Cebes

One work, known as the Pinax (Πίναξ) or Tabula, attributed to Cebes still survives, but it is believed to be a composition by a pseudonymous author of the 1st or 2nd century AD.

He is one of the speakers in the Phaedo of Plato, in which he is represented as an earnest seeker after virtue and truth, keen in argument and cautious in decision.

[3][4] The work professes to be an interpretation of an allegorical picture of a tablet on which the whole of human life with its dangers and temptations was symbolically represented, and which is said to have been dedicated by someone in the temple of Cronus at Athens or Thebes.

[5] The author introduces some youths contemplating the tablet, and an old man who steps among them undertakes to explain its meaning.

[5] The author develops the Platonic theory of pre-existence, and shows that true education consists not in mere erudition, but rather in the formation of character.

Title page with the Tablet of Cebes, by Hans Holbein the Younger , 1521. Metalcut by Jacob Faber .