Soc.
Then it is not by that which does not belong to each that each of them is beautiful; for
both does not belong to each; so that it is possible, according to our hypothesis, to say that they both are beautiful, but not to say that each is so;
303a
or what shall we say? Is that not inevitable?
Hipp.
It appears so.
Soc.
Shall we say, then, that both are beautiful, but that each is not?
Hipp.
What is to prevent?
Soc.
This seems to me, my friend, to prevent, that there were some attributes thus belonging to individual things, which belonged, we thought, to each, if they belonged to both, and to both, if they belonged to each—I mean all those attributes which you specified.
1
Am I right?
Hipp.
Yes.
Soc.
But those again which I specified
2
did not; and among those were precisely
each and
both. Is that so?
Hipp.
It is.
Soc.
To which group, then, Hippias, does the beautiful seem to you to belong? To the group of those that you mentioned? If I am strong and you also, are we both collectively strong, and if I am just and you also, are we both collectively just, and if both collectively, then each individually so, too, if I am beautiful and you also, are we both collectively beautiful, and if both collectively, then each individually? Or is there nothing to prevent this, as in the case that when given things are both collectively even, they may perhaps individually be odd, or perhaps even, and again, when things are individually irrational quantities they may perhaps both collectively be rational, or perhaps irrational,
303c
and countless other cases which, you know, I said appeared before my mind?
3
To which group do you assign the beautiful? Or have you the same view about it as I? For to me it seems great foolishness that we collectively are beautiful, but each of us is not so, or that each of us is so, but both are not, or anything else of that sort. Do you choose in this way, as I do, or in some other way?
Hipp.
In this way, Socrates.
Soc.
You choose well, Hippias, that we may be free from the need of further search;
303d
for if the beautiful is in this group, that which is pleasing through sight and hearing would no longer be the beautiful. For the expression through sight and hearing makes both collectively beautiful, but not each individually; and this was impossible, as you and I agree.
Hipp.
Yes, we agree.
Soc.
It is, then, impossible that the pleasant through sight and hearing be the beautiful, since in becoming beautiful it offers an impossibility.
Hipp.
That is true.
Soc.
Then tell us again, he will say,
from the beginning,
303e
since you failed this time; what do you say that this ’beautiful,’ belonging to both the pleasures, is, on account of which you honored them before the rest and called them beautiful? It seems to me, Hippias, inevitable that we say that these are the most harmless and the best of pleasures, both of them collectively and each of them individually; or have you anything else to suggest, by which they excel the rest?
Hipp.
Not at all; for really they are the best.
Soc.
This, then, he will say,
you say is the beautiful, beneficial pleasure?
It seems that we do, I shall say; and you?
Hipp.
I also.
Hippias Major. Plato. Harold North Fowler (Translator), ed. Walter Rangeley Maitland Lamb. Cambridge, MA. 1926.
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