Dialogues

equally divided between sleeping and waking, in either sphere of existence the soul contends that the thoughts which are present to our minds at the time are true; and during one half of our lives we affirm the truth of the one, and, during the other half, of the other; and are equally confident of both. Theaetetus Most true. Socrates And may not the same be said of madness and other disorders? the difference is only that the times are not equal. Theaetetus Certainly. Socrates And is truth or falsehood to be determined by duration of time? Theaetetus That would be in many ways ridiculous. Socrates But can you certainly determine by any other means which of these opinions is true? Theaetetus I do not think that I can. Socrates Listen, then, to a statement of the other side of the argument, which is made by the champions of appearance. They would say, as I imagine⁠—Can that which is wholly other than something, have the same quality as that from which it differs? and observe, Theaetetus, that the word “other” means not “partially,” but “wholly other.” Theaetetus Certainly, putting the question as you do, that which is wholly other cannot either potentially or in any other way be the same. Socrates And must therefore be admitted to be unlike? Theaetetus True. Socrates If, then, anything happens to become like or unlike itself or another, when it becomes like we call it the same⁠—when unlike, other? Theaetetus Certainly. Socrates Were we not saying that there are agents many and infinite, and patients many and infinite? Theaetetus Yes. Socrates And also that different combinations will produce results which are not the same, but different? Theaetetus Certainly. Socrates Let us take you and me, or anything as an example:⁠—There is Socrates in health, and Socrates sick⁠—Are they like or unlike? Theaetetus You mean to compare Socrates in health as a whole, and Socrates in sickness as a whole? Socrates Exactly; that is my meaning. Theaetetus I answer, they are unlike. Socrates And if unlike, they are other? Theaetetus Certainly. Socrates And would you not say the same of Socrates sleeping and waking, or in any of the states which we were mentioning? Theaetetus I should. Socrates All agents have a different patient in Socrates, accordingly as he is well or ill. Theaetetus Of course. Socrates And I who am the patient, and that which is the agent, will produce something different in each of the two cases? Theaetetus Certainly. Socrates The wine which I drink when I am in health, appears sweet and pleasant to me? Theaetetus True. Socrates For, as has been already acknowledged, the patient and agent meet together and produce sweetness and a perception of sweetness, which are in simultaneous motion, and the perception which comes from the patient makes the tongue percipient, and the quality of sweetness which arises out of and is moving about the wine, makes the wine both to be and to appear sweet to the healthy tongue. Theaetetus Certainly; that has been already acknowledged. Socrates But when I am sick, the wine really acts upon another and a different person? Theaetetus Yes. Socrates The combination of the draught of wine, and the Socrates who is sick, produces quite another result; which is the sensation of bitterness in the tongue, and the motion and creation of bitterness in and about the wine, which becomes not bitterness but something bitter; as I myself become not perception but percipient? Theaetetus True. Socrates There is no other object of which I shall ever have the same perception, for another object would give another perception, and would make the percipient other and different; nor can that object which affects me, meeting another subject, produce the same, or become similar, for that too would produce another result from another subject, and become different. Theaetetus True. Socrates Neither can I by myself, have this sensation, nor the object by itself, this quality. Theaetetus Certainly not. Socrates When I perceive I must become percipient of something⁠—there can be no such thing as perceiving and perceiving nothing; the object, whether it become sweet, bitter, or of any other quality, must have relation to a percipient; nothing can become sweet which is sweet to no one. Theaetetus Certainly not. Socrates Then the inference is, that we (the agent and patient) are or become in relation to one another; there is a law which binds us one to the other, but not to any other existence, nor each of us to himself; and therefore we can only be bound to one another; so that whether a person says that a thing is or becomes, he must say that it is or becomes to or of or in relation to something else; but he must not say or allow anyone else to say that anything is or becomes absolutely:⁠—such is our conclusion. Theaetetus Very true, Socrates. Socrates Then, if that which acts upon me has relation to me and to no other, I and no other am the percipient of it? Theaetetus Of course. Socrates Then my perception is true to me, being inseparable from my own being; and, as Protagoras says, to myself I am judge of what is and what is not to me. Theaetetus I suppose so. Socrates How then, if I never err, and if my mind never trips in the conception of being or becoming, can I fail of knowing that which I perceive? Theaetetus You cannot. Socrates Then you were quite right in affirming that knowledge is only perception; and the meaning turns out to be the same, whether with Homer and Heracleitus, and all that company, you say that all is motion and flux, or with the great sage Protagoras, that man is the measure of all things; or with Theaetetus, that, given these premises, perception is knowledge. Am I not right, Theaetetus, and is not this your newborn child, of which I have delivered you? What say you? Theaetetus I cannot but agree, Socrates. Socrates Then this is the child, however he may turn out, which you and I have with difficulty brought into the world. And now that he is born, we must run round the hearth with him, and see whether he is worth rearing, or is only a wind-egg