tronomy, but at every later stage it was harmful. The ethical and aesthetic bias of Plato, and still
more of Aristotle, did much to kill Greek science.
It is noteworthy that modern Platonists, almost without exception, are ignorant of mathematics,
in spite of the immense importance that Plato attached to arithmetic and geometry, and the
immense influence that they had on his philosophy. This is an example of the evils of
specialization: a man must not write on Plato unless he has spent so much of his youth on
Greek as to have had no time for the things that Plato thought important.
CHAPTER XVI Plato's Theory of ImmortalityTHE dialogue called after Phaedo is interesting in several respects. It purports to describe the
last moments in the life of Socrates: his conversation immediately before drinking the hemlock,
and after, until he loses consciousness. This presents Plato's ideal of a man who is both wise
and good in the highest degree, and who is totally without fear of death. Socrates in face of
death, as represented by Plato, was important ethically, both in ancient and in modern times.
What the gospel account of the Passion and the Crucifixion was for Christians, the Phaedo was
for pagan or freethinking philosophers. * But the imperturbability of Socrates in his last hour is
bound up with his belief in immortality, and the Phaedo is important as setting forth, not only
the death of a martyr, but also many doctrines which were afterwards Christian. The theology of
St. Paul and of the Fathers was largely derived from it, directly or indirectly, and can hardly be
understood if Plato is ignored.
* Even for many Christians, it is second only to the death of Christ. "There is nothing in any
tragedy, ancient or modern, nothing in poetry or history (with one exception), like the last
hours of Socrates in Plato." These are the words of the Rev. Benjamin Jowett.