Plato, Sophist, section 254a

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[254a] he also is hard to see clearly, but the difficulty is not the same in his case and that of the sophist.

Theaetetus
How do they differ?

Stranger
The sophist runs away into the darkness of not-being, feeling his way in it by practice,¹ and is hard to discern on account of the darkness of the place. Don't you think so?

Theaetetus
It seems likely.

Stranger
But the philosopher, always devoting himself through reason to the idea of being, is also very difficult to see on account of the brilliant light of the place; for the eyes

1 By practice, i.e., by empirical knowledge as opposed to reason.

Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 12 translated by Harold N. Fowler. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.

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