It appears, therefore, Lysis (continues Sokrates), that we are travelling in the wrong road, and must try another direction. I now remember to have recently heard some one affirming--contrary to what we have just said--that likeness is a cause of aversion, and** unlikeness a cause of friendship. He too produced evidence from the poets: for Hesiod tells us, that "potter is jealous of potter, and bard of bard". Things most alike are most full of envy, jealousy and hatred to each other: things most unlike, are most full of friendship. Thus the poor man is of necessity a friend to the rich, the weak man to the strong, for the sake of protection: the sick man, for similar reason, to the physician. In general, every ignorant man loves, and is a friend to, the man of knowledge. Nay, there are also physical philosophers, who assert that this principle pervades all nature; that dry is the friend of moist, cold of hot, and so forth: that all contraries serve as nourishment to their contraries. These are ingenious teachers: but if we follow them, we shall have the cleverest disputants attacking us immediately, and asking--What! is the opposite essentially a friend to its opposite? Do you mean that unjust is essentially the friend of just--temperate of intemperate--good of evil? Impossible: the doctrine cannot be maintained.[15] [Footnote 15: Plato, Lysis, 215-216.] [Side-note: Confusion of Sokrates. He suggests, That the Indifferent (neither good nor evil) is friend to the Good.] My head turns (continues Sokrates) with this confusion and puzzle--since neither like is the friend of like, nor contrary of contrary. But I will now hazard a different guess of my own.[16] There are three genera in all: the good--the evil--and that which is neither good nor evil, the indifferent. Now we have found that good is not a friend to good--nor evil to evil--nor good to evil--nor evil to good. If therefore there exist any friendship at all, it must be the indifferent that is friend, either to its like, or to the good: for nothing whatever can be a friend to evil. But if the indifferent be a friend at all, it cannot be a friend to its own like; since we have already shown that like generally is not friend to like. It remains therefore, that the indifferent, in itself neither good nor evil, is friend to the good.[17] [Footnote 16: Plato, Lysis, 216 C-D: [Greek: tô=| o)/nti au)to\s i)liggiô= u(po\ tê=s tou= lo/gou a)pori/as--Le/gô toi/nun a)pomanteuo/menos], &c.] [Footnote 17: Plato, Lysis, 216 D.] [Side-note: Suggestion canvassed. If the Indifferent is friend to the Good, it is determined to become so by the contact of felt evil, from which it is anxious to escape.]