These forced interpretations are resorted to, because the critics cannot bear to see the Platonic Sokrates maintaining a thesis substantially the same as that of Eudoxus and Epikurus. Upon this point, K. F. Hermann is more moderate than the others; he admits the thesis to be seriously maintained in the dialogue — states that it was really the opinion of the historical Sokrates — and adds that it was also the opinion of Plato himself during his early Sokratic stadium, when the Protagoras (as he thinks) was composed (Gesch. und Syst. der Plat. Phil. pp. 462-463).
Most of the critics agree in considering the Protagoras to be one of Plato’s earlier dialogues, about 403 B.C. Ast even refers it to 407 B.C. when Plato was about twenty-one years of age. I have already given my reasons for believing that none of the Platonic dialogues were composed before 399 B.C. The Protagoras belongs, in my opinion, to Plato’s most perfect and mature period.
Grounds of that doctrine. Their insufficiency.
The commentators resort to this hypothesis, partly because the doctrine in question is one which they disapprove — partly because doctrines inconsistent with it are maintained in other Platonic dialogues. These are the same two reasons upon which, in other cases, various dialogues have been rejected as not genuine works of Plato. The first of the two reasons is plainly irrelevant: we must accept what Plato gives us, whether we assent to it or not. The second reason also, I think, proves little. The dialogues are distinct compositions, written each with its own circumstances and purpose: we have no right to require that they shall be all consistent with each other in doctrine, especially when we look to the long philosophical career of Plato. To suppose that the elaborate reasoning of Sokrates in the latter portion of the Protagoras is mere irony, intended to mystify both Protagoras himself and all the by-standers, who accept it as earnest and convincing — appears to me far less reasonable than the admission, that the dialectic pleading ascribed to Sokrates in one dialogue is inconsistent with that assigned to him in another.
Subject is professedly still left unsettled at the close of the dialogue.
Though there is every mark of seriousness, and no mark of irony, in this reasoning of Sokrates, yet we must remember that he does not profess to leave the subject settled at the close of the dialogue. On the contrary, he declares himself to be in a state of puzzle and perplexity. The question, proposed at the outset, Whether virtue is teachable? remains undecided.
CHAPTER XXIV.
GORGIAS.
Persons who debate in the Gorgias. Celebrity of the historical Gorgias.