The Student of Plato and Alexander the Great

The Student of Plato and Alexander the GreatPlato and Aristotle are two of the most influential philosophers ever to emerge from the ancient world. It is these two that we know today as the most influential philosophers. And in recent times, we now know that Plato and Aristotle were tutors to one another. They were tutors to a young philosopher known as Alexander the Great, the most powerful man who ever lived.We see evidence of this because of their works. In fact, the philosopher named Aristotle wrote a book called Nicomachean Ethics after reading Plato's Republic. Plato knew the great philosopher known as Aristotle, and it was from them that he learned how to lead a life of virtue.However, the book that Plato wrote is the most important book on human nature that has ever been written. And the fact that the work still stands as the central text on human nature is because of the strength of its ideas. It is not that all people who read the Republic do not live morally, it is that th ose who do live morally read Plato's work and then use it to better themselves.But even before they became tutors to one another, Aristotle and Plato knew one another. In fact, they would go on to work together for many years, tutoring and guiding one another. Plato, however, would be the one who would go on to write down many of his ideas, leaving his tutors to pick up the parts that could be used by Alexander the Great.It was Alexander the Great who would build an empire on the foundations that were laid by these two men. The empire was very important to his time, but it was from the empire that he later carved out a political name that would define his existence as the greatest man who ever lived.This knowledge that Alexander had about Plato is what caused the later Greek philosophers to further borrow the ideas of Plato in their own philosophy. This was especially true of the first century BC, and it is in this period that we know of Socrates and Plato.These two philosophies, th e teachings of Socrates and Plato, became the backbone of the early Greek philosophy. And we know from this period that the world of Athens was very different from the world that we know today.The Greek city-states were no longer in the shadow of their conquerors, but were instead developing a new form of philosophy, one that would define the soul of the world. And even though Alexander the Great was conquered and destroyed, he left a legacy that would be carried on throughout his successors.