ed price?

ANYTUS: Whom do you mean, Socrates?

SOCRATES: You surely know, do you not, Anytus, that these are the people
whom mankind call Sophists?

ANYTUS: By Heracles, Socrates, forbear! I only hope that no friend or
kinsman or acquaintance of mine, whether citizen or stranger, will ever
be so mad as to allow himself to be corrupted by them; for they are
a manifest pest and corrupting influence to those who have to do with
them.

SOCRATES: What, Anytus? Of all the people who profess that they know how
to do men good, do you mean to say that these are the only ones who not
only do them no good, but positively corrupt those who are entrusted to
them, and in return for this disservice have the face to demand money?
Indeed, I cannot believe you; for I know of a single man, Protagoras,
who made more out of his craft than the illustrious Pheidias, who
created such noble works, or any ten other statuaries. How could that
be? A mender of old shoes, or patcher up of clothes, who made the shoes
or clothes worse than he received them, could not have remained thirty
days undetected, and would very soon have starved; whereas during more
than forty years, Protagoras was corrupting all Hellas, and sending his
disciples from him worse than he received them, and he was never found
out. For, if I am not mistaken, he was about seventy years old at his
death, forty of which were spent in the practice of his profession;
and during all that time he had a good reputation, which to this day he
retains: and not only Protagoras, but many others are well spoken of;
some who lived before him, and others who are still living. Now, when
you say that they deceived and corrupted the youth, are they to be
supposed to have corrupted them consciously or unconsciously? Can those
who were deemed by many to be the wisest men of Hellas have been out of
their minds?

ANYTUS: Out of their minds! No, Socrates; the young men who gave their
money to them were out of their minds, and their relations and guardians
who entrusted their youth to the care of these men were still more out
of their minds, and most of all, the cities who allowed them to come in,
and did not drive them out, citizen and stranger alike.

SOCRATES: Has any of the Sophists wronged you, Anytus? What makes you so
angry with them?

ANYTUS: No, indeed, neither I nor any of my belongings has ever had, nor
would I suffer them to have, anything to do with them.

SOCRATES: Then you are en