Plato, Sophist, section 256e

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[256e] the nature of other so operates as to make each one other than being, and therefore not-being. So we may, from this point of view, rightly say of all of them alike that they are not; and again, since they partake of being, that they are and have being.

Theaetetus
Yes, I suppose so.

Stranger
And so, in relation to each of the classes, being is many, and not-being is infinite in number.¹

Theaetetus
So it seems.

1 Being is many, for each and every thing in all the classes is; but not-being is infinite, for not only is it true that everything in each of the classes is not, but not-being extends also to all conceptions which do not and cannot have any reality.

Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 12 translated by Harold N. Fowler. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.

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