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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: probably to the second or third generation after Plato, when his writings
were well known at Athens and Alexandria. They exhibit considerable
originality, and are remarkable for containing several thoughts of the sort
which we suppose to be modern rather than ancient, and which therefore have
a peculiar interest for us. The Second Alcibiades shows that the
difficulties about prayer which have perplexed Christian theologians were
not unknown among the followers of Plato. The Eryxias was doubted by the
ancients themselves: yet it may claim the distinction of being, among all
Greek or Roman writings, the one which anticipates in the most striking
manner the modern science of political economy and gives an abstract form
to some of its principal doctrines.
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