social order was based.

Such, in principle, appeared to be the state of things. In practice, here
as elsewhere, the devil proved not so black as he was painted. First, not
all the sophists--hardly even the majority of them--drew the logical
conclusions from their views in respect of either morals or religion. They
were teachers of rhetoric, and as such they taught, for instance, all the
tricks by which a bad cause might be defended; that was part of the trade.
But it must be supposed that Gorgias, the most distinguished of them,
expressly insisted that rhetoric, just like any other art the aim of which
was to defeat an opponent, should only be used for good ends. Similarly
many of them may have stopped short in their criticism of popular belief
at some arbitrary point, so that it was possible for them to respect at
any rate something of the established religion, and so, of course, first
and foremost the very belief in the existence of the gods. That they did
not as a rule interfere with public worship, we may be sure; that was
based firmly on "the Law." But, in addition, even sophists who personally
took an attitude radically contradictory to popular belief had the most
important reasons for being careful in advancing such a view. They had to
live by being the teachers of youth; they had no fixed appointment, they
travelled about as lecturers and enlisted disciples by means of their
lectures. For such men it would have been a very serious thing to attack
the established order in its tenderest place, religion, and above all they
had to beware of coming into conflict with the penal laws. This risk they
did not incur while confining themselves to theoretical discussions about
right and wrong, nor by the practical application of them in their
teaching of rhetoric; but they might very easily incur it if attacking
religion. This being the case, it is not to be wondered at that we do not
find many direct statements of undoubtedly atheistical character handed
down from the more eminent sophists, and that trials for impiety are rare
in their case. But, nevertheless, a few such cases are met with, and from
these as our starting-point we will now proceed.

As to Protagoras of Abdera, one of the earliest and most famous of all the
sophists, it is stated that he began a pamphlet treating of the gods with
the words: "Concerning the gods I can say nothing, neither that they exist
nor that they do not exist, nor of what form they are;