Laches by Plato

Plato lived a relatively long life, even according to modern standards. We know that he was born about 427 B.C.E. and died at the age of eighty or eighty-one about 347 B.C.E. Born into a prominent Athenian family, Plato was expected to pursue a career in politics. However, after the trial and execution of his mentor, Socrates, at which Plato was present, Plato became disgusted with Athenian political life, and devoted himself instead to teaching and philosophical inquiry. To that end, he founded the Academy around 385 B.C.E., which counted the famous thinker Aristotle among its students. In addition to his dialogues, the Academy was Plato's great contribution to philosophy and civilization, lasting 912 years until 527 A.D., and serving as the prototype for the Western university system.

Socrates himself lived amidst a time of war and transition. Born in 469 B.C.E. and executed in 399 B.C.E., Socrates lived in Athens during the transfer of power from Athens to Sparta, following Athens's defeat in the Peloponnesian War (431–404 B.C.E) With this war, in which Socrates fought many battles, came the end of Athens's Golden Age, despite the fact that most of the great philosophy of Plato and Aristotle was still to come.

Although Plato is considered by most to be the father of philosophy, he did not create the field out of nothing. There already existed several currents of thought, which were prominent at the time in which Plato was writing and which were influential to his thought. Plato's travels in southern Italy and Sicily as a young man brought him into close contact with many followers of the philosopher Pythagoras, whose mathematical research played an important role in Plato's early intellectual development. He was also familiar with and influenced by the philosophy of Heraclitus, who claimed that the world was in constant flux. Plato was also influenced to write against the relativist ideas advocated at the time by Protagoras and the materialist mode of explanation assumed by Democritus. However, the most important influence on Plato is obviously that of his mentor, Socrates. Aside from other strains of philosophy popular at the time, there were also several periods and methods present within the entire philosophy of Plato. Generally, Plato's dialogues are classed into categories of early, middle, and late periods. The early dialogues were written soon after Socrates's death, and in them we get the clearest picture of Socrates and Socratic philosophy. As Plato matured, however, he developed an increasingly distinct voice and philosophical outlook. The figure of Socrates in the middle and late dialogues is more of a mouthpiece for Plato's own views. In particular, the theory of Forms, we know from Aristotle, was not a belief held by the actual Socrates, despite the fact that his character preaches it consistently in many of the middle and later dialogues. The Laches is considered to be one of Plato's early dialogues. Other early dialogues include the Apology, the Gorgias, and the Euthyphro.

The Laches is a dialogue concerned with the virtue of courage. Throughout the dialogue, two distinguished generals, Nicias and Laches take turns attempting to define the nature of courage while Socrates mediates and responds. By the end of the dialogue Socrates has defeated each of the arguments by the generals and proven to them that they cannot say what the nature of courage is because they do not know it. Despite the fact that Socrates, Nicias, and Laches are all conspicuous examples of courageous men, since not one of the men succeeds in defining courage, they have no real knowledge of it. In the end, Socrates instructs that the whole company go back to school again and that he will also do so himself.

The dialogue begins with a speech by Lysimachus to two of his friends, Nicias and Laches. Lysimachus and his friend Melesias want their sons to become honorable men and so have asked the advice of two generals about how they should educate their children and specifically what they think of the art of fighting in armor. To this question, Nicias responds that he believes the art of fighting in armor would be a good thing to learn for it would make the children want to learn other things in war. Laches replies that he believes the art of fighting in art to be a kind of knowledge without value. Laches argues that most of the men he has seen who are teachers of this art make fools of themselves on the battlefield. He relates a particularly long anecdote concerning a teacher named Stesilaus who was laughed at by all his companions in battle. Laches believes that fighting may be a form of knowledge; but since this knowledge does not make the masters of it better fighters, it is not worth knowing.