Chapter XXI: Euthydemus (2)

The Euthydêmus of Plato is memorable in the history of philosophy as the earliest known attempt to set out, and exhibit to attention, a string of fallacious modes of reasoning. Plato makes them all absurd and ridiculous. He gives a caricature of a dialectic debate, not unworthy of his namesake Plato Comicus--or of Aristophanes, Swift, or Voltaire. The sophisms appear for the most part so silly, as he puts them, that the reader asks himself how any one could have been ever imposed upon by such a palpable delusion? Yet such confidence is by no means justified. A sophism, perfectly analogous in character to those which Plato here exposes to ridicule, may, in another case, easily escape detection from the hearer, and even from the reasoner himself. People are constantly misled by fallacies arising from the same word bearing two senses, from double construction of the same phrase, from unconscious application of a _dictum secundum quid_, as if it were a _dictum simpliciter_; from Petitio Principii, &c., Ignoratio Elenchi, &c. Neither Plato himself, nor Aristotle, can boast of escaping them.[58] If these fallacies appear, in the examples chosen by Plato for the Euthydêmus, so obviously inconclusive that they can deceive no one--the reason lies not in the premisses themselves, but in the particular conclusions to which they lead: which conclusions are known on other grounds to be false, and never to be seriously maintainable by any person. Such conclusions as--"Sokrates had no father: Sophroniskus, if father of Sokrates, was father of all men and all animals: In beating your dog, you beat your father: If you know one thing, you know everything," &c., being known _aliunde_ to be false, prove that there has been some fallacy in the premisses whereby they have been established. Such cases serve as a _reductio ad absurdum_ of the antecedent process. They make us aware of one mode of liability to error, and put us on our guard against it in analogous cases. This is a valuable service, and all the more valuable, because the liability to error is real and widespread, even from fallacies perfectly analogous to those which seem so silly under the particular exemplifications which Plato selects and exposes. Many of the illustrations of the Platonic Euthydêmus are reproduced by Aristotle in the Treatise de Sophisticis Elenchis, together with other fallacies, discriminated with a certain method and system.[59]

[Footnote 58: See a passage in Plato's Charmidês, where Heindorf remarks with propriety upon his equivocal use of the words [Greek: eu)= zê=|n] and [Greek: eu)= pra/ttein]--also the Gorgias, p. 507 D, with the notes of Routh and Heindorf. I have noticed both passages in discussing these two dialogues.]

[Footnote 59: Aristotle, De Sophist. Elench.; also Arist. Rhet. ii. p. 1401, a-b.]

[Side-note: Mistake of supposing fallacies to have been invented and propagated by Athenian Sophists--they are inherent inadvertencies and liabilities to error, in the ordinary process of thinking. Formal debate affords the best means of correcting them.]

The true character of these fallacies is very generally overlooked by the Platonic critics, in their appreciation of the Euthydêmus; when they point our attention to the supposed tricks and frauds of the persons whom they called Sophists, as well as to mischievous corruptions alleged to arise from Eristic or formal contentious debate. These critics speak as if they thought that such fallacies were the special inventions of Athenian Sophists for the purposes of Athenian Eristic: as if such causes of error were inoperative on persons of ordinary honesty or intelligence, who never consulted or heard the Sophists. It has been the practice of writers on logic, from Aristotle down to Whately, to represent logical fallacies as frauds devised and maintained by dishonest practitioners, whose art Whately assimilates to that of jugglers.

This view of the case appears to me incomplete and misleading. It substitutes the rare and accidental in place of the constant and essential. The various sophisms, of which Plato in the Euthydêmus gives the _reductio ad absurdum_, are not the inventions of Sophists. They are erroneous tendencies of the reasoning process, frequently incident to human thought and speech: specimens of those ever-renewed "inadvertencies of ordinary thinking" (to recur to a phrase cited in my preface), which it is the peculiar mission of philosophy or "reasoned truth" to rectify. Moreover the practice of formal debate, which is usually denounced with so much asperity--if it affords on some occasions opportunity to produce such fallacies, presents not merely equal opportunity, but the only effective means, for exposing and confuting them. Whately in his Logic,[60] like Plato in the Euthydêmus, when bringing these fallacies into open daylight in order that every one may detect them, may enliven the theme by presenting them as the deliberate tricks of a Sophist. Doubtless they are so by accident: yet their essential character is that of infirmities incident to the _intellectus sibi permissus_: operative at Athens before Athenian Sophists existed, and in other regions also, where these persons never penetrated.]

[Footnote 60: Whately's Logic, ch. v. sect. 5. Though Whately, like other logicians, keeps the Sophists in the foreground, as the fraudulent enemy who sow tares among that which would otherwise come up as a clean crop of wheat--yet he intimates also incidentally how widespread and frequent such fallacies are, quite apart from dishonest design. He says--"It seems by most persons to be taken for granted, that a Fallacy is to be dreaded merely as a weapon fashioned and wielded by a skilful Sophist: or, if they allow that a man may with honest intentions slide into one, unconsciously, in the heat of _argument_--still they seem to suppose, that where there is no _dispute_, there is no cause to dread Fallacy. Whereas there is much danger, even in what may be called _solitary reasoning_, of sliding unawares into some Fallacy, by which one may be so far deceived as even to act upon the conclusion so obtained. By _solitary reasoning_, is meant the case in which we are not seeking for arguments to prove a given question, but labouring to elicit from our previous stock of knowledge some useful inference."

"To speak of all the Fallacies that have ever been enumerated, as too glaring and obvious to need even being mentioned--because the simple instances given in books, and there stated in the plainest and consequently most easily detected form, are such as (in that form) would deceive no one--this, surely, shows either extreme weakness or extreme unfairness."--Aristotle himself makes the same remark as Whately--That the man who is easily taken in by a Fallacy advanced by another, will be easily misled by the like Fallacy in his own solitary reasoning. Sophist. Elench. 16, 175, a. 10.]

[Side-note: Wide-spread prevalence of erroneous belief, misguided by one or other of these fallacies, attested by Sokrates, Plato, Bacon, &c.,--complete enumeration of heads of fallacies by Mill.]

The wide diffusion and constant prevalence of such infirmities is attested not less by Sokrates in his last speech, wherein he declares real want of knowledge and false persuasion of knowledge, to be universal, the mission of his life being to expose them, though he could not correct them--than by Bacon in his reformatory projects, where he enumerates the various Idola worshipped by the human intellect, and the false tendencies acquired "_in primâ digestione mentis_". The psychological analysis of the sentiment of belief with its different sources, given in Mr. Alexander Bain's work on the Emotions and the Will, shows how this takes place; and exhibits true or sound belief, in so far as it ever is acquired, as an acquisition only attained after expulsion of earlier antecedent error.[61] Of such error, and of the different ways in which apparent evidence is mistaken for real evidence, a comprehensive philosophical exposition is farther given by Mr. John Stuart Mill, in the fifth book of his System of Logic, devoted to the subject of Fallacies. Every variety of erroneous procedure is referable to some one or more of the general heads of Fallacy there enumerated. It is the Fallacies of Ratiocination, of which the two Sophists, in the Platonic Euthydêmus, are made to exhibit specimens: and when we regard such Fallacies, as one branch among several in a complete logical scheme, we shall see at once that they are not inventions of the Athenian Sophists--still less inventions for the purpose of Eristic or formal debate. For every one of these Fallacies is of a nature to ensnare men, and even to ensnare them more easily, in the common, informal, conversation of life--or in their separate thoughts. Besides mistakes on matters of fact, the two main causes which promote the success and encourage the multiplication of Fallacies generally, are first, the emotional bias towards particular conclusions, which disposes persons to accept any apparent evidence, favourable to such conclusion, as if it, were real evidence: next, the careless and elliptical character of common speech, in which some parts of the evidence are merely insinuated, and other parts altogether left out. It is this last circumstance which gives occasion to the very extensive class of Fallacies called by Mr. Mill Fallacies of Confusion: a class so large, that the greater number of Fallacies might plausibly be brought under it.[62]

[Footnote 61: See the instructive and original chapter on the generation, sources, and growth of Belief, in Mr. Bain's work, 'Emotions and Will,' p. 568 seq. After laying down the fundamental characteristic of Belief, as referable altogether to intended action, either certain to come, or contingent under supposed circumstances, and after enumerating the different Sources of Belief.--1. Intuitive or Instinctive. 2. Experience. 3. The Influence of the Emotions (sect. x. p. 579)--Mr. Bain says: "Having in our constitution primordial fountains of activity in the spontaneous and voluntary impulses, we follow the first clue that experience gives us, and accept the indication with the whole force of these natural promptings. Being under the strongest impulses to act somehow, an animal accepts any lead that is presented, and if successful, abides by that lead with unshaken confidence. This is that instinct of credulity so commonly attributed to the infant mind. It is not the single instance, or the repetition of two or three, that makes up the strong tone of confidence; it is the mind's own active determination, finding some definite vent in the gratification of its ends, and abiding by the discovery with the whole energy of the character, until the occurrence of some check, failure, or contradiction. The force of belief, therefore, is not one rising from zero to a full development by slow degrees, according to the length of the experience. We must treat it rather as a strong primitive manifestation, derived from the natural activity of the system, and taking its direction and rectification from experience (p. 583). The anticipation of nature, so strenuously repudiated by Bacon, is the offspring of this characteristic of the mental system. With the active tendency at its maximum, and the exercise of intelligence and acquired knowledge at the minimum, there can issue nothing but a quantity of rash enterprises. The respectable name _generalisation_, implying the best products of enlightened scientific research, has also a different meaning, expressing one of the most erroneous impulses and crudest determinations of untutored human nature. To extend some familiar and narrow experience, so as to comprehend cases the most distant, is a piece of mere reckless instinct, demanding severe discipline for its correction. I have mentioned the case of our supposing all other minds constituted like our own. The veriest infant has got this length in the career of fallacy. Sound belief, instead of being a pacific and gentle growth, is in reality the battering of a series of strongholds, the conquering of a country in hostile occupation. This is a fact common both to the individual and to the race. Observation is unanimous on the point. It will probably be long ere the last of the delusions attributable to this method of believing first and proving afterwards can be eradicated from humanity." [3rd ed., p. 505 seq.]]

[Footnote 62: Mill, 'System of Logic,' Book V., to which is prefixed the following citation from Hobbes's 'Logica'. "Errare non modo affirmando et negando, sed etiam in sentiendo, et in tacitâ hominum cogitatione, contingit."

Mr. Mill points out forcibly both the operation of moral or emotional bias in perverting the intellect, and causing sophisms or fallacies to produce conviction; and the increased chance afforded for the success of a sophism by the suppression of part of the premisses, which is unavoidable in informal discussions.

"Bias is not a direct source of wrong conclusions (v. 1-3). We cannot believe a proposition only by wishing, or only by dreading, to believe it. Bias acts indirectly by placing the intellectual grounds of belief in an incomplete or distorted shape before a man's eyes. It makes him shrink from the irksome labour of a rigorous induction. It operates too by making him look out eagerly for reasons, or apparent reasons, to support opinions which are conformable, or resist those which are repugnant, to his interests or feelings; and when the interests or feelings are common to great numbers of persons, reasons are accepted or pass current which would not for a moment be listened to in that character, if the conclusion had nothing more powerful than its reasons to speak in its behalf. The natural or acquired prejudices of mankind are perpetually throwing up philosophical theories, the sole recommendation of which consists in the premisses which they afford for proving cherished doctrines, or justifying favourite feelings; and when any one of these theories has become so thoroughly discredited as no longer to serve the purpose, another is always ready to take its place."--"Though the opinions of the generality of mankind, when not dependent upon mere habit and inculcation, have their root much more in the inclinations than in the intellect, it is a necessary condition to the triumph of the moral bias that it should first pervert the understanding."

Again in v. 2, 3. "It is not in the nature of bad reasoning to express itself unambiguously. When a sophist, whether he is imposing upon himself or attempting to impose upon others, can be constrained to throw his argument into so distinct a form, it needs, in a large number of cases, no farther exposure. In all arguments, everywhere but in the schools, some of the links are suppressed: _à fortiori_, when the arguer either intends to deceive, or is a lame and inexpert thinker, little accustomed to bring his reasoning processes to any test; and it is in those steps of the reasoning which are made in this tacit and half-conscious, or even wholly unconscious, manner, that the error oftenest lurks. In order to detect the fallacy the proposition thus silently assumed must be supplied, but the reasoner, most likely, has never really asked himself what he was assuming; his confuter, unless permitted to extort it from him by the Socratic mode of interrogation, must himself judge what the suppressed premiss ought to be, in order to support the conclusion." Mr. Mill proceeds to illustrate this confusion by an excellent passage cited from Whately's 'Logic'. I may add, that Aristotle himself makes a remark substantially the same--That the same fallacy may be referred to one general head or to another, according to circumstances. Sophist. Elench. 33, 182, b. 10.]

[Side-note: Value of formal debate as a means for testing and confuting fallacies.]

We thus see not only that the fallacious agencies are self-operative, generating their own weeds in the common soil of human thought and speech, without being planted by Athenian Sophists or watered by Eristic--but that this very Eristic affords the best means of restraining their diffusion. It is only in formal debate that the disputant can be forced to make clear to himself and declare explicitly to others, without reserve or omission, all the premisses upon which his conclusion rests--that every part of these premisses becomes liable to immediate challenge by an opponent--that the question comes distinctly under consideration, what is or is not sufficient evidence--that the premisses of one argument can be compared with the premisses of another, so that if in the former you are tempted to acquiesce in them as sufficient because you have a bias favourable to the conclusion, in the latter you may be made to feel that they are _insufficient_, because the conclusion which they prove is one which you know to be untrue (_reductio ad absurdum_). The habit of formal debate (called by those who do not like it, Eristic[63]) is thus an indispensable condition both for the exposure and confutation of fallacies, which exist quite independent of that habit--owing their rise and prevalence to deep-seated psychological causes.

[Footnote 63: The Platonic critics talk about the Eristics (as they do about the Sophists) as if that name designated a known and definite class of persons. This is altogether misleading. The term is vituperative, and was applied by different persons according to their own tastes.

Ueberweg remarks with great justice, that Isokrates called all speculators on philosophy by the name of Eristics. "Als ob jener Rhetor nicht (wie ja doch Spengel selbst gut nachgewiesen hat) alle und jede Spekulation mit dem Nahmen der Eristik bezeichnete." (Untersuchungen über die Zeitfolge der Plat. Schriften, p. 257.) In reference to the distinction which Aristotle attempts to draw between Dialectic and Eristic--the former legitimate, the latter illegitimate--we must remark that even in the legitimate Dialectic the purpose prominent in his mind is that of victory over an opponent. He enjoins that you are not only to guard against your opponent, lest he should out-manoeuvre you, but you are to conceal and disguise the sequence of your questions so as to out-manoeuvre him. [Greek: Chrê\ d' o(/per phula/ttesthai paragge/llomen a)pokrinome/nous, au)tou\s e)picheirou=ntas peira=sthai lantha/nein.] Anal. Prior. ii. 66, a. 32. Compare Topic. 108, a. 25, 156, a. 23, 164, b. 35.]

[Side-note: Without the habit of formal debate, Plato could not have composed his Euthydêmus, nor Aristotle the treatise De Sophisticis Elenchis.]

Without the experience acquired by this habit of dialectic debate at Athens, Plato could not have composed his Euthydêmus, exhibiting a _reductio ad absurdum_ of several verbal fallacies--nor could we have had the logical theories of Aristotle, embodied in the Analytica and Topica with its annexed treatise De Sophisticis Elenchis, in which various fallacies are discriminated and classified. These theories, and the corollaries connected with them, do infinite honour to the comprehensive intellect of Aristotle: but he could not have conceived them without previous study of the ratiocinative process. He, as the first theorizer, must have had before him abundant arguments explicitly laid out, and contested, or open to be contested, at every step by an opponent.[64] Towards such habit of formal argumentation, a strong repugnance was felt by many of the Athenian public, as there is among modern readers generally: but those who felt thus, had probably little interest in the speculations either of Plato or of Aristotle. That the Platonic critics should themselves feel this same repugnance, seems to me not consistent with their admiration for the great dialectician and logician of antiquity: nor can I at all subscribe to their view, when they present to us the inherent infirmities of the human intellect as factitious distempers generated by the habit of formal debate, and by the rapacity of Protagoras, Prodikus, and others.

[Footnote 64: Mill, 'System of Logic.' Book VI. 1, 1. "Principles of Evidence and Theories of Method, are not to be constructed _à priori_. The laws of our rational faculty, like those of every other natural agency, are only got by seeing the agent at work."]

[Side-note: Probable popularity of the Euthydêmus at Athens--welcomed by all the enemies of Dialectic.]

I think it probable that the dialogue of Euthydêmus, as far as the point to which I have brought it (_i.e._, where Sokrates finishes his recital to Kriton of the conversation which he had had with the two Sophists), was among the most popular of all the Platonic dialogues: not merely because of its dramatic vivacity and charm of expression, but because it would be heartily welcomed by the numerous enemies of Dialectic at Athens. We must remember that in the estimation of most persons at Athens, Dialectic included Sokrates and all the _viri Sokratici_ (Plato among them), just as much as the persons called Sophists. The discreditable picture here given of Euthydêmus and Dionysodorus, would be considered as telling against Dialectic and the Sokratic Elenchus generally: while the rhetors, and others who dealt in long continuous discourse, would treat it as a blow inflicted upon the rival art of dialogue, by the professor of the dialogue himself. In Plato's view, the dialogue was the special and appropriate manifestation of philosophy.

[Side-note: Epilogue of Plato to the Dialogue, trying to obviate this inference by opponents--Conversation between Sokrates and Kriton.]

That the natural effect of the picture here drawn by Plato, was, to justify the antipathy of those who hated philosophy--we may see by the epilogue which Plato has thought fit to annex: an epilogue so little in harmony with what has preceded, that we might almost imagine it to be an afterthought--yet obviously intended to protect philosophy against imputations. Sokrates having concluded the recital, in his ironical way, by saying that he intended to become a pupil under the two Sophists, and by inviting Kriton to be a pupil along with him--Kriton replies by saying that he is anxious to obtain instruction from any one who can give it, but that he has no sympathy with Euthydêmus, and would rather be refuted by him, than learn from him to refute in such a manner. Kriton proceeds to report to Sokrates the remarks of a by-stander (an able writer of discourses for the Dikastery) who had heard all that passed; and who expressed his surprise that Sokrates could have remained so long listening to such nonsense, and manifesting so much deference for a couple of foolish men. Nevertheless (continued the by-stander) this couple are among the most powerful talkers of the day upon philosophy. This shows you how worthless a thing philosophy is: prodigious fuss, with contemptible result--men careless what they say, and carping at every word that they hear.[65]

[Footnote 65: Plat. Euthyd. pp. 304-305.]

Now, Sokrates (concludes Kriton), this man is wrong for depreciating philosophy, and all others who depreciate it are wrong also. But he was right in blaming you, for disputing with such a couple before a large crowd.

_Sokr._--What kind of person is this censor of philosophy? Is he a powerful speaker himself in the Dikastery? Or is he only a composer of discourses to be spoken by others? _Krit._--The latter. I do not think that he has ever spoken in court: but every one says that he knows judicial practice well, and that he composes admirable speeches.[66]

[Footnote 66: Plat. Euthyd. p. 305.]

[Side-note: Altered tone in speaking of Euthydêmus--Disparagement of persons half-philosophers, half-politicians.]

_Sokr._--I understand the man. He belongs to that class whom Prodikus describes as the border-men between philosophy and politics. Persons of this class account themselves the wisest of mankind, and think farther that besides being such in reality, they are also admired as such by many: insomuch that the admiration for them would be universal, if it were not for the professors of philosophy. Accordingly they fancy, that if they could once discredit these philosophers, the prize of glory would be awarded to themselves, without controversy, by every one: they being in truth the wisest men in society, though liable, if ever they are caught in dialectic debate, to be overpowered and humbled by men like Euthydêmus.[67] They have very plausible grounds for believing in their own wisdom, since they pursue both philosophy and politics to a moderate extent, as far as propriety enjoins; and thus pluck the fruit of wisdom without encountering either dangers or contests. _Krit._--What do you say to their reasoning, Sokrates? It seems to me specious. _Sokr._--Yes, it is specious, but not well founded. You cannot easily persuade them, though nevertheless it is true, that men who take a line mid-way between two pursuits, are _better_ than either, if both pursuits be bad--_worse_ than either, if both pursuits be good, but tending to different ends--_better_ than one and _worse_ than the other, if one of the pursuits be bad and the other good--_better_ than both, if both be bad, but tending to different ends. Such being the case, if the pursuit of philosophy and that of active politics be both of them good, but tending to different objects, these men are inferior to the pursuers of one as well as of the other: if one be good, the other bad, they are worse than the pursuers of the former, better than the pursuers of the latter: if both be bad, they are better than either. Now I am sure that these men themselves account both philosophy and politics to be good. Accordingly, they are inferior both to philosophers and politicians:[68] they occupy only the third rank, though they pretend to be in the first. While we pardon such a pretension, and refrain from judging these men severely, we must nevertheless recognise them for such as they really are. We must be content with every one, who announces any scheme of life, whatever it be, coming within the limits of intelligence, and who pursues his work with persevering resolution.[69]

[Footnote 67: Plat. Euthyd. p. 305 D. [Greek: ei)=nai me\n ga\r tê=| a)lêthei/a| spha=s sophôta/tous, e)n de\ toi=s i)di/ois lo/gois o(/tan a)polêphthô=sin, u(po\ tô=n a)mphi\ Eu)thu/dêmon kolou/esthai.]

[Greek: Oi( a)mphi\ Eu)thu/dêmon] may mean Euthydêmus himself and alone; yet I incline to think that it here means Euthydêmus and his like.]

[Footnote 68: Plat. Euthyd. p. 306 B.]

[Footnote 69: Plat. Euthyd. p. 306 C. [Greek: suggignô/skein me\n ou)=n au)toi=s chrê\ tê=s e)pithumi/as kai\ mê\ chalepai/nein, ê(gei=sthai me/ntoi toiou/tous ei)=nai oi(=oi/ ei)si; pa/nta ga\r a)/ndra chrê\ a)gapa=|n, o(/stis kai\ o(tiou=n le/gei e)cho/menon phronê/seôs pra=gma, kai\ a)ndrei/ôs diaponei=tai.]]

[Side-note: Kriton asks Sokrates for advice about the education of his sons--Sokrates cannot recommend a teacher--tells him to search for himself.]

_Krit._ I am always telling you, Sokrates, that I too am embarrassed where to seek instructors for my sons. Conversation with you has satisfied me, that it is madness to bestow so much care upon the fortune and position of sons, and so little upon their instruction. Yet when I turn my eyes to the men who make profession of instructing, I am really astonished. To tell you the truth, every one of them appears to me extravagantly absurd,[70] so that I know not how to help forward my son towards philosophy. _Sokr._--Don't you know, Kriton, that in every different pursuit, most of the professors are foolish and worthless, and that a few only are excellent and above price? Is not this the case with gymnastic, commercial business, rhetoric, military command? Are not most of those who undertake these pursuits ridiculously silly?[71] _Krit._--Unquestionably: nothing can be more true. _Sokr._--Do you think _that_ a sufficient reason for avoiding all these pursuits yourself, and keeping your son out of them also? _Krit._ No: it would be wrong to do so. _Sokr._--Well then, don't do so. Take no heed about the professors of philosophy, whether they are good or bad; but test philosophy itself, well and carefully. If it shall appear to you worthless, dissuade not merely your sons, but every one else also, from following it.[72] But if it shall appear to you as valuable as I consider it to be, then take courage to pursue and practise it, you and your children both, according to the proverb.--

[Footnote 70: Plato, Euthyd. p. 306 E. [Greek: kai/ moi dokei= ei)=s e(/kastos au)tô=n skopou=nti pa/nu a)llo/kotos ei)=nai], &c.]

[Footnote 71: Plato, Euthyd. p. 307 B. [Greek: e)n e(ka/stê| tou/tôn tou\s pollou\s pro\s e(/kaston to\ e)/rgon ou) katagela/stous o(ra=|s?]]

[Footnote 72: Plato, Euthyd. p. 307 B. [Greek: e)a/sas chai/rein tou\s e)pitêdeu/ontas philosophi/an, ei)/te chrêstoi/ ei)sin ei)/te ponêroi/, au)to\ to\ pra=gma basani/sas kalô=s te kai\ eu)=, e)a\n me/n soi phai/nêtai phaulo\n o)/n], &c.]

[Side-note: Euthydêmus is here cited as representative of Dialectic and philosophy.]

The first part of this epilogue, which I have here given in abridgment, has a bearing very different from the rest of the dialogue, and different also from most of the other Platonic dialogues. In the epilogue, Euthydêmus is cited as the representative of true dialectic and philosophy: the opponents of philosophy are represented as afraid of being put down by Euthydêmus: whereas, previously, he had been depicted as contemptible,--as a man whose manner of refuting opponents was more discreditable to himself than to the opponent refuted; and who had no chance of success except among hearers like himself. We are not here told that Euthydêmus was a bad specimen of philosophers, and that there were others better, by the standard of whom philosophy ought to be judged. On the contrary, we find him here announced by Sokrates as among those dreaded by men adverse to philosophy,--and as not undeserving of that epithet which the semi-philosopher cited by Kriton applies to "one of the most powerful champions of the day".

Plato, therefore, after having applied his great dramatic talent to make dialectic debate ridiculous, and thus said much to gratify its enemies--changes his battery, and says something against these enemies, without reflecting whether it is consistent or no with what had preceded. Before the close, however, he comes again into consistency with the tone of the earlier part, in the observation which he assigns to Kriton, that most of the professors of philosophy are worthless; to which Sokrates rejoins that this is not less true of all other professions. The concluding inference is, that philosophy is to be judged, not by its professors but by itself; and that Kriton must examine it for himself, and either pursue it or leave it alone, according as his own convictions dictated.

This is a valuable admonition, and worthy of Sokrates, laying full stress as it does upon the conscientious conviction which the person examining may form for himself. But it is no answer to the question of Kriton; who says that he had already heard from Sokrates, and was himself convinced, that philosophy was of first-rate importance--and that he only desired to learn where he could find teachers to forward the progress of his son in it. As in so many other dialogues, Plato leaves the problem started, but unsolved. The impulse towards philosophy being assured, those who feel it ask Plato in what direction they are to move towards it. He gives no answer. He can neither perform the service himself, nor recommend any one else, as competent. We shall find such silence made matter of pointed animadversion, in the fragment called Kleitophon.

[Side-note: Who is the person here intended by Plato, half-philosopher, half-politician? Is it Isokrates?]

The person, whom Kriton here brings forward as the censor of Sokrates and the enemy of philosophy, is peculiarly marked. In general, the persons whom Plato ranks as enemies of philosophy are the rhetors and politicians: but the example here chosen is not comprised in either of these classes: it is a semi-philosopher, yet a writer of discourses for others. Schleiermacher, Heindorf, and Spengel, suppose that Isokrates is the person intended: Winckelmann thinks it is Thrasymachus: others refer it to Lysias, or Theodorus of Byzantium:[73] Socher and Stallbaum doubt whether any special person is intended, or any thing beyond some supposed representative of a class described by attributes. I rather agree with those who refer the passage to Isokrates. He might naturally be described as one steering a middle course between philosophy and rhetoric: which in fact he himself proclaims in the Oration De Permutatione, and which agrees with the language of Plato in the dialogue Phædrus, where Isokrates is mentioned by name along with Lysias. In the Phædrus, moreover, Plato speaks of Isokrates with unusual esteem, especially as a favourable contrast with Lysias, and as a person who, though not yet a philosopher, may be expected to improve, so as in no long time to deserve that appellation.[74] We must remember that Plato in the Phædrus attacks by name, and with considerable asperity, first Lysias, next Theodorus and Thrasymachus the rhetors--all three persons living and of note. Being sure to offend all these, Plato might well feel disposed to avoid making an enemy of Isokrates at the same time, and to except him honourably by name from the vulgar professors of rhetoric. In the Euthydêmus (where the satire is directed not against the rhetors, but against their competitors the dialecticians or pseudo-dialecticians) he had no similar motive to address compliments to Isokrates: respecting whom he speaks in a manner probably more conformable to his real sentiments, as the unnamed representative of a certain type of character--a semi-philosopher, fancying himself among the first men in Athens, and assuming unwarrantable superiority over the genuine philosopher; but entitled to nothing more than a decent measure of esteem, such as belonged to sincere mediocrity of intelligence.

[Footnote 73: Stallbaum, Proleg. ad Euthyd. p. 47; Winckelmann. Proleg. p. xxxv.

Heindorf, in endeavouring to explain the difference between Plato's language in the Phædrus and in the Euthydêmus respecting Isokrates, assumes as a matter beyond question the theory of Schleiermacher, that the Phædrus was composed during Plato's early years. I have already intimated my may dissent from this theory.]

[Footnote 74: Plato, Phædrus, p. 278 E.

I have already observed that I do not agree with Schleiermacher and the other critics who rank the Phædrus as the earliest or even among the earliest compositions of Plato. That it is of much later composition I am persuaded, but of what particular date can only be conjectured. The opinion of K. F. Hermann, Stallbaum, and others, that it was composed about the time when Plato began his school at Athens (387-386 B.C.) is sufficiently probable.

The Euthydêmus may be earlier or may be later than the Phædrus. I incline to think it later. The opinion of Stallbaum (resting upon the mention of Alkibiadês, p. 275 A), that it was composed in or before 404 B.C., appears to me untenable (Stallbaum, Proleg. p. 64). Plato would not be likely to introduce Sokrates speaking of Alkibiadês as a deceased person, whatever time the dialogue was composed. Nor can I agree with Steinhart, who refers it to 402 B.C. (Einleitung, p. 26). Ueberweg (Untersuch. über die Zeitfolge der Plat. Schr. pp. 265-267) considers the Euthydêmus later (but not much later) than the Phædrus, subsequent to the establishment of the Platonic school at Athens (387-386 B.C.) This seems to me more probable than the contrary.

Schleiermacher, in arranging the Platonic dialogues, ranks the Euthydêmus as an immediate sequel to the Menon, and as presupposing both Gorgias and Theætêtus (Einl. pp. 400-401). Socher agrees in this opinion, but Steinhart rejects it (Einleit. p. 26), placing the Euthydêmus immediately after the Protagoras, and immediately before the Menon and the Gorgias; according to him, Euthydêmus, Menon, and Gorgias, form a well marked Trilogy.

Neither of these arrangements rests upon any sufficient reasons. The chronological order cannot be determined.]

[Side-note: Variable feeling at different times, between Plato and Isokrates.]

That there prevailed at different times different sentiments, more or less of reciprocal esteem or reciprocal jealousy, between Plato and Isokrates, ought not to be matter of surprise. Both of them were celebrated teachers of Athens, each in his own manner, during the last forty years of Plato's life: both of them enjoyed the favour of foreign princes, and received pupils from outlying, sometimes distant, cities--from Bosphorus and Cyprus in the East, and from Sicily in the West. We know moreover that during the years immediately preceding Plato's death (347 B.C.), his pupil Aristotle, then rising into importance as a teacher of rhetoric, was engaged in acrimonious literary warfare, seemingly of his own seeking, with Isokrates (then advanced in years) and some of the Isokratean pupils. The little which we learn concerning the literary and philosophical world of Athens, represents it as much distracted by feuds and jealousies. Isokrates on his part has in his compositions various passages which appear to allude (no name being mentioned) to Plato among others, in a tone of depreciation.[75]

[Footnote 75: Isokrates, ad Philipp. Or. v. s. 14, p. 84; contra Sophistas, Or. xiii.; Or. xiii. s. 2-24, pp. 291-295; Encom. Helenæ, Or. x. init.; Panathenaic. Or. xii. s. 126, p. 257; Or. xv. De Permutatione, s. 90, p. 440, Bekk.]

Isokrates seems, as far as we can make out, to have been in early life, like Lysias, a composer of speeches to be spoken by clients in the Dikastery. This lucrative profession was tempting, since his family had been nearly ruined during the misfortunes of Athens at the close of the Peloponnesian war. Having gained reputation by such means, Isokrates became in his mature age a teacher of Rhetoric, and a composer of discourses, not for private use by clients, but for the general reader, on political or educational topics. In this character, he corresponded to the description given by Plato in the Euthydêmus: being partly a public adviser, partly a philosopher. But the general principle under which Plato here attacks him, though conforming to the doctrine of the Platonic Republic, is contrary to that of Plato in other dialogues, "You must devote yourself either wholly to philosophy, or wholly to politics: a mixture of the two is worse than either"--this agrees with the Republic, wherein Plato enjoins upon each man one special and exclusive pursuit, as well as with the doctrine maintained against Kalliklês in the Gorgias--but it differs from the Phædrus, where he ascribes the excellence of Perikles as a statesmen and rhetor, to the fact of his having acquired a large tincture of philosophy.[76] Cicero quotes this last passage as applicable to his own distinguished career, a combination of philosophy with politics.[77] He dissented altogether from the doctrine here laid down by Plato in the Euthydêmus, and many other eminent men would have dissented from it also.

[Footnote 76: See the facts about Isokrates in a good Dissertation by H. P. Schröder, Utrecht, 1859, Quæstiones Isocrateæ, p. 51, seq.

Plato, Phædrus, p. 270; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 23; Plato, Republic, iii. p. 397.]

[Footnote 77: Cicero, De Orator. iii. 34, 138; Orator. iv. 14; Brutus, 11, 44.]

As a doctrine of universal application, in fact, it cannot be defended. The opposite scheme of life (which is maintained by Isokrates in De Permutatione and by Kalliklês in the Platonic Gorgias)[78]--that philosophy is to be attentively studied in the earlier years of life as an intellectual training, to arm the mind with knowledge and capacities which may afterwards be applied to the active duties of life--is at least equally defensible, and suits better for other minds of a very high order. Not only Xenophon and other distinguished Greeks, but also most of the best Roman citizens, held the opinion which Plato in the Gorgias ascribes to Kalliklês and reprobates through the organ of Sokrates--That philosophical study, if prolonged beyond what was necessary for this purpose of adequate intellectual training, and if made the permanent occupation of life, was more hurtful than beneficial.[79] Certainly, a man may often fail in the attempt to combine philosophy with active politics. No one failed in such a career more lamentably than Dion, the friend of Plato--and Plato himself, when he visited Sicily to second Dion. Moreover Alkibiadês and Kritias were cited by Anytus and the other accusers of Sokrates as examples of the like mischievous conjunction. But on the other hand, Archytas at Tarentum (another friend of Plato and philosopher) administered his native city with success, as long (seemingly) as Periklês administered Athens. Such men as these two are nowise inferior either to the special philosopher or to the special politician. Plato has laid down an untenable generality, in this passage of the Euthydêmus, in order to suit a particular point which he wished to make against Isokrates, or against the semi-philosopher indicated, whoever else he may have been.

[Footnote 78: Isokrates, De Permutatione, Or. xv. sect. 278-288, pp. 485-480, Bekk.; Plato, Gorgias, pp. 484-485.]

[Footnote 79: The half-philosophers and half-politicians to whom Sokrates here alludes, are characterised by one of the Platonic critics as "jene oberflächlichen und schwächlichen Naturen die sich zwischen beiden Richtungen stellen, und zur Erreichung selbstsüchtiger und beschränkter Zwecke von beiden aufnehmen was sie verstehen und was ihnen gefällt" (Steinhart, Einleit. p. 25). On the other hand we find in Tacitus a striking passage respecting the studies of Agricola in his youth at Massilia. "Memoriâ teneo, solitum ipsum narrare, se in primâ juventâ studium philosophiæ acrius, ultra quam concessum Romano ac senatori, hausisse--ni prudentia matris incensum ac flagrantem animum exercuisset: Scilicet sublime et erectum ingenium, pulchritudinem ac speciem excelsæ magnæque gloriæ vehementius quam lauté appetebat: retinuitque, quod est difficillimum, ex sapientiâ modum" (Vit. Agr. c. 4).

Tacitus expresses himself in the same manner about the purpose with which Helvidius Priscus applied himself to philosophy (Hist. iv. 6): "non, ut plerique, ut nomine magnifico segne otium velaret, sed quo constantior adversus fortuita rempublicam capesseret".

Compare also the memorable passage in the Funeral Oration pronounced by Periklês (Thuc. ii. 40)--[Greek: philosophou=men a)/neu malaki/as], &c., which exhibits the like views.

Aulus Gellius (x. 22), who cites the doctrine which Plato ascribes to Kalliklês in the Gorgias (about the propriety of confining philosophy to the function of training and preparation for active pursuits), tries to make out that this was Plato's own opinion.]