Vitae philosophorum

Nowhere in his writings does Plato mention himself by name, except in the dialogue On the Soul[*](Phaedo, 59 b.) and the Apology.[*](34 a.) Aristotle remarks that the style of the dialogues is half-way between poetry and prose. And according to Favorinus, when Plato read the dialogue On the Soul, Aristotle alone stayed to the end; the rest of the audience got up and went away. Some say that Philippus of Opus copied out the Laws, which were left upon waxen tablets, and it is said that he was the author of the Epinomis. Euphorion and Panaetius relate that the beginning of the Republic was found several times revised and rewritten, and the Republic itself Aristoxenus declares to have been nearly all of it included in the Controversies of Protagoras.

There is a story that the Phaedrus was his first dialogue. For the subject has about it something of the freshness of youth. Dicaearchus, however, censures its whole style as vulgar.

A story is told that Plato once saw some one playing at dice and rebuked him. And, upon his protesting that he played for a trifle only, But the habit, rejoined Plato, is not a trifle. Being asked whether there would be any memoirs of him as of his predecessors, he replied, A man must first make a name, and he will have no lack of memoirs. One day, when Xenocrates had come in, Plato asked him to chastise his slave, since he was unable to do it himself because he was in a passion.

Further, it is alleged that he said to one of his slaves, I would have given you a flogging, had I not been in a passion. Being mounted on horseback, he quickly

no one when asleep is good for anything. He also said that the truth is the pleasantest of sounds. Another version of this saying is that the pleasantest of all things is to speak the truth. Again, of truth he speaks thus in the Laws[*](663 e.): Truth, O stranger, is a fair and durable thing. But it is a thing of which it is hard to persuade men. His wish always was to leave a memorial of himself behind, either in the hearts of his friends or in his books. He was himself fond of seclusion according to some authorities.

His death, the circumstances of which have already been related, took place in the thirteenth year of the reign of King Philip, as stated by Favorinus in the third book of his Memorabilia, and according to Theopompus[*](The awkwardness of this last clause can be explained, but not excused, if we suppose that Diogenes Laertius got his citation of Theopompus from Favorinus.) honours were paid to him at his death by Philip.[*](Cf. Hdt. vi. 39 τὸν ἀδελφεὸν δηλαδὴ ἐπιτιμέων.) But Myronianus in his Parallels says that Philo mentions some proverbs that were in circulation about Plato’s lice, implying that this was the mode of his death.

He was buried in the Academy, where he spent the greatest part of his life in philosophical study. And hence the school which he founded was called the Academic school. And all the students there joined in the funeral procession. The terms of his will were as follows:

These things have been left and devised by