Page - 873 - in The Complete Plato

subdividing each of these units, until at last the unity with which we began is seen not only to be one and many and infinite, but also a definite number; the infinite must not be suffered to approach the many until the entire number of the species intermediate between unity and infinity has been discovered,— then, and not till then, we may rest from division, and without further troubling ourselves about the endless individuals may allow them to drop into infinity. This, as I was saying, is the way of considering and learning and teaching one another, which the gods have handed down to us. But the wise men of our time are either too quick or too slow in conceiving plurality in unity. Having no method, they make their one and many anyhow, and from unity pass at once to infinity; the intermediate steps never occur to them. And this, I repeat, is what makes the difference between the mere art of disputation and true dialectic. PROTARCHUS: I think that I partly understand you Socrates, but I should like to have a clearer notion of what you are saying. SOCRATES: I may illustrate my meaning by the letters of the alphabet, Protarchus, which you were made to learn as a child. PROTARCHUS: How do they afford an illustration? SOCRATES: The sound which passes through the lips whether of an individual or of all men is one and yet infinite. PROTARCHUS: Very true. SOCRATES: And yet not by knowing either that sound is one or that sound is infinite are we perfect in the art of speech, but the knowledge of the number and nature of sounds is what makes a man a grammarian. PROTARCHUS: Very true. SOCRATES: And the knowledge which makes a man a musician is of the same kind. PROTARCHUS: How so? SOCRATES: Sound is one in music as well as in grammar? PROTARCHUS: Certainly. SOCRATES: And there is a higher note and a lower note, and a note of equal pitch:—may we affirm so much? PROTARCHUS: Yes. SOCRATES: But you would not be a real musician if this was all that you knew; though if you did not know this you would know almost nothing of music. 873