CEBES, a Theban philosopher, and a disciple of Socrates.' Ho was the writer of three dialogues, called riiyaV (table or tablet), "Efacipe,' and ' sapt'svixes.' (Suidee v. K1$, r. Diog. La8rt, ii. 125.) lie is represented by Plato as attending Socrates in his last moments, and is one of the interlocutors in the ' Phtedon: The first mentioned of his dialogues has been very frequently edited, and is often one of the first books placed before the Greek student. It is a description of an allegorical picture, supposed to bo affixed to the walls of a temple of Saturn, and representing the life and trials of mankind. Scholars have doubted whether it is rightly attributed to the Theban Cebes, but the Greek authorities are conclusive of its genuineness (see Lucian, tom. L p. 702, and tom. iii. p. 5, Hematerhuis); and the Attie dialogue in which it is written is no proof tliat its author was not a Theban, for moral dialogues were always written in Attic, just as the Ionic dialect was appropriated to the epos, and the Doric to lyric poetry.
Wo know nothing of Cebu!' beyond the mention of his name by Plato, who makes Socrates call him a diligent inquirer after truth, and by Xenophon, from whom we learn that his moral character was most unexceptionable. The first complete edition of the ' Meat' is that by J. Gronovius, Amst. 1680; the beat are, perhaps, that by Schweig bliuser, Lips. 1708, which also contains the 'Manual' of Epictetus, or his last edition of 1506, and that by Coraes, Par. 1826, in his edition of Epictetus.
There was a Cebes of Cyzicus, a Stoic philosopher contemporary with the emperor Marcus Aurelius, to whom some critics, apparently without much reason, would attribute the ' Table.' There is a dissertation on the genuineness of the Table,' by F. C. Klopfcr, Zwickau, 1818, 4to.