3. Perhaps (suggests Sokrates) each of these Forms is a Conception of the mind and nothing beyond: the Form is not competent to exist out of the mind.[14] How? (replies Parmenides.) There cannot be in the mind any Conception, which is a Conception of nothing. Every Conception must be of something really existing: in this case, it is a Conception of some one thing, which you conceive as belonging in common to each and all the objects considered. The Something thus conceived as perpetually One and the same in all, is, the Form. Besides, if you think that individual objects participate in the Forms, and that these Forms are Conceptions of the mind,--you must suppose, either that all objects are made up of Conceptions, and are therefore themselves Concipients: or else that these Forms, though Conceptions, are incapable of conceiving. Neither one nor the other is admissible.[15] [Footnote 14: Plato, Parmenid. p. 132 B. [Greek: mê\ _tô=n ei)dô=n_ e(/kaston ê)=| _tou/tôn noê/ma_, kai\ _ou)damou= au)tô=| prosê/kê e)ggi/gnesthai a)/llothi ê)\ e)n psuchai=s_. . . . Ti/ ou)=n? pha/nai, e(\n e(/kasto/n e)sti tô=n noêma/tôn, no/êma de\ ou)deno/s? A)ll' a)du/naton, ei)pei=n. A)lla\ tino/s? Nai/. O)/ntos ê)\ ou)k o)/ntos? O)/ntos. Ou)ch e(no/s tinos, o(\ e)pi\ pa=sin e)kei=no to\ no/êma e)po\n noei=, mi/an tina\ ou)=san i)de/an? Nai/.] Aristotle (Topic. ii. 113, a. 25) indicates one way of meeting this argument, if advanced by an adversary in dialectic debate--[Greek: ei) ta\s i)de/as _e)n ê(mi=n_ e)/phêsen ei)=nai].] [Footnote 15: Plato, Parmenid. p. 132 D. [Greek: ou)k a)na/gkê, ei) ta)/lla phê\| tô=n ei)dô=n mete/chein, ê)\ dokei=n soi e)k noê/mata o)/nta a)no/êta ei)=nai? A)ll' ou)de\ tou=to, pha/nai, e)/chei lo/gon.] The word [Greek: a)no/êta] here is used in its ordinary sense, in which it is the negation, not of [Greek: noêto/s] but of [Greek: noêtiko/s]. There is a similar confusion, Plato, Phædon, p. 80 B. Proklus (pp. 699-701, Stall.) is prolix but very obscure.] [Side-note: The Ideas are types or exemplars, and objects partake of them by being likened to them. Impossible.] 4. Probably the case stands thus (says Sokrates). These Forms are constants and fixtures in nature, as models or patterns. Particular objects are copies or likenesses of them: and the participation of such objects in the Form consists in being made like to it.[16] In that case (replies Parmenides), the Form must itself be like to the objects which have been made like to it. Comparing the Form with the objects, that in which they resemble must itself be a Form: and thus you will have a higher Form above the first Form--and so upwards in the ascending line. This follows necessarily from the hypothesis that the Form is like the objects. The participation of objects in the Form, therefore, cannot consist in being likened to it.[17]