Well, I said, this is amazing. And did you ever behave ill to your father or your mother? No, indeed, he replied. But why then are they so terribly anxious to prevent you from being happy, and doing as you like?--keeping you all day long in subjection to another, and, in a word, doing nothing which you desire; so that you have no good, as would appear, out of their great possessions, which are under the control of anybody rather than of you, and have no use of your own fair person, which is tended and taken care of by another; while you, Lysis, are master of nobody, and can do nothing? Why, he said, Socrates, the reason is that I am not of age. I doubt whether that is the real reason, I said; for I should imagine that your father Democrates, and your mother, do permit you to do many things already, and do not wait until you are of age: for example, if they want anything read or written, you, I presume, would be the first person in the house who is summoned by them. Very true. And you would be allowed to write or read the letters in any order which you please, or to take up the lyre and tune the notes, and play with the fingers, or strike with the plectrum, exactly as you please, and neither father nor mother would interfere with you. That is true, he said. Then what can be the reason, Lysis, I said, why they allow you to do the one and not the other? I suppose, he said, because I understand the one, and not the other. Yes, my dear youth, I said, the reason is not any deficiency of years, but a deficiency of knowledge; and whenever your father thinks that you are wiser than he is, he will instantly commit himself and his possessions to you. I think so. Aye, I said; and about your neighbour, too, does not the same rule hold as about your father? If he is satisfied that you know more of housekeeping than he does, will he continue to administer his affairs himself, or will he commit them to you? I think that he will commit them to me. Will not the Athenian people, too, entrust their affairs to you when they see that you have wisdom enough to manage them? Yes. And oh! let me put another case, I said: There is the great king, and he has an eldest son, who is the Prince of Asia;--suppose that you and I go to him and establish to his satisfaction that we are better cooks than his son, will he not entrust to us the prerogative of making soup, and putting in anything that we like while the pot is boiling, rather than to the Prince of Asia, who is his son? To us, clearly. And we shall be allowed to throw in salt by handfuls, whereas the son will not be allowed to put in as much as he can take up between his fingers? Of course. Or suppose again that the son has bad eyes, will he allow him, or will he not allow him, to touch his own eyes if he thinks that he has no knowledge of medicine? He will not allow him.