discrepancy, in reference to [Greek: to\ daimo/nion], as Stallbaum and Schleiermacher contend for. We perceive indeed this difference between them--that in the Theætêtus, the simile of the obstetric art is largely employed, while it is not noticed in the Theagês. But we should impose an unwarrantable restriction upon Plato's fancy, if we hindered him from working out his variety and exuberance of metaphors, and from accommodating each dialogue to the metaphor predominant with him at the time. Moreover, in respect to what is called the Dæmon of Sokrates, we ought hardly to expect that either Plato or Xenophon would always be consistent even with themselves. It is unsafe for a modern critic to determine beforehand, by reason or feelings of his own, in what manner either of them would speak upon this mysterious subject. The belief and feeling of a divine intervention was very real on the part of both, but their manner of conceiving it might naturally fluctuate: and there was, throughout all the proceedings of Sokrates, a mixture of the serious and the playful, of the sublime and the eccentric, of ratiocinative acuteness with impulsive superstition--which it is difficult to bring into harmonious interpretation. Such heterogeneous mixture is forcibly described in the Platonic Symposium, pp. 215-222. When we consider how undefined, and undefinable, the idea of this [Greek: daimo/nion] was, we cannot wonder if Plato ascribes to it different workings and manifestations at different times. Stallbaum affirms that it is made ridiculous in the Theagês: and Kühner declares that Plutarch makes it ridiculous, in his treatise De Genio Sokratia (Comm. ad. Xenoph. Memor. p. 23). But this is because its agency is described more in detail. You can easily present it in a ridiculous aspect, by introducing it as intervening on petty and insignificant matters. Now it is remarkable, that in the Apology, we are expressly told that it actually did intervene on the most trifling occasions--[Greek: pa/nu e)pi\ smikroi=s e)nantioume/nê]. The business of an historian of philosophy is, to describe it as it was really felt and believed by Sokrates and Plato--whether a modern critic may consider the description ridiculous or not.