A Beginning I Much Admire
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Phaedrus — ἀλλὰ παρίημι φάναι τὸν Φαῖδρον, ἀλλʼ ἐρώτα.
Aristodemus — μετὰ ταῦτα δὴ τὸν Σωκράτη ἔφη ἐνθένδε ποθὲν ἄρξασθαι.
Socrates — καὶ μήν, ὦ φίλε Ἀγάθων, καλῶς μοι ἔδοξας καθηγήσασθαι τοῦ λόγου, λέγων ὅτι πρῶτον μὲν δέοι αὐτὸν ἐπιδεῖξαι ὁποῖός τίς ἐστιν ὁ Ἔρως, ὕστερον δὲ τὰ ἔργα αὐτοῦ. ταύτην τὴν ἀρχὴν πάνυ ἄγαμαι. ἴθι οὖν μοι περὶ Ἔρωτος, ἐπειδὴ καὶ τἆλλα καλῶς καὶ μεγαλοπρεπῶς διῆλθες οἷός ἐστι, καὶ
Why, I allow it, said Phaedrus; so ask away. After this, Socrates, he said, began somewhere here. And indeed, dear Agathon, you seemed to me to open the discourse well, saying that first one must show what kind of thing Eros is, and afterwards his works. This beginning I much admire. So come now, about Eros — since you went through everything else finely and grandly, what he is — tell me also this:
Phaedrus gives leave, and Socrates opens his questioning. He compliments Agathon on the very shape of his speech — that one should first show what kind of thing Eros is, and only then his works — and says he much admires that starting point. Now, he says, since you set out so finely what Eros is like, tell me this one thing too. The question itself comes in 199d.
This is the elenchus setting its hook. By making Agathon own the method — "you were right that we must first say what Eros is" — Socrates commits him to a standard his own speech failed, and the next questions will expose the gap. The move recurs throughout Plato: praise the interlocutor's premise, then follow it further than he did. Agamai, "I admire," is warm and courteous; the courtesy is exactly what makes the coming refutation land without a quarrel.
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