Side Lessons from Phaedo

"What is this worst of all evils, Socrates?" asked Cebes.

"That the soul of every man is compelled, through experiencing some extreme pleasure or pain, to imagine that whatever most strongly arouses such feelings is most vivid and real -- although, of course, it is not..."

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"Misanthropy comes from putting complete confidence in someone without having understanding, and supposing that the fellow is absolutely true and sound and trust-worthy, and then a little later on finding that he is bad and untrustworthy -- and then doing the same with someone else; and when you have experienced this several times, and particularly at the hands of those whom you might consider your nearest and dearest friends, you finally, after many rebuffs, come to hate all men and to suppose that there is nothing sound in anyone at all...

Then is it not wrong...and clear that such a person is trying to deal with his fellow-men without being an expert in human nature? If he had been an expert, he would have held the correct view, that there are few perfectly good men and few utterly bad, but very many in between."

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-- Plato, Phaedo