"It is usually maintained that the Platonic or Socratic philosophy, like the rest of Greek speculation, was original, indigenous, owing very little to any outside influence. But the quest and life and faith of Socrates were as un-Greek as anything could possibly be: that was one of the reasons why the Greeks killed him: the essence of his life belonged to a world unknown to them, and therefore dangerous in their eyes […] There is only one “philosopher” whose doctrines, both practical and theoretical, appear to have resembled Plato’s in spirit and aim as well as in substance; and that one is Pythagoras. It is noteworthy that Pythagoras is the only great thinker of Greece whom Plato never criticises, but of whom he speaks with the greatest deference and respect […] instancing him as the great example of a teacher whose teaching had in it living truth enough to inspire a band of devoted disciples, and to transform their lives as well as their beliefs. And every one of those doctrines, which we know formed the “gospel” of Pythagoras and of the Pythagorean brotherhood at Crotona, was an almost exact reproduction of the cardinal doctrines of the Indian Vidya and the Indian Yoga—so much so that Indian Vedantists today do not hesitate to claim Pythagoras as one of themselves, one of their great expounders, whose very name was only the Greek form of the Indian title Pitta Guru, or Father-Teacher.’"