STREPSIADES. Yes.
SOCRATES. Well, what then?
STREPSIADES. If I placed myself with this stone in the sun and a long way
off from the clerk, while he was writing out the conviction, I could make
all the wax, upon which the words were written, melt.
SOCRATES. Well thought out, by the Graces!
STREPSIADES. Ah! I am delighted to have annulled the decree that was to
cost me five talents.
SOCRATES. Come, take up this next question quickly.
STREPSIADES. Which?
SOCRATES. If, when summoned to court, you were in danger of losing your
case for want of witnesses, how would you make the conviction fall upon
your opponent?
STREPSIADES. 'Tis very simple and most easy.
SOCRATES. Let me hear.
STREPSIADES. This way. If another case had to be pleaded before mine was
called, I should run and hang myself.
SOCRATES. You talk rubbish!
STREPSIADES. Not so, by the gods! if I was dead, no action could lie
against me.
SOCRATES. You are merely beating the air. Begone! I will give you no more
lessons.
STREPSIADES. Why not? Oh! Socrates! in the name of the gods!
SOCRATES. But you forget as fast as you learn. Come, what was the thing I
taught you first? Tell me.
STREPSIADES. Ah! let me see. What was the first thing? What was it then?
Ah! that thing in which we knead the bread, oh! my god! what do you call
it?
SOCRATES. Plague take the most forgetful and silliest of old addlepates!
STREPSIADES. Alas! what a calamity! what will become of me? I am undone
if I do not learn how to ply my tongue. Oh! Clouds! give me good advice.
CHORUS. Old man, we counsel you, if you have brought up a son, to send
him to learn in your stead.
STREPSIADES. Undoubtedly I have a son, as well endowed as the best, but
he is unwilling to learn. What will become of me?
CHORUS. And you don't make him obey you?
STREPSIADES. You see, he is big and strong; moreover, through his mother
he is a descendant of those fine birds, the race of Coesyra.[541]
Nevertheless, I will go and find him, and if he refuses, I will turn him
out of the house. Go in, Socrates, and wait for me awhile.
CHORUS (_to Socrates_). Do you understand, that, thanks to us, you will
be loaded with benefits? Here is a man, ready to obey you in all things.
You see how he is carried away with admiration and enthusiasm. Profit by
it to clip him as short as possible; fine chances are all too quickly
gone.
STREPSIADES. No, by the Clouds! you stay no longer here; go and devour
the ruins of your uncle Megacles' fortune.
PHIDIPPIDES. Oh! my poor father! what has happened to you? By the
Olympian Zeus! you are no longer in your senses!
STREPSIADES. See! see! "the Olympian Zeus." Oh! the fool! to believe in
Zeus at your age!
PHIDIPPIDES. What is there in that to make you laugh?
STREPSIADES. You are then a tiny little child, if you credit such
antiquated rubbish! But come here, that I may teach you; I will tell you
something very necessary to know to be a man; but you will not repeat it
to anybody.
PHIDIPPIDES. Come, what is it?
STREPSIADES. Just now you swore by Zeus.
PHIDIPPIDES. Aye, that I did.
STREPSIADES. Do you see how good it is to learn? Phidippides, there is no
Zeus.
PHIDIPPIDES. What is there then?
STREPSIADES. 'Tis the Whirlwind, that has driven out Jupiter and is King
now.
PHIDIPPIDES. Go to! what drivel!
STREPSIADES. Know it to be the truth.
PHIDIPPIDES. And who says so?
STREPSIADES. 'Tis Socrates, the Melian,[542] and Chaerephon, who knows
how to measure the jump of a flea.
PHIDIPPIDES. Have you reached such a pitch of madness that you believe
those bilious fellows?
STREPSIADES. Use better language, and do not insult men who are clever
and full of wisdom, who, to economize, are never shaved, shun the
gymnasia and never go to the baths, while you, you only await my death to
eat up my wealth. But come, come as quickly as you can to learn in my
stead.
PHIDIPPIDES. And what good can be learnt of them?
STREPSIADES. What good indeed? Why, all human knowledge. Firstly, you
will know yourself grossly ignorant. But await me here awhile.
PHIDIPPIDES. Alas! what is to be done? My father has lost his wits. Must
I have him certificated for lunacy, or must I order his coffin?
STREPSIADES. Come! what kind of bird is this? tell me.
PHIDIPPIDES. A pigeon.
STREPSIADES. Good! And this female?
PHIDIPPIDES. A pigeon.
STREPSIADES. The same for both? You make me laugh! For the future you
will call this one a pigeonnette and the other a pigeon.
PHIDIPPIDES. A pigeonnette! These then are the fine things you have just
learnt at the school of these sons of the Earth![543]
STREPSIADES. And many others; but what I learnt I forgot at once, because
I am too old.
PHIDIPPIDES. So this is why you have lost your cloak?
STREPSIADES. I have not lost it, I have consecrated it to Philosophy.
PHIDIPPIDES. And what have you done with your sandals, you poor fool?
STREPSIADES. If I have lost them, it is for what was necessary, just as
Pericles did.[544] But come, move yourself, let us go in; if necessary,
do wrong to obey your father. When you were six years old and still
lisped, 'twas I who obeyed you. I remember at the feasts of Zeus you had
a consuming wish for a little chariot and I bought it for you with the
first obolus which I received as a juryman in the Courts.
PHIDIPPIDES. You will soon repent of what you ask me to do.
STREPSIADES. Oh! now I am happy! He obeys. Here, Socrates, here! Come out
quick! Here I am bringing you my son; he refused, but I have persuaded
him.
SOCRATES. Why, he is but a child yet. He is not used to these baskets, in
which we suspend our minds.[545]
PHIDIPPIDES. To make you better used to them, I would you were hung.
STREPSIADES. A curse upon you! you insult your master!
SOCRATES. "I would you were hung!" What a stupid speech! and so
emphatically spoken! How can one ever get out of an accusation with such
a tone, summon witnesses or touch or convince? And yet when we think,
Hyperbolus learnt all this for one talent!
STREPSIADES. Rest undisturbed and teach him. 'Tis a most intelligent
nature. Even when quite little he amused himself at home with making
houses, carving boats, constructing little chariots of leather, and
understood wonderfully how to make frogs out of pomegranate rinds. Teach
him both methods of reasoning, the strong and also the weak, which by
false arguments triumphs over the strong; if not the two, at least the
false, and that in every possible way.
SOCRATES. 'Tis Just and Unjust Discourse themselves that shall instruct
him.[546]
STREPSIADES. I go, but forget it not, he must always, always be able to
confound the true.
JUST DISCOURSE. Come here! Shameless as you may be, will you dare to show
your face to the spectators?
UNJUST DISCOURSE. Take me where you list. I seek a throng, so that I may
the better annihilate you.
JUST DISCOURSE. Annihilate me! Do you forget who you are?
UNJUST DISCOURSE. I am Reasoning.