And in this way, the one, if it has being, has turned out to be many?

True.

But now, let us abstract the one which, as we say, partakes of being, and
try to imagine it apart from that of which, as we say, it partakes--will
this abstract one be one only or many?

One, I think.

Let us see:--Must not the being of one be other than one? for the one is
not being, but, considered as one, only partook of being?

Certainly.

If being and the one be two different things, it is not because the one is
one that it is other than being; nor because being is being that it is
other than the one; but they differ from one another in virtue of otherness
and difference.

Certainly.

So that the other is not the same--either with the one or with being?

Certainly not.

And therefore whether we take being and the other, or being and the one, or
the one and the other, in every such case we take two things, which may be
rightly called both.