Note 76 — Chapter XXXVII · REPUBLIC — REMARKS ON THE PLATONIC COMMONWEALTH.

Plato, Legg. iii. p. 679; compare x. p. 887 C, xi. p. 913 C.

So again in the Timæus (p. 40 E), he accepts the received genealogy of the Gods, upon the authority of the sons and early descendants of the Gods. These sons must have known their own fathers; we ought therefore “to follow the law and believe them” (ἐπομένους τῷ νόμῳ πιστευτέον) though they spoke without either probable or demonstrative proof (ἀδύνατον οὖν θεῶν παισὶν ἀπιστεῖν, καίπερ ἄνευ τε εἰκότων καὶ ἀναγκαίων ἀποδείξεων λέγουσιν).

That which Plato here enjoins to be believed is the genealogy of Hesiod and other poets, though he does not expressly name the poets. Julian in his remark on the passage (Orat. vii. p. 237) understands the poets to be meant, and their credibility to be upheld, by Plato — καὶ τοιαῦτα ἕτερα ἐν Τιμαίῳ· πιστεύειν γὰρ ἁπλῶς ἀξιοῖ καὶ χωρὶς ἀποδείξεως λεγομένοις, ὅσα ὑπὲρ τῶν θεῶν φασὶν οἱ ποιηταί. See Lindau’s note on this passage in his edition of the Timæus, p. 62.