previous next

μᾶλλον δὲ -- θείῳ. “Both Plato and Aristotle thought that there was in human nature a certain imperfect presence of God, and that it was this divine presence, however small, which made it specifically human nature” (Nettleship Lect. and Remains II p 334). Cf. VI 501 B note with Tim. 90 A ff. (man is a φυτὸν οὐκ ἔγγειον, ἀλλ᾽ οὐράνιον) and Arist. Eth. Nic. X 7. 1177^{b} 30 ff. The doctrine of a θεῖόν τι ἐν ἡμῖν was by no means new to Greek philosophical and religious thought (see Rohde Psyche^{2} II pp. 121, 184 ff., 207 ff.), but Plato gave it a far deeper meaning than it ever had before.

δουλούμενα is bracketed by Herwerden, who suggests as an alternative the omission of ὑπό before τῷ ἀγρίῳ. Neither change should be adopted: cf. ὑπὸ τῷ ἀθεωτάτῳδουλοῦται 589 E.

ἐάν μοι -- πείθηται. ‘If he takes my advice, he will.’ ἐμοί, which I once read (with Stobaeus Flor. 9. 65, W. H. Thompson, Baiter)—‘if he takes my advice’—is certainly more pointed; but there is no real ground for deserting the MSS, and the unemphatic pronoun is quieter and, as it seems to me, more in keeping with the general spirit of this ‘gentle exhortation’ (πείθωμεν τοίνυν αὐτὸν πράως 589 C).

λαμβάνων τὸ χρυσίον κτλ. On the construction see I 351 B note For the structure of the sentence beginning εἰ μὲν λαβὼν κτλ. cf. I 336 E note

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide References (1 total)
  • Commentary references from this page (1):
    • Plato, Timaeus, 90a
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: