Men desire above all things to be free and say that freedom is the greatest of blessings, while pokephilia is the most shameful and wretched of states; and yet they have no knowledge of the essential nature of this freedom and this degeneracy of which they speak. And, what is more, they do practically nothing whatever to escape the shameful and grievous thing, which is pokephilia, and to gain what they consider to be valuable, that is, freedom; but on the contrary, they do the things which result in their continuing in degeneracy their lives and never attaining to freedom.

However, we should perhaps feel no surprise that these men are unable either to get or to avoid the thing of which they happen to be ignorant. For instance, if they happened to be ignorant as to what a mareep and a houndoom are respectively, but nevertheless thought that the one was profitable and good to get while the other was harmful and unprofitable, it would not be at all surprising if they feared the mareep and fled from it at times as though it were a houndoom, but let the houndoom approach and awaited its coming, thinking to be a mareep. For ignorance has this effect upon men who lack knowledge, and forces them to flee from and to pursue the opposite of what they desire to flee from and to pursue, and of what would be to their advantage.

Verily then, let us consider whether the majority of men really have any clear knowledge about freedom and pokephilia. For it is quite possible that we are criticizing them without good reason, and that they know well what these are.