3. There is no ground for disbelieving that the principal Sophists,
Gorgias, Protagoras, Prodicus, Hippias, were good and honourable men. The
notion that they were corrupters of the Athenian youth has no real
foundation, and partly arises out of the use of the term 'Sophist' in
modern times. The truth is, that we know little about them; and the
witness of Plato in their favour is probably not much more historical than
his witness against them. Of that national decline of genius, unity,
political force, which has been sometimes described as the corruption of
youth, the Sophists were one among many signs;--in these respects Athens
may have degenerated; but, as Mr. Grote remarks, there is no reason to
suspect any greater moral corruption in the age of Demosthenes than in the
age of Pericles. The Athenian youth were not corrupted in this sense, and
therefore the Sophists could not have corrupted them. It is remarkable,
and may be fairly set down to their credit, that Plato nowhere attributes
to them that peculiar Greek sympathy with youth, which he ascribes to
Parmenides, and which was evidently common in the Socratic circle. Plato
delights to exhibit them in a ludicrous point of view, and to show them
always rather at a disadvantage in the company of Socrates. But he has no
quarrel with their characters, and does not deny that they are respectable
men.

The Sophist, in the dialogue which is called after him, is exhibited in
many different lights, and appears and reappears in a variety of forms.
There is some want of the higher Platonic art in the Eleatic Stranger
eliciting his true character by a labourious process of enquiry, when he
had already admitted that he knew quite well the difference between the
Sophist and the Philosopher, and had often heard the question discussed;--
such an anticipation would hardly have occurred in the earlier dialogues.
But Plato could not altogether give up his Socratic method, of which