  The motivation for this claim is our understanding of the thesis at 100c that Beauty Itself alone Is beautiful and that other things acquire their beauty in virtue of partaking in what Is beautiful. The traditional and obvious way to parse this claim is to allow that it is the Form Itself which the particular has, for it seems that only the Form whose essence is Y, Is Y. But if this is true, then if, as the Identity view maintains, the Form and its essence are identical, it follows that the essence must also be predicable of the particular. In which case it seems that the particulars do have essences, albeit via Partaking, for they have something which is identical with an essence.