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This translation of Xenophon's Memorabilia of Socrates was first published in 1712, and is here printed from the revised edition of 1722. Its author was Edward Bysshe, who had produced in 1702 The Art of English Poetry, a well-known work that was near its fifth edition when its author published his translation of the Memorabilia. This was a translation that remained in good repute. There was another edition of it in 1758. Bysshe translated the title of the book into The Memorable Things of Socrates. I have changed Things into Thoughts, for whether they be sayings or doings, the words and deeds of a wise man are alike expressions of his thought. Xenophon is said to have been, when young, a pupil of Socrates. Two authorities have recorded that in the flight from the battle of Delium in the year B.C. 424, when Xenophon fell from his horse, Socrates picked him up and carried him on his back for a considerable distance. The time of Xenophon's death is not known, but he was alive sixty-seven years after the battle of Delium. When Cyrus the Younger was preparing war against his brother Artaxerxes Mnemon, King of Persia, Xenophon went with him. After the death of Cyrus on the plains of Cunaxa, the barbarian auxiliaries fled, and the Greeks were left to return as they could from the far region between the Tigris and Euphrates. Xenophon had to take part in the conduct of the retreat, and tells the story of it in his Anabasis, a history of the expedition of the younger Cyrus and of the retreat of the Greeks. His return into Greece was in the year of the death of Socrates, B.C. 399, but his association was now with the Spartans, with whom he fought, B.C. 394, at Coroneia. Afterwards he settled, and lived for about twenty years, at Scillus in Eleia with his wife and children. At Scillus he wrote probably his Anabasis and some other of his books. At last he was driven out by the Eleans. In the battle of Mantineia the Spartans and Athenians fought as allies, and Xenophon's two sons were in the battle; he had sent them to Athens as fellow-combatants from Sparta. His banishment from Athens was repealed by change of times, but it does not appear that he returned to Athens. He is said to have lived, and perhaps died, at Corinth, after he had been driven from his home at Scillus.

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Xenophon (c. 431 BC[1] - 354 BC) was an ancient Greek historian, philosopher and soldier.[2] Xenophon became commander of the Ten Thousand at about 30, with noted military historian Theodore Ayrault Dodge saying of him, the centuries since have devised nothing to surpass the genius of this warrior. [3] He established the precedent for many logistical operations and was among the first to use flanking maneuvers and feints. A student of Socrates, Xenophon is known for his writings and recording the history of his time (late-5th and early-4th centuries BC), in such works as Anabasis and Hellenica, which covered the final seven years and the aftermath of the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC), thus representing a thematic continuation of Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War. As one of the Ten Thousand (Greek mercenaries), Xenophon participated in Cyrus the Younger's failed campaign to claim the Persian throne from his brother Artaxerxes II of Persia. He recounted the events in Anabasis, his most notable history. Like Plato, Xenophon is an authority on Socrates, about whom he wrote several books of dialogues (the Memorabilia) and an Apology of Socrates to the Jury, which recounts the philosopher's trial in 399 BC. Despite being born an Athenian citizen, Xenophon was also associated with Sparta, the traditional enemy of Athens. His pro-oligarchic politics, military service under Spartan generals in the Persian campaign and elsewhere, and his friendship with King Agesilaus II endeared Xenophon to the Spartans. Some of his works have a pro-Spartan bias, especially the royal biography Agesilaus and the Constitution of the Spartans. Xenophon's works span several genres and are written in plain-language Attic Greek, for which reason they serve as translation exercises for contemporary students of the Ancient Greek language. In the Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, Diogenes Laertius observed that, as a writer, Xenophon of Athens was known as the Attic Muse, for the sweetness of his diction

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