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Younger Socrates
Y. Soc. Very true; but that’s just the trouble, Stranger: how can we get a clearer knowledge of class and part, and see that they are not the same thing, but different?
Stranger
Str. Socrates, you most excellent young man, it is no small task you impose upon me. We have already strayed away from our subject more than we ought, and you wish us to wander still farther afield. So for the present let us return to our subject, as is proper; then we will go on the trail of this other matter by and by, when we have time. Only take very good care not to imagine that you ever heard me declare flatly—
Younger Socrates
Y. Soc. What?
Stranger
Str. That class and part are separate from one another.
Younger Socrates
Y. Soc. But what did you say?
5
Stranger
Str. That when there is a class of anything, it must necessarily be a part of the thing of which it is said to be a class; but there is no necessity that a part be also a class. Please always give this, rather than the other, as my doctrine.
Younger Socrates
Y. Soc. I will do so.
Stranger
Str. Then please go on to the next point.
Younger Socrates
Y. Soc. What is it?
Stranger
Str. That from which our present digression started. For I think it started when you were asked how the art of herding should be divided and said with great readiness that there were two kinds of living beings, the human race and a second one, a single class, comprising all the beasts.
10
Younger Socrates
Y. Soc. True.
Stranger
Str. And it was clear to me at the time that you removed a part and then thought that the remainder was one class because you were able to call them all by the same name of beasts.
