PLATO. 71 



and scoffing the comedian. That Plato parodied Lysias, and mocked 

 his artificial and balanced sentences, his formal antithesis and set 

 cadences, we may rest assured on the evidence of Plutarch, who men- 

 tions it as an ingenious way of dealing with an adversary, to surpass 

 him in his own style, as Plato did Lysias. But we are, perhaps, argu- 

 ing this point too seriously, and too much at length, since all that the 

 critic probably intended, was to give a definition of his own dialogues ; 

 and, as applied to those refined and most elegant compositions of his, 

 the definition is perfect. 



In attempting an outline of Plato's philosophy, we fully admit the Outline of 

 justice of Wyttenbach's 1 remark, that no abstract can give an adequate fophy! Ph 

 notion of the merits of the original. Plato has two great excellences 

 in the highest degree, which any attempt to represent to the reader 

 in the course of an abstract must entirely fail. The first, is his 

 method of opening and investigating his subject, so that unforeseen 

 truths are elicited, in a manner at once surprising and satisfactory, 

 from the most obvious premises, and from axioms which every under- 

 standing recognises. The other is, that his diction, figurative as it is, 

 is in the greatest degree proper and philosophical ; what is called his 

 poetry, is, in fact, a chain of continued argument, and of animated 

 illustration. So that his writings, extensive as they are, are really 

 much more incapable of abridgment or condensation, than many 

 persons are inclined to imagine from a first view of their expanded 

 diction and dialogue form. We must honestly confess, therefore, 

 that we can present our readers with a little more than a sketch of 

 the most prominent points of Plato's philosophy, which we have 

 collected, however, not from previous compendiums, but from the 

 original works of our author. To enable our learned readers to 

 judge how far we are borne out by the original, we shall support our 

 sketch by quotations or references to the passages upon which we 

 principally rely. One or two translations of a larger nature we shall 

 intersperse, that our English readers may be brought acquainted in 

 some degree with the peculiar manner in which the subject sought is 

 evolved in Plato's dialogues. But the more we study the subject, 

 the more we are convinced of the truth of a remark made by the 

 learned and amiable foreign critic just mentioned, that Plato's system 

 can only be adequately learned by a full and thorough perusal of his 

 dialogues in the original; and that those who wish to master the 

 subject, must have recourse to that means alone, and must not rely 

 upon compendiums, the best of which cannot but be extremely im- 

 perfect. We shall be well pleased if the following outline serves the 

 purpose of stimulating curiosity, and of promoting the study of an 

 author, whose merits and beauties have not, we think, of late been 

 sufficiently appreciated in this country. 



Philosophy was divided by Plato into three parts : Morals, pj 1 ]j^ ns h of 



1 See his Epistola Critica ad Van Heude, prefixed to Van Heude's Specimen Cri- 

 ticum in Platonem. Lugd. Bat. 1818. 



