Commentary on the First Alcibiades of Plato (Cambridge, University Library, MS Kk.5.27)

...exercise, it must be said that it must be placed first of all the Platonic dialogues. For as he says in the Phaedrus, it is ridiculous for one who ignores himself to know other things. Second, that one must learn the things of Socrates in the Socratic manner. And Socrates is said to have come to philosophy from "Know yourself." Furthermore, one must consider that this dialogue resembles the outer courts original: "προπυλαίοις". And just as those outer courts are the vestibules of the inner sanctums, so Alcibiades must be likened to the outer courts, and the Parmenides to the inner sanctums. Concerning the division into chapters, or parts, one must know that the dialogue is divided into three: the elenctic refutational, the protreptic exhortatory, and the maieutic midwifery. In the elenctic part, he shows him to be doubly ignorant: because he ignores political matters, and because he thinks he knows them. For he is ignorant, as he has neither learned from a teacher nor sought for himself. For knowledge comes about in two ways: either through learning from teachers, or through our own seeking. And it is better to know by seeking for oneself than by learning from another, in as much as that which is self-moving is better than that which is moved by another, as Aristotle says in the Rhetoric. And the self-grown is better than the...