on; Apol.).
The characters are ill-drawn. Socrates assumes the 'superior person' and
preaches too much, while Alcibiades is stupid and heavy-in-hand. There
are traces of Stoic influence in the general tone and phraseology of the
Dialogue (compare opos melesei tis...kaka: oti pas aphron mainetai):
and the writer seems to have been acquainted with the 'Laws' of Plato
(compare Laws). An incident from the Symposium is rather clumsily
introduced, and two somewhat hackneyed quotations (Symp., Gorg.) recur.
The reference to the death of Archelaus as having occurred 'quite
lately' is only a fiction, probably suggested by the Gorgias, where the
story of Archelaus is told, and a similar phrase occurs;--ta gar echthes
kai proen gegonota tauta, k.t.l. There are several passages which
are either corrupt or extremely ill-expressed. But there is a modern
interest in the subject of the dialogue; and it is a good example of
a short spurious work, which may be attributed to the second or third
century before Christ.

ALCIBIADES II

PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE: Socrates and Alcibiades.

SOCRATES: Are you going, Alcibiades, to offer prayer to Zeus?

ALCIBIADES: Yes, Socrates, I am.

SOCRATES: you seem to be troubled and to cast your eyes on the ground,
as though you were thinking about something.

ALCIBIADES: Of what do you suppose that I am thinking?

SOCRATES: Of the greatest of all things, as I believe. Tell me, do you
not suppose that the Gods sometimes partly grant and partly reject the
requests which we make in public and private, and favour some persons
and not others?

ALCIBIADES: Certainly.

SOCRATES: Do you not imagine, then, that a man ought to be very careful,
lest perchance without knowing it he implore great evils for himself,
deeming that he is asking for good, especially if the Gods are in the
mood to grant whatever he may request? There is the story of Oedipus,
for instance, who prayed that his children might divide their
inheritance between them by the sword: he did not, as he might have
done, beg that his present evils might be averted, but called down new
ones. And was not his prayer accomplished, and did not many and terrible
evils thence arise, upon which I need not dilate?

ALCIBIADES: Yes, Socrates, but you are speaking of a madman: surely you
do not think that any one in his senses would venture to make such a
prayer?

SOCRATES: Madness, then, you consider to be the opposite of discretion?