The purpose of the dialogue and its position in the Platonic writings.

That the Phaedo is a work of supreme art, perhaps the greatest achievement in Greek prose literature, is something that needs no argument. The serenity of Socrates in the hours before he drank the hemlock, his conviction that the parting of soul from body is not the death of the soul, his unabated zest in argument, the devotion of his intimate friends, the admiration of the gaoler for his prisoner, above all perhaps the moving record of the last few pages, given with inimitable simplicity and restraint of language—all these things contribute to the greatness of a work which for many readers stands, if considered as pure literature, even higher than that other literary masterpiece, the Symposium.

Both these dialogues, as also the Republic, would be generally admitted to show us Plato at the height of his powers as a writer, and we may assume provisionally that they were all composed in his prime, say between the ages of thirty-five and fifty-five. A closer dating will be suggested in what follows.

But before we come to that, it will be well to ask what is the fundamental purpose of the dialogue.