Note 802 — Chapter LXVIII · SOKRATES. (continued 2)

Aristotle (Problem. c. 30, p. 953, Bek.) numbers both Sokratês and Plato (compare Plutarch, Lysand. c. 2) among those to whom he ascribes φύσιν μελανχολικὴν, the black bile and ecstatic temperament. I do not know how to reconcile this with a passage in his Rhetoric (ii, 17), in which he ranks Sokratês among the sedate persons (στάσιμον). The first of the two assertions seems countenanced by the anecdotes respecting Sokratês (in Plato, Symposion, p. 175, B; p. 220, C), that he stood in the same posture, quite unmoved, even for several hours continuously, absorbed in meditation upon some idea which had seized his mind.