is followed by many others—are of opinion that man naturally has a conscience or moral sense which discriminates between right and wrong, just as he has naturally a sense of taste, which distinguishes between sweet and bitter, and a sense of sight, which discriminates between red and blue, or a sentient organism, which distinguishes between pleasure and pain. That man has by nature, and from the first, the possibility of attaining to a conscience is not to be denied. That he has within him by birthright something out of which conscience is developed, I firmly believe; and what this is I shall endeavour by-and-by to show, when I come to speak of Socrates and his philosophy as opposed to the doctrines of the Sophists. But that the man is furnished by nature with a conscience ready-made, just as he is furnished with a readymade sensational apparatus, this is a doctrine in which I have no faith, and which I regard as altogether erroneous. It arises out of the disposition to attribute more to the natural man than properly belongs to him. The other error into which inquirers are apt to fall in making a discrimination between what man is by nature, and what he is by convention, is the opposite of the one just mentioned. They sometimes attribute to the natural man less than properly belongs to him. And this, I think, was the error into which the Sophists were betrayed. They fell into it inadvertently, and not with any design of embracing or promulgating erroneous opinions. We shall see by-and-by how Socrates availed himself
