Economics

Yes, I see all this.You do! Then what is there in it that you don’t understand? Is it that you don’t know how to put the crocks on the top of the clay, Socrates?Of course there is nothing in what you have said that I don’t know, Ischomachus. But I am again set thinking what can have made me answer No to the question you put to me a while ago, when you asked me briefly, Did I understand planting? For I thought I should have nothing to say about the right method of planting. But now that you have undertaken to question me in particular, my answers, you tell me, agree exactly with the views of a farmer so famous for his skill as yourself!

Can it be that questioning is a kind of teaching, Ischomachus? The fact is, I have just discovered the plan of your series of questions! You lead me by paths of knowledge familiar to me, point out things like what I know, and bring me to think that I really know things that I thought I had no knowledge of.

Now suppose I questioned you about money, said Ischomachus, whether it is good or bad, could I persuade you that you know how to distinguish good from false by test? And by putting questions about flute-players could I convince you that you understand flute-playing; and by means of questions about painters and other artists—— You might, since you have convinced me that I understand agriculture, though I know that I have never been taught this art. No, it isn’t so, Socrates.

I told you a while ago that agriculture is such a humane, gentle art that you have but to see her and listen to her, and she at once makes you understand her.

She herself gives you many lessons in the best way of treating her. For instance, the vine climbs the nearest tree, and so teaches you that she wants support. And when her clusters are yet tender, she spreads her leaves about them, and teaches you to shade the exposed parts from the sun’s rays during that period.

But when it is now time for her grapes to be sweetened by the sun, she sheds her leaves, teaching you to strip her and ripen her fruit. And thanks to her teeming fertility, she shows some mellow clusters while she carries others yet sour, so saying to you: Pluck my grapes as men pluck figs,—choose the luscious ones as they come.

And now I asked, How is it then, Ischomachus, if the operations of husbandry are so easy to learn and all alike know what must needs be done, that all have not the same fortune? How is it that some farmers live in abundance and have more than they want, while others cannot get the bare necessaries of life, and even run into debt? Oh, I will tell you, Socrates.

It is not knowledge nor want of knowledge on the part of farmers that causes one to thrive while another is needy.

You won’t hear a story like this running about: The estate has gone to ruin because the sower sowed unevenly, or because he didn’t plant the rows straight, or because someone, not knowing the right soil for vines, planted them in barren ground, or because someone didn’t know that it is well to prepare the fallow for sowing, or because someone didn’t know that it is well to manure the land.

No, you are much more likely to hear it said: The man gets no corn from his field because he takes no trouble to see that it is sown or manured. Or, The man has got no wine, for he takes no trouble to plant vines or to make his old stock bear. Or, The man has neither olives nor figs, because he doesn’t take the trouble; he does nothing to get them.

It is not the farmers reputed to have made some clever discovery in agriculture who differ in fortune from others: it is things of this sort that make all the difference, Socrates.

This is true of generals also: there are some branches of strategy in which one is better or worse than another, not because he differs in intelligence, but in point of carefulness, undoubtedly. For the things that all generals know, and most privates, are done by some commanders and left undone by others.

For example, they all know that when marching through an enemy’s country, the right way is to march in the formation in which they will fight best, if need be. Well, knowing this, some observe the rule, others break it.

All know that it is right to post sentries by day and night before the camp; but this too is a duty that some attend to, while others neglect it.