Sophist Part 19

THEAETETUS: True.

STRANGER: For, surely, either all things have communion with all; or nothing with any other thing; or some things communicate with some things and others not.

THEAETETUS: Certainly.

STRANGER: And two out of these three suppositions have been found to be impossible.

THEAETETUS: Yes.

STRANGER: Every one then, who desires to answer truly, will adopt the third and remaining hypothesis of the communion of some with some.

THEAETETUS: Quite true.

STRANGER: This communion of some with some may be ill.u.s.trated by the case of letters; for some letters do not fit each other, while others do.

THEAETETUS: Of course.

STRANGER: And the vowels, especially, are a sort of bond which pervades all the other letters, so that without a vowel one consonant cannot be joined to another.

THEAETETUS: True.

STRANGER: But does every one know what letters will unite with what? Or is art required in order to do so?

THEAETETUS: Art is required.

STRANGER: What art?

THEAETETUS: The art of grammar.

STRANGER: And is not this also true of sounds high and low?--Is not he who has the art to know what sounds mingle, a musician, and he who is ignorant, not a musician?

THEAETETUS: Yes.

STRANGER: And we shall find this to be generally true of art or the absence of art.

THEAETETUS: Of course.

STRANGER: And as cla.s.ses are admitted by us in like manner to be some of them capable and others incapable of intermixture, must not he who would rightly show what kinds will unite and what will not, proceed by the help of science in the path of argument? And will he not ask if the connecting links are universal, and so capable of intermixture with all things; and again, in divisions, whether there are not other universal cla.s.ses, which make them possible?

THEAETETUS: To be sure he will require science, and, if I am not mistaken, the very greatest of all sciences.

STRANGER: How are we to call it? By Zeus, have we not lighted unwittingly upon our free and n.o.ble science, and in looking for the Sophist have we not entertained the philosopher unawares?

THEAETETUS: What do you mean?

STRANGER: Should we not say that the division according to cla.s.ses, which neither makes the same other, nor makes other the same, is the business of the dialectical science?

THEAETETUS: That is what we should say.

STRANGER: Then, surely, he who can divide rightly is able to see clearly one form pervading a scattered mult.i.tude, and many different forms contained under one higher form; and again, one form knit together into a single whole and pervading many such wholes, and many forms, existing only in separation and isolation. This is the knowledge of cla.s.ses which determines where they can have communion with one another and where not.

THEAETETUS: Quite true.

STRANGER: And the art of dialectic would be attributed by you only to the philosopher pure and true?

THEAETETUS: Who but he can be worthy?

STRANGER: In this region we shall always discover the philosopher, if we look for him; like the Sophist, he is not easily discovered, but for a different reason.

THEAETETUS: For what reason?

STRANGER: Because the Sophist runs away into the darkness of not-being, in which he has learned by habit to feel about, and cannot be discovered because of the darkness of the place. Is not that true?

THEAETETUS: It seems to be so.

STRANGER: And the philosopher, always holding converse through reason with the idea of being, is also dark from excess of light; for the souls of the many have no eye which can endure the vision of the divine.

THEAETETUS: Yes; that seems to be quite as true as the other.

STRANGER: Well, the philosopher may hereafter be more fully considered by us, if we are disposed; but the Sophist must clearly not be allowed to escape until we have had a good look at him.

THEAETETUS: Very good.

STRANGER: Since, then, we are agreed that some cla.s.ses have a communion with one another, and others not, and some have communion with a few and others with many, and that there is no reason why some should not have universal communion with all, let us now pursue the enquiry, as the argument suggests, not in relation to all ideas, lest the mult.i.tude of them should confuse us, but let us select a few of those which are reckoned to be the princ.i.p.al ones, and consider their several natures and their capacity of communion with one another, in order that if we are not able to apprehend with perfect clearness the notions of being and not-being, we may at least not fall short in the consideration of them, so far as they come within the scope of the present enquiry, if peradventure we may be allowed to a.s.sert the reality of not-being, and yet escape unscathed.

THEAETETUS: We must do so.

STRANGER: The most important of all the genera are those which we were just now mentioning--being and rest and motion.

THEAETETUS: Yes, by far.

STRANGER: And two of these are, as we affirm, incapable of communion with one another.

THEAETETUS: Quite incapable.

STRANGER: Whereas being surely has communion with both of them, for both of them are?

THEAETETUS: Of course.

STRANGER: That makes up three of them.

THEAETETUS: To be sure.

STRANGER: And each of them is other than the remaining two, but the same with itself.

THEAETETUS: True.

STRANGER: But then, what is the meaning of these two words, 'same' and 'other'? Are they two new kinds other than the three, and yet always of necessity intermingling with them, and are we to have five kinds instead of three; or when we speak of the same and other, are we unconsciously speaking of one of the three first kinds?