Alcibiades I | Page 6

their definite form, and to their inimitable excellence. The three
dialogues which we have offered in the Appendix to the criticism of the
reader may be partly spurious and partly genuine; they may be
altogether spurious;--that is an alternative which must be frankly
admitted. Nor can we maintain of some other dialogues, such as the
Parmenides, and the Sophist, and Politicus, that no considerable
objection can be urged against them, though greatly overbalanced by
the weight (chiefly) of internal evidence in their favour. Nor, on the
other hand, can we exclude a bare possibility that some dialogues
which are usually rejected, such as the Greater Hippias and the
Cleitophon, may be genuine. The nature and object of these
semi-Platonic writings require more careful study and more comparison
of them with one another, and with forged writings in general, than
they have yet received, before we can finally decide on their character.
We do not consider them all as genuine until they can be proved to be
spurious, as is often maintained and still more often implied in this and
similar discussions; but should say of some of them, that their
genuineness is neither proven nor disproven until further evidence
about them can be adduced. And we are as confident that the Epistles
are spurious, as that the Republic, the Timaeus, and the Laws are

genuine.
On the whole, not a twentieth part of the writings which pass under the
name of Plato, if we exclude the works rejected by the ancients
themselves and two or three other plausible inventions, can be fairly
doubted by those who are willing to allow that a considerable change
and growth may have taken place in his philosophy (see above). That
twentieth debatable portion scarcely in any degree affects our judgment
of Plato, either as a thinker or a writer, and though suggesting some
interesting questions to the scholar and critic, is of little importance to
the general reader.
ALCIBIADES I
by
Plato (see Appendix I above)
Translated by Benjamin Jowett
INTRODUCTION.
The First Alcibiades is a conversation between Socrates and Alcibiades.
Socrates is represented in the character which he attributes to himself in
the Apology of a know-nothing who detects the conceit of knowledge
in others. The two have met already in the Protagoras and in the
Symposium; in the latter dialogue, as in this, the relation between them
is that of a lover and his beloved. But the narrative of their loves is told
differently in different places; for in the Symposium Alcibiades is
depicted as the impassioned but rejected lover; here, as coldly receiving
the advances of Socrates, who, for the best of purposes, lies in wait for
the aspiring and ambitious youth.
Alcibiades, who is described as a very young man, is about to enter on
public life, having an inordinate opinion of himself, and an extravagant
ambition. Socrates, 'who knows what is in man,' astonishes him by a
revelation of his designs. But has he the knowledge which is necessary
for carrying them out? He is going to persuade the Athenians--about

what? Not about any particular art, but about politics--when to fight
and when to make peace. Now, men should fight and make peace on
just grounds, and therefore the question of justice and injustice must
enter into peace and war; and he who advises the Athenians must know
the difference between them. Does Alcibiades know? If he does, he
must either have been taught by some master, or he must have
discovered the nature of them himself. If he has had a master, Socrates
would like to be informed who he is, that he may go and learn of him
also. Alcibiades admits that he has never learned. Then has he enquired
for himself? He may have, if he was ever aware of a time when he was
ignorant. But he never was ignorant; for when he played with other
boys at dice, he charged them with cheating, and this implied a
knowledge of just and unjust. According to his own explanation, he had
learned of the multitude. Why, he asks, should he not learn of them the
nature of justice, as he has learned the Greek language of them? To this
Socrates answers, that they can teach Greek, but they cannot teach
justice; for they are agreed about the one, but they are not agreed about
the other: and therefore Alcibiades, who has admitted that if he knows
he must either have learned from a master or have discovered for
himself the nature of justice, is convicted out of his own mouth.
Alcibiades rejoins, that the Athenians debate not about what is just, but
about what is expedient; and he asserts that the two principles of justice
and expediency are opposed. Socrates, by a series of questions,
compels him to