Gonzalez Lodge, Commentary on Plato: Gorgias

οὐκ ὀλίγης συνουσίας: a delicate allusion to 458 c, which shows Socrates' fine feeling in not insisting on a discussion which must be unpleasant and also humiliating to Gorgias. The word συνουσία is elsewhere employed so as to include the discourses (διάλογοι), e.g. Prot. 310 a τί οὖν οὐ διηγήσω ἡμῖν τὴν ξυνουσίαν; i.e. in the sense of the Eng. “meeting.”

On Polus, who here again thrusts himself into the discussion, see note to 448 a, and Introd. § 14.

καί: belongs, according to the sense, with δοξάζεις. Is what you say also really your opinion? We should expect a second καί with ὥσπερ, according to usage. See on 457 e. Others construe καί with σύ.

ἢ οἴει: or do you think. The second question repeats the first in a varied form. Both questions are ‘rhetorical,’ expecting no answer, and express a protest against the idea that the art of rhetoric has anything to do with a knowledge of what is right.

μὴ οὐχὶ... λανγ̂γρεεκ>εἰδέναι κτἑ.: two negs. after ἠσχύνθη μὴ προσομολογῆσαι, on account of the negative force of the expression. Cf. Prot. 352 c, d. See H. 1034 b, and on 458 d. The construction is the same as that after ἀπαρνήσεσθαι below, which is followed by a double neg. because the question τίνα οἴει veils the assertion οὐδείς. οὐχὶ is merely more emphatic than οὐ.

ἐὰν μὴ ἔλθῃ ταῦτα εἰδώς: more logically, ἐὰν ἔλθῃ ταῖτα μὴ εἰδώς.—

διδάξειν: depends upon some verb of saying to be supplied from προσομολογῆσαι. The asyndeton with ἔπειτα instead of κἄπειτα (cf. Apol. 23 c) is not uncommon, and the clause is to be construed in dependence on ὅτι (because). By this time, however, Polus' flow of words has run away with him; he has only energy enough left to hurl at Socrates the words τοῦθ᾽ ὃ δὴ ἀγαπᾷς, before he abandons his struggling sentence altogether and starts afresh. Such passages as this show Plato to have been no mean dramatist.

ἴσως: gives expression in passing to the hint that perhaps the contradiction was not so clearly deduced from Gorgias' words as Socrates supposed. The whole sentence, however, shows Polus' complete inability to grasp the real point at issue.