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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Charmides by Plato: dialogues in a purely arbitrary manner, although there is no indication
that the author intended the two passages to be so combined, or that when
he appears to be experimenting on the different points of view from which a
subject of philosophy may be regarded, he is secretly elaborating a system.
By such a use of language any premises may be made to lead to any
conclusion. I am not one of those who believe Plato to have been a mystic
or to have had hidden meanings; nor do I agree with Dr. Jackson in thinking
that 'when he is precise and dogmatic, he generally contrives to introduce
an element of obscurity into the expostion' (J. of Philol.). The great
master of language wrote as clearly as he could in an age when the minds of
men were clouded by controversy, and philosophical terms had not yet
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