The Simile of the Cave

'But anyone with any sense,' I said, 'will remember that the eyes may be unsighted in two ways, by a transition wither from light to darkness or from darkness to light, and thatt he same distinction applies to the mind. So when he sees a mind confused and unable to see clearly hewill not laugh without thinking, but will ask himself whether it has come from a clearer world and is confused by the unaccustomed darkness, or whether it is dazzled by the stronger light of the clearer world to which it has escaped from its previous ignorance. The first state is a reason for congratulation, the second for sympathy, though if one wants to laugh at it one can do wo with less absurdity than at the mind that has descended from the daylight of the upper world.'

-The Simile of the Cave, Plato