Hippolytus - Book I

Socrates; His Philosophy Reproduced by Plato.

Chapter XV.—Socrates; His Philosophy Reproduced by Plato.

Socrates, then, was a hearer of Archelaus, the natural philosopher; and he, reverencing the rule, "Know thyself," and having assembled a large school, had Plato (there), who was far superior to all his pupils. (Socrates) himself left no writings ^[108] after him. Plato, however, taking notes ^[109] of all his (lectures on) wisdom, established a school, combining together natural, ethical, (and) logical (philosophy). But the points Plato determined are these following.

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[108] Or, "writing." Still Socrates may be called the father of the Greek philosophy. "From the age of Aristotle and Plato, the rise of the several Greek sects may be estimated as so many successful or abortive efforts to carry out the principles enunciated by Socrates."—Translator's Treatise on Metaphysics, chap. iii. p. 45.

[109] This word signifies to take impressions from anything, which justifies the translation, historically correct, given above. Its literal import is "wipe clean," and in this sense Hippolytus may intend to assert that Plato wholly appropriated the philosophy of Socrates. (See Diogenes Laertius, xi. 61, where the same word occurs.)

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