e Idea may be the ground of God's existence as it
is the ground of all else in the universe. But this theory does
violence to the idea of God, turning Him into a mere derivative
existence, and, in fact, into an appearance. Thirdly, God and the Idea
may be co-ordinate in the system as equally primordial independent
ultimate realities. But this means that Plato has given two mutually
inconsistent accounts of the ultimate reality, or, if not, that his
system is a hopeless dualism. As none of these theories can be
maintained, it must be supposed that God is identical with the Idea of
the Good, and we find certain expressions in the "Philebus" which seem
clearly to assert this. But in that case God is not a personal God at
all, since the Idea is not a person. The word God, if used in this
way, is merely a figurative term for the Idea. And this is the most
probable theory, if we reflect that there is in fact no room for a
personal God in a system which places all reality in the Idea, and
that to introduce such a conception threatens to break up the whole
system. Plato probably found it useful to take the popular conceptions
about the personality of God or the gods and use them, in mythical
fashion, to express his Ideas. Those parts of Plato which speak of
God, and the governance of God, {204} are to be interpreted on the
same principles as the other Platonic myths.

[Footnote 13: _Plato and the Older Academy_, chap. vi.]

Before closing our discussion of dialectic, it may be well to consider
what place it occupies in the life of man, and what importance is
attached to it. Here Plato's answer is emphatic. Dialectic is the
crown of knowledge, and knowledge is the crown of life. All other
spiritual activities have value only in so far as they lead up to the
knowledge of the Idea. All other subjects of intellectual study are
merely preparatory to the study of philosophy. The special sciences
have no value in themselves, but they have value inasmuch as their
definitions and classifications form a preparation for the knowledge
of Ideas. Mathematics is important because it is a stepping-stone from
the world of sense to the Ideas. Its objects, namely, numbers and
geometrical figures, resemble the Ideas in so far as they are
immutable, and they resemble sense-objects in so far as they are in
space or time. In the educational curriculum of Plato, philosophy
comes last. Not everyone may study it. And none may study it till he
has been