The Euthydêmus may be earlier or may be later than the Phædrus. I incline to think it later. The opinion of Stallbaum (resting upon the mention of Alkibiadês, p. 275 A), that it was composed in or before 404 B.C., appears to me untenable (Stallbaum, Proleg. p. 64). Plato would not be likely to introduce Sokrates speaking of Alkibiadês as a deceased person, whatever time the dialogue was composed. Nor can I agree with Steinhart, who refers it to 402 B.C. (Einleitung, p. 26). Ueberweg (Untersuch. über die Zeitfolge der Plat. Schr. pp. 265-267) considers the Euthydêmus later (but not much later) than the Phædrus, subsequent to the establishment of the Platonic school at Athens (387-386 B.C.) This seems to me more probable than the contrary.
Schleiermacher, in arranging the Platonic dialogues, ranks the Euthydêmus as an immediate sequel to the Menon, and as presupposing both Gorgias and Theætêtus (Einl. pp. 400-401). Socher agrees in this opinion, but Steinhart rejects it (Einleit. p. 26), placing the Euthydêmus immediately after the Protagoras, and immediately before the Menon and the Gorgias; according to him, Euthydêmus, Menon, and Gorgias, form a well marked Trilogy.
Neither of these arrangements rests upon any sufficient reasons. The chronological order cannot be determined.
Variable feeling at different times, between Plato and Isokrates.
That there prevailed at different times different sentiments, more or less of reciprocal esteem or reciprocal jealousy, between Plato and Isokrates, ought not to be matter of surprise. Both of them were celebrated teachers of Athens, each in his own manner, during the last forty years of Plato’s life: both of them enjoyed the favour of foreign princes, and received pupils from outlying, sometimes distant, cities — from Bosphorus and Cyprus in the East, and from Sicily in the West. We know moreover that during the years immediately preceding Plato’s death (347 B.C.), his pupil Aristotle, then rising into importance as a teacher of rhetoric, was engaged in acrimonious literary warfare, seemingly of his own seeking, with Isokrates (then advanced in years) and some of the Isokratean pupils. The little which we learn concerning the literary and philosophical world of Athens, represents it as much distracted by feuds and jealousies. Isokrates on his part has in his compositions various passages which appear to allude (no name being mentioned) to Plato among others, in a tone of depreciation.[75]
[75] Isokrates, ad Philipp. Or. v. s. 14, p. 84; contra Sophistas, Or. xiii.; Or. xiii. s. 2-24, pp. 291-295; Encom. Helenæ, Or. x. init.; Panathenaic. Or. xii. s. 126, p. 257; Or. xv. De Permutatione, s. 90, p. 440, Bekk.
Isokrates seems, as far as we can make out, to have been in early life, like Lysias, a composer of speeches to be spoken by clients in the Dikastery. This lucrative profession was tempting, since his family had been nearly ruined during the misfortunes of Athens at the close of the Peloponnesian war. Having gained reputation by such means, Isokrates became in his mature age a teacher of Rhetoric, and a composer of discourses, not for private use by clients, but for the general reader, on political or educational topics. In this character, he corresponded to the description given by Plato in the Euthydêmus: being partly a public adviser, partly a philosopher. But the general principle under which Plato here attacks him, though conforming to the doctrine of the Platonic Republic, is contrary to that of Plato in other dialogues, “You must devote yourself either wholly to philosophy, or wholly to politics: a mixture of the two is worse than either“ — this agrees with the Republic, wherein Plato enjoins upon each man one special and exclusive pursuit, as well as with the doctrine maintained against Kalliklês in the Gorgias — but it differs from the Phædrus, where he ascribes the excellence of Perikles as a statesmen and rhetor, to the fact of his having acquired a large tincture of philosophy.[76] Cicero quotes this last passage as applicable to his own distinguished career, a combination of philosophy with politics.[77] He dissented altogether from the doctrine here laid down by Plato in the Euthydêmus, and many other eminent men would have dissented from it also.
[76] See the facts about Isokrates in a good Dissertation by H. P. Schröder, Utrecht, 1859, Quæstiones Isocrateæ, p. 51, seq.
Plato, Phædrus, p. 270; Plutarch, Periklês, c. 23; Plato, Republic, iii. p. 397.
[77] Cicero, De Orator. iii. 34, 138; Orator. iv. 14; Brutus, 11, 44.