by the study of one department of human knowledge to the exclusion of the
rest; and stronger far the prejudice engendered by a pecuniary or party
interest in certain tenets. There is the sophistry of law, the sophistry
of medicine, the sophistry of politics, the sophistry of theology. All of
these disguises wear the appearance of the truth; some of them are very
ancient, and we do not easily disengage ourselves from them; for we have
inherited them, and they have become a part of us. The sophistry of an
ancient Greek sophist is nothing compared with the sophistry of a religious
order, or of a church in which during many ages falsehood has been
accumulating, and everything has been said on one side, and nothing on the
other. The conventions and customs which we observe in conversation, and
the opposition of our interests when we have dealings with one another
('the buyer saith, it is nought--it is nought,' etc.), are always obscuring
our sense of truth and right. The sophistry of human nature is far more
subtle than the deceit of any one man. Few persons speak freely from their
own natures, and scarcely any one dares to think for himself: most of us
imperceptibly fall into the opinions of those around us, which we partly
help to make. A man who would shake himself loose from them, requires
great force of mind; he hardly knows where to begin in the search after
truth. On every side he is met by the world, which is not an abstraction
of theologians, but the most real of all things, being another name for
ourselves when regarded collectively and subjected to the influences of
society.

Then comes Socrates, impressed as no other man ever was, with the unreality
and untruthfulness of popular opinion, and tells mankind that they must be
and not seem. How are they to be? At any rate they must have the spirit
and desire to be. If they are ignorant, they must acknowledge their
ignorance to themselves; if they are conscious of doing evil, they must
learn to do well; if they are weak, and have nothing in them which they can