est, I must confess that I
could not understand what you were saying. Will you tell me, and then I
shall perhaps understand you better; has not Homer made Achilles wily?

HIPPIAS: Certainly not, Socrates; he is the most straight-forward of
mankind, and when Homer introduces them talking with one another in the
passage called the Prayers, Achilles is supposed by the poet to say to
Odysseus:--

'Son of Laertes, sprung from heaven, crafty Odysseus, I will speak out
plainly the word which I intend to carry out in act, and which will,
I believe, be accomplished. For I hate him like the gates of death who
thinks one thing and says another. But I will speak that which shall be
accomplished.'

Now, in these verses he clearly indicates the character of the two men;
he shows Achilles to be true and simple, and Odysseus to be wily and
false; for he supposes Achilles to be addressing Odysseus in these
lines.

SOCRATES: Now, Hippias, I think that I understand your meaning; when you
say that Odysseus is wily, you clearly mean that he is false?

HIPPIAS: Exactly so, Socrates; it is the character of Odysseus, as he is
represented by Homer in many passages both of the Iliad and Odyssey.

SOCRATES: And Homer must be presumed to have meant that the true man is
not the same as the false?

HIPPIAS: Of course, Socrates.

SOCRATES: And is that your own opinion, Hippias?

HIPPIAS: Certainly; how can I have any other?

SOCRATES: Well, then, as there is no possibility of asking Homer what
he meant in these verses of his, let us leave him; but as you show a
willingness to take up his cause, and your opinion agrees with what you
declare to be his, will you answer on behalf of yourself and him?

HIPPIAS: I will; ask shortly anything which you like.

SOCRATES: Do you say that the false, like the sick, have no power to do
things, or that they have the power to do things?

HIPPIAS: I should say that they have power to do many things, and in
particular to deceive mankind.

SOCRATES: Then, according to you, they are both powerful and wily, are
they not?

HIPPIAS: Yes.

SOCRATES: And are they wily, and do they deceive by reason of their
simplicity and folly, or by reason of their cunning and a certain sort
of prudence?

HIPPIAS: By reason of their cunning and prudence, most certainly.

SOCRATES: Then they are prudent, I suppose?

HIPPIAS: So they are--very.

SOCRATES: And if they are prudent, do they know or do they not know wha