this instance, you who are the father of letters, from a 
     paternal love of your own children have been led to 
     attribute to them a quality which they cannot have; for 
     this discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the 
     learners’ souls, because they will not use their memories; 
     they will trust to the external written characters and not 
     remember of themselves. The specific which you have 
     discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence, 
     and you give your disciples not truth, but only the 
     semblance of truth; they will be hearers of many things 
     and will have learned nothing; they will appear to be 
     omniscient and will generally know nothing; they will be 
     tiresome company, having the show of wisdom without 
     the reality.

     Plato shows no awareness here or elsewhere of how the