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Nor is there any use in arguing strictly either from a few chance

words, or from the silence of Plato, or in drawing inferences

which were beyond his vision. Aristotle, in his criticism on the

position of the lower classes, does not perceive that the

poetical creation is 'like the air, invulnerable,' and cannot be

penetrated by the shafts of his logic (Pol.).

6. Two paradoxes which strike the modern reader as in the highest

degree fanciful and ideal, and which suggest to him many

reflections, are to be found in the third book of the Republic:

first, the great power of music, so much beyond any influence

which is experienced by us in modern times, when the art or

science has been far more developed, and has found the secret of

harmony, as well as of melody; secondly, the indefinite and

almost absolute control which the soul is supposed to exercise

over the body.