Parmenides proceeded: And would you also make absolute ideas of
the just and the beautiful and the good, and of all that class?
Yes, he said, I should.
And would you make an idea of man apart from us and from all other
human creatures, or of fire and water?
I am often undecided, Parmenides, as to whether I ought to include
them or not.
And would you feel equally undecided, Socrates, about things of
which the mention may provoke a smile?-I mean such things as hair,
mud, dirt, or anything else which is vile and paltry; would you
suppose that each of these has an idea distinct from the actual
objects with which we come into contact, or not?
Certainly not, said Socrates; visible things like these are such
as they appear to us, and I am afraid that there would be an absurdity
in assuming any idea of them, although I sometimes get disturbed,
and begin to think that there is nothing without an idea; but then
again, when I have taken up this position, I run away, because I am
afraid that I may fall into a bottomless pit of nonsense, and
perish; and so I return to the ideas of which I was just now speaking,
and occupy myself with them.
Yes, Socrates, said Parmenides; that is because you are still young;
the time will come, if I am not mistaken, when philosophy will have
a firmer grasp of you, and then you will not despise even the
meanest things; at your age, you are too much disposed to regard
opinions of men.
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