ence which has to do with all that knowledge of
which we are now speaking; for I am sure that all men who have a grain
of intelligence will admit that the knowledge which has to do with being
and reality, and sameness and unchangeableness, is by far the truest of
all. But how would you decide this question, Protarchus?

PROTARCHUS: I have often heard Gorgias maintain, Socrates, that the art
of persuasion far surpassed every other; this, as he says, is by far the
best of them all, for to it all things submit, not by compulsion, but of
their own free will. Now, I should not like to quarrel either with you
or with him.

SOCRATES: You mean to say that you would like to desert, if you were not
ashamed?

PROTARCHUS: As you please.

SOCRATES: May I not have led you into a misapprehension?

PROTARCHUS: How?

SOCRATES: Dear Protarchus, I never asked which was the greatest or best
or usefullest of arts or sciences, but which had clearness and accuracy,
and the greatest amount of truth, however humble and little useful
an art. And as for Gorgias, if you do not deny that his art has the
advantage in usefulness to mankind, he will not quarrel with you
for saying that the study of which I am speaking is superior in this
particular of essential truth; as in the comparison of white colours, a
little whiteness, if that little be only pure, was said to be superior
in truth to a great mass which is impure. And now let us give our best
attention and consider well, not the comparative use or reputation of
the sciences, but the power or faculty, if there be such, which the soul
has of loving the truth, and of doing all things for the sake of it; let
us search into the pure element of mind and intelligence, and then we
shall be able to say whether the science of which I have been speaking
is most likely to possess the faculty, or whether there be some other
which has higher claims.

PROTARCHUS: Well, I have been considering, and I can hardly think that
any other science or art has a firmer grasp of the truth than this.

SOCRATES: Do you say so because you observe that the arts in general and
those engaged in them make use of opinion, and are resolutely engaged in
the investigation of matters of opinion? Even he who supposes himself
to be occupied with nature is really occupied with the things of this
world, how created, how acting or acted upon. Is not this the sort of
enquiry in which his life is spent?

PROTARCHUS: True.

SOCRA