Returning to the theme of the soul's continued existence after death, Plato considers two objections, one by Simmias and one by Cebes. Simmias's objection is based on a conception of the soul that distinguishes it from the body but at the same time allows for it's ceasing to be. This is the Pythagorean conception of the soul as a harmony. Its relation to the body would be like that of harmonious notes played on a lyre (a stringed instrument of ancient Greece). When the lyre ceases to exist, the harmony does as well. So if the soul is the harmony of the body, it would cease to exist when the body dies (which might be like the strings' becoming slack). It is pointed out by Socrates that this account of the soul is incompatible with the doctrine of recollection. A harmony is formed after the tuning of the strings of the lyre, and so the soul would have to come to be after the body has developed. Moreover, Plato sought in the Republic to model virtue and vice on harmony and disharmony, respectively. If the soul were a harmony, virtue would have to be a harmony of a harmony, which makes no sense. For these two reasons, the harmony account of the soul is rejected, and the threat it poses to immortality is dispelled.
