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tation, which is (says Plato) two degrees removed from reality; for taking any object, such as a bed, there is first the ideal bed, created by the Deity, which alone has real existence; and then there is the bed made by the carpenter in the image of the first; and thirdly, there is the shadow of this image, which the painter or poet delineates in his picture or his poem, as it may be. "I have a great liking and reverence for Homer" (Plato continues), "who is the great master of all tragic poets—indeed from childhood I have loved his name; but I love truth better. And what has Homer done for us, after all? He has not given us laws, like Solon or Lycurgus; he has not given us inventions, like Thales and Anacharsis; nor has he founded a brotherhood, like Pythagoras; nor, again, has he taught us any of the arts of war and peace. If he had done any real good to men, is it likely that he would have been allowed to wander about, blind and poor? No;—all that he does is to give us a second-hand imitation of reality, to exalt the feelings which are an inferior part of our soul, to thrill us with pity or terror, and so render us unmanly and effeminate." "There are enough sorrows in actual life" (he says, later on, in the "Philebus"), without multiplying them on the stage or in fiction."

Though Plato was more of a poet than a philosopher himself, and in his writings was said to strike the happy medium between poetry and prose, he is always disposed to regard the poets, as a class, in the light of harmless enthusiasts, often the cause of much mischief, but hardly responsible for their actions. In an earlier