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Section 75

"We also agree on this: we did not perceive this, nor could we have perceived it, from anything else but sight, touch, or some other sense—I am considering all the senses the same." "They are the same, Socrates, for the purposes of the argument." "But surely from our senses we must perceive that all sensibly equal things strive after that Equal itself, but fall short of it. Or how else shall we say it?" "Just so." "So before we began to see, hear, and use our other senses, we must have acquired the knowledge of the Equal itself—what it is—if we were going to refer the equal things from our senses to it, realizing that they all strive to be like it, but are inferior." "This is necessary from what has been said, Socrates." "Did we not begin seeing, hearing, and having our other senses immediately upon being born?" "Certainly." "But we had to acquire knowledge of the Equal before these, we say?" "Yes." "Therefore, it seems we must have acquired it before we were born." "It seems so." "If, then, we acquired it before being born, and were born possessing it, did we know, both before birth and immediately upon being born, not only the Equal, the Greater, and the Smaller, but all such things? For our argument now is no more about the Equal than about the Beautiful itself, the Good itself, the Just, the Holy, and, as I say, everything upon which we stamp the seal of 'what it itself is' in our questioning and answering. So we must necessarily have acquired knowledge of all these things before we were born." "That is so." "And if, having acquired it, we did not forget it, we would always be born knowing, and would know throughout life. For knowing is this: acquiring knowledge of something and not losing it. Is not losing knowledge what we call forgetting, Simmias?" "Most certainly, Socrates," he said. "But if, having acquired it before birth, we lost it upon being born, and later, by using our senses regarding these things, we recovered the knowledge we once previously had—would not what we call learning be the recovery of our own knowledge? And would we not be correct to call this recollection?" "Certainly."