Plato, using the method of elimination and incidentally more than three pages of print, eventually arrives at the following definition of Fishing and Angling:[82] “Then, now you and I have come to an understanding, not only about the name of the Angler’s art, but about the definition of the thing itself. One half of all Art was acquisitive: one half of the acquisitive Art was conquest or taking by force: half of this again was hunting, and half of hunting was hunting animals: of this again the under half was fishing, and half of fishing was striking: a part of striking was fishing with a barb, and one half of this again (being the kind which strikes with a hook and draws the fish from below upwards) is the Art we have been seeking, and which from the nature of the operation is denoted Angling or drawing up.” _Theætetus:_ “The result has been quite satisfactorily brought out.” In search of a more helpful definition I turn to the English Dictionaries. The _N.E.D._ (_New English Dictionary_, Oxford) gives Fishing—“to catch, or try to catch fish”—wide enough for all our purpose and for most of our performances! In their definitions of Angling, Angle, etc., the majority of dictionaries disagree, but unite in deriving Angle from the Aryan root, ANK = to bend, and establishing the fishing term as the cousin of the awkward angles of Euclid and of our youth. The _N.E.D._ in its definitions of ‘Angle’ (sb.), of ‘Angle’ (vb.), of ‘Angler,’ or of ‘Angling,’ does not even agree with itself. Thus we find: (A) “Angle (sb.), a fish hook: often in later use extended to the line, or tackle, to which it is fastened, and the Rod to which this is attached. See Book of St. Alban’s (title of ed. 2), _Treatyse perteynynge_ to _Hawkynge, Huntynge, and Fysshynge with an Angle_.” (B) “Angle (vb.), to use an angle: to fish with a hook _and bait_.” (C) “Angler, one who fishes with a hook and _line_.” (D) “Angling, the action or art of fishing with a _rod_.”[83] If A, B, C, which all differ, are accurate, D can hardly be so. Further from A, B, C, we can deduce no correct definition of D. Under D the _N.E.D._ imports as a necessary component part of angling the presence of a rod, but I venture to think on insufficient grounds. In the first quotation cited in support, “Fysshynge, callyd Anglynge with a rodde,” the word “rodde,” if D hold good, must be redundant or unnecessary. “Rodde” I hold to be an added word of limitation, or description, as in “Fysshynge with an _Angle_.” But since the dictionaries do hardly help—to some, indeed, they smack of “the heinous crime of word-splitting”—and since the importance (apart from etymological reasons) of possessing an accurate and adequate definition presses, let us prostrate ourselves before another oracle, the Law. But here too success scarcely crowns our quest. The leading case, _Barnard_ v. _Roberts and Williams_, yields, Delphic-like, little light or leading.[84]