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"Who dares,"--he demanded hoarsely of the courtiers who stood near him--"who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? Seize him and unmask him--that we may know whom we have to hang, at sunrise, from the battlements!"

It was in the blue room where stood the prince, with a group of pale courtiers by his side. At first, as he spoke, there was a slight rushing movement of this group in the direction of the intruder, who at the moment was also near at hand, and now, with deliberate and stately step, made closer approach to the speaker. But from a certain nameless awe with which the mad assumptions of the mummer had inspired the whole party, there were found none who put forth hand to seize him; so that, unimpeded, he passed within a yard of the prince's person; and, while the vast assembly, as if with one impulse, shrank from the centres of the rooms to the walls, he made his way uninterruptedly, but with the same solemn and measured step which had distinguished him from the first, through the blue chamber to the purple--through the purple to the green--through the green to the orange--through this again to the white--and even thence to the violet, ere a decided movement had been made to arrest him. It was then, however, that the Prince Prospero, maddening with rage and the shame of his own momentary cowardice, rushed hurriedly through the six chambers, while none followed him on account of a deadly terror that had seized upon all. He bore aloft a drawn dagger, and had approached, in rapid impetuosity, to within three or four feet of the retreating figure, when the latter, having attained the extremity of the velvet apartment, turned suddenly and confronted his pursuer. There was a sharp cry--and the dagger dropped gleaming upon the sable carpet, upon which, instantly afterwards, fell prostrate in death the Prince Prospero. Then, summoning the wild courage of despair, a throng of the revellers at once threw themselves into the black apartment, and, seizing the mummer, whose tall figure stood erect and motionless within the shadow of the ebony clock, gasped in unutterable horror at finding the grave cerements and corpse-like mask, which they handled with so violent a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form.

... stare

Plato had political ambitions as a young man and appeared destined to continue in the family tradition. His disillusionment with Athenian politics, however, was inevitable. Both the Empire and its politics had begun to decline since the onset of the Peloponnesian War several years before Plato's birth. Outside the political sphere, Plato enjoyed success in athletics, winning the Isthmian wrestling competition, and wrote various forms of poetry and drama. Aristotle reports that during his youth, Plato also became familiar with the teachings of Cratylus, a student of Heraclitus, and other Presocratic thinkers, such as Pythagoras and Parmenides, providing the young philosopher with a worthy introduction to the foundations of Greek metaphysics and epistemology. At about this time, Plato came to know the man who, because of his uncouth habits and intellectual unorthodoxy, was already an infamous figure in the city of Athens. Plato probably met Socrates around 409 through close relatives Critias (Plato's mother's uncle) and Charmides (his mother's brother), who were friends with Socrates. Plato immediately became his devoted follower and a dedicated student of philosophy.

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When in 367 Plato was offered the opportunity to put his philosophical ideas into practice by tutoring the new ruler of Syracuse, Dionysius II, he accepted, despite being heavily occupied with the administration of the Academy and his own philosophical writings. His experiment in Sicily would fail twice, so disagreeably on the second trip that Plato had difficulty returning unscathed to Athens in 360. Meanwhile, Aristotle, Plato's most prominent student, had entered the Academy. There is comparatively little know about the final years of his life, although it is certain Plato continued lecturing at the Academy and writing. The works produced in these years: Theaetetus, Parmenides, Philebus, Laws, and Timaeus, constitute the "later" period and contain some of Plato's most profound meditations on the nature of knowledge, perception, and subjectivity. He died in his sleep at about the age of 80 in Athens in 348 or 347 BC.

go Plato go! rock that casbah!