Page:The Platonic Dialogues for English Readers, vol. 1, 1st. ed. (Whewell, 1859).pdf/17

4 INTRODUCTION  The Platonic Dialogues contain many references to the history of Socrates and of Athens ; and an explanation of the points thus referred to is often requisite for the understanding of the Dialogues ; but we shall for the present explain these points as they occur, rather than delay the reader by any long preliminary narrative or description. Moreover, the subject of philosophy includes a vast multiplicity of trains of thought, of the most different kinds, reaching from the first questions asked by an intelligent and inquisitive child, to subtle inquiries which task the intellects of the wisest man, and which often bewilder the clearest heads. The Platonic Dialogues present to us specimens of these different kinds of inquiries ; and in order to understand the Dialogues we must, in presenting them to the English reader, mark them as belonging to one or another of these classes, according as they really do so. Where the discussion runs into subtleties which are now of no philosophical interest, we may abridge or omit them, in order that the general reader may not be repelled from that which has really a general interest. On the other hand, where the conversation is really concerning difficulties which belong to the infancy of systematic thinking, --concerning ambiguities of words and confusions of notions which may perplex children but which any thoughtful man can see through, we must take care not to mislead our readers by speaking as if these juvenile exercises of thought had some profound and philosophical meaning. We shall find that this caution is by no means unneeded. Since the Platonic Dialogues are of such various kinds, they may on this ground be separated into different classes ; as they may also on