Commentary on the First Alcibiades of Plato

As far as the interpretation of the meaning is concerned, I remit the foul obscurity and continuous barbarism of the language to Gogava.

Regarding the Paris codices, they will be treated in the Philological commentaries. Three were indeed inscribed in the catalog, but since only one page remains of one of them, it provided me with no help in establishing the text. Of the two remaining codices, Cod. 1837, which I designated A, is very recent, neatly but incorrectly written, and it also fails alongside Gogava’s own version at page 194 of this volume. Therefore, only Cod. 217, which I called B, remained for the rest of the commentary; although it is more recent, it is of a fairly good quality and carefully written, and it proceeds through the Platonic dialogue in the same way as all the codices of other European libraries. However, although in the first half of the commentary that I am now bringing to light it is affected by few errors, in the other half, which will be contained in the third volume, it is so infested with mistakes and bristles with so many gaps that it cannot be published in its current state at all. I preferred to leave the small gaps I have encountered so far in their unsightly state, rather than filling them poorly with my own inventions, thinking it better to let the intact ruins remain unsightly than to have them shine falsely restored and repainted. I believe this is owed to the most sacred antiquity, that we should preserve its monuments with a certain reverence, just as the years have handed them down. Therefore, I have given what I had in my hands, exactly as I had it, and I do not regret having given it; but I would regret it if the third volume labored under too many more errors, since they could be easily remedied by collating some excellent codices from the libraries of Italy and using them to aid and illustrate our own. Therefore, I am leaving my homeland again and going to Italy with the hope that I may bring back a joyful harvest of variant readings, by which the poverty of the Paris library may be aided and my edition may grow rich. In the following volume, what I have gathered from that journey will be published.