The Theaetetus of Plato (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1899 edition. Excerpt: ... size, for men of my age do not change, but because you, who are young, had meanwhile grown. C It is manifest that I was once what I was not after-v wards, although I had not become. For, as to havef, become is plainly impossible without becoming, I could not have become smaller without losing in sizej And there are thousands of similar instances, if indeed we choose to admit them. I see that you follow me, Theaetetus, for you are likely not unacquainted with such puzzles. Theae. By the gods, Socrates, when I look into them I am smitten with wonder, and truly sometimes my brain reels. So. So Theodorus made not a bad guess at your D disposition, my friend, since the very state of a philosopher is wonder. Indeed the man seems to have been a wise genealogist who said that Iris was the daughter of Thaumas, for wonder is the only beginning of philosophy. Do you begin to understand what is the solution of your difficulty on the views which we are ascribing to Protagoras? Theae. Not yet. So. Will you count it a favour if I examine with E you into the secret reasoning, which is held as the truth by him and other celebrated men? Theae. I will count it a very great favour. So. Look over the company, so that no profane person may overhear. For there are people who I believe in nothing but what they can fasten upon with both hands, contending that action and gen eration and all the things, which are not seen, do not I exist at all. 156 Theae. They must be hardened and repulsive creatures. So. That they are, my boy, utterly illiterate. But ' it is another much more subtle sect, of whose mysteries I mean to inform you. Their first principle, that upon which our statement depends, is that all is motion (to Trae Kivrja-is) or that nothing exists except motion....