The works of Plato are numerous; with the exception of twelve letters, they are all written in the form of dialogue, in which Socrates is the principal interlocutor. Thus he always speaks by the mouth of others, and the philosopher has nowhere made mention of himself, except once in his dialogue entitled Phædon, and another time in his Apology for Socrates. His writings were so celebrated, and his opinions so respected, that he was called divine; and for the elegance, melody, and sweetness of his expressions, he was distinguished by the appellation of the Athenian bee. His style, however, though commended and admired by the most refined critics among the ancients, has not escaped the censure of some of the moderns. It is obvious that the philosopher cannot escape ridicule, who supposes that fire is a pyramid tied to the earth by numbers; that the world is a figure consisting of twelve pentagons; and who, to prove the metempsychosis and the immortality of the soul, asserts that the dead are born from the living, and the living from the dead. The speculative mind of Plato was employed in examining things divine and human; and he attempted to ascertain and fix not only the practical doctrines of morals and politics but the more subtle and abstruse theory of mystical theogony—the origin of the gods, or divine power. His philosophy was universally received and adopted in ancient times, and it has not only governed the opinions of the speculative part of mankind, but it continues still to influence the reasoning, and to divide the sentiments of the moderns. In his system of philosophy, he followed the physics of Heraclitus, the metaphysical opinions of Pythagoras, and the morals of Socrates. He maintained the existence of two beings—one self-existent, and the other formed by the hand of a pre-existent, creative god and man. The world, he maintained, was created by that self-existent cause, from the rude, undigested mass of matter which had existed from all eternity, and which had ever been animated by an irregular principle of motion. The origin of evil could not be traced under the government of a deity, without admitting a stubborn intractability and wildness congenial to matter; and from these, consequently, could be demonstrated the deviations from the laws of nature, and from thence, the extravagant passions and appetites of men.