Sophist - Page 2

beg of you to
say whether you like and are accustomed to make a long oration on a subject
which you want to explain to another, or to proceed by the method of
question and answer. I remember hearing a very noble discussion in which
Parmenides employed the latter of the two methods, when I was a young man,
and he was far advanced in years. (Compare Parm.)

STRANGER: I prefer to talk with another when he responds pleasantly, and
is light in hand; if not, I would rather have my own say.

SOCRATES: Any one of the present company will respond kindly to you, and
you can choose whom you like of them; I should recommend you to take a
young person--Theaetetus, for example--unless you have a preference for
some one else.

STRANGER: I feel ashamed, Socrates, being a new-comer into your society,
instead of talking a little and hearing others talk, to be spinning out a
long soliloquy or address, as if I wanted to show off. For the true answer
will certainly be a very long one, a great deal longer than might be
expected from such a short and simple question. At the same time, I fear
that I may seem rude and ungracious if I refuse your courteous request,
especially after what you have said. For I certainly cannot object to your
proposal, that Theaetetus should respond, having already conversed with him
myself, and being recommended by you to take him.

THEAETETUS: But are you sure, Stranger, that this will be quite so
acceptable to the rest of the company as Socrates imagines?

STRANGER: You hear them applauding, Theaetetus; after that, there is
nothing more to be said. Well then, I am to argue with you, and if you
tire of the argument, you may complain of your friends and not of me.

THEAETETUS: I do not think that I shall tire, and if I do, I shall get my
friend here, young Socrates, the namesake of the elder Socrates, to help;
he is about my own age, and my partner at the gymnasium, and is constantly
accustomed to work with me.

STRANGER: Very good; you can decide about that for yourself as we proceed.
Meanwhile you and I will begin together and enquire into the nature of the
Sophist, first of the three: I should like you to make out what he is and
bring him to light in a discussion; for at present we are only agreed about
the name, but of the thing to which we both apply the name possibly you
have one notion and I another; whereas we ought always to come to an
understanding about the thing itself in terms of a definition, and not
merely about the name minus the definition. Now the tribe of Sophists
which we are investigating is not easily caught or defined; and the world
has long ago agreed, that if great subjects are to be adequately treated,
they must be studied in the lesser and easier