following
in another state of being the great company of heaven
which he beheld of old in a vision. So, 'partly trifling but
with a certain degree of seriousness,' we linger around the
memory of a world which has passed away.

Yes, 'which has passed away,' and perhaps with no token more
evident of its decease than the sepulture of books that admiring
generations have heaped on it!

III

In a previous lecture I referred you to the beautiful opening and
the yet more beautiful close of the "Phaedrus." Let us turn back
and refresh ourselves with that Dialogue while we learn from it,
in somewhat more of detail, just what a book meant to an
Athenian: how fresh a thing it was to him and how little irksome.

Phaedrus has spent his forenoon listening to a discourse by the
celebrated rhetorician Lysias on the subject of Love, and is
starting to cool his head with a stroll beyond the walls of the
city, when he encounters Socrates, who will not let him go until
he has delivered up the speech with which Lysias regaled him, or,
better still, the manuscript, 'which I suspect you are carrying
there in your left hand under your cloak.' So they bend their way
beside Ilissus towards a tall plane tree, seen in the distance.
Having reached it, they recline.

'By Hera,' says Socrates, 'a fair resting-place, full of
summer sounds and scents! This clearing, with the agnus
castus in high bloom and fragrant, and the stream beneath
the tree so gratefully cool to our feet! Judging from the
ornaments and statues, I think this spot must be sacred to
Acheloues and the Nymphs. And the breeze, how
deliciously charged with balm! and all summer's murmur in
the air, shrilled by the chorus of the grasshoppers! But the
greatest charm is this knoll of turf,--positively a pillow for
the head. My dear Phaedrus, you have been a delectable
guide.'

'What an incomprehensible being you are, Socrates,' returns
Phaedrus. 'When you are in the country, as you say, you
really are like some stranger led about by a guide. Upon my
word, I doubt if you ever stray beyond the gates save by
accident.'

'Very true, my friend: and I hope you will forgive me for the
reason--which is, that I love knowledge, and my teachers are
the men who dwell in the city, not the trees or country
scenes. Yet I do believe you have found a spell to draw me
forth, like a hungry cow before whom a bough or a bunch of
fruit is waved. F