ABSTRACT
Plato infers that artists deal in appearances not merely in the sense that a painting of a bed is remote from the Form of the bed, but in the sense that artists, in so far as they are only concerned to please, are necessarily concerned only with apparent goodness. Plato regards artists as a species of sophist. Reciprocally he accuses lovers of music and the theatre of being like dreamers who confuse image with reality because they delight in sounds, colours and forms which appear to be beautiful without being capable of delighting in beauty itself (op. cit., 476).
