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Stranger
Str. But is it not impossible for that which is in this condition to be itself absolute unity?
Stranger
Str. Why surely that which is really one must, according to right reason, be affirmed to be absolutely without parts.
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Theaetetus
Theaet. Yes, it must.
Stranger
Str. But such a unity consisting of many parts will not harmonize with reason.
Theaetetus
Theaet. I understand.
Stranger
Str. Then shall we agree that being is one and a whole because it has the attribute of unity, or shall we deny that being is a whole at all?
Theaetetus
Theaet. It is a hard choice that you offer me.
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Stranger
Str. That is very true; for being, having in a way had unity imposed upon it, will evidently not be the same as unity, and the all will be more than one.
Stranger
Str. And further, if being is not a whole through having had the attribute of unity imposed upon it, and the absolute whole exists, then it turns out that being lacks something of being.
Theaetetus
Theaet. Certainly.
Stranger
Str. And so, by this reasoning, since being is deprived of being, it will be not-being.
15
Theaetetus
Theaet. So it will.
Stranger
Str. And again the all becomes more than the one, since being and the whole have acquired each its own nature.
Stranger
Str. But if the whole does not exist at all, being is involved in the same difficulties as before, and besides not existing it could not even have ever come into existence
Theaetetus
Theaet. What do you mean?
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