"I am fully satisfied," said Euthydemus, "that a great deal depends on the knowledge of oneself. I hope you will now tell me by what a man must begin to examine himself." "You know," said Socrates, "what things are good and what are bad?" "Indeed," answered Euthydemus, "if I knew not that, I were the most ignorant of all men." "Then tell me your thoughts of this matter," said Socrates. "First," said Euthydemus, "I hold that health is a good and sickness an evil, and that whatever contributes to either of them partakes of the same qualities. Thus nourishment and the exercises that keep the body in health are very good; and, on the contrary, those that cause diseases are hurtful." "But would it not be better to say," replied Socrates, "that health and sickness are both good when they are the causes of any good, and that they are both bad when they are the causes of any ill?" "And when can it ever happen," said Euthydemus, "that health is the cause of any ill, and sickness the cause of any good?" "This may happen," answered Socrates, "when troops are raised for any enterprise that proves fatal; when men are embarked who are destined to perish at sea; for men who are in health may be involved in these misfortunes, when they who, by reason of their infirmities, are left at home, will be exempted from the mischiefs in which the others perish." "You say true," said Euthydemus, "but you see, too, that men who are in health are present in fortunate occasions, while they who are confined to their beds cannot be there." "It must therefore be granted," said Socrates, "that these things which are sometimes useful and sometimes hurtful are not rather good than bad." "That is, indeed, the consequence of your argument," replied Euthydemus; "but it cannot be denied that knowledge is a good thing; for what is there in which a knowing man has not the advantage of an ignorant one?" "And have you not read," said Socrates, "what happened to Daedalus for his knowing so many excellent arts, and how, being fallen into the hands of Minos, he was detained by force, and saw himself at once banished from his country and stripped of his liberty? To complete his misfortune, flying away with his son, he was the occasion of his being miserably lost, and could not, after all, escape in his own person; for, falling into the hands of barbarians, he was again made a slave. Know you not likewise the adventure of Palamedes, who was so envied by Ulysses for his great capacity, and who perished wretchedly by the calumnious artifices of that rival? How many great men likewise has the King of Persia caused to be seized and carried away because of their admirable parts, and who are now languishing under him in a perpetual slavery?" "But, granting this to be as you say," added Euthydemus, "you will certainly allow good fortune to be a good?" "I will," said Socrates, "provided this good fortune consists in things that are undoubtedly good." "And how can it be that