en asked for among my friends, I carry with
me.

_Diogenes._ At this time?

_Plato._ Even so.

_Diogenes._ Give me then a certain part of it for my perusal.

_Plato._ Willingly.

_Diogenes._ Hermes and Pallas! I wanted but a cubit of it, or at most
a fathom, and thou art pulling it out by the plethron.

_Plato._ This is the place in question.

_Diogenes._ Read it.

_Plato._ [_Reads._] 'Sayest thou not that death is the opposite of
life, and that they spring the one from the other?' '_Yes._' 'What
springs then from the living?' '_The dead._' 'And what from the dead?'
'_The living._' 'Then all things alive spring from the dead.'

_Diogenes._ Why the repetition? but go on.

_Plato._ [_Reads._] 'Souls therefore exist after death in the infernal
regions.'

_Diogenes._ Where is the _therefore_? where is it even as to
_existence_? As to the _infernal regions_, there is nothing that
points toward a proof, or promises an indication. Death neither
springs from life, nor life from death. Although death is the
inevitable consequence of life, if the observation and experience of
ages go for anything, yet nothing shows us, or ever hath signified,
that life comes from death. Thou mightest as well say that a
barley-corn dies before the germ of another barley-corn grows up from
it, than which nothing is more untrue; for it is only the protecting
part of the germ that perishes, when its protection is no longer
necessary. The consequence, that souls exist after death, cannot be
drawn from the corruption of the body, even if it were demonstrable
that out of this corruption a live one could rise up. Thou hast not
said that the soul is among those dead things which living things must
spring from; thou hast not said that a living soul produces a dead
soul, or that a dead soul produces a living one.

_Plato._ No, indeed.

_Diogenes._ On my faith, thou hast said, however, things no less
inconsiderate, no less inconsequent, no less unwise; and this very
thing must be said and proved, to make thy argument of any value. Do
dead men beget children?

_Plato._ I have not said it.

_Diogenes._ Thy argument implies it.

_Plato._ These are high mysteries, and to be approached with
reverence.

_Diogenes._ Whatever we cannot account for is in the same predicament.
We may be gainers by being ignorant if we can be thought mysterious.
It is better to shake our heads and to let nothing out of them, than
to be plain and explicit in mat