Socrates. Even that reply is welcome; for I can ask whether the words he produced would be true, or false, or partly true and partly false. Even that would suffice.

Cratylus. I should say that the man in such a case was merely making a noise, going through purposeless motions, as if he were beating a bronze pot.

Socrates. Let us see, Cratylus, if we cannot come to terms somehow. You would agree, would you not, that the name is one thing and the thing of which it is the name is another?

Cratylus. Yes, I should.

Socrates. And you agree that the name is an imitation of the thing named?

Cratylus. Most assuredly.

Socrates. And you agree that paintings also are imitations, though in a different way, of things?

Cratylus. Yes.

Socrates. Well then—for perhaps I do not understand, and you may be right—can both of these imitations, the paintings and the names, be assigned and applied to the things which they imitate, or not?

Cratylus. They can.

Socrates. First, then, consider this question: Can we assign the likeness of the man to the man and that of the woman to the woman, and so forth?

Cratylus. Certainly.

Socrates. And can we conversely attribute that of the man to the woman, and the woman’s to the man?

Cratylus. That is also possible.

Socrates. And are these assignments both correct, or only the former?

Cratylus. The former.

Socrates. The assignment, in short, which attributes to each that which belongs to it and is like it.

Cratylus. That is my view.

Socrates. To put an end to contentious argument between you and me, since we are friends, let me state my position. I call that kind of assignment in the case of both imitations paintings and names—correct, and in the case of names not only correct, but true; and the other kind, which gives and applies the unlike imitation, I call incorrect and, in the case of names, false.

Cratylus. But it may be, Socrates, that this incorrect assignment is possible in the case of paintings, and not in the case of names, which must be always correctly assigned.

Socrates. What do you mean? What difference is there between the two? Can I not step up to a man and say to him, This is your portrait, and show him perhaps his own likeness or, perhaps, that of a woman? And by show I mean bring before the sense of sight.

Cratylus. Certainly.

Socrates. Well, then, can I not step up to the same man again and say, This is your name? A name is an imitation, just as a picture is. Very well; can I not say to him, This is your name, and then bring before his sense of hearing perhaps the imitation of himself, saying that it is a man, or perhaps the imitation of the female of the human species, saying that it is a woman? Do you not believe that this is possible and sometimes happens?

Cratylus. I am willing to concede it, Socrates, and grant that you are right.

Socrates. That is a good thing for you to do, my friend, if I am right; for now we need no longer argue about the matter. If, then, some such assignment of names takes place, we will call one kind speaking truth, and the other speaking falsehood. But if this is accepted, and if it is possible to assign names incorrectly and to give to objects not the names that befit them, but sometimes those that are unfitting, it would be possible to treat verbs in the same way. And if verbs and nouns can be assigned in this way, the same must be true of sentences; for sentences are, I conceive, a combination of verbs and nouns. What do you say to that, Cratylus?

Cratylus. I agree; I think you are right.

Socrates. If, then, we compare the earliest words to sketches, it is possible in them, as in pictures, to reproduce all the colors and shapes, or not all; some may be wanting, and some may be added, and they may be too many or too large. Is not that true?

Cratylus. Yes, it is.

Socrates. Then he who reproduces all, produces good sketches and pictures, and he who adds or takes away produces also sketches and pictures, but bad ones?

Cratylus. Yes.

Socrates. And how about him who imitates the nature of things by means of letters and syllables? By the same principle, if he gives all that is appropriate, the image—that is to say, the name—will be good, and if he sometimes omits a little, it will be an image, but not a good one; and therefore some names are well and others badly made. Is that not true?

Cratylus. Perhaps.

Socrates. Perhaps, then, one artisan of names will be good, and another bad?

Cratylus. Yes.

Socrates. The name of such an artisan was lawgiver?

Cratylus. Yes.

Socrates. Perhaps, then, by Zeus, as is the case in the other arts, one lawgiver may be good and another bad, if we accept our previous conclusions.

Cratylus. That is true. But you see, Socrates, when by the science of grammar we assign these letters—alpha, beta, and the rest—to names, if we take away or add or transpose any letter, it is not true that the name is written, but written incorrectly; it is not written at all, but immediately becomes a different word, if any such thing happens to it.

Socrates. Perhaps we are not considering the matter in the right way.

Cratylus. Why not?

Socrates. It may be that what you say would be true of those things which must necessarily consist of a certain number or cease to exist at all, as ten, for instance, or any number you like, if you add or subtract anything is immediately another number; but this is not the kind of correctness which applies to quality or to images in general; on the contrary, the image must not by any means reproduce all the qualities of that which it imitates, if it is to be an image. See if I am not right. Would there be two things, Cratylus and the image of Cratylus, if some god should not merely imitate your color and form, as painters do, but should also make all the inner parts like yours, should reproduce the same flexibility and warmth, should put into them motion, life, and intellect, such as exist in you, and in short, should place beside you a duplicate of all your qualities? Would there be in such an event Cratylus and an image of Cratylus, or two Cratyluses?

Cratylus. I should say, Socrates, two Cratyluses.

Socrates. Then don’t you see, my friend, that we must look for some other principle of correctness in images and in names, of which we were speaking, and must not insist that they are no longer images if anything be wanting or be added? Do you not perceive how far images are from possessing the same qualities as the originals which they imitate?

Cratylus. Yes, I do.

Socrates. Surely, Cratylus, the effect produced by the names upon the things of which they are the names would be ridiculous, if they were to be entirely like them in every respect. For everything would be duplicated, and no one could tell in any case which was the real thing and which the name.

Cratylus. Quite true.

Socrates. Then do not be faint-hearted, but have the courage to admit that one name may be correctly and another incorrectly given; do not insist that it must have all the letters and be exactly the same as the thing named, but grant that an inappropriate letter may be employed. But if a letter, then grant that also a noun in a clause, and if a noun, then also a clause in a sentence may be employed which is not appropriate to the things in question, and the thing may none the less be named and described, so long as the intrinsic quality of the thing named is retained, as is the case in the names of the letters of the alphabet, if you remember what Hermogenes and I were saying a while ago.