James Adam, The Republic of Plato

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ff. τίς οὖν ἡ παιδεία; κτλ. The educational scheme contained in Books II and III contributes to the purgation of the τρυφῶσα πόλις, and thereby helps to complete Plato's second picture of an ideal city: see on 372 D ff. For the correct understanding of these regulations it is well to bear in mind (1) that Plato's object in this preliminary discipline is to train the character rather than the intellect (cf. IV 430 C note), and (2) that all the guardians have to pass through this curriculum. The higher scheme of education (in Book VII), on the other hand, is confined to those guardians who are to be made Rulers in the State, and its express aim is to educate the intellect rather than the will. See especially VI 502 E, VII 521 D—522 A notes The best discussion on Plato's theory of education in its broader aspects is still, I think, Nettleship's Essay in Hellenica pp. 67—180. Platon's Erziehungstheorie n. s. Schrift. dargestellt von Dr A. Drygas Schneidemühl 1880 is a useful summary. For Plato's criticism of poetry, we may refer in particular to Heine's excellent dissertation De rat. quae Platoni c. poet. Gr. intercedit etc. Vratislaviae 1880, and to Reber's Plato und die Poesie Leipzig, 1864.

ἔστιν δέ που — μουσική. The usual Greek view (see for example Isocr. 15. 180—185), corrected by Plato in III 410 C ff.

εἶπον. Richter (Fl. Jahrb. 1867 p. 141) revives Muretus' conjecture εἶδος: but εἶπον is alone satisfactory. The confusion of ο and ω occurs in Inscriptions from the third century B.C. onwards (Meisterhans^{3} p. 24 note 128). See also Introd. § 5.

λόγων δὲ -- ἕτερον. The word ‘lies’ is here used by Plato in its popular sense of that which is false in fact: his own definition of the ‘veritable lie’ is different: see 382 B note ‘Lies’ are necessary—so Plato holds—in education: only they must be moral lies. Under ‘lies’ he includes stories (μῦθοι） about the gods, about the daemons and heroes long since dead, about a future life—all of them subjects where the alleged facts cannot be verified. The ἀληθεῖς λόγοι are concerned with men, and are passed over by Plato, because he could not state his view without anticipating the conclusion which the Republic is intended to prove (see III 392 A—C). This point is missed by Krohn (Pl. St. p. 12).