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The Lost Plato Volume 2
Notes to Chapter 1, Plato Versus Isocrates
1. I put the first volume of The Lost Plato online in August 2008.
2. The Lost Plato, online at www.juliustomin.org.
3. R. Hackforth, Plato’s Phaedrus, University Printing House, Cambridge, 1952, repr. 1972, p. 34, n. 2.
4. Plato, Phaedrus 278e10-279b1, tr. C.J. Rowe.
5. Leonhard Spengel, ‘Isokrates und Platon’, in: Abh. d. bayerischen Akad. Muenchen 1855, pp. 746, 762.
6. Usener points out that in Phaedrus 269d Plato says that a man can become an accomplished performer (teleon genesthai), if he has a natural talent for rhetoric (phusei rhêtorikôi einai), if he acquires knowledge of the subject and gets practiced in it (proslabôn epistêmên te kai meletên). In particular, the student must learn the forms of speeches and of discourse (logôn eidê, 271d, 272a). Similarly, Isocrates in Against the Sophists 16 says that the student must acquire knowledge (labein tên epistêmên) of the forms (ideôn) out of which all speeches are composed, and in paragraph 17 he says that the student of rhetoric must have a natural talent for rhetoric (tên phusin echein hoian chrê), that he must learn the forms of discourse (ta eidê tôn logôn), and that he must be practised in their use (peri tas chrêseis autôn gumnasthênai). Plato says: ‘If you lack any of these you will be incomplete in this respect’ (hotou d’ an elleipêis toutôn, tautêi atelês esêi, 269d5-6). Isocrates in paragraph 18 says similarly: ‘If any of these were left out, the student would be disadvantaged accordingly’ (kath’ ho d’ an elleiphthêi ti tôn eirêmenôn, anankê tautêi cheiron diakeisthai tous plêsiazontas). See Hermann Usener, ‘Abfassungszeit des Platonischen Phaidros’, Rheinisches Museum fuer Philologie, vol. 35, 1880, pp. 137-139.
7. Ferdinand Duemmler, Chronologische Beitraege zu einigen Platonischen Dialogen aus den Reden des Isokrates, Basel 1890, pp. 6-8.
8. Otto Immisch, ‘Zum gegenwaertigen Stande der Platonischen Frage’, Neue Jahrb. f. d. Kl. Alt., 1899, vol. 3, p. 550, n.3.
9. Edwin Gifford, The Euthydemus of Plato, Oxford 1905, p. 31.
10. Tr. George Norlin.
11. Isocrates’ use of the plural should not stay in our way of referring the criticism in the first instance to Plato, for apart from the reference to Isocrates by name in the Phaedrus Plato and Isocrates had recourse to plural in their mutual invectives, to make them sound less offensive on the one hand, and to include their respective disciples and followers on the other.
12. Cf. Julius Tomin, ‘Plato’s disappointment with his Phaedran characters and its impact on his theory of psychology’, Classical Quarterly 50.2 (2000), pp. 374-383.
13. ‘Mit dieser Annahme macht man ohne Umstaende Plato zum Mitschuldigen der Anklage von 399; die Apologie haette sich, statt gegen Aristophanes Wolken, gegen Platos Phaedrus verwahren muessen.’ Paul Natorp, ‘Platos Phaedrus’, Hermes 35, 1900, p. 403.
14. Tr. R. Hackforth.
15. See Andocides De Mysteriis 90 and 94. Cf. John Burnet, Plato: Euthyphro, Apology of Socrates, Crito, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1924, rep. 2002, p. 180-181; Debra Nails, The People of Plato, Hackett Publishing Company, Indianopolis/Cambridge, 2002, Excursus 4, pp. 219-222.
16. It might be argued against this observation that I fail to take into account the simple fact that the Apology was written by Plato, and that it was not a verbatim transcription of what Socrates had said in the court: ‘Would Plato include Socrates’ casting aspersion on the Phaedrus?’ To this I must answer that when Plato wrote the Apology he had many reasons for distancing himself from his first dialogue as a work of his youth. It was not just his unfortunate reference to Polemarchus as an exemplary follower of philosophy, and his unfortunate praise of Isocrates as the most talented rhetorician which put the Phaedrus in a bad light. What must have been most painful for him was Socrates’ defeat at the court, viewed against the background of the Phaedran boastful claim of the power of philosophically founded rhetoric to unfailingly persuade and win over the audience. Cf. Julius Tomin, ‘Plato’s disappointment with his Phaedran characters and its impact on his theory of psychology’, op. cit., and The Lost Plato, op. cit. ch. 4 and 11.
17. H. von Arnim, ‘Sprachliche Forschungen zur Chronologie der platonischen Dialoge’ Sitzungsberichte der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse, 1912, vol. 169, 3, pp. 1-235; Platos Jugenddialoge und die Entstehungszeit des Phaidros, Leipzig, B.G. Teubner. Cf. Hackforth, op. cit. pp. 3-7, Julius Tomin, ‘Plato’s First Dialogue’, Ancient Philosophy 17 (1997), pp. 31-45.
18. G.J. de Vries, A Commentary on the Phaedrus of Plato, Amsterdam 1969, pp. 15-
19. C.J. Rowe, Phaedrus, Aris&Philips, Warminster 1986, p. 215.
20. ‘Wahrlich ein hohes Lob, keine Spur von Ironie.’ U. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorf, Platon, 2nd ed. vol. ii. Berlin 1920, p. 122.
21. Hackforth p. 167.
22. Hackforth p. 168.
23. Tr. Norlin with a minor change. To bring to light the conceptual proximity and difference between Plato and Isocrates, I retain Isocrates’ term eudaemonia, which Norlin renders as ‘prosperity’.
24. Tr. Jowett, with a minor changes. Instead of Jowett’s ‘at a festival’ I substitute Plato’s ‘at a panegyris’, and instead of his ‘delightful’ for charientôs I substitute ‘charming’ in order to re-establish the conceptual interplay between Isocrates’ Panegyricus and Plato’s Republic.
25. In my text of the Antidosis I remarked ‘Duemmler’ on the margin. I studied Duemmler's works in the 1980s when I spent most of my days in the Bodleian Library. Now the Bodleian is out of my reach, allow me therefore to acknowledge my dept to Duemmler without a precise reference.
26. Wilamowitz says: ‘Versichern kann man nicht, dass der Phaidros die Wunde heilen will, die der Staat geshlagen hatte; unmoeglich ist es nicht.’ (‘One cannot be sure that the Phaedrus will heal the wound inflicted by the Republic; but it is not impossible.’) Wilamowitz, op. cit. p. 122, quoted by Hackworth p. 168, n. 2.
27. Tr. George Norlin.
28. Tr. C.J. Rowe.
29. The term ‘mobs’ has been felicitously chosen to render Plato’s ochlois by Terence Irwin in his translation of the Gorgias.
30. This derogatory reference to law-courts in the Gorgias is of considerable significance for its dating, for Plato would hardly have spoken in this manner of the law-courts, essential as they were in democracy, while his hopes of entering on a political career in Athens were still alive. In his Seventh Letter Plato intimates that even after the death of Socrates he did not completely abandon his hopes of a political career in Athens. He was approaching forty when he realized that there was no place for him within the framework of the Athenian political life and left Athens for his first journey to Sicily (SL 324a -326b), and the Gorgias is best seen as the first fruit of that realization.
31. Tr. C.J. Rowe.
32. Tr. C.J. Rowe.
33. See Isocrates, Antidosis 161.
34. See Lysias, Against Eratosthenes 18-20.
35. In Isocrates’ Against Ethynus we learn that Nicias, the plaintiff, deposited three talents with Euthynus during the reign of the Thirty Tyrants, in 404. When he wanted his money back, still during the reign of the oligarchs, fearing for his safety and wanting to leave Athens, Euthynus returned only two talents. Nicias sued him for the remaining deposit after the restoration of democracy, presumably as soon as the law-courts reopened, in 403. Among the titles of Lysias’ lost forensic speeches we have the titles For Euthynus (HUPER EUTHUNOU, frg. 38) and Against Nicias on the Deposit (PROS NIKIAN PERI PARAKATATHEKES), which belong to one and the same speech, as can be deduced from Isocrates’ Against Euthynus. (Cf. Larue van Hook, ‘Introduction’ to ‘Against Euthynus’ in Isocrates, LCT edition, London and Cambridge, 1968, vol. iii, p. 351; C. Eucken, Isokrates, Berlin 1983, pp. 160-1.)
36. Isocrates’ Against Euthynus has a subtitle Without Witnesses (Amarturos) and among the titles of Antisthenes we find Against Isocrates’ “Without Witnesses” (Pros ton Isokratous Amarturon). See Diog. Laert. VI. 15.
37. In Against Euthynus Isocrates did his best to apply the Phaedran principles of philosophic rhetoric with its emphasis on defining the subject-matter and then dividing the subject into its forms (eidê, Phdr. 265e1), which enables the rhetorician to manipulate the probabilities (ta eikota, Phdr. 272e3) so as to persuade the audience according to his wish (peithô hên an boulêi paradôsein, Phdr. 270b8-9). After briefly stating that Nicias gave three talents of silver in trust to Euthynus, of which Euthynus restored only two, denying that he had received the third, he points out that the transaction took place without witnesses, which means that the jury must decide on the basis of likelihood. What was more likely, he asks, Nicias entrusting Euthynus with three talents, recovering only too, and suing Euthynus for the third, or entrusting him with two talents and trying to gain a third talent by a false allegation? Isocrates then neatly delineates on the one hand the profile of a wrongdoer likely to misappropriate the deposit, and on the other a man likely to be wronged in this manner. He then maintains that Euthynus fits the former category, whereas Nicias, for whom he wrote the speech, fits the latter. He then argues that it is much more probable (hoti polu mallon eikos, XXI. 6) that Euthynus received the money and denied it than that Nicias did not entrust it to him and then entered the complaint pretending that he had.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, an ancient literary critic, can help us understand why Lysias’ speech prevailed. In his essay on Isocrates he says ‘I judged Lysias to be simpler in sentence-structure and Isocrates the more elaborate; the former more convincing in creating the illusion of truth (tês alêtheias pithanôteron eikastên), the latter the more powerful master of technique.’ (Dion. Halic. Critical Essays, LCL 1974, vol. i. p. 132, tr. S. Usher.) In his essay on Lysias Dionysius says that the persuasive powers of Lysias are such ‘that they smuggle conviction unnoticed past the listener’s senses. It is thus difficult to find a narrative that appears false and unconvincing, either in whole or in part, such is the persuasive charm of the story as he tells it’ (op. cit. p. 58).
38. Plato, Republic 469b8-c7, tr. B. Jowett.
39. Tr. G. Norlin.
40. Tr. C.J. Rowe.
41. G. Norlin notes on Panegyricus 8: ‘The author of the treatise On the Sublime, xxxviii, quotes this passage and condemns Isocrates’ “puerility” in thus dwelling on the power of rhetoric when leading up to the praise of Athens, and so arousing distrust of his sincerity. But the objection loses its force if Isocrates is here using what had become a conventionalised statement of the power of oratory.’ Norlin’s apology for Isocrates does not improve the matter, for in the Panegyricus Isocrates endeavours to be anything but conventional. Isocrates must have had a very powerful reasons for his reflections on oratory unrelated to his subject-matter, which on the conventional late dating of the Phaedrus are baffling and incomprehensible, but become obvious on the ancient dating of the Phaedrus as Plato’s first dialogue.
42. Tr. G. Norlin.
43. Tr. G. Norlin.
44. As I have argued in The Lost Plato (op. cit. ch. 12), I view the Cratylus as one of the first dialogues written after the death of Socrates.
45. In the dialogue Plato attributes this view to Cratylus, the fellow Heraclitean of his youth, but both the positive exposition of this view and its subsequent refutation are entirely the work of Plato’s Socrates. We know from Aristotle that Cratylus was a radical Heraclitean and that Plato associated with him and shared his views prior to becoming a follower of Socrates. See Aristotle, Metaphysics A, 987a32-33.
46. There is one significant difference between the programme of scientific rhetoric in the Phaedrus and the Cratylus: in the Phaedrus synthesis precedes analysis, in the Cratylus synthesis follows analysis. The reason for the precedence of synthesis in the Phaedrus is Socrates’ emphasis on definition, with which on his view every speech concerned with disputed terms ought to begin (263d, 264a4-c5):
‘First, there is perceiving together and bringing into one form (eis mian idean sunorônta agein) items that are scattered in many places (ta pollachêi diesparmena), in order that one can define each thing and make clear (hina hekaston horizomenos dêlon poiêi) whatever it is that one wishes to instruct one’s audience about on any occasion. Just so with the things said just now about love, about what it is when defined: whether it is right or wrong, the speech was able to say what was at any rate clear and self-consistent because of that.’ (265d3-7, tr. C.J. Rowe).
This method closely corresponds to the way in which Socrates’ pursued his philosophic discussions with those who opposed his views on moral or political issues (Xenophon, Memorabilia IV.vi.13-15), but it was abandoned by Plato in most of his writings. The only piece in the Phaedrus that corresponds to it is Socrates’ first speech on love; his second speech, the palinode, is very far from doing so. Plato is well aware of this, and so he tries to obfuscate the matter by speaking as if Socrates’ definition of love was shared by his two speeches as being common to both of them:
‘The two speeches took the unreasoning aspect of the mind (to aphron tês dianoias) as one form together (hen ti koinêi eidos), and just as a single body naturally has its parts in pairs, with both members of each pair having the same name, and labelled respectively left and right, so too the two speeches regarded derangement as naturally a single form in us, and the one cut off the part on the left-hand side, then cutting it again, and not giving up until it had found among the parts a love which is, as we say, ‘left-handed’, and abused it with full justice, while the other speech led us to the parts of madness (tês manias) on the right-hand side, and discovering and exhibiting a love which shares the same name as the other, but is divine, it praised it as cause of our greatest goods.’ (265e3-266b1, tr. C.J. Rowe).
The unreasoning aspect of the mind figures in the initial characterization of the lover, as the aspect which Lysias’ and Socrates’ rival speech were to share, and the way it pops up can hardly count as a definition (236a1). In the didactic proem to Socrates’ first speech love is defined as one of a number of bodily desires (epithumia tis, 237d3):
‘The irrational desire which has gained control over judgement which urges a man towards the right, borne towards pleasure in beauty, and which is forcefully reinforced by the desires related to it in its pursuit of bodily beauty, overcoming them in its course, and takes its name from its very force (rhômê) – this is called love (erôs).’ (238b7-c4, tr. C.J. Rowe).
This is not a definition that can in any way apply to the second speech. Love in the second speech is broached as a subdivision of madness given to us by god (mania theiai dosei didomenê) as the source of the greatest benefits (ta megista tôn agathôn hêmin gignetai dia manias, 244a6-8). Again, this is not a definition. The term ‘madness’ (mania) is indeed introduced towards the end of the first speech as a characteristic of the lover (241a4), but the way it is introduced cannot count as definition. The term is put forward when the lover sobers up: ‘he adopts a different ruler and master, sense and sanity (noun kai sôphrosunên) in place of love and madness’ (ant’ erôtos kai manias, 241a3-4). In the second speech anything that very vaguely approximates a definition of love comes in its very middle. At 250a Socrates begins to describe the state in which a philosopher-lover finds himself face to face with the beauty of his beloved boy, his soul all excited. At 252b he at last comes to identifying the state in which he finds himself as love: ‘This experience (touto to pathos), my beautiful boy, the one to whom my speech is addressed, men term love’ (anthrôpoi erôta onomazousin, 252b1-3, tr. C.J. Rowe).
47. Cf. the Phaedrus with its depiction of the written word as deprived of motion and remaining always the same (Phdr. 275d-e).
48. Tr. G. Norlin.
49. Tr. G. Norlin.
50. See note v.
51. See Julius Tomin, ‘Plato’s First Dialogue’, op.cit. p. 41, and the Preface, Introduction, and Chapter 1 in The Lost Plato, op. cit.
52. J. Adam in The Republic of Plato (Cambridge 1902, repr. 1969) in his note ad loc. says, with reference to Teichmueller and Spengel, that Plato here replies to Isocrates’ Against the Sophist 8, and that this retort is the more telling because Isocrates aspired to the name philosophos.
Volume 2 Chapter 1 Plato Versus Isocrates
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