413
Socrates. Up to this point, as I said just now, many men agree about justice (δίκαιον); and I, Hermogenes, being very much in earnest about it, have persistently asked questions and have been told in secret teachings that this is justice, or the cause—for that through which creation takes place is a cause—and some one told me that it was for this reason rightly called Zeus (Δία). But when, after hearing this, I nevertheless ask them quietly, What then, my most excellent friend, if this is true, is justice? they think I am asking too many questions and am leaping over the trenches.A trench was the limit of the leap for the pentathletes. They say I have been told enough; they try to satisfy me by saying all sorts of different things, and they no longer agree. For one says the sun is justice, for the sun alone superintends all things, passing through and burning (διαϊόντα καὶ καίοντα) them. Then when I am pleased and tell this to some one, thinking it is a fine answer, he laughs at me and asks if I think there is no justice among men when the sun has set. So I beg him to tell me what he thinks it is, and he says Fire. But this is not easy to understand. He says it is not actual fire, but heat in the abstract that is in the fire. Another man says he laughs at all these notions, and that justice is what Anaxagoras says it is, mind; for mind, he says, is ruled only by itself, is mixed with nothing, orders all things, and passes through them. Then, my friend, I am far more perplexed than before I undertook to learn about the nature of justice. But I think the name—and that was the subject of our investigation—was given for the reasons I have mentioned.
413
Hermogenes. I think, Socrates, you must have heard this from some one and are not inventing it yourself.
413
Socrates. And how about the rest of my talk?
413
Hermogenes. I do not at all think you had heard that.
