IV.—­He inculcated Practical Precepts of a self-denying kind, intended to curb the excesses of human desire and ambition.  He urged the pleasures of self-improvement and of duty against indulgences, honours, and worldly advancement.  In the ‘Apology,’ he states it as the second aim of his life (after imparting the shock of conscious ignorance) to reproach men for pursuing wealth and glory more than wisdom and virtue.  In ‘Kriton,’ he lays it down that we are never to act wrongly or unjustly, although others are unjust to us.  And, in his own life, he furnished an illustrious example of his teaching.  The same lofty strain was taken up by Plato, and repeated in most of the subsequent Ethical schools.

V.—­His Ethical Theory extended itself to Government, where he applied his analogy of the special arts.  The legitimate King was he that knew how to govern well.

VI.—­The connexion in the mind of Sokrates between Ethics and Theology was very slender.

In the first place, his distinction of Divine and Human things, was an exclusion of the arbitrary will of the gods from human affairs, or from those things that constituted the ethical end.

But in the next place, he always preserved a pious and reverential tone of mind; and considered that, after patient study, men should still consult the oracles, by which the gods, in cases of difficulty, graciously signified their intentions, and their beneficent care of the race.  Then, the practice of well-doing was prompted by reference to the satisfaction of the gods.  In so far as the gods administered the world in a right spirit, they would show favour to the virtuous.

PLATO. [427-347 B.C.]

The Ethical Doctrines of Plato are scattered through his various Dialogues; and incorporated with his philosophical method, with his theory of Ideas, and with his theories of man and of society.

From Sokrates, Plato derived Dialectics, or the method of Debate; he embodied all his views in imaginary conversations, or Dialogues, suggested by, and resembling the real conversations of Sokrates.  And farther, in imitation of his master, he carried on his search after truth under the guise of ascertaining the exact meaning or definition of leading terms; as Virtue, Courage, Holiness, Temperance, Justice, Law, Beauty, Knowledge, Rhetoric, &c.

We shall first pass in review the chief Dialogues containing Ethical doctrines.

The APOLOGY, KRITON, and EUTHYPHRON (we follow Mr. Grote’s order) may be passed by as belonging more to his master than to himself; moreover, everything contained in them will be found recurring in other dialogues.

The ALKIBIADES I. is a good specimen of the Sokratic manner.  It brings out the loose discordant notions of Just and Unjust prevailing in the community; sets forth that the Just is also honourable, good, and expedient—­the cause of happiness to the just man; urges the importance of Self-knowledge; and maintains that the conditions of happiness are not wealth and power, but Justice and Temperance.