crowded; they were idolised by the rising generation; and they not uncommonly made large fortunes, charging often as much as fifty drachmas (about two guineas) a lesson; for few of them would have the magnanimity of Protagoras, who left it to the conscience of his pupils to name their own fees.
The Sophists were the sceptics and rationalists of their times, and they headed the reaction against the dogmatism of previous philosophy. According to them, there was no fixed standard of morality; real knowledge was impossible; tradition was false; religion was the invention of lying prophets; law and justice were devices of the strong to ensnare the weak; pleasure and pain were the only criteria of right and wrong; each man should use his private judgment in all matters, and do that which seemed good in his own eyes.
We can hardly estimate the mingled feelings of fear and dislike with which an average Athenian citizen would regard the influence undoubtedly possessed by this class. Patriotism and religious prejudice would intensify the hatred against these foreign sceptics; and added to this would be the popular antipathy which has in all times shown itself against scheming lawyers and ambitious churchmen—
"Chicane in furs, and casuistry in lawn."
For, inasmuch as philosophy was closely blended with their religion, the Sophist would seem to practise a sort of intellectual simony; tampering with and selling at a high price the divinest mysteries; holding the keys
