Whitney J Oates _Plato’s View of Art Charles Scribner’s Sons. / New York pesto B Bart a4 02 OHIO UNIVERSITY LIBRARYV The Quasi- Mysticism of Plato In the preceding chapter we advanced the argument that Plato really expected the true artist to be a “philosopher,” that is, one who has or possesses an awareness of reality and value. And we must repeat that for Plato his Theory of Ideas provides answers to the questions “What is real?” and “What is valuable?” Likewise let us be reminded that inherent in the theory is the notion that, so far as aesthetic and ethical conceptions are concerned, reality and value coincide. This is the equivalent of saying that that which is most real is most valuable, and that which is most valuable is most real. In other words a Platonic Idea is at once the entity which is most real and most valuable, ultimately and finally so in each instance. The “philosophical creative artist” therefore must be aware of the realm of reality and value, and must be awate of the various most significant of the Ideas, such as the Idea of Justness, or Courage, or 6364 / Plato's View of Art Moderation, or Wisdom, as well as the Idea of Beauty. As we have repeatedly insisted, the depth and compre- hensiveness of the artist’s grasp of this complex of values actually determine the quality of the work of art he produces. Such, at least, seems to be a reasonable inference to be drawn from the Phaedrus. ‘And in addition it seems reasonable to infer that the work of art thus produced “participates,” one of the technical terms as we recall of the Theory of Ideas, in the Idea of Beauty. And so the creative artist must be as fully as possible aware of that Idea. We must not forget that of all the Ideas, the Idea of Beauty has the most complete embodiment in the things of sense. As evidence for this Platonic view we need only to cite this explicit statement in the Phaedrus: We were telling how the essential beauty shines among the realities yonder [that is, in the realm of pure existence or the realm of the Ideas] ; and after ‘our arrival here we apprehended it, most clearly gleaming, by that senso which is most clear in us, the eye-sight, for sight comes to us as the most piercing of our bodily sensations. But the eye does not see Wisdom. O what amazing love would Wisdom cause in us if she sent forth an image of herself that entered the sight, as the image of Beauty does! And the other Verities, what love they would awaken! But now has Beauty alone ‘obtained this lot, to be most clearly seen, most clearly loved.' ‘One might argue that all this about pure, absoluce “Ideas,” existing outside of space and time, is fine, a prety theory, but after all how valid is it? How far does it go to explain this or that fundamental mysterious The Quasi-Mysticism of Plato J 65 phenomenon? What has it to do with art anyway? These are all central queries, and any honest inquiring mind bent on penetrating beneath the surface of things should and must put these questions to itself when faced with an idealistic formulation of human experience, speaking in the technical philosophical sense, an ideal view of life. Particularly pertinent, it seems to me, is the question which we might put to Plato: “How in any sense-da we know, do we have ‘knowl f these Ideas?” This then ithe problem we must face but we should pause for a moment to discuss briefly the prior question, the general problem of epistemology: “How can we know anything at all?” or “Do we know anything at all?” In this connection fone cannot refrain from recalling Gorgias, the famous fifth-century sophist in the Greek world, who is purported to have written a book entitled On Nature, or the Non- existent. In it we are told that he argued for the following thesis: first, that there is nothing; second, that even if there is anything we cannot know it; and third, that even if we could know it, we could not communicate our knowledge to anyone else. Few if any would be willing to be this nihilistic. In 1925 there ape ing, by W. P. Montagu) a book entitled Ways of Know- professor of philosophy at Columbia University,wHich quite apart from its other merits provides a convehient introduction to the problem, or rather problems, of epistemology.* In the volume Montague offers a classification of several ways or sepa- mate, distinct methods of “knowing.” The distinctions are historically valid, that is, there have been philosophers in the past who have relied predominantly on one of these ways of knowing or on several in combination. Montague argues that there are six wavs of “attaining knowledge”: the method of authoritarianism, the method of mysticism, the method of rationalism, the method of empiricism, the66 / Plato's View of Art method of pragmatism, and the method of scepticism. It may be instructive to say a brief word about each of these methods. It should be obvious that in the context of our own argument these remarks about Montague’s thesis are of necessity oversimplified. First, let us take up the method of authoritarianism. All of us would have to admit that much of what we think we “know” we have accepted on the authority of some so- called expert, The very conditions of human existence make this a necessity. For example, in the case of scientific knowledge only a small fragment of the population has firsthand acquaintance with the experiments themselves upon which this type of knowledge is hased. Montague points out that in this method we may find ourselves in trouble, particularly if we are faced with a conflict of authorities. This and other like difficulties become apparent after a moment's reflection, with the result that, though we are constrained so often to accept authority, we should always stand ready to check the “knowledge” ée- rived from authority by putting into play one or another of the methods of knowing. ‘Because of the great importance of mysticism for Plato, it seems better to postpone our consideration of it and rather now take up the methods of rationalism and empiricism, which Montague treats together. Because the two have to deal with “universals,” on the one hand, and with the data of experience on the other, they stand in complementary relation to each other, and in a serse operate simultaneously when they are used as methods of artiving at “knowledge.” In the case of pragmatism, there seems to be no need to go into Montague’s account in detail. It boils down to this, that the method of pragmatism relies upon the practicality or workability or the verifiability in practice of anything before we may be justified in affirming that it has achieved ‘The Quasi-Mysticism of Plato. / 67 the status of “knowledge.” Similarly, we can appraise the method of scepticism. The check that always comes with doubt conceming any proposition often does lead to an improved conclusion which may very well qualify as “knowledge.” And finally we come to the method of mysticism. Mont- ague holds that this is the theory that the “truth” or “Knowledge” comes by a super-rational and super-sensuous faculty of “intuition.” He of course offers all the standard objections to any form of “‘intuitionism,” which we need not examine here. It may be recalled that we indicated earlier in our treatment of the conclusion of the Oresteia of Aeschylus that an element of the mystical is present there (see p, 10), At all events, there seems to be tittle . |“ doubt that for Plato the method of mysticism is the supreme method, as 1 hope our forthcoming treatment of 2 the Symposium will show. At the present moment we should of course be reminded that for Plato “knowledge” in the full sense of the word can only be of the Ideas, as he held that one could know only that which does not change. Of the various methods explored by Montague, those which are dealing more directly with the things of sense—for example, the method of empiricism or the method of pragmatism—could not lead to “knowledge” in the Platonic sense, but only to “opinion.” Hence, I believe it is safe to say that we find Plato using authority, reason, sensation, action, and doubt, as his thought moves around with the data derived from the phenomenal world. Some- times he employs one of these instruments, and sometimes he uses several in combination, relying more heavily perhaps, but certainly not finally, upon reason. ‘The Platonic corpus compels us to conclude that all this use of these other instruments is for him propaedeutic, or neces- sarily preliminary to what we are arguing is the “final method” for Plato, in fact the only method (no matterxf 68 / Plato's View of Art what one may say, this is the method in the Symposium), that is, the method of mysticism. So Plato would maintain that an individual “knows” the Ideas, insofar as it is possible for a finite human being to “know” them, by an immediate, direct, intuitive vision, whose claim for accept- ance and validity rests upon its very immediacy and its immediate clarity. ‘Any full length treatment of the very complicated ques- tion of mysticism would be out of place here. Certainly there is a vast amount of literature dealing with tne subject. There are, however, a few points that deserve mention now. “Mysticism” is a loose word. Sometimes the various common garden phenomena of what we call “intai- tion” are labeled “mystical.” Furthermore the term is applied to a whole range of phenomena, up to the other extreme of the so-called “negative” mysticism characteris: tic of the Orient. For example, there is the case of Buddhism, where the individual by the mystical process is completely obliterated and is swallowed up in the ineffable emptiness of the absolute. It might be noted here that “negative” mysticism is particularly abhorrent to Professor Montague. "There have been such “negative” mystics in the Christian tradition, but the brand of mysticism more characteristic within it is known as “positive” mysticism or “quési- mysticism” where, in the Christian tradition, the mystic ‘comes to have his vision of God, but he retains his individuality. His mind is not emptied of its contents; though, so it is reported, the experience gives him some- thing that is in a way beyond “knowledge” in the ordinary sense of the word. Plato’s method of knowing then is on this “quasi” or “positive” mystical level. The individual “knows” the Idea by an immediate vision, a “click” or a flash of insight or penctration, but he can have those moments of vision only if he has previously moved about The Quasi-Mysticism of Plato / 69 intelligently and thoughtfully in the totality of his own experience, which of course includes his experience of the phenomenal world, the world of “sights and sounds.”” When we turn now to the Symposium, it must first. be observed that the document as a whole does not deal directly with the problems inherent in the study of art or the developing of a “philosophy of art,” but there are many implications which bear immediately upon the argu- ment that we have been attempting to put forward. Professor Shorey has contrasted what he calls the Gothic architecture of the Phaedrus with the classic architecture of the Symposium.® Certainly one can find a symmetry of structure of a sort in the latter dialogue that is palpably lacking in the Phaedrus. The Symposium is supposedly the record of a conversation at a dinner held at the house of the tragie poet Agathon, in order to celebrate a victory he had just won in the contest in which competing tragedies were performed. The guests at the party are of various types. Phaedrus is there, a doctor by the name of Eryxima- chus, the famous comic poet Aristophanes, Socrates, and toward the close of the dialogue the brilliant and notorious Alcibiades. The company all agree that they should pass the evening by each of them in turn giving a speech, an encomium in honour of the God of love, Eros. The various speeches are characteristic of the several speakers, and here Plato exhibits his great powers as a mimic. For example, the doctor Eryximachus gives a somewhat pedantic utter- ance filled with allusions to contemporary medical theory and practice. Aristophanes delivers himself of a fantastic and rather Rabelaisian myth purporting to account for the origin of sexuality. Plato here really outdoes himself in his imitation of the Aristophanic manner, and the speech is as thoroughly amusing and funny as ate the plays of the comic poet. ‘The host, Agathon, also takes his turn and praises Eros in70 | Plato's View of Art flowery, cuphuistic, brilliantly rhetorical language, ending in a great flow of words carefully chosen with a view Lo rhythm and assonance. To illustrate, let me quote a short passage in the Greek: rpadmnra nev ropa, eerpisrnra SkopBior; giddBuspoc etipeveiar, BSwpoc Suopeveioss Dewe éyavic * DeaTds oopoic, dyaarac evis - {nhurd duoipouc, Kratos euoipars * tpwpns, ABedrnT0s,, ADIs, xapirwr, inépov, méBou, nari * emmedns ayadav, ueding Kouccn + €v Topo, € vOByo, ev TODS, EV ow koBeponrns, émBéerns, napaordans Te Kai o&rnp Wp.aT0s, krh Professor Shorey, in his book What Plato Said, has compounded a translation which very skillfully preserves in English the effect of the original: Love, or Eros, “alienates hostility, conciliates civility, bringing us togeth- er in the union of such communion with one another, in festivals, dances, and sacrifices, leader and guide. {Here begins the rendering of the Greek above.) To mildness impelling, all wildness expelling, donor of kindness, dis- owner of unkindness, gracious to the good, beheld by the wise, beloved by the gods, desired by the hapless, acquired by the happy. Of wantonness, daintiness, luxury, grace, desire and longing the sire; regardful of the good; regard- less of the bad; in labor, in terror, in yearning, in learning, guide, consorter, supporter, and savior best.”” The quoted Greek ends here but the Shorey rendering continues: “Of all gods and men the glory; the leader fairest and rarest whom every man should follow fairly, fair hymns reciting, wherein delighting he casts his spell on the minds of geds and men alike.” This brilliant conclusion, with its parody of the artificial, overripe rhetorical style, brings down the house. Next comes the speech of Socrates, and, as .we might well expect, it constitutes the central and most significant portion of the dialogue. It would not be relevant to go into The Quasi-Mysticism of Plato. / 71 it in detail, nor into the speech of Alcibiades, who bursts in on the party in a semidrunken state right after Socrates has finished and who insists that he will not speak in praise of Love but, rather, will follow the suggestion that he deliver an encomium of Socrates. There are, however, two or three most relevant points in what Socrates has to say. and on these we must focus our sharpest attention. He begins his remarks, as is his usual custom, by maintaining his own ignorance and by insisting upon his inability to handle or cope with the subject matter. He therefore says that, in place of a speech of his own, he will report a conversation he once had had with a priestess of Mantinea, by the name of Diotima, who clarified his mind on many of the difficulties inherent in the problem of the nature of Tove and Eros. So Socrates repeats the conversation purportedly in its entirety. Diotima explains, to quote Professor Shorey: that Love is not a god but a demon, the inter- mediary and the interpreter between the gods and men. Love, a little interpolated myth explains, is a child which Penia or Want got to be begotten upon her by Poros, Resource, when he was drunk with nectar at the banquet in which the gods celebrated the birth of Aphrodite, And Love thus partakes in the conflicting qualities of his contrasted parents. He lacks like his mother, and like his father is an eager and enterprising seeker, hunter, sophist, jug- gler, and philosopher, or lover and pursuer of wisdom. No god is a philosopher or a lover of wisdom, for God already possesses it; no hopelessly ignorant being, for hopeless ignorance is precisely the false conceit of knowledge without the real- ity—the self-sufficiency of self-content.72 | Plato’s View of Art So, for the benefit of Socrates, Diotima expands the conception of Love or Etos. She insists that Eros is really more than the desire of the lover for the beloved, but actually “Eros is the longing that the good shall be one’s ‘own for ever.”” That the good shall be forever present accounts for the desire for generation, reproduction, for this is an immortal or immortalizing element in human life. In this way would be explained physical reproduction, which is in Diotima’s view inspired by the beautiful. And this is also true in the case of any kind of creation or making. After all “poetry” (noinoic) and “poet” (moms) come from the verb “to make.”* So “poetry” in a larger sense is made to refer to that. which is created by the soul, works of art, laws, noble institutions, etc. All this is done in a sense through a desire for fame, “that last infirmity of noble mind” in Milton’s phrase, that is, a desire for immortality which is to all intents and purposes the desire that the good be one’s own forever. ‘A supporting passage from the Symposium should be quoted here at length. Diotima mentions the noble actions of Alcestis, Achilles, and Codrus, and then goes on to say: No, methinks they all do all they can for an etemnity of virtue and for glorious renown like that, and the better men they are, the more they do it. ‘The reason is that they love immortality. Well then, when men’s fecundity is of the body, they turn rather to the women, and the fashion of their love is this: through begetting children to provide themselves with immortality, renown, and happiness, as they imagine— “Securing them for all time to come.” But when fecundity is of the soul—for indeed there are those persons who are fecund in their souls, even more ‘The Quasi-Mysticism of Plato / than in their bodies, fecund in what it is the func- tion of the soul to conceive and also to bring forth—what is this proper offspring? It is wisdom (godrnois), along with every other spiritual value (Gperh). Of these, the poets, all of them, are gen- erators, and, among the artists, as many as are called “original” (ebperuot). [Could there be a better or more accurate description of the “philo- sophical creative artist” which we found in the Phaedrus?] By far the greatest and most beautiful form of wisdom is that which has to do with regulating states and households, and has the name, no doubt, of “temperance” and “justice.” Now, when a person from his youth bears the germ of these within his soul, a godlike person, and with the coming of maturity desires to generate and ptocreate, he goes about, he too, in quest of the beauty in which he may beget, for never will he do it in deformity. And hence in his fecundity he is more drawn to bodies that are beautiful than to ugly ones; and if in one of them he meets a soul that is beautiful, high-minded, and well-born, he is powerfully attracted to this union of the two, and in the presence of this man he straightway becomes ready in discourse on virtue, and on the sort of things the good man ought to be concerned with, and be doing, and sets out to teach him. At the touch methinks, of beauty, and in communion with it, he begets what he has long been fecund with, and brings it forth; present or absent, he has in mind the lovely being, and reats the progeny in common with that being; and thus such persons are united by a bond far closer than the tie through children, and continue in a firmer mutual affec- 7374 | Plato’s View of Art tion, because their common offspring are more beautiful and deathless. Further, every one would rather have such children born to him than human offspring. Diotima goes on to point out how much this new “poet” must envy the “fame and memory” of Homer, Hesiod, “and the other able poets,” as well as the laws, that is, the offspring of a Lycurgus or a Solon. ‘As Diotima continues her argument, it becomes clear ‘that she believes love of the beautiful and the good to involve more than she has thus far revealed. Here it seems that she regards the beautiful and the good to be virtually identical and she believes that love of them leads to a mystic vision of them. Love then in this part of the ‘Symposium becomes an amor mysticus,'! a mystical love, like the love of the Christian mystic for God which carries him on his upward ascent until he comprehends God, insofar as a finite human being may. Let us then look at certain portions of Diotima’s description of the ascen to and the apprehension of the Idea of Beauty or the Beautiful, compassed under the influence of the amor mysticus: He... who has come to see the beautiful in successive stages and in order due, when now he nears the goal of the initiation, will suddenly be- hold a beauty of wondrous nature;~a beauty, first of all, which is eternal, not growing up or perish- ing, increasing or decreasing; secondly, not beauti- ful in one point and ugly in another, nor beautiful in this place and ugly in that, as if beautiful to some, to others ugly; again this beauty will not be revealed to him in the semblance of a face, ox hands, or any other element of the body, nor in The Quasi-Mysticism of Plato / any form of speech or knowledge, nor yet as if it appertained to any other being, a creature, for example, upon earth, or in the sky or elsewhere; no, it will be seen as beauty in and for itself, consistent with itself in uniformity forever, where- as all beauties share it in such fashion that, while they are ever born and perish, that eternal beauty, never waxing, never waning, never is impaired. Now when a man, beginning with these transitory beauties, and through the rightful love of youths ascending, comes to have a sight of that eternal beauty, he is not far short of the goal. This is indeed the rightful way of going, or of being guided by another, to the things of love: starting from these transitory beauties, with that beauty yonder as a goal, ever to mount upwards, using these as rungs, from one going on to two, and from two to all fair bodies, and from beautiful bodies to beautiful pursuits, and from beautiful pursuits to beautiful domains of science, until mounting from the sciences, he finally attains to yonder science which has no other object save eternal beauty in itself, and knows at last the beauty absolute, 75 And so Diotima adds her comment: “There you have the life, dear Socrates, there if anywhere the life that is worth living by a man, in contemplation of the beauty abso- lute?" ‘This passage, a very famous one in Plato, is beyond doubt his best description of how one “knows” or comes to “know” the Ideas, And though it clearly involves preparation by the employment of other “ways of know- ing,” for example, the data of experience and the powers of reason,[it is only with that kind of preparatory enrich- ment that the eternal Idea can be grasped. And it is76 | Plato’s View of Art grasped by the way of knowing of mysticism, by an immediate, and rightly designated, “philosophico-intui- tive” method, or in other words by vision. In this connection, one cannot fail to be reminded of a famous sentence in Plato’s Seventh Epistle: “It requires long- continued intercourse between pupil and teacher in joint pursuit of the object they are seeking to apprehend; and then suddenly, just as light flashes forth when a fire is Kindled, this knowledge is born in the soul and henceforth nourishes itself.” * ‘Now let us examine the relevance of this material found in the Symposium for Plato’s attitude toward art, or his “philosophy of art,” if you will. Pethaps we can best accomplish this by retracing our steps. In the fon we were introduced to the problems of the inspiration of the artist and the relationship which obtains or should obtain be- tween art and “knowledge.” In the Republic, whatever may be the strengths and weaknesses of Plato’s arguments in this dialogue, art was seen in its fuller philosophical setting, in its relation to life and to morality. Next, in the Greater Hippias we found the unsuccessful attempt to define Beauty conceptually, which left our problem in the air, to be sure, but it definitely prepared the way for the Phaedrus, There Beauty was seen as a real value, an Idea in a complex of Ideas in that realm of permanence. And then the conception of a creative artist as “philosopher” in Plato’s sense emerged, as one who was aware of reality and value, that is, the realm of Ideas. And finally now in the Symposium we find Plato giving us his conception con- cerning the way in which this awareness comes about. That is, a man apprehends, as best he can, the Ideas through the mystical process. In this way, he “knows,” in Plato's view and vernacular, the Ideas, and in particular the Idea of Beauty, virtually indistinguishable from the Idea of the Good, to be found at the very pinnacle of the hierarchy of ‘The Quasi-Mysticism of Plato {77 all Platonic Ideas. And it is, of course, the Idea of Beauty which is supremely important for the artist. If the foregoing be an accurate summary of our argu- ment, then what are its implications? Certainly, in the Platonic view, it would seem that every human activity would be valuable in direct proportion to the closeness of its approximation to the domain of reals and values. To repeat, for Plato the success or failure of any individual enterprise would depend upon the extent to which Ideas, the eternal principles in Reality, had been apprehended in the process. And so we might argue: the creation of a work of art is a human activity, a most valid activity under certain conditions, as Plato makes explicitly clear in the Phaedrus. It must therefore be oriented toward the realm of Ideas, in a fundamental sense. ‘That is, the creative artist must be “philosophical,” and now, on the basis of the evidence of the Symposium, finally it emerges that he, as philosopher, must be a positive or quasi-mystic, for that is the way by which he comes close to the Ideas. Hence our “philosophical” creative artist has now become a “mys- tico-philosophical” creative artist. All this is “straight” Plato, and insofar as T can see, these views constitute the teal key to Plato’s attitude toward art, his “philosophy of art.”” am 1, Phaedrus 250¢ (Lane Cooper's translation). 2 W.P. Montague, Ways of Knowing (New York: Macmillan, 1926). 3. Shorey, What Plato Said, p. 198. ‘Symposium 1974 ff, Shorey, What Plato Said, p. 198, Thid, p. 198 Symposium 206a,78 / Plato's View of Art & Symposium 205b, 209a, 9. Lycidaa, |. 71. Professor Shorey uses the quotation, What Plaio Said, p. 195. 10. Symposium 2084-209e (Lane Cooper's translation). 11, A.E, Taylor makes this point in his discussion of the Sym- posium in Plato, the Man and Hie Work (New York, Dial Press, 1929), Srd. ed., p. 209, There are certain theological erities who would deny that Taylor's amor mysticus has anything to do with genuine Christian mysticism, which comes to the Christian mystic ns the free gift of divine Grace, While T would not wish to assert that there was no difference between Christian mysticism and Plato's version (through Diotima) of the mystical phenomenon, I still would argue that there is enough similarity between the two to justify ‘Taylor's use of amor mysticus. In this connection in Plato’s theology ‘one should never forget the goodness of the Demiurge (God), whieh Plato never fails to emphasize. 12, Symposium 210-2114 (Lane Cooper's translation). 18. Seventh Epistle 341 ed (Glenn Morrow's translation). Some scholars have doubted the authenticity of the Seventh Epistle, though it is my belief that the majority consider it to be genuine. VI Conclusion To this Platonic analysis, a nonidealistic aesthetician or philosopher of art would no doubt take strong exception. Is all this talk about nonspatial and nontemporal Ideas empty verbiage, as Aristotle would have it? No doubt also the nonidealist would plead that it is necessary to get down to earth, for Plato is really demanding that the. ive artist be the i le. A sympathizer with Plato would probably frame his answer to a critic of this sort in some such terms as these: “Yes, beyond doubt, Plato is setting an imposingly high level, and its elevation has caused him to be misunderstood. But so far as this question of ‘getting down to earth’ is concerned, we must not forget that, when Plato is describing the ascent to the apprehension of the Idea of Beauty in the Symposium, in it earlier stages ounding In the fe demands a thorou realm of sense And sieong) the aol of the malls seem 7980 / Plato’s View of Art to be that Plato is exploiting the potentialities len Ology- He is insisting on the conception that there is some. “goal or end or se above and beyond human life ar human limitation. He is insisting that a realization of that “Goal or purpose, however ie, acts a3 a powerful fc SOOT TET Tar Wes hint Siengit to erable him somehow th to enable him somehow to transcen: own sical and intellectual limitations.” Toe aympaete aor of Fat wll ee tat he Thepo of Ideas should provide man with a goal or an end, standard of value above and beyond him, which he will never reach but which will ever be there to give him drive and the power which he so desperately needs. Such is the context in which Plato’s creative artist finds himself. The great values lie before him which he may apprehend through vision and which are a source of his inspiration. ‘And it is in his capacity as a creator that he can com- municate to others the essence of his vision of reality and value through the medium of his art. In the fourth chapter, (see p. 61) above, we cited the great creative artists Aeschylus, Sophocles, Dante, Milton, and Shakespeare who, we know, have really done no more nor less than ‘this, communicated through to us their respective visions of reality and value. To this group we might well add the painting and sculpture of Michelangelo. 1k what the ‘observer can receive from gazing upon those late so-called “unfinished” slaves as they appear to be struggling to free themselves from the imprisonment of the stone, ‘And, of course, we cannot refrain from mentioning again Plato himself, a creative artist if there ever was one. These dialogues, these philosophical dramas, particularly the earlier ones, are on every count works of art. They differ from other works of art in that their content or meaning happens to be only a more explicit expression of a vision of reality and value than is to be found in epics or tragedies or lyrics. Conclusion / 31 We have been attempting to anaylze what Plato thought and felt about art, This inevitably led us to try to grasp the totality of his vision, within which his view of art is to be found. In my opinion, we can well ponder long on the nature of his vision, « vision which has had a profound influence on the thought and art of the Western world, And as we ponder it, we must remember that it came together, blended with, and reinforced the early Christian vision of the Christian God who, for the Christian, is that which is ultimately real and ultimately valuable, and is “known” or “apprehended” or “comprehended” in a manner not unlike that whereby Plato’s Ideas of the Beautiful and the Good are known. 1. It seems needless to point out that much has been done and more needs to be done to relate our view of Plato to all which may bbe derived from the vast arena of Easter thought and art.