These precepts are not forgotten, either in the Sophist or in the
Statesman. The Sophist contains four examples of division, carried on
by regular steps, until in four different lines of descent we detect
the Sophist. In the Statesman the king or statesman is discovered by
a similar process; and we have a summary, probably made for the first
time, of possessions appropriated by the labour of man, which are
distributed into seven classes. We are warned against preferring the
shorter to the longer method;--if we divide in the middle, we are most
likely to light upon species; at the same time, the important remark
is made, that 'a part is not to be confounded with a class.' Having
discovered the genus under which the king falls, we proceed to
distinguish him from the collateral species. To assist our imagination
in making this separation, we require an example. The higher ideas,
of which we have a dreamy knowledge, can only be represented by images
taken from the external world. But, first of all, the nature of example
is explained by an example. The child is taught to read by comparing
the letters in words which he knows with the same letters in unknown
combinations; and this is the sort of process which we are about to
attempt. As a parallel to the king we select the worker in wool, and
compare the art of weaving with the royal science, trying to separate
either of them from the inferior classes to which they are akin. This
has the incidental advantage, that weaving and the web furnish us with a
figure of speech, which we can afterwards transfer to the State.