ABSTRACT
BOTH the dialogues to be considered in this chapter have something of the character of “occasional works.” Both are strongly marked by a broad farcical humour, which is apparently rather Socratic than Platonic; we meet it again, e.g., in the comic fury of the satire in some parts of the Republic, but it is quite unlike the grave and gentle malice of such works as the Parmenides and Sophistes. The mirth, especially in the Euthydemus, has something of the rollicking extravagance of Aristophanes, and, according to the Symposium, there really was a side to Socrates which made him congenial company for the great comic poet. (Both men could relish wild fun, and both could enjoy a laugh at themselves.) In neither of our two dialogues is the professed main purpose directly ethical, though the Socratic convictions about the conduct of life incidentally receive an impressive exposition in the Euthydemus. It seems impossible to say anything more precise about the date of composition of either than that stylistic considerations show that both must be earlier than the great dramatic dialogues, Protagoras, Symposium, Phaedo, Republic. Since the Cratylus is a directly enacted drama with only three personages, while the Euthydemus is a reported dialogue with numerous personages and a vigorously delineated “background,” this second is presumably the more mature work of the two.
