Socrates' Rooster part III

“Oh you idealist philosopher and imitator, “ the rooster said in Greek worthy of Gorgias himself, “won’t you even bother? You won’t even fly as much as a rooster can? What now? It frightens you that I can talk? Well, don’t you know me? I’m the rooster from Gorgias’ corral. I know you. You’re a shadow. The shadow of a dead man. It’s the destiny of disciples to outlive their masters. They remain here like larvae in order to frighten children. The inspired dreamer dies and his wing-clipped disciples remain, who are one more cause for fear and just another tragedy for the world. As well as a superstition that turns the poetic ideals of the sublime, clear-eyed master into stone.”

“Silence, rooster. In the name of the Idea of your Genus, nature commands that you be quiet!”

“I talk and meanwhile you boast about the Idea. Hey, I speak through my own individual ability and without permission from the Idea of my Genus. From so much hearing talk of Rhetoric, that is the art of talking for talking’s sake, I learned something of the profession.”

“And you repay your master by fleeing from his side, leaving his house and renouncing his power over you?”

“Gorgias is just as crazy but not as pleasant as you. You can’t live with such a man. He tests everything and that is both disturbing and tiring. He who demonstrates things all his life leaves life hallow. Knowing the why of everything is to be left with the geometry of things and the substance of nothing. Reducing the world to an equation is to render it meaningless. Look you, get out of here. For I could go on saying things like this for seventy days and seventy nights. Remember, I’m Gorgias the sophist’ rooster.”

“Well then, for being a sophist as well as sacrilegious and because Zeus wills it, you’re going to die. Come here!”

To be continued in part IV . . . . .