Euthydemus

Soc.

Come then, tell me straight off, he said; since you admit that Zeus and the other gods are yours, are you free to sell or bestow them or treat them just as you please, like the other animals? Well, Crito, here I must say I was knocked out, as it were, by the argument, and lay speechless; then Ctesippus rushed to the rescue and—Bravo, Hercules! he cried, a fine argument! Whereat Dionysodorus asked: Now, do you mean that Hercules is a bravo, or that bravo is Hercules? Ctesippus replied: Poseidon, what a frightful use of words! I give up the fight: these two are invincible. Hereupon I confess, my dear Crito, that everyone present without exception wildly applauded the argument and the two men, till they all nearly died of laughing and clapping and rejoicing. For their previous successes had been highly acclaimed one by one, but only by the devotees of Euthydemus; whereas now almost the very pillars of the Lyceum took part in the joyful acclamations in honor of the pair. For myself, I was quite disposed to admit that never had I set eyes on such clever people, and I was so utterly enthralled by their skill that I betook myself to praising and congratulating them, and said: Ah, happy pair! What amazing genius, to acquire such a great accomplishment so quickly and in so short a time! Among the many fine points in your arguments, Euthydemus and Dionysodorus, there is one that stands out in particular magnificence—that you care not a jot for the multitude, or for any would-be important or famous people, but only for those of your own sort. And I am perfectly sure that there are but a few persons like yourselves who would be satisfied with these arguments: the rest of the world regard them only as arguments with which, I assure you, they would feel it a greater disgrace to refute others than to be refuted themselves. And further, there is at the same time a popular and kindly feature in your talk: when you say there is nothing either beautiful, or good, or white, and so on, and no difference of things at all, in truth you simply stitch up men’s mouths, as you expressly say you do; while as to your apparent power of stitching up your own mouths as well, this is a piece of agreeable manners that takes off any offence from your talk. But the greatest thing of all is, that this faculty of yours is such, and is so skilfully contrived, that anyone in the world may learn it of you in a very short time; this fact I perceived myself by watching Ctesippus and observing how quickly he was able to imitate you on the spot.