Parmenides | Page 7

answer.' 'I should imagine
the conception of ideas to arise as follows: you see great objects
pervaded by a common form or idea of greatness, which you abstract.'
'That is quite true.' 'And supposing you embrace in one view the idea of
greatness thus gained and the individuals which it comprises, a further
idea of greatness arises, which makes both great; and this may go on to
infinity.' Socrates replies that the ideas may be thoughts in the mind
only; in this case, the consequence would no longer follow. 'But must
not the thought be of something which is the same in all and is the idea?
And if the world partakes in the ideas, and the ideas are thoughts, must
not all things think? Or can thought be without thought?' 'I
acknowledge the unmeaningness of this,' says Socrates, 'and would
rather have recourse to the explanation that the ideas are types in nature,
and that other things partake of them by becoming like them.' 'But to
become like them is to be comprehended in the same idea; and the
likeness of the idea and the individuals implies another idea of likeness,
and another without end.' 'Quite true.' 'The theory, then, of participation
by likeness has to be given up. You have hardly yet, Socrates, found
out the real difficulty of maintaining abstract ideas.' 'What difficulty?'
'The greatest of all perhaps is this: an opponent will argue that the ideas
are not within the range of human knowledge; and you cannot disprove
the assertion without a long and laborious demonstration, which he
may be unable or unwilling to follow. In the first place, neither you nor
any one who maintains the existence of absolute ideas will affirm that
they are subjective.' 'That would be a contradiction.' 'True; and
therefore any relation in these ideas is a relation which concerns
themselves only; and the objects which are named after them, are
relative to one another only, and have nothing to do with the ideas
themselves.' 'How do you mean?' said Socrates. 'I may illustrate my
meaning in this way: one of us has a slave; and the idea of a slave in
the abstract is relative to the idea of a master in the abstract; this
correspondence of ideas, however, has nothing to do with the particular
relation of our slave to us.--Do you see my meaning?' 'Perfectly.' 'And
absolute knowledge in the same way corresponds to absolute truth and
being, and particular knowledge to particular truth and being.' Clearly.'
'And there is a subjective knowledge which is of subjective truth,

having many kinds, general and particular. But the ideas themselves are
not subjective, and therefore are not within our ken.' 'They are not.'
'Then the beautiful and the good in their own nature are unknown to
us?' 'It would seem so.' 'There is a worse consequence yet.' 'What is
that?' 'I think we must admit that absolute knowledge is the most exact
knowledge, which we must therefore attribute to God. But then see
what follows: God, having this exact knowledge, can have no
knowledge of human things, as we have divided the two spheres, and
forbidden any passing from one to the other:--the gods have knowledge
and authority in their world only, as we have in ours.' 'Yet, surely, to
deprive God of knowledge is monstrous.'--'These are some of the
difficulties which are involved in the assumption of absolute ideas; the
learner will find them nearly impossible to understand, and the teacher
who has to impart them will require superhuman ability; there will
always be a suspicion, either that they have no existence, or are beyond
human knowledge.' 'There I agree with you,' said Socrates. 'Yet if these
difficulties induce you to give up universal ideas, what becomes of the
mind? and where are the reasoning and reflecting powers? philosophy
is at an end.' 'I certainly do not see my way.' 'I think,' said Parmenides,
'that this arises out of your attempting to define abstractions, such as
the good and the beautiful and the just, before you have had sufficient
previous training; I noticed your deficiency when you were talking with
Aristoteles, the day before yesterday. Your enthusiasm is a wonderful
gift; but I fear that unless you discipline yourself by dialectic while you
are young, truth will elude your grasp.' 'And what kind of discipline
would you recommend?' 'The training which you heard Zeno practising;
at the same time, I admire your saying to him that you did not care to
consider the difficulty in reference to visible objects, but only in
relation to ideas.' 'Yes; because I think that in visible objects you may
easily show any number of inconsistent consequences.' 'Yes; and you
should consider, not only the consequences which follow from a given
hypothesis, but the consequences