[36] Lassalle (Herakleitos, vol. ii. pp. 379-384) asserts and shows very truly that Protagoras cannot be the person intended to be represented by Plato under the name of Kratylus, or as holding the opinion of Kratylus about names. Lassalle affirms that Plato intends Kratylus in the dialogue to represent Herakleitus himself (p. 385); moreover he greatly extols the sagacity of Herakleitos for having laid down the principle, that “Names are the essence of things,” in which principle Lassalle (so far as I understand him) himself concurs.
Assuming this to be the case, we should naturally suppose that if Plato intends to ridicule any one, by presenting caricatured etymologies as flowing from this principle, the person intended as butt must be Herakleitus himself. Not so Lassalle. He asserts as broadly as Stallbaum that it was Protagoras and the other Sophists who grossly abused the doctrine of Herakleitus, for the purpose of confusing and perverting truth by arbitrary etymologies. His language is even more monstrous and extravagant than that of Stallbaum; yet he does not produce (any more than Stallbaum) the least fragment of proof that the Sophists or Protagoras did what he imputes to them (pp. 400-401-403-422).
M. Lenormant, in his recent edition of the Kratylus (Comm. p. 7-9), maintains also that neither the Sophists nor the Rhetors pretended to etymologise, nor are here ridiculed. But he ascribes to Plato in the Kratylus a mystical and theological purpose which I find it difficult to follow.
Plato did not intend to propose mock-etymologies, or to deride any one. Protagoras could not be ridiculed here. Neither Hermogenes nor Kratylus understand the etymologies as caricature.
Suppose it then ascertained that Plato intended to ridicule and humiliate some rash etymologists, there would still be no propriety in singling out the Sophists as his victims — except that they are obnoxious names, against whom every unattested accusation is readily believed. But it is neither ascertained, nor (in my judgment) probable, that Plato here intended to ridicule or humiliate any one. The ridicule, if any was intended, would tell against himself more than against others. For he first begins by laying down a general theory respecting names: a theory unquestionably propounded as serious, and understood to be so by the critics:[37] moreover, involving some of his favourite and peculiar doctrines. It is this theory that his particular etymologies are announced as intended to carry out, in the way of illustration or exemplification. Moreover, he undertakes to prove this theory against Hermogenes, who declares himself strongly opposed to it: and he proves it by a string of arguments which (whether valid or not) are obviously given with a serious and sincere purpose of establishing the conclusion. Immediately after having established that there was a real rectitude of names, and after announcing that he would proceed to enquire wherein such rectitude consisted,[38] what sense or consistency would there be in his inventing a string of intentional caricatures announced as real etymologies? By doing this, he would be only discrediting and degrading the very theory which he had taken so much pains to inculcate upon Hermogenes. Instead of ridiculing Protagoras, he would ridicule himself and his own theory for the benefit of opponents generally, one among them being Protagoras: who (if we imagine his life prolonged) would have had the satisfaction of seeing a theory, framed in direct opposition to his doctrine, discredited and parodied by his own advocate. Hermogenes, too (himself an opponent of the theory, though not concurring with Protagoras), if these etymologies were intended as caricatures, ought to be made to receive them as such, and to join in the joke at the expense of the persons derided. But Hermogenes is not made to manifest any sense of their being so intended: he accepts them all as serious, though some as novel and surprising, in the same passive way which is usual with the interlocutors of Sokrates in other dialogues. Farther, there are some among these etymologies plain and plausible enough, accepted as serious by all the critics.[39] Yet these are presented in the series, without being parted off by any definite line, along with those which we are called upon to regard as deliberate specimens of mock-etymology. Again, there are also some, which, looking at their etymological character, are as strange and surprising as any in the whole dialogue: but which yet, from the place which they occupy in the argument, and from the plain language in which they are presented, almost exclude the supposition that they can be intended as jest or caricature.[40] Lastly, Kratylus, whose theory all these etymologies are supposed to be intended to caricature, is so far from being aware of this, that he cordially approves every thing which Sokrates had said.[41]
[37] Schleiermacher, Introd. to Krat. pp. 7-10; Lassalle, Herakleit. ii. p. 387.
[38] Plato, Kratylus, p. 391 B.
[39] See, as an example, his derivation of Δίφιλος from Διΐ φίλος, p. 399: Μοῦσα, p. 406: δαίμων from δαήμων, p. 398: for Ἀφροδίτη he takes the Hesiodic etymology, p. 406. Ἄρης and ἄῤῥην (p. 407). His derivation of αἰθήρ — ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀεὶ θέειν (p. 410) is given twice by Aristotle (De Cœlo, i. 3, p. 270, b. 22; Meteorol. i. 3, p. 339, b. 25) as well as in the Pseudo-Aristotle, De Mundo, p. 392, a. 8. None of the Platonic etymologies is more strange than that of ψυχή, quasi φυσέχη, ἀπὸ τοῦ τὴν φύσιν ὀχεῖν καὶ ἔχειν (Kratyl. p. 400). Yet Proklus cites this as serious, Scholia in Kratylum, p. 4, ed. Boissonnade. Plato, in the Treatise De Legibus, derives χόρος from χαρά and νόμος from νοῦς or νόος (ii. 1, p. 654 A, xii. 8, p. 957 D).
[40] See Plato, Kratyl. p. 437 A-B.
This occurs in the latter portion of the dialogue carried on by Sokrates with Kratylus, and is admitted by Lassalle to be seriously meant by Plato: though Lassalle maintains that the etymologies in the first part of the dialogue (between Sokrates and Hermogenes) are mere mockery and parody. (Lassalle, Herakleitos der Dunkle, vol. ii., pp. 402-403).