PREFACE.

Here comes to light the first part of the commentary that Proclus composed on Plato's First Alcibiades, and indeed, with a short time intervening, the second part will follow, so that nothing now will be almost wanting for the understanding of one of the most serious works of Plato.

The First Alcibiades treats of human nature, namely, that from which Philosophy originates, if indeed you are yourself the only instrument of knowledge, which you cannot use, unless you have first examined how much it is worth and how much it excels. That Know thyself, having entered from the Delphic sanctuary into the schools of the philosophers, and clearly known and practiced by the Socratics, the Alexandrians—who had gathered scattered religions and various opinions of philosophical sects into the broad bosom of Eclecticism—had established among the more sublime principles of that science.