The arrangement might have been improved; the connexion of the argument might have been made plainer, and the sentences more accurately framed.

Something also may be attributed to the feebleness of old age.

Even a rough sketch of the Phaedrus or Symposium would have had a very different look.

There is, however, an interest in possessing one writing of Plato which is in the process of creation.
We must endeavour to find a thread of order which will carry us through this comparative disorder.

The first four books are described by Plato himself as the preface or preamble.