The Philosophical Review/Volume 1/Summary: Zeller - Plato's Mittheilungen iiber friihere und gleichzeitige Philosophen
Plato's writings are less important for our knowledge of the philosophy of his predecessors and contemporaries than those of Aristotle, partly because Plato attached less worth to facts as such than Aristotle, — he is less scholar than poet. Further, the form in which his thought is cast is not adapted for considerable treatment of historical views; again, opinions are presented and discussed not in his own name, and he takes no part in the dialogue. When views of other philosophers are mentioned, it is sometimes without specification of the source; sometimes with expressed reference to the work from which the statement has been derived; and again, as if the view had no other authority than current tradition. Sokrates mentions the maxims of the Seven Wise Men (Protag., 343 A f.) and the discoveries of Thales and Anacharsis (Rep., X, 600 A) merely as something universally accepted. Z. quotes references in Theaitetos, Parmenides, Kratylos, Sophistes, Timaios, etc., to various doctrines of Plato's predecessors, which are recounted in the traditional form of historical narrative, and points out that these communications of Plato on the older philosophers are to be regarded as historical reports. Author distinguishes between statements of this kind and those made by the characters themselves in the dialogue. The latter require special investigation and confirmation before being regarded as true. Much of the following space is occupied with Plato's references to the Sophists. The myth, which Protagoras (Prot., 320 C ff.) recounts, has been generally regarded as taken from a writing of this Sophist. Z. defends this generally accepted view against the objection of Gomperz by a number of arguments, and cites two new passages in favor of the old interpretation: Aristotle, part. an. IV, 10. 687 a 23, and Διαλέξεις ὴθικαί (c. 5, p. 551 a, Mull.). References to doctrines of Aristippos, Antisthenes, and the many others cited by Z., show, as he points out, in what intimate relationship Plato stood to the intellectual movement of his time, and what a lively interest he took, as one of the contending parties, in its scientific conflicts.