"For it is a thing," he writes to the Kindred and Friends of Dion, "altogether correct and honorable for him who aspires after things the most honorable, both to himself and his country, to suffer whatever he may suffer; for not one of us is naturally immortal; nor if this should happen to any one would he become happy, as it seems he would to the multitude. For in things inanimate there is nothing either good or evil worthy of mention, but good or ill will happen to each soul, either existing with the body, or separated from it. But it is ever requisite to trust really to the sacred accounts of the olden times, which inform us that the soul is immortal, and has judges of its conduct, and suffers the greatest punishments when liberated from the body. Hence, it is requisite to think it is a lesser evil to suffer, than to commit the greatest sins and injuries."
• • • • •
"And I should have felt more justly against those who murdered Dion, an anger, in a certain manner, almost as great as against Dionysius; for both had injured myself and all the rest, so to say, in the highest degree. For the former had destroyed a man who was willing to make use of justice; while the latter was unwilling to make use of it through the whole of his dominions, although possessing the highest power. In which dominions had philosophy and power existed really, as it were, in the same dwelling, they would have set up amongst men, both Greeks and barbarians, an opinion not vainly shining, and in every respect the true one, that neither a state nor a man can ever be happy unless by leading a life with prudence in subjection to justice, whether possessing those things themselves, or by being brought up in the habits of holy persons, their rulers, or instructed in justice."
"This injury did Dionysius inflict. But the rest would have been a trifling wrong as compared to these. But he who murdered Dion did not know that he had done the same deed as Dionysius. For I clearly know, as far as possible for one man to speak confidently of another, that if Dion had attained power, he would never have changed it to any other form of government than to that by which he first caused Syracuse, his own country, after he had delivered it from slavery, to look joyous, and had put it into the garb of freedom; and after all this, he would by every contrivance have adorned the citizens with laws both befitting and best; and he would have been ready to do what followed in due order after this, and have colonized the whole of Sicily, and have freed it from the barbarians, by expelling some and subduing others, more easily than Hiero did. But if these things had taken place through a man just, brave, and temperate, and who was a philosopher, the same opinion of virtue would have been produced amongst the multitude, as would have been amongst all men, so to say, and have saved Dionysius, had he been persuaded by me. But now some dæmon, surely, or some evil spirit, falling upon with iniquity and impiety, and what is the greatest matter, with the audacity of ignorance, in which all evils are rooted, and from which they spring up, and afterwards produce fruit the most bitter to those who have begotten it,—this has a second time subverted and destroyed everything. However, let us, for the sake of a good augury, keep for the third time a well-omened silence."[15]
One sees the noble spirit of Plato in these passages, and feels how the death of his friend and pupil, Dion, at the moment when he had won the freedom of his country, and a sphere for proving his master's ideas in its rule, must have affected Plato, and the friends of Dion. If doubts have been entertained as to the genuineness of these letters, it is plain they were written by some intimate friend of his, or of Dion, and have the merit, at least, of historical accuracy and evidence.
PLATO.[16]
It was a common speech among the Athenians, that Apollo begat Æsculapius and Plato,—the one to cure bodies, the other, souls. Certainly the last was of divine extraction; his life and thoughts fruitful in genius and immortality. Like other superior persons, his birth is traced to a divine ancestry, and dignified with fables. His mother, Perictione, was a descendant of Solon, and a woman of extraordinary beauty. Aristo, his father, was of an eminent family. To him Apollo appeared in a dream, enjoining upon him respect for his wife's maternity; and, in accordance with the vision, it was affirmed,—
"He did not issue from a mortal bed;