, but
these ideals were centered in Athenian culture.

6. It excluded women and slaves from its benefits, and was by no means
universal.

7. It recognized the value of play as an educational force, thereby
anticipating the kindergarten.

8. The State exercised a certain control over the school by furnishing
places where it might be held, by defraying the expense of examinations,
by determining the number of pupils to a teacher, by fixing the limit of
school hours, and by deciding upon the qualifications of teachers. And
yet the choice of education was free, and its aim was the good of the
individual and not the glory of the State.

CHAPTER IX

ATHENIAN EDUCATORS

=Literature.=--_Bulkley_, Plato's Best Thoughts; _Schwegler_, History of
Philosophy; _Morris_, Historical Tales; _Curtius_, History of Greece;
_Lord_, Beacon Lights; _Spofford_, Library of Historical Characters;
_Jowett_, The Republic of Plato; _Vogel_, Geschichte der Paedagogik;
_Emerson_, Representative Men; _De Quincey_, Plato's Republic; _Hegel_,
Philosophy of History.

SOCRATES (B.C. 470-399)

Socrates was the son of a sculptor of Athens. Though he learned his
father's trade and followed it in early manhood, he relinquished it to
devote himself to the study of philosophy, for which he had a natural
bent. In person he was far from fulfilling the Athenian ideal of beauty,
being short of stature, corpulent, with protruding eyes, upturned nose,
large mouth, and thick lips. His domestic life was not happy, his wife,
Xantippe, being a noted shrew. His failure to provide for the material
welfare of his family, though quite natural in a man to whom all
material things seemed unessential, must have sorely tried her patience.
But Socrates bore her scolding with resignation. Indeed, he seemed to
regard it as furnishing an opportunity to practice the philosophic
patience that he preached.

Socrates believed that he had a divine call to "convince men of
ignorance mistaking itself for knowledge, and by so doing to promote
their intellectual and moral development." Like many other
philosophers, he spent his time in the streets, markets, and other
public places, arguing with any one who would stop to listen or
converse. This manner of teaching was common in Athens, and he never
lacked hearers. The whole atmosphere of the classic city was charged
with the spirit of intellectual activity and philosophic discussion.
Socrates did not teach positive doctri