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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Theaetetus by Plato: of Theaetetus, who has just been carried up from the army at Corinth in a
dying state. The expectation of his death recalls the promise of his
youth, and especially the famous conversation which Socrates had with him
when he was quite young, a few days before his own trial and death, as we
are once more reminded at the end of the dialogue. Yet we may observe that
Plato has himself forgotten this, when he represents Euclides as from time
to time coming to Athens and correcting the copy from Socrates' own mouth.
The narrative, having introduced Theaetetus, and having guaranteed the
authenticity of the dialogue (compare Symposium, Phaedo, Parmenides), is
then dropped. No further use is made of the device. As Plato himself
remarks, who in this as in some other minute points is imitated by Cicero
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