Jowett: episteme

Knowledge

Soc. I am afraid, Meno, that you and I are not good for much, and that Gorgias has been as poor an educator of you as Prodicus has been of me. Certainly we shall have to look to ourselves, and try to find some one who will help in some way or other to improve us. This I say, because I observe that in the previous discussion none of us remarked that right and good action is possible to man under other guidance than that of knowledge (episteme) ; — and indeed if this be denied, there is no seeing how there can be any good men at all. MENO

Soc. That is a tremendous class of names which you are disinterring ; still, as I have put on the lion’s skin, I must not be faint of heart ; and I suppose that I must consider the meaning of wisdom (phronesis) and understanding (sunesis), and judgment (gnome), and knowledge (episteme), and all those other charming words, as you call them ? CRATYLUS  

Soc. The meaning of sumpheron (expedient) I think that you may discover for yourself by the light of the previous examples, — for it is a sister word to episteme, meaning just the motion (pora) of the soul accompanying the world, and things which are done upon this principle are called sumphora or sumpheronta, because they are carried round with the world. CRATYLUS

Soc. Let us revert to episteme (knowledge) and observe how ambiguous this word is, seeming rather to signify stopping the soul at things than going round with them ; and therefore we should leave the beginning as at present, and not reject the e, but make an insertion of an instead of an i (not pioteme, but epiisteme). Take another example : bebaion (sure) is clearly the expression of station and position, and not of motion. Again, the word istoria (enquiry) bears upon the face of it the stopping (istanai) of the stream ; and the word piston (faithful) certainly indicates cessation of motion ; then, again, mneme (memory), as any one may see, expresses rest in the soul, and not motion. Moreover, words such as amartia and sumphora, which have a bad sense, viewed in the light of their etymologies will be the same as sunesis and episteme and other words which have a good sense (i.e., omartein, sunienai, epesthai, sumphersthai) and much the same may be said of amathia and akolaia, for amathia may be explained as e ama theo iontos poreia, and akolasia as e akolouthia tois pragmasin. Thus the names which in these instances we find to have the worst sense, will turn out to be framed on the same principle as those which have the best. And any one I believe who would take the trouble might find many other examples in which the giver of names indicates, not that things are in motion or progress, but that they are at rest ; which is the opposite of motion. CRATYLUS