if the primitive names were not yet given? For, if we are correct in
our view, the only way of learning and discovering things, is either to
discover names for ourselves or to learn them from others.
CRATYLUS: I think that there is a good deal in what you say, Socrates.
SOCRATES: But if things are only to be known through names, how can we
suppose that the givers of names had knowledge, or were legislators
before there were names at all, and therefore before they could have
known them?
CRATYLUS: I believe, Socrates, the true account of the matter to be,
that a power more than human gave things their first names, and that
the names which are thus given are necessarily their true names.
SOCRATES: Then how came the giver of the names, if he was an inspired
being or God, to contradict himself? For were we not saying just now
that he made some names expressive of rest and others of motion? Were
we mistaken?
CRATYLUS: But I suppose one of the two not to be names at all.
SOCRATES: And which, then, did he make, my good friend; those which are
expressive of rest, or those which are expressive of motion? This is a
point which, as I said before, cannot be determined by counting them.
CRATYLUS: No; not in that way, Socrates.
SOCRATES: But if this is a battle of names, some of them asserting that
they are like the truth, others contending that THEY are, how or by
what criterion are we to decide between them? For there are no other
names to which appeal can be made, but obviously recourse must be had
to another standard which, without employing names, will make clear
which of the two are right; and this must be a standard which shows the
truth of things.
CRATYLUS: I agree.
SOCRATES: But if that is true, Cratylus, then I suppose that things may
be known without names?
CRATYLUS: Clearly.
SOCRATES: But how would you expect to know them? What other way can
there be of knowing them, except the true and natural way, through
their affinities, when they are akin to each other, and through
themselves? For that which is other and different from them must
signify something other and different from them.
CRATYLUS: What you are saying is, I think, true.
SOCRATES: Well, but reflect; have we not several times acknowledged
that names rightly given are the likenesses and images of the things
which they name?
CRATYLUS: Yes.
SOCRATES: Let us suppose that to any extent you please you can learn
things through the medium of names, and suppose also that you can learn
them from the things themselves—which is likely to be the nobler and
clearer way; to learn of the image, whether the image and the truth of
which the image is the expression have been rightly conceived, or to
learn of the truth whether the truth and the image of it have been duly
executed?
CRATYLUS: I should say that we must learn of the truth.
SOCRATES: How real existence is to be studied or discovered is, I
suspect, beyond you and me. But we may admit so much, that the
knowledge of things is not to be derived from names. No; they must be
studied and investigated in themselves.
CRATYLUS: Clearly, Socrates.
SOCRATES: There is another point. I should not like us to be imposed
upon by the appearance of such a multitude of names, all tending in the
same direction. I myself do not deny that the givers of names did
really give them under the idea that all things were in motion and
flux; which was their sincere but, I think, mistaken opinion. And
having fallen into a kind of whirlpool themselves, they are carried
round, and want to drag us in after them. There is a matter, master
Cratylus, about which I often dream, and should like to ask your
opinion: Tell me, whether there is or is not any absolute beauty or
good, or any other absolute existence?
CRATYLUS: Certainly, Socrates, I think so.
SOCRATES: Then let us seek the true beauty: not asking whether a face
is fair, or anything of that sort, for all such things appear to be in
a flux; but let us ask whether the true beauty is not always beautiful.
CRATYLUS: Certainly.
SOCRATES: And can we rightly speak of a beauty which is always passing
away, and is first this and then that; must not the same thing be born
and retire and vanish while the word is in our mouths?
CRATYLUS: Undoubtedly.
SOCRATES: Then how can that be a real thing which is never in the same
state? for obviously things which are the same cannot change while they
remain the same; and if they are always the same and in the same state,
and never depart from their original form, they can never change or be
moved.
CRATYLUS: Certainly they cannot.
SOCRATES: Nor yet can they be known by any one; for at the moment that
the observer approaches, then they become other and of another nature,
so that you cannot get any further in knowing their nature or state,
for you cannot know that which has no state.
CRATYLUS: True.
SOCRATES: Nor can we reasonably say, Cratylus, that there is knowledge
at all, if everything is in a state of transition and there is nothing
abiding; for knowledge too cannot continue to be knowledge unless
continuing always to abide and exist. But if the very nature of
knowledge changes, at the time when the change occurs there will be no
knowledge; and if the transition is always going on, there will always
be no knowledge, and, according to this view, there will be no one to
know and nothing to be known: but if that which knows and that which is
known exists ever, and the beautiful and the good and every other thing
also exist, then I do not think that they can resemble a process or
flux, as we were just now supposing. Whether there is this eternal
nature in things, or whether the truth is what Heracleitus and his
followers and many others say, is a question hard to determine; and no
man of sense will like to put himself or the education of his mind in
the power of names: neither will he so far trust names or the givers of
names as to be confident in any knowledge which condemns himself and
other existences to an unhealthy state of unreality; he will not
believe that all things leak like a pot, or imagine that the world is a
man who has a running at the nose. This may be true, Cratylus, but is
also very likely to be untrue; and therefore I would not have you be
too easily persuaded of it. Reflect well and like a man, and do not
easily accept such a doctrine; for you are young and of an age to
learn. And when you have found the truth, come and tell me.
CRATYLUS: I will do as you say, though I can assure you, Socrates, that
I have been considering the matter already, and the result of a great
deal of trouble and consideration is that I incline to Heracleitus.
SOCRATES: Then, another day, my friend, when you come back, you shall
give me a lesson; but at present, go into the country, as you are
intending, and Hermogenes shall set you on your way.
CRATYLUS: Very good, Socrates; I hope, however, that you will continue
to think about these things yourself.