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"It is most plain," said Euthydemus, "that it is he who deceives with premeditate design." "But you said," replied Socrates, "that he who can read is more learned than he who cannot read?" "I did so." "Therefore he who best knows which are the duties of justice is more just than he that knows them not." "It seems to be so," answered Euthydemus, "and I know not well how I came to say what I did."
He had been told that Euthydemus had bought up several works of the most celebrated poets and sophists, and that this acquisition had so puffed him up with arrogance, that he already esteemed himself the greatest man for learning and parts of any of the age, and pretended to no less than being the first man of the city, either for negotiating or for discoursing in public.
The whole may also be considered as a satire on those who spin pompous theories out of nothing. As in the arguments of the Euthydemus and of the Cratylus, the veil of irony is never withdrawn; and we are left in doubt at last how far in this interpretation of Simonides Socrates is 'fooling, how far he is in earnest.
I refused, though I had some excellent men on my side, namely, Euthydemus my fellow-priest, and Patrocles my relative, who brought several the like instances, which they had gathered both from husbandry and hunting; for instance, that those officers that are appointed to watch the coming of the hail avert the storm by offering a mole's blood or a woman's cloths; that a wild fig being bound to a garden fig-tree will keep the fruit from falling and promote their ripening; that deer when they are taken shed salt tears, and boars sweet.
"You are in the right," said Euthydemus, "and we ought to render them many praises for it."
All the company fell a-laughing at this pleasant preface, and from that time Euthydemus never avoided Socrates' company as he had done before; but he never offered to speak, believing that his silence would be an argument of his modesty. Socrates, being desirous to rally him out of that mistaken notion, spoke to him in this manner:
"Not in the least," answered Euthydemus, "for I have observed that men of that profession know indeed a great many verses by heart, but for anything else they are for the most part very impertinent." "Perhaps you are in love with that noble science that makes politicians and economists, and that renders men capable to govern, and to be useful to others and to themselves?"
"And is it not likely to be true that the cause of the contrary effects is good?" "Most certainly." "It follows, then, my dear Euthydemus," said Socrates, "that temperance is a very good thing?" "Undoubtedly it is."
The Bactrian kings bore Greek names and in 209 Antiochus III made peace with one of them called Euthydemus, in common cause against the nomads who threatened Western Asia. The most important of them was Menander, apparently king of the Kabul valley. About 155 he made an incursion to the east, occupied Muttra and threatened Pataliputra itself but was repulsed.
Perhaps the feats of Euthydemus in stripping words of all meaning urged him to some constructive work for Plato's system is essentially destructive first, then constructive. At any rate, he does insist on the necessity for determining a word's meaning by its derivation, and points out that a language is the possession of a whole people.
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