Dialogue

 1  Gorg|          bad men do what they think best, but not what they desire,
 2  Gorg|             than seem; for the next best thing to a man’s being just
 3  Gorg|        master Socrates. ‘One of the best of men, and a proficient
 4  Gorg|             and a proficient in the best and noblest of experimental
 5  Gorg|         rhetoric uses relate to the best and greatest of human things.’
 6  Gorg|           me, Gorgias, what are the best? ‘Health first, beauty next,
 7  Gorg|             only do what they think best, and never what they desire;
 8  Gorg|      fondest of that in which he is best.’ Philosophy is graceful
 9  Gorg|     speaking with a view to what is best; their way is to humour
10  Gorg|         think only how you can live best, leaving all besides to
11  Gorg|         shall be able to illustrate best by parallel notions, which,
12  Gorg|         persuasion, of all arts the best, for to it all things submit,
13  Gorg|             who appears to have the best of the argument; or to repeat
14  Gorg|      considered in what way ‘we can best spend the appointed time,
15  Gorg|            order all things for the best (compare Phaedo), but he
16  Gorg|            we are very far from the best imaginable world at present,
17  Gorg|             different arts, and the best persons in the best arts.
18  Gorg|             the best persons in the best arts. And our friend Gorgias
19  Gorg|        friend Gorgias is one of the best, and the art in which he
20  Gorg|            longer; but I will do my best to make them as short as
21  Gorg|         greatest, Socrates, and the best of human things.~SOCRATES:
22  Gorg|          which are the greatest and best of human things? I dare
23  Gorg|            to know what food is the best for the body; and if the
24  Gorg|       children, as to which of them best understands the goodness
25  Gorg|          without any thought of the best. An art I do not call it,
26  Gorg|            but only what they think best.~POLUS: And is not that
27  Gorg|            fool does what he thinks best, this is a good, and would
28  Gorg| rhetoricians who do what they think best in states, and the tyrants,
29  Gorg|          that they do as they think best?~SOCRATES: And I say so
30  Gorg|             they do what they think best?~SOCRATES: Aye.~POLUS: That,
31  Gorg|            be said to do what seems best to him?~POLUS: Yes.~SOCRATES:
32  Gorg|             mere doing as you think best is great power?~POLUS: Certainly
33  Gorg|       SOCRATES: Which, then, is the best of these three?~POLUS: Will
34  Gorg|       SOCRATES: And justice, if the best, gives the greatest pleasure
35  Gorg|        fellows, of whom we take the best and strongest from their
36  Gorg|             test gold, and the very best possible one to which I
37  Gorg|        weakest of all, he being the best of all will have the smallest
38  Gorg|             go about clothed in the best and finest of them?~CALLICLES:
39  Gorg|            Then the skilfullest and best in making shoes ought to
40  Gorg|        suppose that I must make the best of a bad business, as they
41  Gorg|            always to aim at what is best, and do they seek to improve
42  Gorg|          and strives to say what is best, whether welcome or unwelcome,
43  Gorg|             says with a view to the best, speak with a reference
44  Gorg|           when given to them in the best way comes to them not by
45  Gorg|        considers in what way he can best spend his appointed term;—
46  Gorg|            is, how a man may become best himself, and best govern
47  Gorg|            become best himself, and best govern his family and state,
48  Gorg|          and that I look to what is best and not to what is most
49  Gorg|        acknowledged by us to be the best sort of defence. And if
50  Gorg|        chastised, and that the next best thing to a man being just
51  Gorg|             revealed to us that the best way of life is to practise