differences. (4) The general treatment in Plato both of the Poets and the
Sophists, who are their interpreters, and whom he delights to identify with
them. (5) The depreciating spirit in which Socrates speaks of the
introduction of the poets as a substitute for original conversation, which
is intended to contrast with Protagoras' exaltation of the study of them--
this again is hardly consistent with the serious defence of Simonides. (6)
the marked approval of Hippias, who is supposed at once to catch the
familiar sound, just as in the previous conversation Prodicus is
represented as ready to accept any distinctions of language however absurd.
At the same time Hippias is desirous of substituting a new interpretation
of his own; as if the words might really be made to mean anything, and were
only to be regarded as affording a field for the ingenuity of the
interpreter.

This curious passage is, therefore, to be regarded as Plato's satire on the
tedious and hypercritical arts of interpretation which prevailed in his own
day, and may be compared with his condemnation of the same arts when
applied to mythology in the Phaedrus, and with his other parodies, e.g.
with the two first speeches in the Phaedrus and with the Menexenus.
Several lesser touches of satire may be observed, such as the claim of
philosophy advanced for the Lacedaemonians, which is a parody of the claims
advanced for the Poets by Protagoras; the mistake of the Laconizing set in
supposing that the Lacedaemonians are a great nation because they bruise
their ears; the far-fetched notion, which is 'really too bad,' that
Simonides uses the Lesbian (?) word, (Greek), because he is addressing a
Lesbian. The whole may also be considered as a satire on those who spin
pompous theories out of nothing. As in the arguments of the Euthydemus and
of the Cratylus, the veil of irony is never withdrawn; and we are left in
doubt at last how far in this interpretation of Simonides Socrates is
'fooling,' how far he is in earnest.