“You all seem to me to understand, Athenians, that it is better to make a just peace than to keep going to war. But you do not perceive that politicians agree to peace in name but they oppose the acts that foster it. For they claim that, once peace is achieved, there is the greatest peril for the people that the current regime may be dissolved.
Therefore, if the people of the Athenians had never made peace before with the Lakedaimonians, we might rightly fear this because of inexperience of the process or distrust for them. Since you have often made peace with them previously when you were already ruled as a democracy, how would it not be right for you to first examine the things that happened before. For, it is right, Athenians, to use prior events as a guide about what will happen in the future.”
ὡς ἔστι δεινότατον… Smyth §2224 δεινός εἰμι functions grammatically as an expression of fear, triggering the fear clause postponed to the end of the sentence (μὴ καταλυθῇ)
M. Cornelius Fronto to Marcus Aurelius (c. 139 CE)
“I believe that a lack of experience and learning is completely preferable in all arts to partial experience and incomplete education. For one who knows that he has no experience in an art tries less and fails less thanks to that. In fact, such hesitation limits arrogance. But whenever anyone uses knowing something lightly as expertise he makes many mistakes because of false confidence.
So, people claim that it is better to never taste Philosophy than to sample it lightly, as it is said, with just the lips. Those men turn out to be the most malicious kind, who travel to a discipline’s entrance and turn away rather than going completely inside. It is still possible in other arts that you can play a part for a while and seem experienced in what you do not know. But in how to choose and arrange words, one shines through immediately when he cannot provide any words but those that show his ignorance of them, that he judges them poorly, provides them rashly, and cannot know either their usage or their strength.”
1. Omnium artium, ut ego arbitror, imperitum et indoctum omnino esse praestat quam semiperitum ac semidoctum. Nam qui sibi conscius est artis expertem esse minus adtemptat, eoque minus praecipitat; diffidentia profecto audaciam prohibet. At ubi quis leviter quid cognitum pro comperto | ostentat, falsa fiducia multifariam labitur. Philosophiae quoque disciplinas aiunt satius esse numquam adtigisse quam leviter et primoribus, ut dicitur, labiis delibasse, eosque provenire malitiosissimos, qui in vestibulo artis obversati prius inde averterint quam penetraverint. Tamen est in aliis artibus ubi interdum delitescas et peritus paulisper habeare quod nescias. In verbis vero eligendis conlocandisque ilico dilucet, nec verba dare diu quis1 potest, quin se ipse indicet verborum ignarum esse, eaque male probare et temere existimare et inscie contrectare, neque modum neque pondus verbi internosse.
Andries Cornelis Lens, “Hercules Protects Painting from Ignorance and Envy” 1763
“But when each of them were lined up with their leaders,
The Trojans went forward with screeching and cries just like birds,
With the sound like the call of cranes high in the sky,
Those birds that flee the winter and its endless rain
And fly with a cry over the ocean’s streams
Bringing death and murder to the Pygmies.
The Achaeans went forward exhaling rage in silence,
Eager in their heart to stand in defense of one another.”
Mackie, Hilary Susan. Talking Trojan: speech and community in the Iliad. Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Lanham (Md.): Rowman and Littlefield, 1996.
Muellner, Leonard Charles. “The simile of the cranes and Pygmies : a study of Homeric metaphor.” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, vol. XCIII, 1990, pp. 59-101.
Ross, Shawn A. “Barbarophonos: Language and Panhellenism in the Iliad.” Classical Philology 100, no. 4 (2005): 299–316. https://doi.org/10.1086/500434.
“I would wish, men of the jury, that I might possess a power of speech and experience of events equal both to my misfortune and the events that occurred. But now I have experienced the latter beyond what is fitting and I lack more of the former than is advantageous. When it was necessary that I endure physical suffering because of the unjustified charge, experience didn’t help me at all; and since it is necessary now that I tell you want happened truthfully, my limited speaking ability undermines me. For many of those who are bad at speaking are disbelieved regarding the truth and they perish because of this, because they cannot make the true events clear. But many people who can speak well are credible by lying and save themselves in that way, because they lied! Therefore, whenever someone has no experience in speaking publicly, his challenge is more the words of his accusers than the events themselves and the truth of the matter.
I would, then, ask you, men, not what many of those who go to court ask for, to be heard, these men who don’t trust themselves and who believe something unjust about you beforehand—for it is right that a defendant will get a fair hearing among good men without asking for it since even the prosecution obtains this without asking—No, I need these things from you. If I make a mistake in my speech, pardon me and take it more as inexperience than a deliberate injustice. If I say something correctly, assume it spoken truly rather than cleverly. For it is not right that the one who does wrong in deed be saved through speech any more than it is that the one who has done rightly in deed perish through speech.
A word is a slip of the tongue, but a deed is an error in judgment. Someone in danger necessarily makes some mistakes. For he not only is forced to think about what has been said, but about what will happen, since all the things that may still happen are subject to chance for than to good planning. This is why someone in danger is out of sorts. For I also see people very familiar with talking in public speaking much worse about themselves whenever they are in danger. When they act without any danger, they speak more correctly.”
This post is a continuation of my substack on the Iliad. All proceeds from the substack are donated to classics adjacent non-profits on a monthly basis. This post is a diversion from the Iliad, but not one that is unrelated to the Iliad
Anachronism can be a major obstacle for engaging with ancient texts. Often readers will object to certain interpretations of Homer because the frameworks applied center values or ideas that are more at home to our contemporary concerns than what we can say with certainty about epic and its audiences. While reader response approaches can countermand such complaints, there are some claims that can be a little more challenging to answer.
This is especially the case when it comes to modern interests in emotion, affect, and psychology. As some of my recent posts have emphasized, there is a bit of a sketchy history when it comes to continuities in human expression and experiences over time. (Most grievous is the insistence on a particular type of progressive movement from unintegrated selves to a modern ‘whole and complicated person). My stance has long been that human minds (and bodies) have not changed since the time of Homeric audiences—the primary change is how people talk and understand the way their minds and bodies work (and in connection with each other). Even in the same century, from one culture to another, the way we communicate and characterize minds, bodies and communities can change radically and can have a resulting impact on the way people think about minds, bodies, and groups.
I have talked about this some in my post about Historical Psychology, but in recent comment on scholarship I noted that some times people talk about ideas of agency and selfhood in one epic without thinking about the other. My basic view is that the epics are complementary in their construction of how a human mind works (and doesn’t) in the world. Almost everything I write about the Iliad is now influenced by my thoughts about how the poem anticipates and shapes audience responses and how these responses are based on implicit models of cognition, narrative, and emotion. From the epic’s first conflict to its final, albeit brief resolution, the Iliad is invested in testing ways of thinking about thinking, of how stories shape thought and action, and how understanding the way people’ ‘work’ can change the way we treat one another. Indeed, if my time on this earth is long enough, I hope to write a book about how the Iliad itself offers a model of humanization through narrative and recognition.
But that’s about the future: this post is in part about what takes us there. I am teaching a course called “The Homeric Odyssey and the Human Mind” (virtually) for Roundtable at the 92nd Y starting on October 17th. It will be three sessions. Here’s the description from Roundtable:
This three-part course on Homer’s Odyssey builds on the ancient tradition of reading Homeric epics, but with a twist. Instead of focusing merely on the narrative, you’ll be guided through this complex ancient Greek poem with an emphasis on how modern psychological concepts are reflected in its “theory of mind” — and on how Homeric narrative positions storytelling both as a therapeutic treatment for and a potential cause of maladies of the mind. Your expert guide will be Joel Christensen, Professor of Classical and Mediterranean Studies at Brandeis University. In addition to articles and books on early Greek poetry and myth, he is the author of The Many-Minded Man: the Odyssey, Psychology, and the Therapy of Epic.
By drawing on modern cognitive science and clinical psychology, Christensen will help you see TheOdyssey the way ancient readers did — as allegory or metaphor, and as a narrative that offers insight into the nature of the universe, the character of the gods, and the fundamental challenges of the human condition.
The story of Odysseus’ wanderings after the fall of Troy has long enchanted audiences with its themes of journey and homecoming, and is especially attractive to modern readers interested in its exploration of identity and what it means to be a person. Join us to discover how the plot of The Odyssey also creates a framework for thinking about human decision-making and the relationship between individuals and their communities. Professor Christensen would like to use Emily Wilson’s acclaimed translation of The Odyssey.
As a one-time resident of NYC, I know the 92nd Y is a legendary community venue, so it was easy for me to say yes when they invited me to share work from the Odyssey. Don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions about this course or its contents. Registration for the course is open now.
If by chance nature or the power of one’s outstanding genius fails them, or if they are less instructed in the studies of the great arts, let them nevertheless hold the course that they can, for it’s an honorable thing for someone chasing first to rest content with second or third. For among the poets (if I might speak of the Greeks) there isn’t just room for Homer alone or Archilochus or Sophocles or Pindar, but also for people who are of second rank (or even lower) to them. The copiousness of Plato’s work did not deter Aristotle from philosophy, nor did Aristotle, with his admirable knowledge and abundance, put out the flame of others’ studies.
Quod si quem aut natura sua [aut] illa praestantis ingeni vis forte deficiet aut minus instructus erit magnarum artium disciplinis, teneat tamen eum cursum quem poterit; prima enim sequentem honestum est in secundis tertiisque consistere. Nam in poetis non Homero soli locus est, ut de Graecis loquar, aut Archilocho aut Sophocli aut Pindaro, sed horum vel secundis vel etiam infra secundos; nec vero Aristotelem in philosophia deterruit a scribendo amplitudo Platonis, nec ipse Aristoteles admirabili quadam scientia et copia ceterorum studia restinxit.
This post is a continuation of my substack on the Iliad. All proceeds from the substack are donated to classics adjacent non-profits on a monthly basis.
In my earlier posts on the second book of the Iliad, I wrote in general terms about the structure of the book and in specific about the treatment of Thersites during the political scene. If I have to convey one thematic point about book 2 it is this: book 2 is both a political and a poetic response to the rupture of book 1. It features the Greeks attempting to reunify their coalition after Achilles’ apostasy at the beginning of the epic and then resets the narrative by taking us to the beginning of the Trojan War. Here’s how I would break down the structure of the book.
A Political Theme: Reunifying the Greeks 1-484
Zeus’ False Dream, Agamemnon’s Council 1-84
Agamemnon’s Test 85-154
Hera’s Intervention through Odysseus 155-210
Thersites’ Scene 211-277
Odysseus’ Speech 278-333
Nestor’s Speech and Agamemnon’s Commands-395
Similes and Marshalling, 396-483
Poetics: Repositioning the Trojan War, 484-
Greek Catalog 484-785
Trojan Catalog 786-877
I have been thinking about the structure of this book and the scenes in the first half since my dissertation days, now two decades ago. The crucial thing thing about the first half is that there is a movement from a state of uncertainty into one of disorder that is than reshaped into one of greater order by the interventions of Odysseus and Nestor who stage-manage the conflict effectively to put Agamemnon into a position to retake the helm of war.
There are many interpretive issues about book 2: it starts with a false dream sent by Zeus to get Agamemnon to lead the Greeks into war, in part to satisfy Zeus’ local plan to honor Achilles by making the Greeks suffer. Of course, this also leads into the larger plan of the Trojan War, which is to lighten the burden of the race of heroes on the earth by killing them off through conflicts at Thebes and Troy. Final questions about the book circle around the poets of the Homeric narrator appealing to the Muses again, the compositional tension between a catalog that seems thematically and content-wise fit to the beginning of the war, poetic interest in the associative series of inset narratives associated with the catalog, and, finally, the strange, nearly afterthought nature of the Trojan Catalog.
But one initial question for the beginning of the book is what we are supposed to make of Agamemnon’s decision to test his troops. The Diapeira of Iliad 2 is often used as a touchstone for the epic’s characterization of Agamemnon. Ancient authors approve of his strategy. For one scholiast the test is an ancient custom (κατά τι παλαιὸν ἔθος) to see whether the Achaeans fight earnestly or compulsion (προθυμίᾳ ἤ ἀνάγκῃ;Schol. D Il. 2.73c ex. 2-4); another sees it motivated by a long campaign and Achilles’ revolt (Schol. bT Il. 2.73a ex. 1-1). Eustathius commends it as “good and strategic” (Comm. ad. Il. II. 285.14).
Although some critics have read the test as a mistake, they do not clarify why it is so in the epic’s terms. Thalmann (1988, p. 7-9) suggests that Agamemnon “intends a complex message” but his failure to articulate this “marks the disruption of the relations between king and people”. Russo and Knox (1989) argue that Agamemnon’s testing of the army is traditional and acceptable; see also McGlew 1989. Porter (2013, Chapter 4) argues that Agamemnon has miscalculated the reactions and the scene constitutes a reflection of his inept character.
But, as one might guess, I have a different take on this beginning. I think it is successful! But it takes a little bit of explaining why. One of the first things to (re)introduce are some basic ideas from speech act theory (which I have discussed before). J. L. Austin was one of the first philosophers to qualify as a “performative speech act” an utterance that in some way changes reality by effecting or amounting to an action. His examples were fairly limited: utterances like “I bet” or “I thee wed” are those that need no accompanying action or other act to suffice to have changed the relationship between the speaker and others (or among those subject to the speech) based on the context. Austin added more vocabulary to this: a felicitous speech act is one that obtains its outcome (and infelicitous is one that does not). Austin also helpfully distinguished between different kinds of outcomes: he calls the intended effect of a speech-act the illocutionary effect of the speaker and the actual outcome the perlocutionary effect. If we take the example of making a bet, an infelicitous “betting” would be one where the process or formula were wrong or either the speaker or the recipient did not have the contextual (social) standing to execute the speech act.
Essential to any analysis of what Agamemnon achieves is a reevaluation of what he actually proposes to the boulê of gerontes (2.72-75):
‘But come let us see if somehow we may arm the sons of the Achaeans. But first, I will test them with words, which is thémis, and I will order them to flee with the many-benched ships; but you, spread out and individually restrain them with words.
Agamemnon communicates an expectation (illocutionary force) for his speech’s (perlocutionary) effect. Agamemnon characterizes his speech without qualification as a command (κελεύσω): he will order the Achaeans to flee (φεύγειν). Furthermore, he expects the host to obey him since he orders the gerontes to restrain the host with words (ὑμεῖς δ’ ἄλλοθεν ἄλλος ἐρητύειν ἐπέεσσιν) These details imply that he really intends for them to (try to) flee.
To confirm this: When he speaks in front of the entire assembly, he is persuasive and vivid in his language. He paints a bleak picture of futility: he emphasizes divine deception while also using memorable language (repetitions, e.g. τοιόνδε τοσόνδε τε λαὸν, 120; alliterations, e.g. ἄπρηκτον πόλεμον πολεμίζειν, 121)[1] to activate cultural codes of shame for army’s failure (e.g δυσκλέα ῎Αργος ἱκέσθαι, 115; αἰσχρὸν γὰρ τόδε γ’ ἐστὶ καὶ ἐσσομένοισι πυθέσθαι, 119).
Achilles and Agamemnon, scene from Book I of the Iliad, Roman mosaic.
He initiates the speech by taking responsibility for destroying the host (ἐπεὶ πολὺν ὤλεσα λαόν, 115) and ends it by appealing to a collective desire to flee and thus save the host (140-141) In short, the speech appears wholly aimed at convincing the Achaean host to return home. To confirm the success of this endeavor, the audience hears similes comparing the army to waves of the sea pushed in different directions or fields of grain whirled asunder by wind attend the men from assembly to a mad dash to the ships (2.142-254).
The missing piece in analyzing this sequence is often what Agamemnon orders the captains to do: He enjoins them to respond to his speech and persuade the soldiers to prepare for war (ἀλλ’ ἄγετ’ αἴ κέν πως θωρήξομεν υἷας ᾿Αχαιῶν) and also to restrain the men when they panic (ὑμεῖς δ’ ἄλλοθεν ἄλλος ἐρητύειν ἐπέεσσιν). So, Agamemnon achieves his perlocution with the army (they flee) but somehow fails to secure obedience to his command to his council or, perhaps, is so persuasive in his feigned lament that his speech obtains the ‘infelicitous’ outcome of unnerving even the elders who are in on the game [see Cook (2003, p. 172): “The problem lies not with the plan, but its execution”].
From the perspective of the larger book, however, these orders are eventually realized: Odysseus gets everyone to sit down; he meets the challenge of Thersites’ dissent; Nestor and Odysseus give rousing speeches that reauthorize Agamemnon’s power; and the similes following Agamemnon’s orders reflect groups unified in a shared cause. By Agamemnon’s final speech, on the other hand, the Achaeans one wave raised to a mighty height against a jutting cliff by a single wind, 2.394-7. And, yet, despite this unity, the narrative leaves the impression that it was a close thing altogether: if not for the intervention of Athena and Hera, “the Achaeans would have obtained a homecoming against their fate”[3].
In a way, this sequence is a microcosm of the whole Iliad: we have interpretive indeterminacy, a confusion of divine and human agency, and overlapping motivations all within a frame of advancing an immediate plot (the rage of Achilles and breakdown in Achaean politics) within the more-or-less known arc of the larger Trojan War. The test as I have suggested elsewhere, is as much a challenge for the epic’s external audience as for those acting within the poem.
Dentice di Accadia Stefano, «La ‘Prova’ di Agamennone: Una Strategia Retorica Vincente», Rheinisches Museum für Philologie, nº 153, 2010, p. 225-246.
Austin J. L., How to Do Things With Words, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1975.
Barker E. T. E., «Achilles’ Last Stand: Institutionalising Dissent in Homer’s Iliad», PCPS nº 50, 2004, p. 92-120.
Barker E. T. E., Entering the Agôn: Dissent and Authority in Homer, Historiography and Tragedy, Oxford, 2009.
Clark Matthew, «Chryses’ Supplication: Speech Act and Mythological Allusion», Classical Antiquity, nº 17, 1997, p. 5-24.
Cook Erwin F., «Agamemnon’s Test of the Army in Iliad Book 2 and the Function of Homeric Akhos», American Journal of Philology, nº 124, 2003, p. 165-198.
Elmer David, The Poetics of Consent: Collective Decision Making and the Iliad, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins, 2013.
Gorman David, «The Use and Abuse of Speech-Act Theory in Criticism», Poetics Today nº 20, 1999, p. 93-119.
Hammer Dean, The Iliad as Politics: The Performance of Political Thought, Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, 2002.
Katzung P. G., Die Diapeira in der Iliashandlung, Dissertation, Frankfurt, 1960.
Knox Ronald and Russo Joseph, «Agamemnon’s Test: Iliad 2.73-5», Classical Antiquity nº 8, 1989, p. 351-358.
Kullman W. «Die Probe Des Achaierheerds in der Ilias», Museum Helveticum, nº 12, 1955, p. 253-273.
Lloyd Michael, «The Politeness of Achilles: Off-Record Conversation Strategies», Journal of Hellenic Studies nº 124, 2004, p. 75-89.
Lohmann Dieter, Die Komposition der Reden in der Ilias, Berlin: de Gruyter, 1970.
Louden Bruce, «Pivotal Contrafactuals in Homeric Epic», Classical Antiquity, nº 12, 1993, p. 181-198.
Mackie Hilary, Talking Trojan: Speech and Community in the Iliad, Lanham, MD, Rowman and Littlefield, 1989.
Martin, Richard, The Language of Heroes: Speech and Performance in the Iliad, Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1989.
McGlew James F., «Agamemnon’s Test of the Army in Iliad Book 2», Classical Antiquity, nº 8, 1989, p. 283-295.
Morrison James V., Homeric Misdirection: False Predictions in the Iliad, Ann Arbor, The University of Michigan Press, 1992.
Morrison James V., «Alternatives to the Epic Tradition: Homer’s Challenges in the Iliad», TAPA nº 122, 1992, p. 61-71.
Moulton Carroll, Similes in the Homeric Poems, Göttingen,Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1977.
Rabel Robert J., «Agamemnon’s Iliad», Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies, nº 32, 1992, p. 103-117.
Porter Andrew E., Agamemon, the Pathetic Despot: Reading Traditional Characterization in Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, 2013
Pratt M. L., Toward a Speech Act Theory of Literary Discourse, Bloomington, University of Indiana Press, 1977.
Roochnik David, «Homeric Speech Acts: Word and Deed in the Epics», Classical Journal, nº85, 1990, p. 289-299.
Sammons Benjamin, «Agamemnon and His Audiences», Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies, nº 49, 2009, p. 159-185.
Schmidt Jens-Uwe, «Die ‘Probe’ des Achaierheeres als Spiegel der besonderen Intentionen des Iliasdichters», Philologus, nº146, 2002, p. 3-21
Searle J. R., Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1969.
Searle J. R., « A Classification of Illocutionary Acts». Language in Society, nº 5, 1976, 1-22.
Searle J. R., Expression and Meaning: Studies in the Theories of Speech Acts, Cambridge, 1979.
Scodel Ruth, Epic Facework: Self-Presentation and Social Interaction in Homer, Swansea, Classical Press of Wales, 2008.
Taplin Oliver, «Agamemnon’s Role in the Iliad», dans Charecterisation and Individuality in Greek Literature, C.Pelling (ed.). Oxford, Oxford University, 1990, p. 60-82.
Wilson Donna F., Ransom, Revenge, and Heroic Identity in the Iliad, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002.
“So I was speaking, but [the Kyklops] did not answer me because of his pitiless heart.
But then he leapt up, shot out his hands at my companions,
Grabbed two together, and struck them against the ground
Like puppies. Brains were flowing out from them and they dyed the ground.
After tearing them limb from limb, he prepared himself a meal.
He ate them like a mountain-born lion and left nothing behind,
The innards, the meat, and the marrow-filled bones.”
“Nearly all the Greeks made use of the dog in sacrifice and some still do today, for cleansing rituals. They also bring puppies for Hekate along with other purification materials; and they rub down people who need cleansing with the puppies.”
“The Greeks in their purification bring out the puppies and in many places use them in the practice called periskulakismos [‘carrying puppies around’]”
“Here, each of these groups of youths sacrifice a puppy to Enyalius, god of war, because they believe that it is best to make this most valiant of the domesticated animals to the bravest of the gods. I don’t know any other Greeks who believe it is right to sacrifice puppies to the gods except for the Kolophonians. For the Kolophonians sacrifice a black female puppy to the goddess of the Crossroad. The sacrifices of both the Kolophonians and the Spartan youths take place at night.”
“Indeed, the ancients did not consider this animal to be clean either: it was never sacrificed to one of the Olympian goes, but when it is given to Hekate at the cross-roads, it functions as part of the sacrifices that turn away and cleanse evil. In Sparta, they sacrifice dogs to the bloodiest of the gods, Enyalios. In Boiotia, it is the public cleansing ritual to walk between the parts of a dog that has been cut in half. The Romans themselves, during the Wolf-Festival which they call the Lupercalia, they sacrifice a dog in the month of purification.”
“The frogs, distressed by the anarchy prevailing among them, sent ambassadors to Zeus asking him to give them a king. He took note of their silliness and threw down a piece of wood into the pond. The frogs, terrified at first by the loud sound, submerged themselves in the depths of the pond.
Later, when the piece of wood was still, they came back up and rose to such a height of insolence that they mounted the wood and perched upon it. Deeming this king unworthy of them, they sent messengers to Zeus, asking him to change their king, because the first one was too lazy. Zeus was irritated by this, so he sent them a snake as king, by whom they were all snatched up and eaten.”
The law respecting sufficiency of evidence ought to be the same for ancient times as for modern; and the reader will find in this History an application, to the former, of criteria analogous to those which have been long recognized in the latter. Approaching, though with a certain measure of indulgence, to this standard, I begin the real history of Greece with the first recorded Olympiad, or 776 B. C.
To such as are accustomed to the habits once universal, and still not uncommon, in investigating the ancient world, I may appear to be striking off one thousand years from the scroll of history; but to those whose canon of evidence is derived from Mr. Hallam, M. Sismondi, or any other eminent historian of modern events, I am well assured that I shall appear lax and credulous rather than exigent or sceptical. For the truth is, that historical records, properly so called, do not begin until long after this date: nor will any man, who candidly considers the extreme paucity of attested facts for two centuries after 776 B. C., be astonished to learn that the state of Greece in 900, 1000, 1100, 1200, 1300, 1400 B. C., etc.,—or any earlier century which it may please chronologists to include in their computed genealogies,—cannot be described to him upon anything like decent evidence.
I shall hope, when I come to the lives of Socrates and Plato, to illustrate one of the most valuable of their principles,—that conscious and confessed ignorance is a better state of mind, than the fancy, without the reality, of knowledge. Meanwhile, I begin by making that confession, in reference to the real world of Greece anterior to the Olympiads; meaning the disclaimer to apply to anything like a general history,—not to exclude rigorously every individual event.
