Theaetetus
shame--they fancy that they hear others saying of them, 'These are not
mere good-for-nothing persons, mere burdens of the earth, but such as
men should be who mean to dwell safely in a state.' Let us tell them
that they are all the more truly what they do not think they are because
they do not know it; for they do not know the penalty of injustice,
which above all things they ought to know--not stripes and death, as
they suppose, which evil-doers often escape, but a penalty which cannot
be escaped.
THEODORUS: What is that?
SOCRATES: There are two patterns eternally set before them; the one
blessed and divine, the other godless and wretched: but they do not see
them, or perceive that in their utter folly and infatuation they are
growing like the one and unlike the other, by reason of their evil
deeds; and the penalty is, that they lead a life answering to the
pattern which they are growing like. And if we tell them, that unless
they depart from their cunning, the place of innocence will not receive
them after death; and that here on earth, they will live ever in the
likeness of their own evil selves, and with evil friends--when they hear
this they in their superior cunning will seem to be listening to the
talk of idiots.
THEODORUS: Very true, Socrates.
SOCRATES: Too true, my friend, as I well know; there is, however, one
peculiarity in their case: when they begin to reason in private about
their dislike of philosophy, if they have the courage to hear the
argument out, and do not run away, they grow at last strangely
discontented with themselves; their rhetoric fades away, and they become
helpless as children. These however are digressions from which we must
now desist, or they will overflow, and drown the original argument; to
which, if you please, we will now return.
THEODORUS: For my part, Socrates, I would rather have the digressions,
for at my age I find them easier to follow; but if you wish, let us go
back to the argument.
SOCRATES: Had we not reached the point at which the partisans of the
perpetual flux, who say that things are as they seem to each one, were
confidently maintaining that the ordinances which the state commanded
and thought just, were just to the state which imposed them, while they
were in force; this was especially asserted of justice; but as to the
good, no one had any longer the hardihood to contend of any ordinances
which the state thought and enacted to be good that these, while they
were in force, were really good;--he who said so would be playing with
the name 'good,' and would not touch the real question--it would be a
mockery, would it not?
THEODORUS: Certainly it would.
SOCRATES: He ought not to speak of the name, but of the thing which is
contemplated under the name.
THEODORUS: Right.
SOCRATES: Whatever be the term used, the good or expedient is the aim
of legislation, and as far as she has an opinion, the state imposes all
laws with a view to the greatest expediency; can legislation have any
other aim?
THEODORUS: Certainly not.
SOCRATES: But is the aim attained always? do not mistakes often happen?
THEODORUS: Yes, I think that there are mistakes.
SOCRATES: The possibility of error will be more distinctly recognised,
if we put the question in reference to the whole class under which the
good or expedient falls. That whole class has to do with the future, and
laws are passed under the idea that they will be useful in after-time;
which, in other words, is the future.
THEODORUS: Very true.
SOCRATES: Suppose now, that we ask Protagoras, or one of his disciples,
a question:--O, Protagoras, we will say to him, Man is, as you declare,
the measure of all things--white, heavy, light: of all such things he
is the judge; for he has the criterion of them in himself, and when he
thinks that things are such as he experiences them to be, he thinks what
is and is true to himself. Is it not so?
THEODORUS: Yes.
SOCRATES: And do you extend your doctrine, Protagoras (as we shall
further say), to the future as well as to the present; and has he the
criterion not only of what in his opinion is but of what will be, and do
things always happen to him as he expected? For example, take the case
of heat:--When an ordinary man thinks that he is going to have a fever,
and that this kind of heat is coming on, and another person, who is a
physician, thinks the contrary, whose opinion is likely to prove right?
Or are they both right?--he will have a heat and fever in his own
judgment, and not have a fever in the physician's judgment?
THEODORUS: How ludicrous!
SOCRATES: And the vinegrower, if I am not mistaken, is a better judge of
the sweetness or dryness of the vintage which is not yet gathered than
the harp-player?
THEODORUS: Certainly.
SOCRATES: And in musical composition the musician will know better than
the training master what the training master himself will hereafter
think harmonious or the reverse?
THEODORUS: Of course.
SOCRATES: And the cook will be a better judge than the guest, who is
not a cook, of the pleasure to be derived from the dinner which is in
preparation; for of present or past pleasure we are not as yet arguing;
but can we say that every one will be to himself the best judge of the
pleasure which will seem to be and will be to him in the future?--nay,
would not you, Protagoras, better guess which arguments in a court would
convince any one of us than the ordinary man?
THEODORUS: Certainly, Socrates, he used to profess in the strongest
manner that he was the superior of all men in this respect.
SOCRATES: To be sure, friend: who would have paid a large sum for the
privilege of talking to him, if he had really persuaded his visitors
that neither a prophet nor any other man was better able to judge what
will be and seem to be in the future than every one could for himself?
THEODORUS: Who indeed?
SOCRATES: And legislation and expediency are all concerned with the
future; and every one will admit that states, in passing laws, must
often fail of their highest interests?
THEODORUS: Quite true.
SOCRATES: Then we may fairly argue against your master, that he must
admit one man to be wiser than another, and that the wiser is a measure:
but I, who know nothing, am not at all obliged to accept the honour
which the advocate of Protagoras was just now forcing upon me, whether I
would or not, of being a measure of anything.
THEODORUS: That is the best refutation of him, Socrates; although he is
also caught when he ascribes truth to the opinions of others, who give
the lie direct to his own opinion.
SOCRATES: There are many ways, Theodorus, in which the doctrine that
every opinion of every man is true may be refuted; but there is more
difficulty in proving that states of feeling, which are present to a
man, and out of which arise sensations and opinions in accordance with
them, are also untrue. And very likely I have been talking nonsense
about them; for they may be unassailable, and those who say that there
is clear evidence of them, and that they are matters of knowledge, may
probably be right; in which case our friend Theaetetus was not so far
from the mark when he identified perception and knowledge. And therefore
let us draw nearer, as the advocate of Protagoras desires; and give the
truth of the universal flux a ring: is the theory sound or not? at any
rate, no small war is raging about it, and there are combination not a
few.
THEODORUS: No small, war, indeed, for in Ionia the sect makes rapid
strides; the disciples of Heracleitus are most energetic upholders of
the doctrine.
SOCRATES: Then we are the more bound, my dear Theodorus, to examine the
question from the foundation as it is set forth by themselves.
THEODORUS: Certainly we are. About these speculations of Heracleitus,
which, as you say, are as old as Homer, or even older still, the
Ephesians themselves, who profess to know them, are downright mad, and
you cannot talk with them on the subject. For, in accordance with their
text-books, they are always in motion; but as for dwelling upon an
argument or a question, and quietly asking and answering in turn, they
can no more do so than they can fly; or rather, the determination of
these fellows not to have a particle of rest in them is more than
the utmost powers of negation can express. If you ask any of them a
question, he will produce, as from a quiver, sayings brief and dark, and
shoot them at you; and if you inquire the reason of what he has said,
you will be hit by some other new-fangled word, and will make no way
with any of them, nor they with one another; their great care is, not
to allow of any settled principle either in their arguments or in
their minds, conceiving, as I imagine, that any such principle would be
stationary; for they are at war with the stationary, and do what they
can to drive it out everywhere.
SOCRATES: I suppose, Theodorus, that you have only seen them when they
were fighting, and have never stayed with them in time of peace,
for they are no friends of yours; and their peace doctrines are only
communicated by them at leisure, as I imagine, to those disciples of
theirs whom they want to make like themselves.
THEODORUS: Disciples! my good sir, they have none; men of their sort are
not one another's disciples, but they grow up at their own sweet will,
and get their inspiration anywhere, each of them saying of his neighbour
that he knows nothing. From these men, then, as I was going to remark,
you will never get a reason, whether with their will or without their
will; we must take the question out of their hands, and make the
analysis ourselves, as if we were doing geometrical problem.
SOCRATES: Quite right too; but as touching the aforesaid problem, have
we not heard from the ancients, who concealed their wisdom from the many
in poetical figures, that Oceanus and Tethys, the origin of all things,
are streams, and that nothing is at rest? And now the moderns, in their
superior wisdom, have declared the same openly, that the cobbler too may
hear and learn of them, and no longer foolishly imagine that some things
are at rest and others in motion--having learned that all is motion,
he will duly honour his teachers. I had almost forgotten the opposite
doctrine, Theodorus,
'Alone Being remains unmoved, which is the name for the all.'
This is the language of Parmenides, Melissus, and their followers, who
stoutly maintain that all being is one and self-contained, and has no
place in which to move. What shall we do, friend, with all these people;
for, advancing step by step, we have imperceptibly got between the
combatants, and, unless we can protect our retreat, we shall pay the
penalty of our rashness--like the players in the palaestra who are
caught upon the line, and are dragged different ways by the two parties.
Therefore I think that we had better begin by considering those whom we
first accosted, 'the river-gods,' and, if we find any truth in them, we
will help them to pull us over, and try to get away from the others. But
if the partisans of 'the whole' appear to speak more truly, we will fly
off from the party which would move the immovable, to them. And if I
find that neither of them have anything reasonable to say, we shall
be in a ridiculous position, having so great a conceit of our own poor
opinion and rejecting that of ancient and famous men. O Theodorus, do
you think that there is any use in proceeding when the danger is so
great?
THEODORUS: Nay, Socrates, not to examine thoroughly what the two parties
have to say would be quite intolerable.
SOCRATES: Then examine we must, since you, who were so reluctant to
begin, are so eager to proceed. The nature of motion appears to be the