among things existing in the soul, of what sort is virtue, that it should be teachable (well, recollectable) or not? Is it knowledge (which is the only thing that man can be taught) or not?"
  • We say that virtue is something good.
  • ⇒ If there is anything else good that is not knowledge, then virtue may not be knowledge, but if there isn't, virtue must be knowledge.
• S: Virtue makes us good, and therefore beneficent? (M: Yes.)
  • ⇒ Virtue is something beneficial? (M: Yes.)
• S: Then let's examine the kind of things that benefit us: things like health, strength, beauty, etc., right? (M: Yes.)
  • Yet these same things are also sometimes harmful. (M: Yes.)
  • ⇒ Isn't it the right use of these things that benefits us, and the wrong that harms us? (M: Yes.)
  • Now look at the qualities of the soul: moderation, justice, memory, intelligence. Do these not at times harm us, and at others benefit us? (M: Yes.)
  • ⇒ Everything that the soul does, if directed by wisdom, ends in happiness, and if by ignorance, the opposite? (M: Yes.)
• S: ⇒ If virtue is in the soul and is beneficial, it must be a kind of wisdom, either the whole or a part of it? (M: Yes.)
  • ⇒ The good are not good by nature? (M: No.)
  • For if they were, we could find the youth who were good and make sure no one could corrupt them.

Virtue cannot be taught

S: Since the good are not good by nature, learning must make them so? (M: Yes.)

• But perhaps this is not correct: if something can be taught, should there not be teachers and learners of it? ⇒ If there are no teachers or learners, then the subject cannot be taught? ⏸️
• M: yes, but do you really believe that there are no teachers of virtue?
• S: I cannot find any. Anytus, come join us in our inquiry as to who the teachers of virtue are. Is it not reasonable that we should send a learner of a craft to someone who practices and has shown themselves to be a teacher and exacts fees for this practice? (Anytus (A): Yes.)
  • Then to whom should we send one to learn virtue? Those who profess to be teachers of virtue and charge for it — the sophists?
  • A: Hush, Socrates; no one should go to these people, for they cause the ruin and corruption of their followers.
  • S: What do you mean, that they knowingly harm the young, or that they unknowingly do so? Are they really so mad?
  • A: They are not mad — it's the youth, relatives, and cities that allow this behavior who are mad.
• S: So tell us, to whom should one who wishes to learn virtue go?
  • A: Any Athenian man would make him better than the sophists would.
  • S: Have these men become virtuous without learning from anyone? Are they able to teach others what they have never learned?
  • A: I think that they've learned from the gentlemen before them.
  • S: Wasn't Themistocles a good man? But his son Cleophantus was not the same — if virtue could be taught wouldn't he have taught his son? The same with Aristides and his son Lysimachus? And Pericles and his sons Paralus and Xanthippus? Since they did not, virtue must not be able to be taught.
  • A: Socrates, I think that you speak ill of people too easily. Be careful.
• S: Meno, I think that Anytus is angry and thinks that I'm slandering these men. Tell me, are there not worthy men among your people? Do they claim that they are teachers and that virtue can be taught?
  • M: No, but sometimes they say that it can be taught, and sometimes they say that it cannot.
  • S: So should we call them teachers if they can't agree on even this?
  • M: No.
  • S: Do you think these sophists are teachers?
  • M: I cannot tell — at times I think they are, and at others I think they are not.
  • S: The poet Theognis says the same thing:
    • "Eat and drink with these men, and keep their company. Please those whose power is great, for you will learn goodness from the good. If you mingle with bad men you will lose even what wit you possess."
    • Then, "If this could be done and intelligence could be instilled," ... "never would a bad son be born of a good father, for he would be persuaded by wise words, but you will never make a bad man good by teaching."
  • S: Isn't he contradicting himself? Is there any other subject the teachers of which are not recognized to be teachers nor are recognized to have knowledge of it themselves? Or the teachers of which claim that it can sometimes be taught and other times not?
    • ⇒ There are no teachers of virtue.
    • ⇒ There are no learners of virtue.
    • ⇒ Virtue cannot be taught.

Part 5: Virtue is neither an inborn quality nor is taught; rather, it comes as a gift from the gods

True opinion is just as good as knowledge in directing action

M: Apparently not — I wonder if there are no good men at all, or in what way good men come to be.

• S: We must be poor specimen, you and I; we failed to see that it's not only knowledge that leads men to success.
• M: How so?
• S: We said that good men are beneficent, correct? (M: Yes.)
  • And they are beneficent if they guide us correctly? (M: Yes.)
  • We falsely assume that one cannot guide correctly what one does not know. For example, if a man has a correct opinion as to the correct way to Larissa, but has not gone there nor had knowledge of it, this is just as good as knowing the way.
  • ⇒ True opinion is not a worse guide to correct action than knowledge.
• M: But the man with knowledge will always succeed, while the man with true opinion will only succeed at times.
• S: Won't the man with right opinion succeed as long as his opinion is right?
• M: It seems so. Then, why is knowledge prized more than right opinion?
• S: Because true opinion doesn't stay long in the mind, is not worth much until they are explained by reason — which is recollection. Then, it becomes knowledge and remains in place. So, correct opinion is neither inferior to knowledge nor less useful in directing action.

Virtue is not knowledge (because it is not teachable); so virtue must be true opinion; so virtue is divine

S: So:

• First, we inquired whether virtue comes by nature.
  • We established that the good man is beneficent, and neither knowledge nor true opinion come by nature; they are rather acquired.
  • ⇒ Men are not beneficent by nature.
• Next, we inquired as to whether virtue can be taught.
  • We thought that something can be taught if and only if it is knowledge, and if there are teachers of it, it can be taught; if not, it can not.
  • We agreed that there were no teachers of virtue.
  • ⇒ It is neither teachable nor knowledge.
• But, we agree that virtue is good, and that which guides correctly is useful and good, and only true opinion and knowledge guide correctly.
  • ⇒ It is by some kind of wisdom that men lead their cities, not knowledge.
• Since it is not knowledge that makes them wise, it is right opinion, which is no different from soothsayers and prophets — so it is right to call these men divine.
• ⇒ Virtue is neither an inborn quality nor taught, but comes as a gift from the gods. We have clear knowledge of this when, before we try to investigate how it comes to be present in men, we first try to find out what virtue in itself is. Now, I must go.