It is of the philosophy of Plato that I would write, but I would keep in mind a definition of philosophy given by Plato himself when he spoke of it as “meditation on death.” I would write, too, not of any inner details of what Plato thought, but of his teaching in its general character and value; and especially, on behalf of my readers, I would assume that, for their purposes as well as always for my own, no fair estimate and no vital appreciation of Plato or his meditation can ever be attained without some understanding of the place of Plato and his philosophy in the history of his very remarkable people, the ancient Greeks, and of their dead civilization.