om the class of twenty years
old will be promoted to higher honour, and the sciences which they
learned without any order in their early education will now be brought
together, and they will be able to see the natural relationship of them
to one another and to true being.

Yes, he said, that is the only kind of knowledge which takes lasting
root.

Yes, I said; and the capacity for such knowledge is the great criterion
of dialectical talent: the comprehensive mind is always the dialectical.

I agree with you, he said.

These, I said, are the points which you must consider; and those who
have most of this comprehension, and who are most steadfast in their
learning, and in their military and other appointed duties, when they
have arrived at the age of thirty have to be chosen by you out of the
select class, and elevated to higher honour; and you will have to prove
them by the help of dialectic, in order to learn which of them is able
to give up the use of sight and the other senses, and in company with
truth to attain absolute being: And here, my friend, great caution is
required.

Why great caution?

Do you not remark, I said, how great is the evil which dialectic has
introduced?

What evil? he said.

The students of the art are filled with lawlessness.

Quite true, he said.

Do you think that there is anything so very unnatural or inexcusable in
their case? or will you make allowance for them?

In what way make allowance?

I want you, I said, by way of parallel, to imagine a supposititious son
who is brought up in great wealth; he is one of a great and numerous
family, and has many flatterers. When he grows up to manhood, he learns
that his alleged are not his real parents; but who the real are he
is unable to discover. Can you guess how he will be likely to behave
towards his flatterers and his supposed parents, first of all during the
period when he is ignorant of the false relation, and then again when he
knows? Or shall I guess for you?

If you please.

Then I should say, that while he is ignorant of the truth he will be
likely to honour his father and his mother and his supposed relations
more than the flatterers; he will be less inclined to neglect them when
in need, or to do or say anything against them; and he will be less
willing to disobey them in any important matter.

He will.

But when he has made the discovery, I should imagine that he would
diminish his honour and regard for them, an