ing, because this is the way in which the
three-pronged spears are mostly used.

THEAETETUS: Yes, it is often called so.

STRANGER: Then now there is only one kind remaining.

THEAETETUS: What is that?

STRANGER: When a hook is used, and the fish is not struck in any chance
part of his body, as he is with the spear, but only about the head
and mouth, and is then drawn out from below upwards with reeds and
rods:--What is the right name of that mode of fishing, Theaetetus?

THEAETETUS: I suspect that we have now discovered the object of our
search.

STRANGER: Then now you and I have come to an understanding not only
about the name of the angler's art, but about the definition of
the thing itself. One half of all art was acquisitive--half of the
acquisitive art was conquest or taking by force, half of this was
hunting, and half of hunting was hunting animals, half of this was
hunting water animals--of this again, the under half was fishing, half
of fishing was striking; a part of striking was fishing with a barb,
and one half of this again, being the kind which strikes with a hook
and draws the fish from below upwards, is the art which we have been
seeking, and which from the nature of the operation is denoted angling
or drawing up (aspalieutike, anaspasthai).

THEAETETUS: The result has been quite satisfactorily brought out.

STRANGER: And now, following this pattern, let us endeavour to find out
what a Sophist is.

THEAETETUS: By all means.

STRANGER: The first question about the angler was, whether he was a
skilled artist or unskilled?

THEAETETUS: True.

STRANGER: And shall we call our new friend unskilled, or a thorough
master of his craft?

THEAETETUS: Certainly not unskilled, for his name, as, indeed, you
imply, must surely express his nature.

STRANGER: Then he must be supposed to have some art.

THEAETETUS: What art?

STRANGER: By heaven, they are cousins! it never occurred to us.

THEAETETUS: Who are cousins?

STRANGER: The angler and the Sophist.

THEAETETUS: In what way are they related?

STRANGER: They both appear to me to be hunters.

THEAETETUS: How the Sophist? Of the other we have spoken.

STRANGER: You remember our division of hunting, into hunting after
swimming animals and land animals?

THEAETETUS: Yes.

STRANGER: And you remember that we subdivided the swimming and left the
land animals, saying that there were many kinds of them?

THEAETETUS: Certainly.

STRANGER: T