Euthydemus

Soc.

So you know everything, I asked, since you know anything? Everything, he replied; yes, and you too, if you know one thing, know all. Good Heavens, I cried, what a wonderful statement! What a great blessing to boast of! And the rest of mankind, do they know everything or nothing? Surely, he said, they cannot know some things and not others, and so be at once knowing and unknowing. But what then? I asked. All men, he replied, know all things, if they know one. In the name of goodness, Dionysodorus, I said—for now I can see both of you are serious; before, I could hardly prevail on you to be so—do you yourselves really know everything? Carpentry, for instance, and shoe-making? Certainly, he said. And you are good hands at leather-stitching? Why yes, in faith, and cobbling, he said. And are you good also at such things as counting the stars, and the sand? Certainly, he said: can you think we would not admit that also? Here Ctesippus broke in: Be so good, Dionysodorus, he said, as to place some such evidence before me as will convince me that what you say is true. What shall I put forward? he asked. Do you know how many teeth Euthydemus has, and does Euthydemus know how many you have? Are you not content, he rejoined, to be told that we know everything? No, do not say that, he replied: only tell us this one thing more, and propound to us that you speak the truth. Then, if you tell us how many teeth each of you has, and you are found by our counting to have known it, we shall believe you thenceforth in everything else likewise. Well, as they supposed we were making fun of them, they would not do it: only they agreed that they knew all subjects, when questioned on them, one after the other, by Ctesippus; who, before he had done with them, asked them if they knew every kind of thing, even the most unseemly, without the least reserve; while they most valiantly encountered his questions, agreeing that they had the knowledge in each case, like boars when driven up to face the spears: so that I for my part, Crito, became quite incredulous,and had to ask in the end if Dionysodorus knew also how to dance. To which he replied: Certainly. I do not suppose, I said, that you have attained such a degree of skill as to do sword-dancing, or be whirled about on a wheel, at your time of life? There is nothing, he said, that I cannot do. Then tell me, I went on, do you know everything at present only, or for ever? For ever too, he said. And when you were children, and were just born, you knew? Everything, they both replied together.