Page:History of Greece Vol VIII.djvu/404

 382 HISTORY OF GREECE. high for Athenian practice ; but most certainty it would not ert on the side of corruption, selfishness, or over-indulgence. We may -fairly presume that this discourse composed by Hippias would not be unworthy, in spirit and purpose, to be placed by the side of " The Choice of Hercules," nor its author by that of Prodikus as a moral teacher. The dialogue entitled " Gorgias," in Plato, is carried on by Sokrates with three different persons one after the other, Gor- gias, Polus, and Kallikles. Gorgias of Leontini in Sicily, as a rhetorical teacher, acquired greater celebrity than any man of his time, during the Peloponnesian war : his abundant powers of illustration, his florid ornaments, his artificial structure of sen- tences distributed into exact antithetical fractions, all spread a new fashion in the art of speaking, which for the time was very popular, but afterwards became discredited. If the line could be clearly drawn between rhetors and sophists, Gorgias ought rather to be ranked with the former. 1 In the conversation with Gorgias, Sokrates exposes the fallacy and imposture of rhetoric and rhetorical teaching, as -cheating an ignorant audience into persuasion without knowledge, and as framed to satisfy the pass- ing caprice, without any regard to the permanent welfare and improvement of the people. Whatever real inculpation may be conveyed in these arguments against a rhetorical teacher, Gorgias must bear in common with Isokrates and Quintilian, and under the shield of Aristotle. But save and except rhetorical teaching, no dissemination of corrupt morality is ascribed to him by Plato ; who, indeed, treats him with a degree of respect which surprises the commentators. 2 The tone of the dialogue changes materially when it passes to Polus and Kallikles, the former of whom is described as a writer on rhetoric, and probably a teacher also. 3 There is much inso- lence in Polus, and no small asperity in Sokrates. Yet the former maintains no arguments which justify the charge of immorality against himself or his fellow-teachers. He defends the tastes 1 Plato Menon, p. 95, A. ; Foss, De GrorgiJl Leontino, p. 27, ieq. 3 See the observations of Groen Tan Prinsterer and Stallbaum, Stallbaun ad Platon. Gorg. c. 1.
 * Plato Gorgias, c. 17, p. 462, B.