I have already stated that the first half of the Phædrus differs materially from the second; and that its three discourses on the subject of Eros (the first two depreciating Eros, the third being an effusion of high-flown and poetical panegyric on the same theme) may be better understood by being looked at in conjunction with the Symposion. The second half of the Phædrus passes into a different discussion, criticising the discourse of Lysias as a rhetorical composition: examining the principles upon which the teaching of Rhetoric as an Art either is founded, or ought to be founded: and estimating the efficacy of written discourse generally, as a means of working upon or instructing other minds. [Side-note: Lysias is called a logographer by active politicians. Contempt conveyed by the word. Sokrates declares that the only question is, Whether a man writes well or ill.] I heard one of our active political citizens (says Phædrus) severely denounce Lysias, and fasten upon him with contempt, many times over, the title of a logographer. Active politicians will not consent to compose and leave behind them written discourses, for fear of being called Sophists.[59] To write discourses (replies Sokrates) is noway discreditable: the real question is, whether he writes them well.[60] And the same question is the only one proper to be asked about other writers on all subjects--public or private, in prose or in verse. How to speak _well_, and how to write _well_--is the problem.[61] Is there any art or systematic method, capable of being laid down beforehand and defended upon principle, for accomplishing the object _well_? Or does a man succeed only by unsystematic knack or practice, such as he can neither realise distinctly to his own consciousness, nor describe to others? [Footnote 59: Plato, Phædrus, p. 257 C.] [Footnote 60: Plato, Phædrus, pp. 257 E, 258 D. The two appellations--[Greek: logogra/phos] and [Greek: sophistê/s]--are here coupled together as terms of reproach, just as they stand coupled in Demosthenes, Fals. Leg. p. 417. It is plain that both appellations acquired their discreditable import mainly from the collateral circumstance that the persons so denominated took money for their compositions or teaching. The [Greek: logogra/phos] wrote for pay, and on behalf of any client who could pay him. In the strict etymological sense, neither of the two terms would imply any reproach.