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568 568 Socrates^ Schleiermacher^ and Delbrueck. would be no more than one such night, most men would have reason to desire it. On this view of the matter Mr D. remarks, that for his own part he can see nothing desirable in a dreamless sleep, except as At refreshes the body and mind, and prepares them for new exertions ; but that if an everlasting sleep were so great a good as Socrates represents, it would follow that men had reason to prefer darkness to light, privation to existence, nothing to something, and the gloomy song of the Chorus, who declare, that for man never to have been born is the first of blessings, the next, which leaves all others far behind, to return as quickly as he may to the night from which he sprung, (CEd. Col. 1225.) would become a philosophical truth. But dark as was the shade thrown over all the brilliant variety of Grecian life, by the void in the prospects of futurity, which was the source of so many lamentations over the lot of mortals, Sophocles would never have uttered in his own person such a sentiment as he puts into the mouth of the Chorus, and would only have defended it on the o-round of the dramatic situation. And as in Socrates the sentiment itself is unnatural and false, so the mention of the Great King is unworthy of a philosopher ; since it implies that it is outward prosperity that gives life its value. If for the Great King we substitute the Wise Man, it will be impossible to repeat the assertion without blushing (p. 79). The contemplation of these passages had seriously dis- turbed Mr D.'^s peace of mind, even while he continued to regard the Apology as a work of Plato'^s, and the main thought, the appeal to the oracle, as ironical. But when he began to perceive its real import, and recognised in it the language of pious enthusiasm, and was convinced that the speech expressed the very mind of Socrates, his uneasiness rose to a painful degree of intensity. He saw himself reduced to the alternative, of either giving up his faith in the character of Socrates, or else assuming that the offensive passages do not convey his thoughts, but were interpolated by Plato. In support of the latter conjecture, he adduces the passages in Xenophon's Apology which bear on the same points; and in these he observes there is no trace of dissimulation, false subtilty, or exaggeration, so that one is inclined to believe that every-