The Dialogues of Plato (Jowett)/Lesser Hippias
LESSER HIPPIAS.
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE.
| Eudicus. | Socrates. | Hippias. |
Steph. 363
Lesser Hippias.
Socrates, Eudicus, Hippias.
Eudicus. Why are you silent, Socrates, after the magnifi- Lesser
363 cent display which Hippias has been making ? Why do you not either refute his words, if he seems to you to have been wrong in any point, or join with us in commending him? There is the more reason why you should speak, because we are now alone, and the audience is confined to those who may fairly claim to take part in a philosophical discussion.
The Iliad of Homer a finer work than the Odyssey, because Achilles, the hero of the poem, is greater than Odysseus. Socrates. I should greatly like, Eudicus, to ask Hippias the meaning of what he was saying just now about Homer. I have heard your father, Apemantus, declare that the Iliad of Homer is a finer poem than the Odyssey in the same degree that Achilles was a better man than Odysseus; Odysseus, he would say, is the central figure of the one poem and Achilles of the other. Now, I should like to know, if Hippias has no objection to tell me, what he thinks about these two heroes, and which of them he maintains to be the better; he has already told us in the course of his exhibition many things of various kinds about Homer and divers other poets.
Eud. I am sure that Hippias will be delighted to answer anything which you would like to ask; tell me, Hippias, if Socrates asks you a question, will you answer him?
Hippias. Indeed, Eudicus, I should be strangely inconsistent if I refused to answer Socrates, when at each Olympic festival, as I went up from my house at Elis to the temple of Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/447 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/448 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/449 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/450 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/451 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/452 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/453 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/454 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/455 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/456 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/457 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/458 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/459 Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 2.djvu/460