knowing; that he has attained _some_ end, and seen _some_ city, I may
perhaps allow; but whether he saw the right one, or whether, Corinth being
the real goal, he got to Babylon and thought he had seen Corinth--that is
still undecided; for surely every one who has seen a city has not seen
Corinth, unless Corinth is the only city there is. But my greatest
difficulty of all is the absolute certainty that the true road is one; for
Corinth is one, and the other roads lead anywhere but to Corinth, though
there may be people deluded enough to suppose that the North road and the
South road lead equally to Corinth.

_Her_. But that is absurd, Lycinus; they go opposite ways, you see.

_Ly_. Then, my dear good man, this choice of roads and guides is quite a
serious matter; we can by no means just follow our noses; we shall be
discovering that we are well on the way to Babylon or Bactria instead of
to Corinth. Nor is it advisable to toss up, either, on the chance that we
may hit upon the right way if we start upon any one at a venture. That is
no impossibility; it may have come off once and again in a cycle; but I
cannot think we ought to gamble recklessly with such high stakes, nor
commit our hopes to a frail craft, like the wise men who went to sea in a
bowl; we should have no fair complaint against Fortune, if her arrow or
dart did not precisely hit the centre; the odds are ten thousand to one
against her; just so the archer in Homer--Teucer, I suppose it was--when
he meant to hit the dove, only cut the string, which held it; of course it
is infinitely more likely that the point of the arrow will find its billet
in one of the numberless other places, than just in that particular
central one. And as to the perils of blundering into one of the wrong
roads instead of the right one, misled by a belief in the discretion of
Fortune, here is an illustration:--it is no easy matter to turn back and
get safe into port when you have once cast loose your moorings and