柏拉图的早期对话录《伊安篇》（《Ion》，又译作《埃奥恩》约写于公元前390年），是对灵感问题所作的全面探讨。伊安是一位专以吟诵荷马史诗为业的诵诗人，这天参加诵诗竞赛归来，正为自己获得头奖而洋洋自得。不料，遇见苏格拉底假装向他求教，提出许多令人困惑的问题，结果却使伊安自相矛盾，难以招架。按照苏格拉底的逻辑，如果伊安果真是凭技艺解说荷马史诗的话，那么，他也就能凭借技艺去解说其他诗人的作品。因为既然它们都是诗歌，就会具有诗歌的共通性。可是，事实上伊安只擅长吟诵荷马，谈及别的诗人来就要打瞌睡。由此看来，他之擅长解说荷马，并非是一种技艺，而是凭借着灵感。柏拉图由此指出：
凡是高明的诗人，无论在史诗或抒情诗方面，都不是凭技艺来做成他们的优美的诗歌，而是因为他们得到灵感，有神力凭附着……因为诗人是一种轻飘的长着羽翼的神明的东西，不得到灵感，不失去平常理智而陷入迷狂，就没有能力创作，就不能做诗或代神说话。诗人们对于他们所写的那些题材，说出那样多的优美词句，像你自己解说荷马那样，并非凭技艺的规矩，而是依诗神的驱遣。柏拉图在《伊安篇》中,通过"赫剌克勒斯石"之链的比喻,形象地说明了艺术创作中灵感的作用,诗人进入灵感状态的表现,以及作品的艺术感染力的问题,对后世文艺理论的发展产生了极为重要的影响.
《Ion》原文
Ion
by Plato translated by Benjamin Jowett
"In Plato's Ion Socrates discusses with the title character the question of whether the rhapsode, a professional performer of poetry, gives his performance on account of his skill and knowledge or by virtue of divine possession.
Ion has just come from a festival of Asclepius at the city of Epidarus, and is full of himself for having carried off first prize in the competition. Socrates presses the view that it is divine possession and not acquired skill that is behind the actor's art, but Ion admits that it is the specter of money that really keeps him on his toes. Socrates subjects Ion to his philosophical dialectic, and gets him to admit that because he recites Homer's war stories, he is as much military general as actor. Only then does Socrates seem satisfied that he has made a fool of the actor, whom he accuses of being as shifty as Proteus.
Ion admits when Socrates asks, that his skill in performance recitation is limited to Homer, and that all other poets bore him. Socrates finds this puzzling, and sets out to solve the "riddle" of Ion's limited expertise. He points out to Ion that art critics and judges of sculpture normally do not limit themselves to judging the work of only a single artist, but can criticize the art no matter who the particular artist. Socrates deduces from this observation that Ion has no real skill, but is like a soothsayer or prophet in being divinely possessed. Socrates offers the metaphor of a magnet to explain how the actor transmits the poet's original inspiration from the muse to the audience. He says that the god speaks first to the poet, then gives the actor his skill, and thus, gods communicate to the people; the only other option is to be a cheater since Ion does not know of skills in which he recites (military general).
