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[433c]

Socrates
And the proper letters are those which are like the things named?

Cratylus
Yes, certainly.

Socrates
That is, then, the method by which wellgiven names are given. But if any name is not well given, the greater part of it may perhaps, if it is to be an image at all, be made up of proper and like letters, but it may contain some inappropriate element, and is on that account not good or well made. Is that our view?

Cratylus
I suppose, Socrates, there is no use in keeping up my contention; but I am not satisfied that it can be a name and not be well given.

Socrates
Are you not satisfied that the name is


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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