HIPPIAS:It would seem so.
SOCRATES:And now,Hippias,consider the question at large about all the sciences,and see whether the same principle does not always hold.I know that in most arts you are the wisest of men,as I have heard you boasting in the agora at the tables of the money-changers,when you were setting forth the great and enviable stores of your wisdom;and you said that upon one occasion,when you went to the Olympic games,all that you had on your person was made by yourself.You began with your ring,which was of your own workmanship,and you said that you could engrave rings;and you had another seal which was also of your own workmanship,and a strigil and an oil flask,which you had made yourself;you said also that you had made the shoes which you had on your feet,and the cloak and the short tunic;but what appeared to us all most extraordinary and a proof of singular art,was the girdle of your tunic,which,you said,was as fine as the most costly Persian fabric,and of your own weaving;moreover,you told us that you had brought with you poems,epic,tragic,and dithyrambic,as well as prose writings of the most various kinds;and you said that your skill was also pre-eminent in the arts which I was just now mentioning,and in the true principles of rhythm and harmony and of orthography;and if I remember rightly,there were a great many other accomplishments in which you excelled.I have forgotten to mention your art of memory,which you regard as your special glory,and I dare say that I have forgotten many other things;but,as I was saying,only look to your own arts--and there are plenty of them--and to those of others;and tell me,having regard to the admissions which you and I have made,whether you discover any department of art or any deion of wisdom or cunning,whichever name you use,in which the true and false are different and not the same:tell me,if you can,of any.But you cannot.
HIPPIAS:Not without consideration,Socrates.
SOCRATES:Nor will consideration help you,Hippias,as I believe;but then if I am right,remember what the consequence will be.
HIPPIAS:I do not know what you mean,Socrates.
SOCRATES:I suppose that you are not using your art of memory,doubtless because you think that such an accomplishment is not needed on the present occasion.I will therefore remind you of what you were saying:were you not saying that Achilles was a true man,and Odysseus false and wily?
HIPPIAS:I was.
SOCRATES:And now do you perceive that the same person has turned out to be false as well as true?If Odysseus is false he is also true,and if Achilles is true he is also false,and so the two men are not opposed to one another,but they are alike.
HIPPIAS:O Socrates,you are always weaving the meshes of an argument,selecting the most difficult point,and fastening upon details instead of grappling with the matter in hand as a whole.Come now,and I will demonstrate to you,if you will allow me,by many satisfactory proofs,that Homer has made Achilles a better man than Odysseus,and a truthful man too;and that he has made the other crafty,and a teller of many untruths,and inferior to Achilles.And then,if you please,you shall make a speech on the other side,in order to prove that Odysseus is the better man;and this may be compared to mine,and then the company will know which of us is the better speaker.
SOCRATES:O Hippias,I do not doubt that you are wiser than I am.But Ihave a way,when anybody else says anything,of giving close attention to him,especially if the speaker appears to me to be a wise man.Having a desire to understand,I question him,and I examine and analyse and put together what he says,in order that I may understand;but if the speaker appears to me to be a poor hand,I do not interrogate him,or trouble myself about him,and you may know by this who they are whom I deem to be wise men,for you will see that when I am talking with a wise man,I am very attentive to what he says;and I ask questions of him,in order that Imay learn,and be improved by him.And I could not help remarking while you were speaking,that when you recited the verses in which Achilles,as you argued,attacks Odysseus as a deceiver,that you must be strangely mistaken,because Odysseus,the man of wiles,is never found to tell a lie;but Achilles is found to be wily on your own showing.At any rate he speaks falsely;for first he utters these words,which you just now repeated,--'He is hateful to me even as the gates of death who thinks one thing and says another:'--And then he says,a little while afterwards,he will not be persuaded by Odysseus and Agamemnon,neither will he remain at Troy;but,says he,--'To-morrow,when I have offered sacrifices to Zeus and all the Gods,having loaded my ships well,I will drag them down into the deep;and then you shall see,if you have a mind,and if such things are a care to you,early in the morning my ships sailing over the fishy Hellespont,and my men eagerly plying the oar;and,if the illustrious shaker of the earth gives me a good voyage,on the third day I shall reach the fertile Phthia.'
And before that,when he was reviling Agamemnon,he said,--'And now to Phthia I will go,since to return home in the beaked ships is far better,nor am I inclined to stay here in dishonour and amass wealth and riches for you.'
But although on that occasion,in the presence of the whole army,he spoke after this fashion,and on the other occasion to his companions,he appears never to have made any preparation or attempt to draw down the ships,as if he had the least intention of sailing home;so nobly regardless was he of the truth.Now I,Hippias,originally asked you the question,because Iwas in doubt as to which of the two heroes was intended by the poet to be the best,and because I thought that both of them were the best,and that it would be difficult to decide which was the better of them,not only in respect of truth and falsehood,but of virtue generally,for even in this matter of speaking the truth they are much upon a par.
