Charles Kendrick
Humanities 62

Pain of Change

	Works like Plato's Republic and Augustine's Confessions, and many other works 
like these, are essentially constructed in order to force a paradigm shift in the reader.  
The conversions these works mean to accomplish are often shadowed by a conversion 
depicted within the work itself.  In the case of Augustine this is his own conversation to 
Christianity; in the case of Plato we have a description of the archetypal conversion 
experience, most likely modeled on the 'enlightenment' of Socrates.  On the surface, these 
two conversions appear to differ widely, but a better understanding of Plato's dedication 
to reason and knowledge shows how similar Augustine and Plato's conversions really are.  
Plato's Forms are manifestations of the Good, to understand and conceive of the Forms is 
to approach the Good.  The Good being the closest thing to God in Plato's system of 
thought, reasoning is to approach God, and the closest to God one can come is gaining 
understanding and knowledge.  In this sense Plato and Augustine describe the same 
event, an approach to God in the form of a sudden conversion.  Using this thought, it 
becomes clear that the two conversions have many underlying similarities.
	Augustine and Plato both depict a moment of finality to the conversion.  
Augustine's exact moment of conversion is actually pinpointed to the reading of the 
passage from Paul's Epistles, while Plato's conversion ends when the converted man 
understands the Sun as the cause of all things in the visible world: 

	And now he would begin to draw the conclusion that it is the Sun that produces 
the seasons and the course of the year and controls everything in the visible world, and 
moreover is in a way the cause of all that he and his companions used to see.
	Clearly he would come at last to that conclusion.  (Plato, Republic, p.230)

The cause of the moment of conversion is what differs between Plato and Augustine.  
Augustine sees his conversion moment as caused by a divine sign; caused by God 
himself.  Plato, however, sees the final conversion as an inevitable consequence of 
having been exposed to the world of truth.  For, in Plato's allegory, the world of the 
visible has been shifted to the underground cave, and the world of thought likened 
allegorically to the visible world.  The converted man's understanding of the Sun as the 
cause of all of the visible world is the philosopher's comprehension of the Good as the 
root of all thought.  In so far as Plato worships truth and the Good as God, Plato has been 
converted by the direct action, or at least the direct perception, of God, just as 
Augustine's conversion required exposure to God.  Plato's conversion is completed by 
power of the Good just as Augustine's conversion is completed by the power of God.
	The most obvious similarity between Plato's conversion and Augustine's is that 
both are painful.  The surface difference we can explore is that Augustine's pain is due to 
a conflict of will while Plato's pain involves perception and intelligence.  Augustine 
intellectually understands the correct path, but only lacks the strength to follow it.  Plato's 
convert is trying to deal with new knowledge that is painfully forcing his understanding 
to change.  Yet as each author describes the reason for the pain, we see the underlying 
similarity: 

Yet, in my state of indecision, they [ aspects of Augustine's earlier life that he wants to 
continue ] kept me from tearing myself away, from shaking myself free of them and 
leaping across the barrier to the other side, where you were calling me.  Habit was too 
strong for me when it asked 'Do you think you can live without these things?'
(Augustine, Confessions, p.176)

Suppose one of them set free and forced suddenly to stand up, turn his head, and walk 
with eyes lifted to the light; all these movements would be painful... 	
Suppose further that he were shown the various objects and were made to say, in reply to 
questions, what each of them was.  Would he not be perplexed and believe the objects 
now shown him to be not so real as what he formerly saw?  (Plato, Republic, p.229)

The pain depicted has an obvious common source: it is the pain of breaking away from 
old habits, the pain of change.  While Augustine is overcoming his old sinful ways to 
come to the path of virtue, and Plato's convert is discarding old ideas to come to truth, 
each path is painful for the same reason: that these paradigm shifts are a tremendous 
change.  Down to the reason for pain, the conversions are still similar.
	What seems irreconcilably different about the conversions is the way the convert 
is reassimilated into the world.  Augustine's conversion ends with his joining the Church 
and living as a Christian until death.  Plato's convert, on the other hand, is murdered by 
members of his unenlightened society.  Yet this difference is clearly not a difference in 
the nature of the conversion, but rather a difference in the society in which the 
conversion was attempted.
	In conclusion Plato and Augustine depict an essentially similar conversion despite 
the fact that they have been converted to somewhat dissimilar understandings and ideals.  
If we are high-minded enough to judge either conversion, we should start by noticing that 
neither was the easy slip into a self-reinforcing ideal, but rather a painful move to an 
alien credo.  This is perhaps one solid criterion for judging a conversion.  In any case, if 
we feel that we are not yet following the perfect ideal, then perhaps the best thing we can 
do is forcibly accustom ourselves to change.  In this way the larger changes of mind will 
come readily and we will not be as locked into habit as Augustine confessed himself to 
be.