And when Aristippus, returning to the charge, asked him "if he knew of any thing beautiful."
He answered: Yes, many things.
Aristip. Are they all like each other?
Soc. On the contrary, they are often as unlike as possible.
How then (he asked) can that be beautiful which is unlike the beautiful?
Soc. Bless me! for the simple reason that it is possible for a man who is a beautiful runner to be quite unlike another man who is a beautiful boxer, (6) or for a shield, which is a beautiful weapon for the purpose of defence, to be absolutely unlike a javelin, which is a beautiful weapon of swift and sure discharge.
(6) See Grote, "H. G." x. 164, in reference to Epaminondas and his
gymnastic training; below, III. x. 6.
Aristip. Your answers are no better now than (7) when I asked you whether you knew any good thing. They are both of a pattern.
(7) Or, "You answer precisely as you did when..."
Soc. And so they should be. Do you imagine that one thing is good and another beautiful? Do not you know that relatively to the same standard all things are at once beautiful and good? (8) In the first place, virtue is not a good thing relatively to one standard and a beautiful thing relatively to another standard; and in the next place, human beings, on the same principle (9) and relatively to the same standard, are called "beautiful and good"; and so the bodily frames of men relatively to the same standards are seen to be "beautiful and good," and in general all things capable of being used by man are regarded as at once beautiful and good relatively to the same standard—the standing being in each case what the thing happens to be useful for. (10)