handled in the argument. Let me make my meaning clearer by an
instance: it is as if you were to tell me that, in order to be able to
take down a speech in writing,[7] or to read a written statement, a
man must know his letters. Of course, if not stone deaf, I must have
garnered that for a certain object knowledge of letters was important
to me, but the bare recognition of the fact, I fear, would not enable
me in any deeper sense to know my letters. So, too, at present I am
easily persuaded that if I am to direct my care aright in tillage I
must have a knowledge of the art of tillage. But the bare recognition
of the fact does not one whit provide me with the knowledge how I
ought to till. And if I resolved without ado to set about the work of
tilling, I imagine, I should soon resemble your physician going on his
rounds and visiting his patients without knowing what to prescribe or
what to do to ease their sufferings. To save me from the like
predicaments, please teach me the actual work and processes of
tillage.

[7] Or, "something from dictation."

Isch. But truly,[8] Socrates, it is not with tillage as with the other
arts, where the learner must be well-nigh crushed[9] beneath a load of
study before his prentice-hand can turn out work of worth sufficient
merely to support him.[10] The art of husbandry, I say, is not so ill
to learn and cross-grained; but by watching labourers in the field, by
listening to what they say, you will have straightway knowledge enough
to teach another, should the humour take you. I imagine, Socrates (he
added), that you yourself, albeit quite unconscious of the fact,
already know a vast amount about the subject. The fact is, other
craftsmen (the race, I mean, in general of artists) are each and all
disposed to keep the most important[11] features of their several arts