| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Alcibiades I by Plato: know ourselves, we cannot know what belongs to ourselves or belongs to
others, and are unfit to take a part in political affairs. Both for the
sake of the individual and of the state, we ought to aim at justice and
temperance, not at wealth or power. The evil and unjust should have no
power,--they should be the slaves of better men than themselves. None but
the virtuous are deserving of freedom.
And are you, Alcibiades, a freeman? 'I feel that I am not; but I hope,
Socrates, that by your aid I may become free, and from this day forward I
will never leave you.'
The Alcibiades has several points of resemblance to the undoubted dialogues
of Plato. The process of interrogation is of the same kind with that which
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Les Miserables by Victor Hugo: the death penalty? Italians, with you as with us, Beccaria is dead
and Farinace is alive. And then, let us scrutinize your state reasons.
Have you a government which comprehends the identity of morality
and politics? You have reached the point where you grant amnesty
to heroes! Something very similar has been done in France.
Stay, let us pass miseries in review, let each one contribute
his pile, you are as rich as we. Have you not, like ourselves,
two condemnations, religious condemnation pronounced by the priest,
and social condemnation decreed by the judge? Oh, great nation of Italy,
thou resemblest the great nation of France! Alas! our brothers,
you are, like ourselves, Miserables.
Les Miserables |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Charmides by Plato: 'Theaetetus,' the 'Sophist,' and the 'Politicus;' Professor Thompson's
'Phaedrus;' Th. Martin's 'Etudes sur le Timee;' Mr. Poste's edition and
translation of the 'Philebus;' the Translation of the 'Republic,' by
Messrs. Davies and Vaughan, and the Translation of the 'Gorgias,' by Mr.
Cope.
I have also derived much assistance from the great work of Mr. Grote, which
contains excellent analyses of the Dialogues, and is rich in original
thoughts and observations. I agree with him in rejecting as futile the
attempt of Schleiermacher and others to arrange the Dialogues of Plato into
a harmonious whole. Any such arrangement appears to me not only to be
unsupported by evidence, but to involve an anachronism in the history of
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