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From, A History of Greek Philosophy, vol. IV, Plato: the man and his dialogues, earlier period,
Cambridge University Press, 19896, pp. 8-38.(Ι) LIFE ||| (a) Sources ||| (b) Birth and family connexions ||| (c) Early years ||| (d) Sicily and the Academy ||| (2) PHILOSOPHICAL INFLUENCES \ Greek Fonts \ Plato Home Page
Page 17
In this respect it might be said that the years had brought him no increase in practical wisdom. But the reasons why, after all the doubts and hesitations to which he was so prone, and which the Seventh Letter emphasizes at every turn, he finally accepted the tall to action, bring out another, not unattractive, side of his character. It is commonly said that he seized on the opportunity to realize in practice his now developed ideal of the philosopher-king, or at least that he felt it would be cowardly to let even a slender chance slip by. The latter is true, but both the opportunity and the idea that refusal would be shameful were put into his head by Dion (Ep. 7.328e). What the story illustrates is the enormous importance to him of his relations with individuals, and the way in which a personal attachment could sway his judgement in public no less than in private affairs. As one reads the story it is obvious that Dion is the pivot of Plato’s movements, that the fear of seeming in Dion’s eyes to have acted unworthily of their friendship and his own philosophy was the reason above all others for his participating in the forlorn hope of reforming Dionysius. Then there was Dionysius himself, who must have had considerable personal charm, and who even after his quarrel with Dion seemed almost pathetically anxious to retain the friendship and good opinion of Plato. His character is extremely difficult to assess. Aristotle, in a passing remark (Ρolitics 1312a4), says that Dion despised him because he was always drunk, and there was a story (‘They say...’, Plut. Dion 7) that soon after his accession he ‘drank εontinuously for three months’, during which his court was closed to serious men or affairs and given over to drunkenness, mirth, music, dancing and buffoonery.[52] On the other hand, a habitual drunkard could hardly have won the recommendation of the haughty[53] moralist Dion and still less of the philosopher Archytas. What is certain is that he was lazy, weak-willed, and at the mercy of advisers who hated and feared Dion. Plato, who had taken him υp because of his devotion to, and absolute trust in, Dion, would only say, when finally convinced that he could never make a philosopher out of him, and when Dionysius had already appropriated Dion’s property, that after all he ought not to be angry with Dionysius so much as with himself and those who had forced him to enter the Sicilian whirlpool for the third time.
A Day in Old Athens * A Short History of Greek Philosophy
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Reference address : https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/ancient-Greece/guthrie-plato.asp?pg=17
