Flex. The circumstance that you do not understand the significance of words leads you far from the knowledge of truth. Tell us, what do you call good, so that we may know if there is a better than thyself?
Grym. What do I know of the good? The good comes from being the offspring of good parents.
The Real “Good”
Flex. This, therefore, is not yet known to thee, what it is to be good, and yet you talk about what being “better” means. How hast thou reached to the comparative, when as yet thou hast not learned the positive? But how dost thou know that thy forefathers were good? By what mark canst thou make that clear?
Grym. What! do you deny that they were good?
Flex. I did not know them! How can I then assert anything of their goodness either way? By what method of reasoning canst thou prove that they were good?
Grym. Because every one says so of them; but why, I beg, do you ask me all these vexatious questions?
Flex. These questions are not vexatious, but necessary, so that thou canst understand what thou art inquiring from me.
Grym. Confine your answer, I beg, to a few words.