The Open Society and Its Enemies (Princeton Classics)

by Karl Popper

Socrates seems to have kept away from metaphysical theories as much as he could. His appeal was a moral appeal, and his theory of individuality (or of the ‘soul’, if this word is preferred) is, I think, a moral and not a metaphysical doctrine. He was fighting, with the help of this doctrine, as always, against self-satisfaction and complacency. He demanded that individualism should not be merely the dissolution of tribalism, but that the individual should prove worthy of his liberation. This is why he insisted that man is not merely a piece of flesh—a body. There is more in man, a divine spark, reason; and a love of truth, of kindness, humaneness, a love of beauty and of goodness. It is these that make a man’s life worth while. But if I am not merely a ‘body’, what am I, then? You are, first of all, intelligence, was Socrates’ reply It is your reason that makes you human; that enables you to be more than a mere bundle of desires and wishes; that makes you a self-sufficient individual and entitles you to claim that you are an end in yourself. Socrates’ saying ‘care for your souls’ is largely an appeal for intellectual honesty, just as the saying ‘know thyself’ is used by him to remind us of our intellectual limitations.