Education

Education
Based on The Republic by Plato
"Quickness to learn, memory, incisiveness, acuity, and everything that follows on these--you know that youthful spirits and high intelligence often refuse to combine with a willingness to live orderly lives accompanied by quiet and stability. Instead, people like this are carried by their acuteness in any chance direction and stability utterly escapes them."¹
I believe that what Socrates is saying, in regards to education, is that we all must be educated to be acute in intelligence. A rather obvious analysis, but one that is quite often overlooked by many. Socrates states that any seed, or growing thing, must be met with suitable nurture, and if it is not then it falls short in growth. This can be related to education by means of children, and how they are brought up and educated. If a child does not get the proper, suitable education, or in the plant’s case, nurture, then he falls short of expectations and mental growth. Hopefully, for the sake of intellectual growth, the parent or guardian has high expectations for their child, for if they don’t then the child excuses himself from the said education.
“Then if someone educated in music and poetry pursues the same track in gymnastic, he will choose to have no need of medicine beyond what is minimally necessary?”
“Yes, and he will even undertake the labors of gymnastic exercise with a view to the spirited form of his nature, rousing it by his exertions, rather than to bodily strength…”²
What Socrates is saying here, I believe, is that when you are educated in a certain subject, you cannot possibly go from that to another without being educated in it as well. By doing so not only would a fool be made of yourself, but it would disrepute the subject in which you are making a fool of yourself!
According to me, Socrates logic makes heads spin. In other words, it requires you THINK. In thinking, it is more beneficial to the thinker to have some level of education. Philosophy is thinking, and thinking leads to ideas, which leads to opinions, then onto statements and so and so forth. Without education, thinking is somewhat useless, and indirectly, so are the uneducated opinions and statements.
Permit me to be philosophical and poetic for a moment and say that education is the altruistic form of knowledge. Education seeks us, but for it to take full form in our soul, like it should, we must also seek it in return. It is like returning a grandiose favor; not necessarily required, however normally expected. Education gives us the license to be whatever we want, whoever that may be, and with no limitations or rules. It is the quintessence of freedom; the opposite of intellectual poverty; the pinnacle of life; the romantic infusion of knowledge and thirst for the simplicity of just knowing.
“…we must acknowledge that education is not what it is said to be by some, who profess to be able to put knowledge into a soul where it is not present, as though putting sight into blind eyes.”³
What Socrates is saying is that we all have different view points and definitions of education. It cannot just be shoved into our minds like cramming information at twelve A.M. the night before the finals. It takes time, and we all must be willing to learn. We must crave knowledge and thirst for intelligence. This is how we must receive education: willingly.

Footnotes
(ALL FOOTNOTES ARE FROM THE REPUBLIC BY PLATO)
1 – Book 6, pg. 214
2 – Book 3, pg. 101
3 – Book 7, pg. 232