indistinct,
the changes of person and number more frequent, examples of pleonasm,
tautology, and periphrasis, antitheses of positive and negative, false
emphasis, and other affectations, are more numerous than in the other
writings of Plato; there is also a more common and sometimes unmeaning
use of qualifying formulae, os epos eipein, kata dunamin, and of double
expressions, pante pantos, oudame oudamos, opos kai ope--these are too
numerous to be attributed to errors in the text; again, there is an
over-curious adjustment of verb and participle, noun and epithet, and
other artificial forms of cadence and expression take the place of
natural variety: thirdly, the absence of metaphorical language is
remarkable--the style is not devoid of ornament, but the ornament is of
a debased rhetorical kind, patched on to instead of growing out of the
subject; there is a great command of words, and a laboured use of
them; forced attempts at metaphor occur in several passages,--e.g.
parocheteuein logois; ta men os tithemena ta d os paratithemena; oinos
kolazomenos upo nephontos eterou theou; the plays on the word nomos =
nou dianome, ode etara: fourthly, there is a foolish extravagance of
language in other passages,--'the swinish ignorance of arithmetic;' 'the
justice and suitableness of the discourse on laws;' over-emphasis; 'best
of Greeks,' said of all the Greeks, and the like: fifthly, poor and
insipid illustrations are also common: sixthly, we may observe an
excessive use of climax and hyperbole, aischron legein chre pros autous
doulon te kai doulen kai paida kai ei pos oion te olen ten oikian: dokei
touto to epitedeuma kata phusin tas peri ta aphrodisia edonas ou monon
anthropon alla kai therion diephtharkenai.

4. The peculiarities in the use of words which occur in the Laws have
been collected by Zeller (Platonische Studien) and Stallbaum
(Legg.): first, in the use of nouns, such as allodemia, apeniautesis,
glukuthumia, diatheter, thrasuxenia, koros, megalonoia, paidourgia:
secondly, in the use of adjectives, such as aistor, biodotes,
echthodopos, eitheos, chronios, and of adverbs, such as aniditi, anatei,
nepoivei: thirdly, in the use of verbs, such as athurein, aissein
(aixeien eipein), euthemoneisthai, parapodizesthai, sebein, temelein,
tetan. These words however, as Stallbaum remarks, are formed according
to analogy, and nearly all of them have the support of some poetical or
other authority.

Zeller and Stallbaum have