[58] Timæus said that Alexander the Great conquered the Persian empire in less time than Isokrates required for the composition of his panegyrical oration (Longinus, De Sublim. c. 4).
[59] “Als aesthetisches Kunstwerk ist der Dialog Protagoras das meisterhafteste unter den Werken Platon’s.” (Socher, Ueber Platon, p. 226.)
But over and above this presumption, there are other reasons which induce me to believe, that none of the Platonic dialogues were published during the lifetime of Sokrates. My reasons are partly connected with Sokrates, partly with Plato.
Reasons founded on the personality of Sokrates, and his relations with Plato.
First, in reference to Sokrates — we may reasonably doubt whether any written reports of his actual conversations were published during his lifetime. He was the most constant, public, and indiscriminate of all talkers: always in some frequented place, and desiring nothing so much as a respondent with an audience. Every one who chose to hear him, might do so without payment and with the utmost facility. Why then should any one wish to read written reports of his conversations? especially when we know that the strong interest which they excited in the hearers depended much upon the spontaneity of his inspirations, and hardly less upon the singularity of his manner and physiognomy. Any written report of what he said must appear comparatively tame. Again, as to fictitious dialogues (like the Platonic) employing the name of Sokrates as spokesman — such might doubtless be published during his lifetime by derisory dramatists for the purpose of raising a laugh, but not surely by a respectful disciple and admirer for the purpose of giving utterance to doctrines of his own. The greater was the respect felt by Plato for Sokrates, the less would he be likely to take the liberty of making Sokrates responsible before the public for what Sokrates had never said.[60] There is a story in Diogenes — to the effect that Sokrates, when he first heard the Platonic dialogue called Lysis, exclaimed — “What a heap of falsehoods does the young man utter about me!”[61] This story merits no credence as a fact: but it expresses the displeasure which Sokrates would be likely to feel, on hearing that one of his youthful companions had dramatised him as he appears in the Lysis. Xenophon tells us, and it is very probable, that inaccurate oral reports of the real colloquies of Sokrates may have got into circulation. But that the friends and disciples of Sokrates, during his lifetime, should deliberately publish fictitious dialogues, putting their own sentiments into his mouth, and thus contribute to mislead the public — is not easily credible. Still less credible is it that Plato, during the lifetime of Sokrates, should have published such a dialogue as the Phædrus, wherein we find ascribed to Sokrates, poetical and dithyrambic effusions utterly at variance with the real manifestations which Athenians might hear every day from Sokrates in the market-place.[62] Sokrates in the Platonic Apology, complains of the comic poet Aristophanes for misrepresenting him. Had the Platonic Phædrus been then in circulation, or any other Platonic dialogues, he might with equally good reason have warned the Dikasts against judging of him, a real citizen on trial, from the titular Sokrates whom even disciples did not scruple to employ as spokesman for their own transcendental doctrine, and their own controversial sarcasms.
[60] Valentine Rose observes, in regard to a dialogue composed by some one else, wherein Plato was introduced as one of the interlocutors, that it could not have been composed until after Plato’s death, and that the dialogues of Plato were not composed until after the death of Sokrates. “Platonis autem sermones antequam mortuus fuerit, scripto neminem tradidisse, neque magistri viventis personâ in dialogis abusos fuisse (non magis quam vivum Socratem induxerunt Xenophon, Plato, cæteri Socratici), hoc veterum mori et religioni quivis facile concedet,” &c. (V. Rose, Aristoteles Pseudepigraphus, pp. 57, 74, Leipsic, 1863.) — Val. Rose expresses the same opinion (that none of the Sokratic dialogues, either by Plato or the other companions of Sokrates, were written until after the death of Sokrates) in his earlier work, De Aristotelis Librorum Ordine et Auctoritate, p. 25.
[61] Diog. L. iii. 35.
[62] In regard to the theory (elaborated by Schleiermacher, recently again defended by Volquardsen), that the Phædrus is the earliest among the Platonic dialogues, composed about 406 B.C., it appears to me inconsistent also with what we know about Lysias. In the Platonic Phædrus, Lysias is presented as a λογογράφος of the highest reputation and eminence (p. 228 A, 257 C, and indeed throughout the whole dialogue). Now this is quite inconsistent with what we read from Lysias himself in the indictment which he preferred against Eratosthenes, not long after the restoration of the democracy, 403 B.C. He protests therein strenuously that he had never had judicial affairs of his own, nor meddled with those of others; and he expresses the greatest apprehension from his own ἀπειρία (sects. 4-6). I cannot believe that this would be said by a person whom Phædrus terms δεινότατος ὣν τῶν νῦν γράφειν. Moreover, Lysias, in that same discourse, describes his own position at Athens, anterior to the Thirty: he belonged to a rich metic family, and was engaged along with his brother Polemarchus in a large manufactory of shields, employing 120 slaves (s. 20). A person thus rich and occupied was not likely to become a professed and notorious λογογράφος, though he may have been a clever and accomplished man. Lysias was plundered and impoverished by the Thirty; and he is said to have incurred much expense in aiding the efforts of Thrasybulus. It was after this change of circumstances that he took to rhetoric as a profession; and it is to some one of these later years that the Platonic Phædrus refers.
Reasons, founded on the early life, character, and position of Plato.
Secondly, in regard to Plato, the reasons leading to the same conclusion are yet stronger. Unfortunately, we know little of the life of Plato before he attained the age of 28, that is, before the death of Sokrates: but our best means of appreciating it are derived from three sources. 1. Our knowledge of the history of Athens from 409-399 B.C., communicated by Thucydides, Xenophon, &c. 2. The seventh Epistle of Plato himself, written four or five years before his death (about 352 B.C.). 3. A few hints from the Memorabilia of Xenophon.