the wise man, shunning the search after
absolute truth as an impious attempt of the Titans to scale Olympus,
to busy himself humbly and practically with subjective truth, and
with those methods-rhetoric, for instance-by which he can make the
subjective opinions of others either similar to his own, or, leaving
them as they are-for it may be very often unnecessary to change
them-useful to his own ends."

Then Socrates, laughing:

"My fine fellow, you will have made more than one oration in the
Pnyx to-day. And indeed, I myself felt quite exalted, and rapt
aloft, like Bellerophon on Pegasus, upon the eloquence of Protagoras
and you. But yet forgive me this one thing; for my mother bare me,
as you know, a man-midwife, after her own trade, and not a sage."

ALCIBIADES. "What then?"

SOCRATES. "This, my astonishing friend-for really I am altogether
astonished and struck dumb, as I always am whensoever I hear a
brilliant talker like you discourse concerning objectivities and
subjectivities, and such mysterious words; at such moments I am like
an old war-horse, who, though he will rush on levelled lances,
shudders and sweats with terror at a boy rattling pebbles in a
bladder; and I feel altogether dizzy, and dread lest I should suffer
some such transformation as Scylla, when I hear awful words, like
incantations, pronounced over me, of which I, being no sage,
understand nothing. But tell me now, Alcibiades, did the opinion of
Protagoras altogether please you?"

A. "Why not? Is it not certain that two equally honest men may
differ in their opinions on the same matter?"

S. "Undeniable."

A. "But if each is equally sincere in speaking what he believes, is
not each equally moved by the spirit of truth?"

S. "You seem to have been lately initiated, and that not at Eleusis
merely, nor in the Cabiria, but rather in some Persian or Babylonian
mysteries, when you discourse thus of spirits. But you, Phaethon"
(turning to me), "how did you like the periods of Protagoras?"

"Do not ask me, Socrates," said I, "for indeed we have fought a
weary battle together ever since sundown last night, and all that I
had to say I learnt from you."

S. "From me, good fellow?"

PHAETHON. "Yes, indeed. I seemed to have heard from you that truth
is simply 'facts as they are.' But when I urged this on Alcibiades,
his arguments seemed superior to mine."

A. "But I have been telling him, drunk and sober, that it is my
opinion