LYCINUS

Of course not; there is no plausible answer. So, if we wish to find either the man who has the sacred chalice or the bye or the man who will best lead us to that city of Corinth, we shall of necessity go to everyone and make our research, trying them carefully, and stripping and comparing. And it will be only with difficulty that we shall find the truth by this means, and if anyone is likely to give me trustworthy advice on which philosophy to pursue, only that man who knows what they all say will be he; the rest will fall short, and I would not put my trust in them, as long as they are unacquainted with even one philosophy—that one might be the best. If someone were to produce a handsome man and say that he was the most handsome of all men, we should certainly not believe him, unless we knew that he had seen all men. This man may well be handsome, but whether the most handsome of all he could not know, since he has not seen them all. And we are looking, not just for something beautiful, but for the most beautiful; and if we do not find it, we shall not think that we have made any progress. For we are not going to be content with any chance beauty. No, we are looking for the supreme beauty, and of that there can only be one.

HERMOTIMUS

True.

LYCINUS

Well then, can you name me a man who has tried every path in philosophy, who knows what Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, Chrysippus, Epicurus, and the rest, say, and, finally, has chosen one path out of them all, has proved it genuine, and has learnt by experience that it alone leads straight to happiness? If we found such a person we should stop worrying.

HERMOTIMUS

It would not be easy to discover such a person.

LYCINUS

Then what shall we do, Hermotimus? I do not think that we ought to give up because we have no such guide at the moment. Is it not the best and safest plan for everyone at the beginning to make his own way through every system and examine carefully the doctrines of each?

HERMOTIMUS

That seems to follow. But we must watch lest we meet this stumbling-block in what you said a little before. When we have once committed ourselves and spread the sail, it is not easy to return. How can we travel all the paths, if we are to be held fast in the first, as you say?

LYCINUS

I will tell you. We will copy that stratagem of Theseus and take a thread from Ariadne in the play, and then enter every labyrinth. So, by winding it up we shall have no difficulty in getting out.

HERMOTIMUS

Then who will be our Ariadne? And where shall we get our thread?

LYCINUS

Never fear, my friend. I think I have discovered what to hold on to, if we are to get out.

HERMOTIMUS

Well, what?

LYCINUS

I will tell you—it is not mine, it comes from one of the sages: “Keep sober, and remember to disbelieve.” Epicharmus, frag. 250 Kaibel. For, if we are not prepared to believe everything we hear, but rather to act like judges and let the next man have his say, perhaps we may escape the labyrinths with ease.

HERMOTIMUS

Good, let us do this.

LYCINUS

Well then, which path should we travel first? Or will this make no difference? Let us begin anywhere—with Pythagoras, for instance. If we do this, how long do we suppose we shall spend in learning all the doctrines of Pythagoras? Please do not leave out those five years of silence. Including the five years I suppose thirty years will be enough, or certainly a minimum of twenty.

HERMOTIMUS

Let us assume so.

LYCINUS

Following that, we must obviously give the same number to Plato, and not less to Aristotle.

HERMOTIMUS

No, not less.

LYCINUS

For Chrysippus, I shall not ask you how many. I know from what I have heard you say that forty will hardly suffice.

HERMOTIMUS

Just so.

LYCINUS

Then Epicurus in his turn, and the rest. You can realise that I do not put these figures too high, when you consider the number of Stoics, Epicureans, and Platonists, who are octogenarians but who admit, each and every one, that they do not know all the teachings of their own sect, so as to have a thorough knowledge of its doctrines. If they did not admit it, then Chrysippus and Aristotle and Plato would, and even more would Socrates, a man not one whit their inferior: he used to shout out to the whole world not only that he did not know everything, but that he knew absolutely nothing, or only this one thing—that he did not know. Let us count them up from the beginning: we gave twenty to Pythagoras, the same to Plato, and to all the others the same. What would the total be if we assume only ten philosophical sects?

HERMOTIMUS

More than two hundred years, Lycinus.

LYCINUS

Shall we take off a quarter, and make a hundred and fifty years enough, or a whole half?

HERMOTIMUS

You would know better than I see this: few would get through them all even on this reckoning, if they began right from the day they were born.

LYCINUS

If that is the case, Hermotimus, what can we do? Must we go back on what we have already agreed—that no one can choose the best out of so many without trying them all? We agreed that to choose without putting to the test was to seek the truth more by divination than by judgment. Is that not what we said?

HERMOTIMUS

Yes.

LYCINUS

Then there is every necessity for us to live all that time, if we are going first to make a good choice when we have made trial of them all, then to practise philosophy after we have made our choice, and finally to be happy after we have practised our philosophy. Until we do this we shall be dancing in the dark, as they say, and whatever we happen to stumble on, and whatever comes first into our hands, we shall assume to be what we are after because of our ignorance of the truth. In any case even if by some good fortune we happen to fall over the truth, we shall not be able to know for sure if it is what we are after. There are many things much alike, each claiming to be the real truth.

HERMOTIMUS

I feel, Lycinus, that what you say is reasonable, but—and I shall be honest—you annoy me a great deal by this detailed examination and your unnecessary precision. It may be that it has done me no good in leaving home today and then meeting you. I was already near the fulfilment of my hopes, but you have thrown me into difficulties with your demonstration that the search for truth is impossible since it needs all those years.

LYCINUS

Surely it would be much fairer, my friend, to blame your father, Menecrates, and your mother, whatever her name was (I do not know) or before them our human natures for having made you (unlike Tithonus) of few years and short life, and for decreeing a hundred years as the longest life for man All I did was with your help to consider and discover the conclusions of the argument.