protagoras   

Yes, that may be assumed.

And what is that which the Sophist knows and makes his disciple

know?

Indeed, he said, I cannot tell.

Then I proceeded to say: Well, but are you aware of the danger which

you are incurring? If you were going to commit your body to some

one, who might do good or harm to it, would you not carefully consider

and ask the opinion of your friends and kindred, and deliberate many

days as to whether you should give him the care of your body? But when

the soul is in question, which you hold to be of far more value than

the body, and upon the good or evil of which depends the well-being of

your all,-about this never consulted either with your father or with

your brother or with any one of us who are your companions. But no

sooner does this foreigner appear, than you instantly commit your soul

to his keeping. In the evening, as you say, you hear of him, and in

the morning you go to him, never deliberating or taking the opinion of

any one as to whether you ought to intrust yourself to him or not;-you

have quite made up your mind that you will at all hazards be a pupil

of Protagoras, and are prepared to expend all the property of yourself

and of your friends in carrying out at any price this determination,

although, as you admit, you do not know him, and have never spoken

with him: and you call him a Sophist, but are manifestly ignorant of

what a Sophist is; and yet you are going to commit yourself to his

keeping.

When he heard me say this, he replied: No other inference, Socrates,

can be drawn from your words.

I proceeded: Is not a Sophist, Hippocrates, one who deals

wholesale or retail in the food of the soul? To me that appears to

be his nature.

And what, Socrates, is the food of the soul?

Surely, I said, knowledge is the food of the soul; and we must

take care, my friend, that the Sophist does not deceive us when he