James Adam, The Republic of Plato

---

τὰ τῆς σωφροσύνης εἴδη κτλ. Are the εἴδη Plato's Ideas? So Zeller (II^{4} 1 p. 560 note), and many other critics, understand the word; nor can it be denied that the language of Plato, if interpreted in the light of Book VII, can bear this meaning. Nevertheless we are bound in the first instance to interpret this passage by itself, and not by Book VII, the more so as the doctrine of transcendent or separate (χωρισταί) Ideas appears nowhere else in I—IV, and seems to be expressly reserved by Plato for his philosophical, as distinct from his musical education (see IV 435 D and VI 504 B note). What is meant by the words εἰκόνας αὐτῶν? The context shews conclusively that εἰκόνες refers to copies (sc. of the virtues σωφροσύνη etc.) represented in poetry and the fine arts (so also Krohn Pl. Frage p. 47). On any other interpretation the introduction of these εἰκόνες is irrelevant in a discussion on the rules which imitative art must obey. This being so, if εἴδη means the Ideas, Poetry will be a direct imitation of the Ideas, which is inconsistent with X 595 C —598 D. Or does Plato mean to suggest that Poetry and Art in his ideal city are really to imitate the Ideas directly? This is a bold and attractive solution, and there are several hints elsewhere to the same or nearly the same effect, but Plato expressly speaks of the εἴδη here only as immanent, and not transcendent (ἐνόντα ἐν οἷς ἔνεστιν), and we must therefore suppose that the artist copies from the life (cf. ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ καλὰ ἤθη ἐνόντα D). The word εἴδη is repeatedly used by Plato without reference to transcendent Ideas, as has been amply proved by Krohn (Pl. St. pp. 65, 66), Pfleiderer (Zur Lösung etc. p. 17), and Campbell (II pp. 296 ff.). Here it does not mean ‘varieties’ (as if there were more than one variety of σωφροσύνη), but simply ‘forms’ or ‘kinds,’ in the sense in which the immanent reality which every general notion attempts to express is a ‘form’ or ‘kind’—a genus or species—of the totality of things. Cf. IV 435 B note The genitives are genitives of definition. The use of εἴδη in the sense of “immanente Seinsformen” (Krohn) is interesting as a harbinger of the Ideal theory of VI and VII—a sort of half-way house between the Socratic λόγοι and Plato's ideas. It recurs in IV 434 D, 435 B, 437 D. See further Krohn Pl. Frage pp. 54—58, and cf. VI 504 D note But although the separatists have (as I think) made out their claim that transcendent Ideas do not appear in Books I—IV, I agree with Hirmer (Entst. u. Komp. d. Pl. Pol. p. 645) in thinking their deductions from this fact unwarrantable.

μεγαλοπρεπείας . μεγαλοπρέπεια in Plato is ‘highmindedness,’ not, as in Aristotle, ‘magnificence’: cf. VI 486 A note In like manner Plato's ἐλευθεριότης denotes the virtue proper to an ἐλεύθερος, and is not restricted to liberality in spending money. Contrast Arist. Eth. Nic. IV cc. 2—6.