Receiving the ethics of power : Ficino, Plato and the education of the prince

Abstract

In this paper I offer a preliminary investigation of the modalities of Plato’s reception as evidenced in Marsilio Ficino’s Letters to Lorenzo De’ Medici. I examine some features of the genre speculum principis, which emerge from a study of this correspondence, in the light of Renaissance modes of reception, not only in relation to considerations of ethical principles, but also of specific vocabulary. In this instance, a vocabulary evocative of subjection and subservience. I hope to show how fruitful a detailed study of Ficino’s correspondence might be to understand better both the significance of Plato’s reception in the Renaissance and the influence that Ficino exerted on literature and the figurative arts in the 16th century and beyond.