Theaetetus (162)

THEO. Socrates, the man was my friend, as you just remarked. So I should hate to bring about the refutation of Protagoras by agreeing with you, and I should hate also to oppose you contrary to my real convictions. So take Theaetetus again; especially as he seemed just now to follow your suggestions very carefully.

SOC. If you went to Sparta, Theodorus, and visited the wrestling-schools, would you think it fair to look on at other people naked, some of whom were of poor physique, without stripping and showing your own form, too?

THEO. Why not, if I could persuade them to allow me to do so? So now I think I shall persuade you to let me be a spectator, and not to drag me into the ring, since I am old and stiff, but to take the younger and nimbler man as your antagonist.

SOC. Well, Theodorus, if that pleases you, it does not displease me, as the saying is. So I must attack the wise Theaetetus again. Tell me, Theaetetus, referring to the doctrine we have just expounded, do you not share my amazement at being suddenly exalted to an equality with the wisest man, or even god? Or do you think Protagoras’s measure applies any less to gods than to men?

THEAET. By no means; and I am amazed that you ask such a question at all; for when we were discussing the meaning of the doctrine that whatever appears to each one really is to him, I thought it was good; but now it has suddenly changed to the opposite.

SOC. You are young, my dear boy; so you are quickly moved and swayed by popular oratory. For in reply to what I have said, Protagoras, or someone speaking for him, will say, Excellent boys and old men, there you sit together declaiming to the people, and you bring in the gods, the question of whose existence or non-existence I exclude from oral and written discussion, and you say the sort of thing that the crowd would readily accept—that it is a terrible thing if every man is to be no better than any beast in point of wisdom; but you do not advance any cogent proof whatsoever; you base your statements on probability. If Theodorus, or any other geometrician, should base his geometry on probability, he would be of no account at all. So you and Theodorus had better consider whether you will accept arguments founded on plausibility and probabilities in such important matters.