S. "You, then, while you were loving facts as they are, and longing
to see them as they are, yet did not possess that which you longed
for?"

P. "True, indeed; else why should I have been driven forth by the
anger of the gods, like Bellerophon, to pace the Aleian plain,
eating my own soul, if I had possessed that for which I longed?"

S. "Well said, dear boy. But see again. This truth which you
loved, and which was not yourself or part of yourself, was certainly
also nothing of your own making?-Though they say that Pygmalion was
enamoured of the statue which he himself had carved."

P. "But he was miserable, Socrates, till the statue became alive."

S. "They say so; but what has that to do with the argument?"

P. "I know not. But it seems to me horrible, as it did to
Pygmalion, to be enamoured of anything which cannot return your
love, but is, as it were, your puppet. Should we not think it a
shameful thing, if a mistress were to be enamoured of one of her own
slaves?"

S. "We should; and that, I suppose, because the slave would have no
free choice whether to refuse or to return his mistress's love; but
would be compelled, being a slave, to submit to her, even if she
were old, or ugly, or hateful to him?"

P. "Of course."