490 NOTES ON PASSAGES IN THE 



Protarchus, though it was with difficulty that he was brought to con- 

 cede the point, does at last grant in a sort of way that it may be so ; 

 and asks, — " Well, what then ?" The answer of Socrates (on irpocra- 

 yopevets k. t. X) is in substance :— The adtni>sion made has a direct 

 bearing on the question in dispute. Tor, you call pleasures, which 

 are dissimilar from one another, by a different name (erepw ovojuari) 

 from pleasure, namely, by the name good (Xeyci? yap ayaOa wavr etvat 

 ra rjSea). Now, had you confined yourself to the single name plea- 

 sure, you would have been in no difficulty ; since, dissimilar as 

 pleasures are, no one can deny that they are all pleasures (to fxev 

 6vv fJ^rj 6v)(^ r/Sea hvat Ta ijSea Aoyos ovSeis afji<f)Lcrj3rjTeL) . But when, 

 though you do not go so far as I do in saying that the mass of plea- 

 sures are evil and that some only are good, you acknowledge pleasures 

 to be dissimilar, and nevertheless call them all by this other name 

 of good (/ca/ca S' ovt olvtwv ra -n-oXXa Kai dyaOa 8e, ws r]fj.€t<i ^a/^ev, 6/x.(os 

 iravra <7V Trpocrayopevet? dyaOa dvTa, o/xoXoyoiv avofxoia eivai, to) Xoy<u it 

 Tts ae Trpoa-avayKat,oL), you are bound to shew what that is, common 

 to all pleasures, the bad and the good (as I term them) alike, which 

 you express by the term good (t6 6vv 8r} ravrov iv rats Ka/cat? 6//,oicjs /cat 

 cv dya6aL<s ivov 7racra9 17801/as dyaOov hvai Trposayopcvets). — Here Protar- 

 chus, blinking the real point of his opponent's argument, and 

 seizing hold of the incidental circumstance that Socrates had stated 

 some pleasures to be good and others bad, asks how Socrates could 

 expect him, or any one who had defined pleasure to be the good, to 

 admit that any pleasure can be bad (tto)? Xeyets, w ScDKparcs; otet ya/> 

 TWO. K. T. X). Of course, this ttws Xeyeis of Protarchus was merely a 

 trick of fence ; for Socrates had himself indicated that he did not 

 expect Protarchus to agree with him in describing certain pleasures 

 as bad (ws rjfxeL? c^a/^ev contrasted with crv Trpo^ayopevei^), nor had he 

 founded his argument upon the idea that pleasures are some good 

 and others bad, but only on the admitted fact that they are dissimilar. 

 The response is therefore directly given : aXX' 6vv <xi/o/x,otous ye <^v/creis 

 (ivras dXXrjXai's iivai jcat rii^as evavrta?. 



The above explanation will shew how utterly at sea Stallbaum is 

 in his criticism. " Seriem disputationis," he says, " si spectamus, 

 sensus requiritur hie : id certe efficitur, voluptates non esse communi 

 boni nomine appellandas, ut quae saepenumero etiam malae sint. Qaod 

 quum verbis non inesse videtur, varias tantarunt emendationes viri 

 docti." That the series disputationis would lead us to expect any 



