Part 9

THEAETETUS: So it would appear.

STRANGER: Their paths diverge when they reach the art of animal hunting; the one going to the sea-shore, and to the rivers and to the lakes, and angling for the animals which are in them.

THEAETETUS: Very true.

STRANGER: While the other goes to land and water of another sort--rivers of wealth and broad meadow-lands of generous youth; and he also is intending to take the animals which are in them.

THEAETETUS: What do you mean?

STRANGER: Of hunting on land there are two principal divisions.

THEAETETUS: What are they?

STRANGER: One is the hunting of tame, and the other of wild animals.

THEAETETUS: But are tame animals ever hunted?

STRANGER: Yes, if you include man under tame animals. But if you like you may say that there are no tame animals, or that, if there are, man is not among them; or you may say that man is a tame animal but is not hunted--you shall decide which of these alternatives you prefer.

THEAETETUS: I should say, Stranger, that man is a tame animal, and I admit that he is hunted.

STRANGER: Then let us divide the hunting of tame animals into two parts.

THEAETETUS: How shall we make the division?

STRANGER: Let us define piracy, man-stealing, tyranny, the whole military art, by one name, as hunting with violence.

THEAETETUS: Very good.

STRANGER: But the art of the lawyer, of the popular orator, and the art of conversation may be called in one word the art of persuasion.

THEAETETUS: True.

STRANGER: And of persuasion, there may be said to be two kinds?

THEAETETUS: What are they?

STRANGER: One is private, and the other public.

THEAETETUS: Yes; each of them forms a class.

STRANGER: And of private hunting, one sort receives hire, and the other brings gifts.

THEAETETUS: I do not understand you.

STRANGER: You seem never to have observed the manner in which lovers hunt.

THEAETETUS: To what do you refer?

STRANGER: I mean that they lavish gifts on those whom they hunt in addition to other inducements.

THEAETETUS: Most true.

STRANGER: Let us admit this, then, to be the amatory art.