s to be possible.

STRANGER: And does not false opinion also think that things which most
certainly exist do not exist at all?

THEAETETUS: Yes.

STRANGER: And here, again, is falsehood?

THEAETETUS: Falsehood--yes.

STRANGER: And in like manner, a false proposition will be deemed to
be one which asserts the non-existence of things which are, and the
existence of things which are not.

THEAETETUS: There is no other way in which a false proposition can
arise.

STRANGER: There is not; but the Sophist will deny these statements.
And indeed how can any rational man assent to them, when the very
expressions which we have just used were before acknowledged by us to
be unutterable, unspeakable, indescribable, unthinkable? Do you see his
point, Theaetetus?

THEAETETUS: Of course he will say that we are contradicting ourselves
when we hazard the assertion, that falsehood exists in opinion and in
words; for in maintaining this, we are compelled over and over again
to assert being of not-being, which we admitted just now to be an utter
impossibility.

STRANGER: How well you remember! And now it is high time to hold a
consultation as to what we ought to do about the Sophist; for if we
persist in looking for him in the class of false workers and magicians,
you see that the handles for objection and the difficulties which will
arise are very numerous and obvious.

THEAETETUS: They are indeed.

STRANGER: We have gone through but a very small portion of them, and
they are really infinite.

THEAETETUS: If that is the case, we cannot possibly catch the Sophist.

STRANGER: Shall we then be so faint-hearted as to give him up?

THEAETETUS: Certainly not, I should say, if we can get the slightest
hold upon him.

STRANGER: Will you then forgive me, and, as your words imply, not be
altogether displeased if I flinch a little from the grasp of such a
sturdy argument?

THEAETETUS: To be sure I will.

STRANGER: I have a yet more urgent request to make.

THEAETETUS: Which is--?

STRANGER: That you will promise not to regard me as a parricide.

THEAETETUS: And why?

STRANGER: Because, in self-defence, I must test the philosophy of my
father Parmenides, and try to prove by main force that in a certain
sense not-being is, and that being, on the other hand, is not.

THEAETETUS: Some attempt of the kind is clearly needed.

STRANGER: Yes, a blind man, as they say, might see that, and, unless
these questions are decided in