>
> The anecdote would be better if the speakers were
> different. In the historical
> reality of ancient Athens it was *Socrates* who was
> the primary spokesperson
> for the position that wisdom was above the reach of
> common folk -- it was
> the Sophists whose central doctrine was that
> ordinary folks, even artisans
> and peasants, in fact could understand the truth.
I've always felt that the sophists were the victims of the first smear campaign in recorded history. A good (if non-scholarly) book on the totalitarian aspect of Socrates' thought is I.F. Stone's "The Trial of Socrates".
Jim Baird
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