Plato Made Easy
The Argument of Plato. By F: H. Ariderson. ' (Dent. -10s. 6d.) TIIERE are too many books about Plato in the world and it is a pity to add to them a book with a title like that above. This book, as the author explains in the preface, is intended " to serve as an introduction to the thought of Plato by
way of the argument which persists throughout his writings and gradually culminates in a philosophy of life;" But surely if we could be given the argument of Plato in two hundred pages of English, we could afford to forgo the sequel of tackling his thought.
Professor Anderson's method is' the Hash Method. In each. chapter he takes a particular heading, such as " Musical Criticism or " Microcosm and Social Macrocosm," and culls (a deplorable word but a more deplorable practice) translated or paraphra.ed passages from all and any of the dialogues, without making clear the context or the relative dates (as far as these can be ascertained) of the composition of these dialogues, and without -discuiSing the poSsibility that Plato's thought, whether at different times or in different contexts, is not. homogeneous. A vicious specimen of his method is his defence of Plato's attitude to poetry. After summarizing the" thesis of Book X; that the products of the mimetic arts are merely third-hand or third-grade entities, Professor Anderson shuffles 'and speaks of " a poet with limited perceptions," but Plato's point is that all poets have limited perceptions. Plato is attacking, not bad poetry, but Poetry (see Republic X. 602B.) But here Professor Anderson, agile with the white- 'ash, has skipped off to the Ion ; " the poet is a released and holy being, aloft upon the wing." He does not point out that even in the ion the argument is two-edged ; the poet is allowed to be " inspired " (for what that was worth to an Athenian) but he is deprived of his traditional glory as a teacher. The chapter ends with a still grosser shuffle- " Poetry is not to be read ; it is to be lived." That may or may not have been Plato's meaning, but up to this point Professor Anderson had appeared to be discussing the poetry that one reads. To have written this chapter properly he ought first to have made clear exactly how sweeping Plato's attacks on poetry are. It is no good explaining away some- thing until you have let the reader have a look at it. The Hash Method could, of course, be used to prove Shake- speare a Temperance Reformer ; and inched, if a man is going to use a high-handed method, he alight at least produce an atrocious result. But Professor Anderson is anything but atrocious. Though not too diScriminating in his assort- ment of material, unhistorical (negatively)' in that he gives his novice no information about fifth or fourth-century Athens, and uncritical in that he never gives the opposition side of a case, he is yet on the whole perfectly honest and unoriginal. The book is full of extracts from Jowett's trans- lation and references are given throughout. It will probably be highly praised and its eclecticism may stimulate the novice; But Plato is not really an author who needs to be shown to the children. The children can quite well start on hini by reading in translation certain of the dialogueS complete. As for the connoisseurs of Geistgeschichte, they may be a little shocked to find a book on Plato which 'Mentions the Pytha- goreans' only once and 'Aristotle not at all:- LOUIS brIA.CNEWE.
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