[482e]
is fouler than suffering it; for owing to this admission he too in his turn got entangled in your argument and had his mouth stopped, being ashamed to say what he thought. For you, Socrates, really turn the talk into such low, popular clap-trap, while you give out that you are pursuing the truth—into stuff that is “fair,” not by nature, but by convention.1 Yet for the most part these two—nature and convention—are opposed to each other, so that if a man is ashamed and dares not say what he thinks, he is forced
1 The distinction between “natural,” or absolute, and “conventional,” or legal, right, first made by the Ionian Archelaus who taught Socrates in his youth, is developed at length in the Republic (Plat. Rep. 1.388 ff.), and was a constant subject of discussion among the sophists of PlatoÕs time.
Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 3 translated by W.R.M. Lamb. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1967.
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