15
Do you want the Athenian over there, who has so much to say?Both Socrates and Plato contribute to the picture of the typical Academic. Consequently some editors, misled by the manuscripts (see introductory note) ascribe the part of Academic to Socrates, some to Plato, and some divide it between the two.
15
By all means.
15
Come here, sir. We are putting up a righteous and intelligent philosophy. Who'll buy the height of sanctity?
15
Tell me what you know best?
15
I am a lover, and wise in matters of love.
15
How am I to buy you, then? What I wanted was a tutor for my son, who is handsome.
15
But who would be more suitable than I to associate with a handsome lad? It is not the body I love, it is the soul that I hold beautiful. As a matter of fact, even if they lie beneath the same cloak with me, they will tell you that I have done them no wrong.See Plato’s Symposium, particularly 216 p-219 D.
15
I can’t believe what you say, that you, though a lover, take no interest in anything beyond the soul, even when you have the opportunity, lying beneath the same cloak.
16
But I swear to you by the dog and the plane-tree that this is so.
16
Heracles! What curious gods!
16
What is that you say? Don’t you think the dog is a god? Don’t you know about Anubis in Egypt, how great he is, and about Sirius in the sky and Cerberus in the world below?
17
Quite right; I was entirely mistaken. But what is your manner of life?
17
I dwell in a city that I created for myself, using an imported constitution and enacting statutes of my own.The allusion is to Plato’s Republic.
17
I should like to hear one of your enactments.
17
Let me tell you the most important one, the view that I hold about wives; it is that none of thei shall belong solely to any one man, but that everyone who so desires may share the rights of the husband.
17
You mean by this that you have abolished the laws against adultery?
17
Yes, and in a word, all this pettiness about such matters.
17
What is your attitude as to pretty boys?
