104. ἧς τὸ πρόσθεν. This—the reading of the best MSS.— has been unjustly rejected in favour of εἰς τὸ πρόσθεν; but εἰς τὸ πρόσθεν can hardly be justified here. Sauppe refers to 339Dὀλίγον δὲ τοῦ ποιήματος εἰς τὸ πρόσθεν προελθών, where, however, εἰς τὸ πρόσθεν goes with προελθών, and in all the cases which he quotes there is a verb containing the idea of progress to go with the phrase, and so in Ar. Knights. 751 ἀλλ᾽ ἐς τὸ πρόσθε χρὴ παρεῖν᾽ ἐς τὴν πύκνα (where probably we should read παριέν᾽ for παρεῖν᾽ as in Ach. 43 πάριτ᾽ ἐς τὸ πρόσθεν). Where there is no such verb (which is very rarely the case), the phrase means ‘with a view to what lies in front’, e.g. Alcib. I, 132B οὐκοῦν τοσοῦτον μὲν ἡμῖν εἰς τὸ πρόσθεν πεπέρανται. It need hardly be said that the phrase cannot mean simply ἔμπροσθεν. On the other hand ἧς seems to be just what is needed: the construction in full would be καὶ οὐ μόνον ἐπιστήμης (ἐνδείᾳ), ἀλλὰ καὶ (ταύτης τῆς ἐπιστήμης ἐνδείᾳ) ἣν τὸ πρόσθεν ἔτι ὡμολογήκατε ὅτι μετρητική (sc. ἐστι: for the omission of ἐστί after ὅτι cf. below 359Dἀπεδείχθη ἄρτι ὅτι ἀδύνατον): ‘and from lack, not merely of knowledge, but of the knowledge which you have further admitted above to be measuring knowledge’. The attraction of the relative extends to μετρητική also in spite of ὅτι: cf. Apol. 37B ὧν εὖ οἶδ᾽ ὅτι κακῶν ὄντων for τούτων ἃ εὖ οἶδ᾽ ὅτι κακὰ ὄντα (ὅτι being used with the participle as in Gorg. 481E: see note on Apol. loc. cit.).
