Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

Phaedo

380-360 B.C.

"But while we may admit that each soul wears out a number of bodies, especially if it lives a great many of years--because although the body is continually changing and disintegrating all through life, the soul never stops replacing what it worn away--still we must suppose that when the soul dies it is still in possession of its latest covering, and perishes before it in this case only, although when the soul has perished the body at last reveals its natural frailty and quickly rots away."

Well, here is my answer. I want you to consider whether there is anything in what I say--because like Simmias I must have recourse to an illustration. Suppose that an elderly tailor has just died. Your theory would be just like saying that the man is not dead, but still exists somewhere safe and sound, and offering as proof the fact that the coat which he had made for himself and was wearing has not perished but is still intact. If anyone was skeptical, I suppose you would ask him which is likely to last longer, a man or a coat which is being regularly used and worn, and when he replied that the former was far more likely, you would imagine that you had proved conclusively that the man is safe and sound, since the less-enduring object has not perished. But surely this is not so, Simmias--because I want your opinion too. Anyone would dismiss such a view as absurd. The tailor makes and wears out any number of coats, but although he outlives all the others, presumably he perishes before the last one, and this does not mean that a man is inferior to a coat, or has a weaker hold upon life. I believe this analogy might apply to the relation of soul to body, and I think that it would be reasonable to say of them in the same way that soul is a long-lived thing, whereas body is relatively feeble and short-lived. But while we may admit that each soul wears out a number of bodies, especially if it lives a great many of years--because although the body is continually changing and disintegrating all through life, the soul never stops replacing what it worn away--still we must suppose that when the soul dies it is still in possession of its latest covering, and perishes before it in this case only, although when the soul has perished the body at last reveals its natural frailty and quickly rots away. If you accept this view there is no justification yet for any confidence that after death our souls still exist somewhere.
(87b-e, p. 69)

Dress::Coat

Reading

Hamilton, E. and Cairns, H., Eds. The Collected Dialogues of Plato. Bollingen Series. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978.

06/20/2003

12/03/2008