"Socrates tells Phaedrus the story of the invention of the alphabet. When Tammus sat upon the throne of Egypt, there came to him Toth, the inventor, who praised alphabetic writing as 'medicine for memory and wisdom'. Thereupon the wise king replied that writing would have just the opposite effect. 'If men learn this, it will implant forgetfulness in their souls; they will...rely on that which is written, calling things to remembrance no longer from within themselves, but by means of external marks.'
This story belongs among the great statements of human wisdom, and should never be allowed to fade from the memory of man. It makes the eternally modern point that technical improvements which to all appearances facilitate man's participation in reality and truth actually do just the opposite: they hamper and possibly even destroy that participation. The ease of communication abolishes real communication...The very great teachers do not write...Thomas (Aquinas) asks whether Christ should not have set down his own doctrine in writing - and answers that the higher mode of teaching is proper to the greater teacher, and that that higher mode consists in impressing his doctrine on the hearts of his hearers."
(Pieper, p. 101)

I thought it strange that Pieper had written two short books on the Platonic dialogue Phaedrus, and indeed there were many sections that were exactly the same as in both books. This one in particular, though, took the entire dialogue with a bit more depth, while his other book focused on divine madness.

As always, I find Pieper's views interesting and at many times refreshing, though his reading of Plato, I think, is at one point in the book a bit off. Generally, though his discussion wasn't as illuminating as other books I've read about Plato (I thought about most of what was written while writing a paper myself), Pieper's discussion fit together a lot of singular ideas and constructed a cohesive whole that led me deeper along paths I had previously scouted.

Man, I love reading Pieper...

Recommended by James Schall in Another Sort of Learning, Chapter 6, as one of Four Books and Two Essays to Help You Begin Wondering about Plato.

Recommended by James Schall in Another Sort of Learning, Intro to Part Three, as one of Fourteen Books by Josef Pieper.