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İngilizce Yunanca

414 Socrates. My friend, you do not bear in mind that the original words have before now been completely buried by those who wished to dress them up, for they have added and subtracted letters for the sake of euphony and have distorted the words in every way for ornamentation or merely in the lapse of time. Do you not, for instance, think it absurd that the letter rho is inserted in the word κάαπτρον (mirror)? I think that sort of thing is the work of people who care nothing for truth, but only for the shape of their mouths; so they keep adding to the original words until finally no human being can understand what in the world the word means. So the sphinx, for instance, is called sphinx, instead of phix, and there are many other examples.

414 Hermogenes. Yes, that is true, Socrates.

414 Socrates. And if we are permitted to insert and remove any letters we please in words, it will be perfectly easy to fit any name to anything.

414 Hermogenes. True.

414 Socrates. Yes, quite true. But I think you, as a wise director, must observe the rule of moderation and probability.

414 Hermogenes. I should like to do so.