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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Eryxias by Platonic Imitator: what you have said, the audience would have thought him raving, and he
would have been ejected from the gymnasium. But you have argued so
excellently well that you have not only persuaded your hearers, but have
brought your opponent to an agreement. For just as in the law courts, if
two witnesses testify to the same fact, one of whom seems to be an honest
fellow and the other a rogue, the testimony of the rogue often has the
contrary effect on the judges' minds to what he intended, while the same
evidence if given by the honest man at once strikes them as perfectly true.
And probably the audience have something of the same feeling about yourself
and Prodicus; they think him a Sophist and a braggart, and regard you as a
gentleman of courtesy and worth. For they do not pay attention to the
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