laches,-or-courage   

Soc. That is what I am going to do, my dear friend. Do not, however,
suppose I shall let you out of the partnership; for I shall expect you
to apply your mind, and join with me in the consideration of the
question.
La. I will if you think that I ought.
Soc. Yes, I do; but I must beg of you, Nicias, to begin again. You
remember that we originally considered courage to be a part of virtue.
Nic. Very true.
Soc. And you yourself said that it was a part; and there were many
other parts, all of which taken together are called virtue.
Nic. Certainly.
Soc. Do you agree with me about the parts? For I say that justice,
temperance, and the like, are all of them parts of virtue as well as
courage. Would you not say the same?
Nic. Certainly.
Soc. Well then, so far we are agreed. And now let us proceed a step,
and try to arrive at a similar agreement about the fearful and the
hopeful: I do not want you to be thinking one thing and myself
another. Let me then tell you my own opinion, and if I am wrong you
shall set me in my opinion the terrible and the are the things which
do or do not create fear, and fear is not of the present, nor of the
past, but is of future and expected evil. Do you not agree to that,
Laches?
La. Yes, Socrates, entirely.
Soc. That is my view, Nicias; the terrible things, as I should say,
are the evils which are future; and the hopeful are the good or not
evil things which are future. Do you or do you not agree with me?
Nic. I agree.
Soc. And the knowledge of these things you call courage?
Nic. Precisely.
Soc. And now let me see whether you agree with Laches and myself as to
a third point.
Nic. What is that?
Soc. I will tell you. He and I have a notion that there is not one
knowledge or science of the past, another of the present, a third of
what is likely to be best and what will be best in the future; but
that of all three there is one science only: for example, there is one
science of medicine which is concerned with the inspection of health
equally in all times, present, past, and future; and one science of
husbandry in like manner, which is concerned with the productions of
the earth in all times. As to the art of the general, you yourselves
will be my witnesses that he has an excellent foreknowledge of the
future, and that he claims to be the master and not the servant of the
soothsayer, because he knows better what is happening or is likely to
happen in war: and accordingly the law places the soothsayer under the
general, and not the general under the soothsayer. Am I not correct in
saying so, Laches?
La. Quite correct.
Soc. And do you, Nicias, also acknowledge that the same science has
understanding of the same things, whether future, present, or past?
Nic. Yes, indeed Socrates; that is my opinion.
Soc. And courage, my friend, is, as you say, a knowledge of the
fearful and of the hopeful?
Nic. Yes.
Soc. And the fearful, and the hopeful, are admitted to be future goods
and future evils?
Nic. True.
Soc. And the same science has to do with the same things in the future
or at any time?
Nic. That is true.
Soc. Then courage is not the science which is concerned with the
fearful and hopeful, for they are future only; courage, like the other
sciences, is concerned not only with good and evil of the future, but
of the present and past, and of any time?