Sophist
StrangerAnd does not false opinion also think that things which most certainly exist do not exist at all?
StrangerAnd here, again, is falsehood?
TheaetetusFalsehood—yes.
StrangerAnd in like manner, a false proposition will be deemed to be one which asserts the non-existence of things which are, and the existence of things which are not.
TheaetetusThere is no other way in which a false proposition can arise.
StrangerThere is not; but the Sophist will deny these statements. And indeed how can any rational man assent to them, when the very expressions which we have just used were before acknowledged by us to be unutterable, unspeakable, indescribable, unthinkable? Do you see his point, Theaetetus?
TheaetetusOf course he will say that we are contradicting ourselves when we hazard the assertion, that falsehood exists in opinion and in words; for in maintaining this, we are compelled over and over again to assert being of not-being, which we admitted just now to be an utter impossibility.
StrangerHow well you remember! And now it is high time to hold a consultation as to what we ought to do about the Sophist; for if we persist in looking for him in the class of false workers and magicians, you see that the handles for objection and the difficulties which will arise are very numerous and obvious.
TheaetetusThey are indeed.
StrangerWe have gone through but a very small portion of them, and they are really infinite.
TheaetetusIf that is the case, we cannot possibly catch the Sophist.
StrangerShall we then be so faint-hearted as to give him up?
TheaetetusCertainly not, I should say, if we can get the slightest hold upon him.
StrangerWill you then forgive me, and, as your words imply, not be altogether displeased if I flinch a little from the grasp of such a sturdy argument?
TheaetetusTo be sure I will.
StrangerI have a yet more urgent request to make.
TheaetetusWhich is—?
StrangerThat you will promise not to regard me as a parricide.
TheaetetusAnd why?
StrangerBecause, in self-defence, I must test the philosophy of my father Parmenides, and try to prove by main force that in a certain sense not-being is, and that being, on the other hand, is not.
TheaetetusSome attempt of the kind is clearly needed.
StrangerYes, a blind man, as they say, might see that, and, unless these questions are decided in one way or another, no one when he speaks of false words, or false opinion, or idols, or images, or imitations, or appearances, or about the arts which are concerned with them; can avoid falling into ridiculous contradictions.
StrangerAnd therefore I must venture to lay hands on my father’s argument; for if I am to be over-scrupulous, I shall have to give the matter up.
TheaetetusNothing in the world should ever induce us to do so.
StrangerI have a third little request which I wish to make.
TheaetetusWhat is it?
StrangerYou heard me say what I have always felt and still feel—that I have no heart for this argument?
TheaetetusI did.
StrangerI tremble at the thought of what I have said, and expect that you will deem me mad, when you hear of my sudden changes and shiftings; let me therefore observe, that I am examining the question entirely out of regard for you.
TheaetetusThere is no reason for you to fear that I shall impute any impropriety to you, if you attempt this refutation and proof; take heart, therefore, and proceed.
StrangerAnd where shall I begin the perilous enterprise? I think that the road which I must take is—
TheaetetusWhich?—Let me hear.
StrangerI think that we had better, first of all, consider the points which at present are regarded as self-evident, lest we may have fallen into some confusion, and be too ready to assent to one another, fancying that we are quite clear about them.
TheaetetusSay more distinctly what you mean.
StrangerI think that Parmenides, and all who ever yet undertook to determine the number and nature of existences, talked to us in rather a light and easy strain.
TheaetetusHow?
StrangerAs if we had been children, to whom they repeated each his own mythus or story;—one said that there were three principles, and that at one time there was war between certain of them; and then again there was peace, and they were married and begat children, and brought them up; and another spoke of two principles,—a moist and a dry, or a hot and a cold, and made them marry and cohabit. The Eleatics, however, in our part of the world, say that all things are many in name, but in nature one; this is their mythus, which goes back to Xenophanes, and is even older. Then there are Ionian, and in more recent times Sicilian muses, who have arrived at the conclusion that to unite the two principles is safer, and to say that being is one and many, and that these are held together by enmity and friendship, ever parting, ever meeting, as the severer Muses assert, while the gentler ones do not insist on the perpetual strife and peace, but admit a relaxation and alternation of them; peace and unity sometimes prevailing under the sway of Aphrodite, and then again plurality and war, by reason of a principle of strife. Whether any of them spoke the truth in all this is hard to determine; besides, antiquity and famous men should have reverence, and not be liable to accusations so serious. Yet one thing may be said of them without offence—
TheaetetusWhat thing?
StrangerThat they went on their several ways disdaining to notice people like ourselves; they did not care whether they took us with them, or left us behind them.
TheaetetusHow do you mean?
StrangerI mean to say, that when they talk of one, two, or more elements, which are or have become or are becoming, or again of heat mingling with cold, assuming in some other part of their works separations and mixtures,—tell me, Theaetetus, do you understand what they mean by these expressions? When I was a younger man, I used to fancy that I understood quite well what was meant by the term ‘not-being,’ which is our present subject of dispute; and now you see in what a fix we are about it.
TheaetetusI see.
StrangerAnd very likely we have been getting into the same perplexity about ‘being,’ and yet may fancy that when anybody utters the word, we understand him quite easily, although we do not know about not-being. But we may be equally ignorant of both.
TheaetetusI dare say.
StrangerAnd the same may be said of all the terms just mentioned.
StrangerThe consideration of most of them may be deferred; but we had better now discuss the chief captain and leader of them.
TheaetetusOf what are you speaking? You clearly think that we must first investigate what people mean by the word ‘being.’
StrangerYou follow close at my heels, Theaetetus. For the right method, I conceive, will be to call into our presence the dualistic philosophers and to interrogate them. ‘Come,’ we will say, ‘Ye, who affirm that hot and cold or any other two principles are the universe, what is this term which you apply to both of them, and what do you mean when you say that both and each of them “are”? How are we to understand the word “are”? Upon your view, are we to suppose that there is a third principle over and above the other two,—three in all, and not two? For clearly you cannot say that one of the two principles is being, and yet attribute being equally to both of them; for, if you did, whichever of the two is identified with being, will comprehend the other; and so they will be one and not two.’
StrangerBut perhaps you mean to give the name of ‘being’ to both of them together?
TheaetetusQuite likely.
Stranger‘Then, friends,’ we shall reply to them, ‘the answer is plainly that the two will still be resolved into one.’
Stranger‘Since, then, we are in a difficulty, please to tell us what you mean, when you speak of being; for there can be no doubt that you always from the first understood your own meaning, whereas we once thought that we understood you, but now we are in a great strait. Please to begin by explaining this matter to us, and let us no longer fancy that we understand you, when we entirely misunderstand you.’ There will be no impropriety in our demanding an answer to this question, either of the dualists or of the pluralists?
StrangerAnd what about the assertors of the oneness of the all—must we not endeavour to ascertain from them what they mean by ‘being’?
TheaetetusBy all means.
StrangerThen let them answer this question: One, you say, alone is? ‘Yes,’ they will reply.
StrangerAnd there is something which you call ‘being’?
Theaetetus‘Yes.’
StrangerAnd is being the same as one, and do you apply two names to the same thing?
TheaetetusWhat will be their answer, Stranger?
StrangerIt is clear, Theaetetus, that he who asserts the unity of being will find a difficulty in answering this or any other question.
TheaetetusWhy so?
StrangerTo admit of two names, and to affirm that there is nothing but unity, is surely ridiculous?
StrangerAnd equally irrational to admit that a name is anything?
TheaetetusHow so?
StrangerTo distinguish the name from the thing, implies duality.
StrangerAnd yet he who identifies the name with the thing will be compelled to say that it is the name of nothing, or if he says that it is the name of something, even then the name will only be the name of a name, and of nothing else.
StrangerAnd the one will turn out to be only one of one, and being absolute unity, will represent a mere name.
StrangerAnd would they say that the whole is other than the one that is, or the same with it?
TheaetetusTo be sure they would, and they actually say so.
StrangerIf being is a whole, as Parmenides sings,—
‘Every way like unto the fullness of a well-rounded sphere, Evenly balanced from the centre on every side, And must needs be neither greater nor less in any way, Neither on this side nor on that—’
then being has a centre and extremes, and, having these, must also have parts.
StrangerYet that which has parts may have the attribute of unity in all the parts, and in this way being all and a whole, may be one?
StrangerBut that of which this is the condition cannot be absolute unity?
TheaetetusWhy not?
StrangerBecause, according to right reason, that which is truly one must be affirmed to be absolutely indivisible.
StrangerBut this indivisible, if made up of many parts, will contradict reason.
TheaetetusI understand.
StrangerShall we say that being is one and a whole, because it has the attribute of unity? Or shall we say that being is not a whole at all?
TheaetetusThat is a hard alternative to offer.
StrangerMost true; for being, having in a certain sense the attribute of one, is yet proved not to be the same as one, and the all is therefore more than one.
StrangerAnd yet if being be not a whole, through having the attribute of unity, and there be such a thing as an absolute whole, being lacks something of its own nature?
StrangerUpon this view, again, being, having a defect of being, will become not-being?
StrangerAnd, again, the all becomes more than one, for being and the whole will each have their separate nature.
StrangerBut if the whole does not exist at all, all the previous difficulties remain the same, and there will be the further difficulty, that besides having no being, being can never have come into being.
TheaetetusWhy so?
StrangerBecause that which comes into being always comes into being as a whole, so that he who does not give whole a place among beings, cannot speak either of essence or generation as existing.
TheaetetusYes, that certainly appears to be true.
StrangerAgain; how can that which is not a whole have any quantity? For that which is of a certain quantity must necessarily be the whole of that quantity.
StrangerAnd there will be innumerable other points, each of them causing infinite trouble to him who says that being is either one or two.
TheaetetusThe difficulties which are dawning upon us prove this; for one objection connects with another, and they are always involving what has preceded in a greater and worse perplexity.
StrangerWe are far from having exhausted the more exact thinkers who treat of being and not-being. But let us be content to leave them, and proceed to view those who speak less precisely; and we shall find as the result of all, that the nature of being is quite as difficult to comprehend as that of not-being.
TheaetetusThen now we will go to the others.
StrangerThere appears to be a sort of war of Giants and Gods going on amongst them; they are fighting with one another about the nature of essence.
TheaetetusHow is that?
StrangerSome of them are dragging down all things from heaven and from the unseen to earth, and they literally grasp in their hands rocks and oaks; of these they lay hold, and obstinately maintain, that the things only which can be touched or handled have being or essence, because they define being and body as one, and if any one else says that what is not a body exists they altogether despise him, and will hear of nothing but body.
TheaetetusI have often met with such men, and terrible fellows they are.
StrangerAnd that is the reason why their opponents cautiously defend themselves from above, out of an unseen world, mightily contending that true essence consists of certain intelligible and incorporeal ideas; the bodies of the materialists, which by them are maintained to be the very truth, they break up into little bits by their arguments, and affirm them to be, not essence, but generation and motion. Between the two armies, Theaetetus, there is always an endless conflict raging concerning these matters.
StrangerLet us ask each party in turn, to give an account of that which they call essence.
TheaetetusHow shall we get it out of them?
StrangerWith those who make being to consist in ideas, there will be less difficulty, for they are civil people enough; but there will be very great difficulty, or rather an absolute impossibility, in getting an opinion out of those who drag everything down to matter. Shall I tell you what we must do?
TheaetetusWhat?
StrangerLet us, if we can, really improve them; but if this is not possible, let us imagine them to be better than they are, and more willing to answer in accordance with the rules of argument, and then their opinion will be more worth having; for that which better men acknowledge has more weight than that which is acknowledged by inferior men. Moreover we are no respecters of persons, but seekers after truth.
StrangerThen now, on the supposition that they are improved, let us ask them to state their views, and do you interpret them.
TheaetetusAgreed.
StrangerLet them say whether they would admit that there is such a thing as a mortal animal.
TheaetetusOf course they would.
StrangerAnd do they not acknowledge this to be a body having a soul?
TheaetetusCertainly they do.
StrangerMeaning to say that the soul is something which exists?
StrangerAnd do they not say that one soul is just, and another unjust, and that one soul is wise, and another foolish?
StrangerAnd that the just and wise soul becomes just and wise by the possession of justice and wisdom, and the opposite under opposite circumstances?
TheaetetusYes, they do.
StrangerBut surely that which may be present or may be absent will be admitted by them to exist?
StrangerAnd, allowing that justice, wisdom, the other virtues, and their opposites exist, as well as a soul in which they inhere, do they affirm any of them to be visible and tangible, or are they all invisible?
TheaetetusThey would say that hardly any of them are visible.
StrangerAnd would they say that they are corporeal?
TheaetetusThey would distinguish: the soul would be said by them to have a body; but as to the other qualities of justice, wisdom, and the like, about which you asked, they would not venture either to deny their existence, or to maintain that they were all corporeal.
StrangerVerily, Theaetetus, I perceive a great improvement in them; the real aborigines, children of the dragon’s teeth, would have been deterred by no shame at all, but would have obstinately asserted that nothing is which they are not able to squeeze in their hands.
TheaetetusThat is pretty much their notion.
StrangerLet us push the question; for if they will admit that any, even the smallest particle of being, is incorporeal, it is enough; they must then say what that nature is which is common to both the corporeal and incorporeal, and which they have in their mind’s eye when they say of both of them that they ‘are.’ Perhaps they may be in a difficulty; and if this is the case, there is a possibility that they may accept a notion of ours respecting the nature of being, having nothing of their own to offer.
TheaetetusWhat is the notion? Tell me, and we shall soon see.
StrangerMy notion would be, that anything which possesses any sort of power to affect another, or to be affected by another, if only for a single moment, however trifling the cause and however slight the effect, has real existence; and I hold that the definition of being is simply power.
TheaetetusThey accept your suggestion, having nothing better of their own to offer.
StrangerVery good; perhaps we, as well as they, may one day change our minds; but, for the present, this may be regarded as the understanding which is established with them.
TheaetetusAgreed.
StrangerLet us now go to the friends of ideas; of their opinions, too, you shall be the interpreter.
TheaetetusI will.
StrangerTo them we say—You would distinguish essence from generation?
Theaetetus‘Yes,’ they reply.
StrangerAnd you would allow that we participate in generation with the body, and through perception, but we participate with the soul through thought in true essence; and essence you would affirm to be always the same and immutable, whereas generation or becoming varies?
TheaetetusYes; that is what we should affirm.
StrangerWell, fair sirs, we say to them, what is this participation, which you assert of both? Do you agree with our recent definition?
TheaetetusWhat definition?
StrangerWe said that being was an active or passive energy, arising out of a certain power which proceeds from elements meeting with one another. Perhaps your ears, Theaetetus, may fail to catch their answer, which I recognize because I have been accustomed to hear it.
TheaetetusAnd what is their answer?
StrangerThey deny the truth of what we were just now saying to the aborigines about existence.
TheaetetusWhat was that?
StrangerAny power of doing or suffering in a degree however slight was held by us to be a sufficient definition of being?
StrangerThey deny this, and say that the power of doing or suffering is confined to becoming, and that neither power is applicable to being.
TheaetetusAnd is there not some truth in what they say?
StrangerYes; but our reply will be, that we want to ascertain from them more distinctly, whether they further admit that the soul knows, and that being or essence is known.
TheaetetusThere can be no doubt that they say so.
StrangerAnd is knowing and being known doing or suffering, or both, or is the one doing and the other suffering, or has neither any share in either?
TheaetetusClearly, neither has any share in either; for if they say anything else, they will contradict themselves.
StrangerI understand; but they will allow that if to know is active, then, of course, to be known is passive. And on this view being, in so far as it is known, is acted upon by knowledge, and is therefore in motion; for that which is in a state of rest cannot be acted upon, as we affirm.
StrangerAnd, O heavens, can we ever be made to believe that motion and life and soul and mind are not present with perfect being? Can we imagine that being is devoid of life and mind, and exists in awful unmeaningness an everlasting fixture?
TheaetetusThat would be a dreadful thing to admit, Stranger.
StrangerBut shall we say that being has mind and not life?
TheaetetusHow is that possible?
StrangerOr shall we say that both inhere in perfect being, but that it has no soul which contains them?
TheaetetusAnd in what other way can it contain them?
StrangerOr that being has mind and life and soul, but although endowed with soul remains absolutely unmoved?
TheaetetusAll three suppositions appear to me to be irrational.
StrangerUnder being, then, we must include motion, and that which is moved.
StrangerThen, Theaetetus, our inference is, that if there is no motion, neither is there any mind anywhere, or about anything or belonging to any one.
StrangerAnd yet this equally follows, if we grant that all things are in motion—upon this view too mind has no existence.
TheaetetusHow so?
StrangerDo you think that sameness of condition and mode and subject could ever exist without a principle of rest?
StrangerCan you see how without them mind could exist, or come into existence anywhere?
TheaetetusNo.
StrangerAnd surely contend we must in every possible way against him who would annihilate knowledge and reason and mind, and yet ventures to speak confidently about anything.
TheaetetusYes, with all our might.
StrangerThen the philosopher, who has the truest reverence for these qualities, cannot possibly accept the notion of those who say that the whole is at rest, either as unity or in many forms: and he will be utterly deaf to those who assert universal motion. As children say entreatingly ‘Give us both,’ so he will include both the moveable and immoveable in his definition of being and all.
StrangerAnd now, do we seem to have gained a fair notion of being?
TheaetetusYes truly.
StrangerAlas, Theaetetus, methinks that we are now only beginning to see the real difficulty of the enquiry into the nature of it.
TheaetetusWhat do you mean?
StrangerO my friend, do you not see that nothing can exceed our ignorance, and yet we fancy that we are saying something good?
TheaetetusI certainly thought that we were; and I do not at all understand how we never found out our desperate case.
StrangerReflect: after having made these admissions, may we not be justly asked the same questions which we ourselves were asking of those who said that all was hot and cold?
TheaetetusWhat were they? Will you recall them to my mind?
StrangerTo be sure I will, and I will remind you of them, by putting the same questions to you which I did to them, and then we shall get on.
StrangerWould you not say that rest and motion are in the most entire opposition to one another?
StrangerAnd yet you would say that both and either of them equally are?
TheaetetusI should.
StrangerAnd when you admit that both or either of them are, do you mean to say that both or either of them are in motion?
StrangerOr do you wish to imply that they are both at rest, when you say that they are?
TheaetetusOf course not.
StrangerThen you conceive of being as some third and distinct nature, under which rest and motion are alike included; and, observing that they both participate in being, you declare that they are.
TheaetetusTruly we seem to have an intimation that being is some third thing, when we say that rest and motion are.
StrangerThen being is not the combination of rest and motion, but something different from them.
TheaetetusSo it would appear.
StrangerBeing, then, according to its own nature, is neither in motion nor at rest.
TheaetetusThat is very much the truth.
StrangerWhere, then, is a man to look for help who would have any clear or fixed notion of being in his mind?
TheaetetusWhere, indeed?
StrangerI scarcely think that he can look anywhere; for that which is not in motion must be at rest, and again, that which is not at rest must be in motion; but being is placed outside of both these classes. Is this possible?
TheaetetusUtterly impossible.
StrangerHere, then, is another thing which we ought to bear in mind.
TheaetetusWhat?
StrangerWhen we were asked to what we were to assign the appellation of not-being, we were in the greatest difficulty:—do you remember?
StrangerAnd are we not now in as great a difficulty about being?
TheaetetusI should say, Stranger, that we are in one which is, if possible, even greater.
StrangerThen let us acknowledge the difficulty; and as being and not-being are involved in the same perplexity, there is hope that when the one appears more or less distinctly, the other will equally appear; and if we are able to see neither, there may still be a chance of steering our way in between them, without any great discredit.
StrangerLet us enquire, then, how we come to predicate many names of the same thing.
TheaetetusGive an example.
StrangerI mean that we speak of man, for example, under many names—that we attribute to him colours and forms and magnitudes and virtues and vices, in all of which instances and in ten thousand others we not only speak of him as a man, but also as good, and having numberless other attributes, and in the same way anything else which we originally supposed to be one is described by us as many, and under many names.
TheaetetusThat is true.
StrangerAnd thus we provide a rich feast for tyros, whether young or old; for there is nothing easier than to argue that the one cannot be many, or the many one; and great is their delight in denying that a man is good; for man, they insist, is man and good is good. I dare say that you have met with persons who take an interest in such matters—they are often elderly men, whose meagre sense is thrown into amazement by these discoveries of theirs, which they believe to be the height of wisdom.
TheaetetusCertainly, I have.
StrangerThen, not to exclude any one who has ever speculated at all upon the nature of being, let us put our questions to them as well as to our former friends.
TheaetetusWhat questions?
StrangerShall we refuse to attribute being to motion and rest, or anything to anything, and assume that they do not mingle, and are incapable of participating in one another? Or shall we gather all into one class of things communicable with one another? Or are some things communicable and others not?—Which of these alternatives, Theaetetus, will they prefer?
TheaetetusI have nothing to answer on their behalf. Suppose that you take all these hypotheses in turn, and see what are the consequences which follow from each of them.
StrangerVery good, and first let us assume them to say that nothing is capable of participating in anything else in any respect; in that case rest and motion cannot participate in being at all.
TheaetetusThey cannot.
StrangerBut would either of them be if not participating in being?
TheaetetusNo.
StrangerThen by this admission everything is instantly overturned, as well the doctrine of universal motion as of universal rest, and also the doctrine of those who distribute being into immutable and everlasting kinds; for all these add on a notion of being, some affirming that things ‘are’ truly in motion, and others that they ‘are’ truly at rest.
TheaetetusJust so.
StrangerAgain, those who would at one time compound, and at another resolve all things, whether making them into one and out of one creating infinity, or dividing them into finite elements, and forming compounds out of these; whether they suppose the processes of creation to be successive or continuous, would be talking nonsense in all this if there were no admixture.
StrangerMost ridiculous of all will the men themselves be who want to carry out the argument and yet forbid us to call anything, because participating in some affection from another, by the name of that other.
TheaetetusWhy so?
StrangerWhy, because they are compelled to use the words ‘to be,’ ‘apart,’ ‘from others,’ ‘in itself,’ and ten thousand more, which they cannot give up, but must make the connecting links of discourse; and therefore they do not require to be refuted by others, but their enemy, as the saying is, inhabits the same house with them; they are always carrying about with them an adversary, like the wonderful ventriloquist, Eurycles, who out of their own bellies audibly contradicts them.
TheaetetusPrecisely so; a very true and exact illustration.
StrangerAnd now, if we suppose that all things have the power of communion with one another—what will follow?
TheaetetusEven I can solve that riddle.
StrangerHow?
TheaetetusWhy, because motion itself would be at rest, and rest again in motion, if they could be attributed to one another.