generation, according to its proper signification, there also there
is time."

A Guest, [Greek: Xenos]. This word, in its more ample signification in
the Greek, denotes a stranger, but properly implies one who receives
another, or is himself received at an entertainment. In the following
dialogues, therefore, wherever one of the speakers is introduced as a
Xenos, I have translated this word guest, as being more conformable to
the genius of Plato's dialogues, which may be justly called rich mental
banquets, and consequently the speakers in them may be considered as so
many guests. Hence in the Timaeus, the persons of that dialogue are
expressly spoken of as guests.

Hyparxis, [Greek: uparxis]. The first principle or foundation, as it
were, of the essence of a thing. Hence also, it is the summit of essence.

Idiom, [Greek: Idioma]. The characteristic peculiarity of a thing.

The Immortal, [Greek: To athanaton]. According to Plato, there are many
orders of immortality, pervading from on high to the last of things; and
the ultimate echo, as it were, of immorality is seen in the perpetuity of
the mundane wholes, which according to the doctrine of the Elean Guest in
the Politicus, they participate from the Father of the universe. For both
the being and the life of every body depend on another cause; since body
is not itself naturally adapted to connect, or adorn, or preserve itself.
But the immortality of partial souls, such as ours, is more manifest and
more perfect than this of the perpetual bodies in the universe; as is
evident from the many demonstrations which are given of it in the Phaedo,
and in the 10th book of the Republic. For the immortality of partial
souls has a more principal subsistence, as possessing in itself the cause