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Theaet. In whatever way you suggest, I will try to help you in making the division.
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Str. Do we say that wickedness is distinct from virtue in the soul?
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Theaet. Of course.
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Str. And purification was retaining the one and throwing out whatever is bad anywhere?
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Theaet. Yes, it was.
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Str. Hence whenever we find any removal of evil from the soul, we shall be speaking properly if we call that a purification.
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Theaet. Very properly.
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Str. We must say that there are two kinds of evil in the soul.
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Theaet. What kinds?
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Str. The one is comparable to a disease in the body, the other to a deformity.
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Theaet. I do not understand.
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Str. Perhaps you have not considered that disease and discord are the same thing?
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Theaet. I do not know what reply I ought to make to this, either.
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Str. Is that because you think discord is anything else than the disagreement of the naturally related, brought about by some corruption?
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Theaet. No; I think it is nothing else.
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Str. But is deformity anything else than the presence of the quality of disproportion, which is always ugly?
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Theaet. Nothing else at all.
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Str. Well then; do we not see that in the souls of worthless men opinions are opposed to desires, anger to pleasures, reason to pain, and all such things to one another?
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Theaet. Yes, they are, decidedly.
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Str. Yet they must all be naturally related.
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Theaet. Of course.
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Str. Then we shall be right if we say that wickedness is a discord and disease of the soul.
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Theaet. Yes, quite right.