CRITIAS: And I, Timaeus, accept the trust, and as you at first said
that you were going to speak of high matters, and begged that some
forbearance might be shown to you, I too ask the same or greater
forbearance for what I am about to say. And although I very well know
that my request may appear to be somewhat ambitious and discourteous, I
must make it nevertheless. For will any man of sense deny that you
have spoken well? I can only attempt to show that I ought to have more
indulgence than you, because my theme is more difficult; and I shall
argue that to seem to speak well of the gods to men is far easier than
to speak well of men to men: for the inexperience and utter ignorance
of his hearers about any subject is a great assistance to him who has to
speak of it, and we know how ignorant we are concerning the gods. But I
should like to make my meaning clearer, if you will follow me. All that
is said by any of us can only be imitation and representation. For if
we consider the likenesses which painters make of bodies divine and
heavenly, and the different degrees of gratification with which the eye
of the spectator receives them, we shall see that we are satisfied
with the artist who is able in any degree to imitate the earth and its
mountains, and the rivers, and the woods, and the universe, and the
things that are and move therein, and further, that knowing nothing
precise about such matters, we do not examine or analyze the painting;
all that is required is a sort of indistinct and deceptive mode of
shadowing them forth. But when a person endeavours to paint the human
form we are quick at finding out defects, and our familiar knowledge
makes us severe judges of any one who does not render every point of
similarity. And we may observe the same thing to happen in discourse;
we are satisfied with a picture of divine and heavenly things which has
very little likeness to them; but we are more precise in our criticism
of mortal and human things. Wherefore if at the moment of speaking I
cannot suitably express my meaning, you must excuse me, considering that
to form approved likenesses of human things is the reverse of easy. This
is what I want to suggest to you, and at the same time to beg, Socrates,
that I may have not less, but more indulgence conceded to me in what I
am about to say. Which favour, if I am right in asking, I hope that you
will be ready to grant.