Sophist
preventing others from conquering, things which exist and have been
already produced--in each and all of these branches there appears to be
an art which may be called acquisitive.
THEAETETUS: Yes, that is the proper name.
STRANGER: Seeing, then, that all arts are either acquisitive or
creative, in which class shall we place the art of the angler?
THEAETETUS: Clearly in the acquisitive class.
STRANGER: And the acquisitive may be subdivided into two parts: there is
exchange, which is voluntary and is effected by gifts, hire, purchase;
and the other part of acquisitive, which takes by force of word or deed,
may be termed conquest?
THEAETETUS: That is implied in what has been said.
STRANGER: And may not conquest be again subdivided?
THEAETETUS: How?
STRANGER: Open force may be called fighting, and secret force may have
the general name of hunting?
THEAETETUS: Yes.
STRANGER: And there is no reason why the art of hunting should not be
further divided.
THEAETETUS: How would you make the division?
STRANGER: Into the hunting of living and of lifeless prey.
THEAETETUS: Yes, if both kinds exist.
STRANGER: Of course they exist; but the hunting after lifeless things
having no special name, except some sorts of diving, and other small
matters, may be omitted; the hunting after living things may be called
animal hunting.
THEAETETUS: Yes.
STRANGER: And animal hunting may be truly said to have two divisions,
land-animal hunting, which has many kinds and names, and water-animal
hunting, or the hunting after animals who swim?
THEAETETUS: True.
STRANGER: And of swimming animals, one class lives on the wing and the
other in the water?
THEAETETUS: Certainly.
STRANGER: Fowling is the general term under which the hunting of all
birds is included.
THEAETETUS: True.
STRANGER: The hunting of animals who live in the water has the general
name of fishing.
THEAETETUS: Yes.
STRANGER: And this sort of hunting may be further divided also into two
principal kinds?
THEAETETUS: What are they?
STRANGER: There is one kind which takes them in nets, another which
takes them by a blow.
THEAETETUS: What do you mean, and how do you distinguish them?
STRANGER: As to the first kind--all that surrounds and encloses anything
to prevent egress, may be rightly called an enclosure.
THEAETETUS: Very true.
STRANGER: For which reason twig baskets, casting-nets, nooses, creels,
and the like may all be termed 'enclosures'?
THEAETETUS: True.
STRANGER: And therefore this first kind of capture may be called by us
capture with enclosures, or something of that sort?
THEAETETUS: Yes.
STRANGER: The other kind, which is practised by a blow with hooks and
three-pronged spears, when summed up under one name, may be called
striking, unless you, Theaetetus, can find some better name?
THEAETETUS: Never mind the name--what you suggest will do very well.
STRANGER: There is one mode of striking, which is done at night, and by
the light of a fire, and is by the hunters themselves called firing, or
spearing by firelight.
THEAETETUS: True.
STRANGER: And the fishing by day is called by the general name of
barbing, because the spears, too, are barbed at the point.
THEAETETUS: Yes, that is the term.
STRANGER: Of this barb-fishing, that which strikes the fish who is below
from above is called spearing, because this is the way in which the
three-pronged spears are mostly used.
THEAETETUS: Yes, it is often called so.
STRANGER: Then now there is only one kind remaining.
THEAETETUS: What is that?
STRANGER: When a hook is used, and the fish is not struck in any chance
part of his body, as he is with the spear, but only about the head
and mouth, and is then drawn out from below upwards with reeds and
rods:--What is the right name of that mode of fishing, Theaetetus?
THEAETETUS: I suspect that we have now discovered the object of our
search.
STRANGER: Then now you and I have come to an understanding not only
about the name of the angler's art, but about the definition of
the thing itself. One half of all art was acquisitive--half of the
acquisitive art was conquest or taking by force, half of this was
hunting, and half of hunting was hunting animals, half of this was
hunting water animals--of this again, the under half was fishing, half
of fishing was striking; a part of striking was fishing with a barb,
and one half of this again, being the kind which strikes with a hook
and draws the fish from below upwards, is the art which we have been
seeking, and which from the nature of the operation is denoted angling
or drawing up (aspalieutike, anaspasthai).
THEAETETUS: The result has been quite satisfactorily brought out.
STRANGER: And now, following this pattern, let us endeavour to find out
what a Sophist is.
THEAETETUS: By all means.
STRANGER: The first question about the angler was, whether he was a
skilled artist or unskilled?
THEAETETUS: True.
STRANGER: And shall we call our new friend unskilled, or a thorough
master of his craft?
THEAETETUS: Certainly not unskilled, for his name, as, indeed, you
imply, must surely express his nature.
STRANGER: Then he must be supposed to have some art.
THEAETETUS: What art?
STRANGER: By heaven, they are cousins! it never occurred to us.
THEAETETUS: Who are cousins?
STRANGER: The angler and the Sophist.
THEAETETUS: In what way are they related?
STRANGER: They both appear to me to be hunters.
THEAETETUS: How the Sophist? Of the other we have spoken.
STRANGER: You remember our division of hunting, into hunting after
swimming animals and land animals?
THEAETETUS: Yes.
STRANGER: And you remember that we subdivided the swimming and left the
land animals, saying that there were many kinds of them?
THEAETETUS: Certainly.
STRANGER: Thus far, then, the Sophist and the angler, starting from the
art of acquiring, take the same road?
THEAETETUS: So it would appear.
STRANGER: Their paths diverge when they reach the art of animal hunting;
the one going to the sea-shore, and to the rivers and to the lakes, and
angling for the animals which are in them.
THEAETETUS: Very true.
STRANGER: While the other goes to land and water of another sort--rivers
of wealth and broad meadow-lands of generous youth; and he also is
intending to take the animals which are in them.
THEAETETUS: What do you mean?
STRANGER: Of hunting on land there are two principal divisions.
THEAETETUS: What are they?
STRANGER: One is the hunting of tame, and the other of wild animals.
THEAETETUS: But are tame animals ever hunted?
STRANGER: Yes, if you include man under tame animals. But if you like
you may say that there are no tame animals, or that, if there are, man
is not among them; or you may say that man is a tame animal but is not
hunted--you shall decide which of these alternatives you prefer.
THEAETETUS: I should say, Stranger, that man is a tame animal, and I
admit that he is hunted.
STRANGER: Then let us divide the hunting of tame animals into two parts.
THEAETETUS: How shall we make the division?
STRANGER: Let us define piracy, man-stealing, tyranny, the whole
military art, by one name, as hunting with violence.
THEAETETUS: Very good.
STRANGER: But the art of the lawyer, of the popular orator, and the art
of conversation may be called in one word the art of persuasion.
THEAETETUS: True.
STRANGER: And of persuasion, there may be said to be two kinds?
THEAETETUS: What are they?
STRANGER: One is private, and the other public.
THEAETETUS: Yes; each of them forms a class.
STRANGER: And of private hunting, one sort receives hire, and the other
brings gifts.
THEAETETUS: I do not understand you.
STRANGER: You seem never to have observed the manner in which lovers
hunt.
THEAETETUS: To what do you refer?
STRANGER: I mean that they lavish gifts on those whom they hunt in
addition to other inducements.
THEAETETUS: Most true.
STRANGER: Let us admit this, then, to be the amatory art.
THEAETETUS: Certainly.
STRANGER: But that sort of hireling whose conversation is pleasing
and who baits his hook only with pleasure and exacts nothing but his
maintenance in return, we should all, if I am not mistaken, describe as
possessing flattery or an art of making things pleasant.
THEAETETUS: Certainly.
STRANGER: And that sort, which professes to form acquaintances only for
the sake of virtue, and demands a reward in the shape of money, may be
fairly called by another name?
THEAETETUS: To be sure.
STRANGER: And what is the name? Will you tell me?
THEAETETUS: It is obvious enough; for I believe that we have discovered
the Sophist: which is, as I conceive, the proper name for the class
described.
STRANGER: Then now, Theaetetus, his art may be traced as a branch of the
appropriative, acquisitive family--which hunts animals,--living--land--
tame animals; which hunts man,--privately--for hire,--taking money in
exchange--having the semblance of education; and this is termed
Sophistry, and is a hunt after young men of wealth and rank--such is the
conclusion.
THEAETETUS: Just so.
STRANGER: Let us take another branch of his genealogy; for he is a
professor of a great and many-sided art; and if we look back at what has
preceded we see that he presents another aspect, besides that of which
we are speaking.
THEAETETUS: In what respect?
STRANGER: There were two sorts of acquisitive art; the one concerned
with hunting, the other with exchange.
THEAETETUS: There were.
STRANGER: And of the art of exchange there are two divisions, the one of
giving, and the other of selling.
THEAETETUS: Let us assume that.
STRANGER: Next, we will suppose the art of selling to be divided into
two parts.
THEAETETUS: How?
STRANGER: There is one part which is distinguished as the sale of a
man's own productions; another, which is the exchange of the works of
others.
THEAETETUS: Certainly.
STRANGER: And is not that part of exchange which takes place in the
city, being about half of the whole, termed retailing?
THEAETETUS: Yes.
STRANGER: And that which exchanges the goods of one city for those of
another by selling and buying is the exchange of the merchant?
THEAETETUS: To be sure.
STRANGER: And you are aware that this exchange of the merchant is of
two kinds: it is partly concerned with food for the use of the body,
and partly with the food of the soul which is bartered and received in
exchange for money.
THEAETETUS: What do you mean?
STRANGER: You want to know what is the meaning of food for the soul; the
other kind you surely understand.
THEAETETUS: Yes.
STRANGER: Take music in general and painting and marionette playing and
many other things, which are purchased in one city, and carried away and
sold in another--wares of the soul which are hawked about either for the
sake of instruction or amusement;--may not he who takes them about and
sells them be quite as truly called a merchant as he who sells meats and
drinks?
THEAETETUS: To be sure he may.
STRANGER: And would you not call by the same name him who buys up
knowledge and goes about from city to city exchanging his wares for
money?
THEAETETUS: Certainly I should.
STRANGER: Of this merchandise of the soul, may not one part be fairly
termed the art of display? And there is another part which is certainly
not less ridiculous, but being a trade in learning must be called by
some name germane to the matter?
THEAETETUS: Certainly.
STRANGER: The latter should have two names,--one descriptive of the sale
of the knowledge of virtue, and the other of the sale of other kinds of
knowledge.
THEAETETUS: Of course.
STRANGER: The name of art-seller corresponds well enough to the latter;