Protagoras' Doctrine of Justice and Virtue in the ‘Protagoras’ of Plato

Protagoras has just been presented with a new pupil, Hippocrates, and he states what he proposes to teach him—such prudence in domestic affairs as will best enable him to regulate his own household, and such wisdom in public affairs as will best qualify him to speak and act in affairs of state (318e). Socrates asks is this the art of politics and is Protagoras undertaking to make men good citizens, and Protagoras agrees (319a). Socrates replies that he had supposed that this art could not be taught, and he gives two grounds: (1) the Athenians are agreed to be wise men, yet, while they call in experts in the assembly to advise them on technical matters, they regard all citizens alike as capable of advising them on matters pertaining to the city (319b–d); (2) the wisest and best of the citizens are not able to hand this virtue on to others. So Pericles educated his sons well in all that could be taught by teachers, but he did not try to teach them, or have them taught his own wisdom, but left them to pick it up unaided (319d–320b). Now Protagoras, it has been pointed out, is in a difficult position. He is apparently confronted with the choice of admitting that virtue cannot be taught and that his profession is a fraud, or of declaring that the theory of Athenian democracy is false, and his patron, Pericles, is ignorant of the true nature of political virtue. His reply takes the form of a myth, followed by a set argument (Logos). Some have regarded his reply as ‘a tissue of obscure and contradictory ideas,’ while others who have recognised its skill, have regarded it as failing in one way or another to give a satisfactory answer to Socrates' objections. It is the aim of what follows to show that Protagoras' answer is perfectly satisfactory if rightly understood, and that the contrary opinions are due to misunderstandings of what Protagoras actually says in the dialogue.