THE PLATONIC DIALOGUES FOR ENGLISH READERS. BY WILLIAM WHEWELL, D. D. VOL. I. DIALOGUES OF THE SOCRATIC SCHOOL, AND DIALOGUES REFERRING TO THE TRIAL OT ODLE MACMILLAN AND CO. Cambridge: AND 23, HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, LONDON. PREFACE. THE object of the following Translations and Remarks is to make the Dialogues of Plato intelligible to the English reader. But I would not have it understood from this that I have altered the substance or the drama of these Dialogues with a view of rendering them more popular. I have given both the matter and the manner with all fidelity, except in so far as I have abridged several parts, in order to avoid prolix and obscure passages. And I can venture to say that my task (including translations of most of the other Platonic Dialogues as well as of those given in this volume) has not been lightly executed. It has been a labour of many years; each part has been gone over again and again; and if I have been led in many cases to views of the purport of these Dialogues different from the views which have been put forth by modern Translators and Commentators, I have tried to give my reasons for my interpretation, and have discussed the interpretations proposed by others. To those who have been accustomed to the usual style of commenting upon the Platonic Dialogues, I shall probably appear, especially in the earlier Dialogues of this series, to see in Plato a less profound philosophy than has been commonly ascribed to him. But I hope the reader will find in the Dialogues themselves, as here presented, and in their connexion with each other, a justification of my views as to the purpose and object of the arguments used. In every part my rule has been to take what seemed the direct and natural import of the Dialogue as its true meaning. Some of the Commentators are in the habit of extracting from Plato doctrines obliquely implied rather than directly asserted: indeed they sometimes seem to ascribe to their Plato an irony so profound, that it makes no difference, in any special case, whether he asserts a proposition or its opposite. I have taken a different course, and have obtained, as I think, a more consistent result. Among the Commentators from whom I have derived most assistance, I must mention Socher, many of whose views and arguments I have adopted without special acknowledgment. The reader may desire to have some notice how far the process of abridgment has been allowed to interfere with full translation. I think that the usual marks of quotation which accompany the translation, compared with their absence, and with the numbers of the abridged Sections which are placed in the margin, will give sufficient indications on this point. Three or four of the Dialogues here given have been asserted to be spurious by some modern Commentators. I have, in the appended Remarks, given my reasons for thinking that doubts of the genuineness of these Dialogues have been raised in many cases without any good foundation, and sometimes with great levity. At any rate, the Dialogues so attacked are parts of the Platonic literature which has delighted the world for ages; and it seems a very wild process to assume a plurality of Platos without strong reasons. In the Translation of the Phaedo and in the accompanying Remarks I have considered the force of the arguments as well as the drama of the Dialogue. That great subject, the immortality of the human soul, cannot be approached without calling up thoughts too serious to be dealt with as mere points of scholarship; and some recently published remarks on the subject appeared to require notice. If the present volume should find favour in the eyes of the public, I shall be tempted to publish others of the Platonic Dialogues in the same manner. |