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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Parmenides by Plato: Socrates, 'and would rather have recourse to the explanation that the ideas
are types in nature, and that other things partake of them by becoming like
them.' 'But to become like them is to be comprehended in the same idea;
and the likeness of the idea and the individuals implies another idea of
likeness, and another without end.' 'Quite true.' 'The theory, then, of
participation by likeness has to be given up. You have hardly yet,
Socrates, found out the real difficulty of maintaining abstract ideas.'
'What difficulty?' 'The greatest of all perhaps is this: an opponent will
argue that the ideas are not within the range of human knowledge; and you
cannot disprove the assertion without a long and laborious demonstration,
which he may be unable or unwilling to follow. In the first place, neither
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