Excerpt from A Companion to Plato's Republic: For English Readers; Being a Commentary Adapted to Davies and Vaughan's Translation The idea of writing a 'Companion to Plato's Republic for English Readers' was suggested to me by the appearance of Mr. Walter Lea's Companion to the Iliad, combined with my own experience of the intense desire for a closer knowledge of Plato, felt by many students who could read him in a translation only. Philosophy loses sorely by translation, but less than poetry; and perhaps a commentator can do more to restore its real meaning. And, indeed, as not all scholars have been trained in philosophy, "I may perhaps hope," to quote Mr. Leaf, 'that even those who have a knowledge of the language may find something to help them' in my work. Whether I have succeeded well or ill, I have at least spared no pains to ascertain and express the real import of Plato's ideas; and this I take to be the true duty of a commentator, especially in dealing with a philosophical genius of the first rank. I ought to say that I have made no attempt at textual criticism. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.