The Dialogues of Plato (Jowett)/Cratylus Introduction

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Euthydemus

The Dialogues of Plato
by Plato

Cratylus Introduction by Benjamin Jowett

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3748041The Dialogues of Plato — Cratylus IntroductionBenjamin Jowett

CRATYLUS.

INTRODUCTION.

Cratylus.
Analysis. The Cratylus has always been a source of perplexity to the student of Plato. While in fancy and humour, and perfection of style and metaphysical originality, this dialogue may be ranked with the best of the Platonic writings, there has been an uncer- tainty about the motive of the piece, which interpreters have hitherto not succeeded in dispelling. We need not suppose that Plato used words in order to conceal his thoughts, or that he would have been unintelligible to an educated contemporary. In the Phaedrus and Euthydemus we also find a difficulty in deter- mining the precise aim of the author. Plato wrote satires in the form of dialogues, and his meaning, like that of other satirical writers, has often slept in the ear of posterity. Two causes may be assigned for this obscurity : ist, the subtlety and allusiveness of this species of composition ; 2nd, the difficulty of reproducing a state of life and literature which has passed away. A satire is unmeaning unless we can place ourselves back among the persons and thoughts of the age in which it was written. Had the treatise of Antisthenes upon words, or the speculations of Cratylus, or some other Heracleitean of the fourth century b.c, on the nature of language been preserved to us; or if we. had lived at the time, and been ' rich enough to attend the fifty-drachma course of Pro- dicus,' we should have understood Plato better, and many points which are now attributed to the extravagance of Socrates' humour would have been found, like the allusions of Aristophanes in the Clouds, to have gone home to the sophists and grammarians of the day.

For the age was very busy with philological speculation ; and many questions were beginning to be asked about language which were parallel to other questions about justice, virtue, knowledge, and were illustrated in a similar manner by the analogy of the

Cratylus.
Introduction. arts. Was there a correctness in words, and were they given by nature or convention ? In the presocratic philosophy manlcind had been striving to attain an expression of their ideas ; and now they were beginning to aslc themselves whether the expression might not be distinguished from the idea ? They were also seek- ing to distinguish the parts of speech and to enquire into the relation of subject and predicate. Grammar and logic were moving about somewhere in the depths of the human soul, but they were not yet awakened into consciousness and had not found names for themselves, or terms by which they might be expressed. Of these beginnings of the study of language we know little, and there necessarily arises an obscurity when the surroundings of such a work as the Cratylus are taken away. Moreover, in this, as in most of the dialogues of Plato, allowance has to be made for the character of Socrates. For the theory of language can only be propounded by him in a manner which is consistent with his own profession of ignorance. Hence his ridicule of the new school of etymology is interspersed with many declarations, 'that he knows nothing,' ' that he has learned from Euthyphro,' and tlie like. Even the truest things which he says are depreciated by himself. He professes to be guessing, but the guesses of Plato are better than all the other theories of the ancients respecting language put together.

The dialogue hardly derives any light from Plato's other writings, and still less from Scholiasts and Neoplatonist writers. Socrates must be interpreted from himself, and on first reading we certainly have a difficulty in understanding his drift, or his relation to the two other interlocutors in the dialogue. Does he agree with Cratylus or with Hermogenes, and is he serious in those fanciful etymologies, extending over more than half the dialogue, which he seems so greatly to relish ? Or is he serious in part only ; and can we separate his jest from his earnest? — Sunt bona, sunt quaedam mediocria, sunt mala phira. Most of them are ridiculously bad, and yet among them are found, as if by accident, principles of philology which are unsurpassed in any ancient writer, and even in advance of any philologer of the last century. May we suppose that Plato, like Lucian, has been amusing his fancy by writing a comedy in the form of a prose dialogue.' And what is

CRATYLUS.

PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE.

Socrates.

Hermogenes.

Cratylus.

^{Steph. 383}

Cratylus.
Hermogenes, Cratylus, Socrates.

Cratylus and hermogenes have been disputing about names; they refer their dispute to Socrates.

H ERMOGENES. Suppose that we make Socrates a party to the argument?

Cratylus. If you please.

Her. I should explain to you, Socrates, that our friend Cratylus has been arguing about names; he says that they are natural and not conventional : not a portion of the human voice which men agree to use ; but that there is a truth or correctness in them, which is the same for Hellenes as for barbarians. Whereupon I ask him, whether his own name of Cratylus is a true name or not, and he answers 'Yes.' And Socrates? 'Yes.' Then every man's name, as I tell him, is that which he is called. To this he replies— 'If all the world were to call you Hermogenes, that would not be your name.' And when I am anxious to have a ³⁸⁴further explanation he is ironical and mysterious, and seems to imply that he has a notion of his own about the matter, if he would only tell, and could entirely convince me, if he chose to be intelligible. Tell me, Socrates, what this oracle means ; or rather tell me, if you will be so good, what is your own view of the truth or correctness of names, which I would far sooner hear.

Socrates not having heard the fifty-drachma course of Prodicus, Socrates. Son of Hipponicus, there is an ancient saying, that 'hard is the knowledge of the good.' And the knowledge of names is a great part of knowledge. If I had not been poor, I might have heard the fifty-drachma course of the great Prodicus, which is a complete education in

Cratylus.
Socrates, Hermogenes.

is incompetent to decide.

grammar and language—these are his own words — and then I should have been at once able to answer your question about the correctness of names. But, indeed, I have only heard the single-drachma course, and therefore, I do not know the truth about such matters ; I will, however, gladly assist you and Cratylus in the investigation of them. When he declares that your name is not really Hermogenes, I suspect that he is only making fun of you ; — he means to say that you are no true son of Hermes, because you are always looking after a fortune and never in luck. But, as I was saying, there is a good deal of difficulty in this sort of know- ledge, and therefore we had better leave the question open until we have heard both sides.

There is no correctness in names other than convention, says Hermogenes. Her. I have often talked over this matter, both with Cratylus and others, and cannot convince myself that there is any principle of correctness in names other than con- vention and agreement ; any name which you give, in my opinion, is the right one, and if you change that and give another, the new name is as correct as the old — we fre- quently change the names of our slaves, and the newly- imposed name is as good as the old : for there is no name given to anything by nature ; all is convention and habit of the users ; — such is my view. But if I am mistaken I shall be happy to hear and learn of Cratylus, or of any one else.

Soc. I dare say that you maybe right, Hermogenes: let ³⁸⁵ us see; — Your meaning is, that the name of each thing is only that which anybody agrees to call it ? Her. That is my notion. Soc. Whether the giver of the name be an individual or a city?

Her. Yes.

Soc. Well, now, let me take an instance ; — suppose that I call a man a horse or a horse a man, you mean to say that a man will be rightly called a horse by me individually, and rightly called a man by the rest of the world ; and a horse again would be rightly called a man by me and a horse by the world : — that is your meaning?

Her. He would, according to my view.

But how, rejoins Socrates, Soc. But how about truth, then ? you would acknowledge that there is in words a true and a false ?