POLITICUS (Statesman) by Plato - Complete text

Page 33

Str. Shall we say that the whole art of the fuller or of the mender has nothing to do with the care and treatment clotes, or are we to regard all these as arts of weaving?

Y. Soc. Certainly not.

Str. And yet surely all these arts will maintain that they are concerned with the treatment and production of clothes; they will dispute the exclusive prerogative of weaving, and though assigning a larger sphere to that, will still reserve a considerable field for themselves.

Y. Soc. Very true.

Str. Besides these, there are the arts which make tools and instruments of weaving, and which will claim at least to be cooperative causes in every work of the weaver.

Y. Soc. Most true.

Str. Well, then, suppose that we define weaving, or rather that part of it which has been selected by us, to be the greatest and noblest of arts which are concerned with woollen garments - shall we be right? Is not the definition, although true, wanting in clearness and completeness; for do not all those other arts require to be first cleared away?

Y. Soc. True.

Str. Then the next thing will be to separate them, in order that the argument may proceed in a regular manner?

Y. Soc. By all means.

Str. Let us consider, in the first place, that there are two kinds of arts entering into everything which we do.

Y. Soc. What are they?

Str. The one kind is the conditional or cooperative, the other the principal cause.

Y. Soc. What do you mean?

Str. The arts which do not manufacture the actual thing, but which furnish the necessary tools for the manufacture, without which the several arts could not fulfil their appointed work, are co - operative; but those which make the things themselves are causal.

Y. Soc. A very reasonable distinction.

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