e to show that all the other arts of which we
were just now speaking are artificers of persuasion, and of what sort,
and about what.

GORGIAS: Very true.

SOCRATES: Then rhetoric is not the only artificer of persuasion?

GORGIAS: True.

SOCRATES: Seeing, then, that not only rhetoric works by persuasion, but
that other arts do the same, as in the case of the painter, a question
has arisen which is a very fair one: Of what persuasion is rhetoric
the artificer, and about what?--is not that a fair way of putting the
question?

GORGIAS: I think so.

SOCRATES: Then, if you approve the question, Gorgias, what is the
answer?

GORGIAS: I answer, Socrates, that rhetoric is the art of persuasion in
courts of law and other assemblies, as I was just now saying, and about
the just and unjust.

SOCRATES: And that, Gorgias, was what I was suspecting to be your
notion; yet I would not have you wonder if by-and-by I am found
repeating a seemingly plain question; for I ask not in order to confute
you, but as I was saying that the argument may proceed consecutively,
and that we may not get the habit of anticipating and suspecting the
meaning of one another's words; I would have you develope your own views
in your own way, whatever may be your hypothesis.

GORGIAS: I think that you are quite right, Socrates.

SOCRATES: Then let me raise another question; there is such a thing as
'having learned'?

GORGIAS: Yes.

SOCRATES: And there is also 'having believed'?

GORGIAS: Yes.

SOCRATES: And is the 'having learned' the same as 'having believed,' and
are learning and belief the same things?

GORGIAS: In my judgment, Socrates, they are not the same.

SOCRATES: And your judgment is right, as you may ascertain in this
way:--If a person were to say to you, 'Is there, Gorgias, a false belief
as well as a true?'--you would reply, if I am not mistaken, that there
is.

GORGIAS: Yes.

SOCRATES: Well, but is there a false knowledge as well as a true?

GORGIAS: No.

SOCRATES: No, indeed; and this again proves that knowledge and belief
differ.

GORGIAS: Very true.

SOCRATES: And yet those who have learned as well as those who have
believed are persuaded?

GORGIAS: Just so.

SOCRATES: Shall we then assume two sorts of persuasion,--one which is
the source of belief without knowledge, as the other is of knowledge?

GORGIAS: By all means.

SOCRATES: And which sort of persuasion does rhetoric create in courts
of law and oth