Those writers398are, therefore, clearly in error who assert that the earliest question of Greek philosophy was, What is God? and that various and discordant answers were given, Thales saying, water is God, Anaximenes, air; Heraclitus, fire; Pythagoras, numbers; and so on. The idea of God is a native intuition of the mind. It springs up spontaneously from the depths of the human soul. The human mind naturally recognizes God as an uncreated Mind, and recognizes itself as "the offspring of God." And, therefore, it is simply impossible for it to acknowledge water, or air, or fire, or any material thing to be its God. Now they who reject this fundamental principle evidently misapprehend the real problem of early Grecian philosophic thought. The external world, the material universe, was the first object of their inquiry, and the method of their inquiry was, at the first stage, purely physical. Every object of sense had a beginning and an end; it rose out of something, and it fell back into something. Beneath this ceaseless flow and change there must be some permanent principle. What is that στοιχεῖον--that first element? The changes in the universe seem to obey some principle of law--they have an orderly succession. What is that µορφή--that form, or ideal, or archetype, proper to each thing, and according to which all things are produced? These changes must be produced by some efficient cause, some power or being which is itself immobile, and permanent, and eternal, and adequate to their production. What is that ἀρχὴ τῆς κινήσεως--that first principle of movement Then, lastly, there must be an end for which all things exist--a good reason why things are as they are, and not otherwise. What is that τὸ οὗ ἕνεκεν καῖ τὸ ἀγαθόν--that reason and good of all things? Now these are all ἀρχαί or first principles of the universe. "Common to all first principles," says Aristotle, "is the being, the original, from which a thing is, or is produced, or is known."399First principles, therefore, include both elements and causes, and, under certain aspects, elements arealso causes, in so far as they are that without which a thing can not be produced. Hence that highest generalization by Aristotle of all first principles; as--1. The Material Cause; 2. The Formal Cause; 3. The Efficient Cause; 4. The Final Cause. The grand subject of inquiry in ancient philosophy was not alone what is the finalelementfrom which all things have been produced? nor yet what is theefficient causeof the movement and the order of the universe?but what are those First Principles which, being assumed, shall furnish a rational explanation of all phenomena, of all becoming?
Footnote 398:(return)As the writer of the article "Attica," in the Encyclopædia Britannica.
Footnote 399:(return)"Metaphysics," bk. iv. ch. i. p. 112 (Bohn's edition).
So much being premised, we proceed to consider the efforts and the results of philosophic thought in
THE PRE-SOCRATIC SCHOOLS.
"The first act in the drama of Grecian speculation was performed on the varied theatre of the Grecian colonies--Asiatic, insular, and Italian, verging at length (in Anaxagoras) towards Athens." During the progress of this drama two distinct schools of philosophy were developed, having distinct geographical provinces, one on the east, the other on the west, of the peninsula of Greece, and deriving their names from the localities in which they flourished. The earliest was theIonian;the latter was theItalianschool.
It would be extremely difficult, at this remote period, to estimate the influence which geographical conditions and ethnical relations exerted in determining the course of philosophic thought in these schools. Unquestionably those conditions contributed somewhat towards fixing their individuality. At the same time, it must be granted that the distinction in these two schools of philosophy is of a deeper character than can be represented or explained by geographical surroundings; it is a distinction reaching to the very foundation of their habits of thought. These schools represent two distinct aspects of philosophic thought, two distinct methods in which the human mind has essayed to solve the problem of the universe.
The ante-Socratic schools were chiefly occupied with thestudy of external nature. "Greek philosophy was, at its first appearance, a philosophy of nature." It was an effort of the reason to reach a "first principle" which should explain the universe. This early attempt was purely speculative. It sought to interpret all phenomena byhypotheses, that is, by suppositions, more or less plausible, suggested by physical analogies or byà priorirational conceptions.
Now there are two distinct aspects under which nature presents itself to the observant mind. The first and most obvious is thesimple phenomenaas perceived by the senses. The second is therelationsofphenomena, cognized by the reason alone. Let phenomena, which are indeed the first objects of perception, continue to be the chief and almost exclusive object of thought, and philosophy is on the highway of pure physics. On the other hand, instead of stopping at phenomena, let their relations become the sole object of thought, and philosophy is now on the road of purely mathematical or metaphysical abstraction. Thus two schools of philosophy are developed, the one SENSATIONAL, the other IDEALIST. Now these, it will be found, are the leading and characteristic tendencies of the two grand divisions of the pre-Socratic schools; the Ionian issensational, the Italian isidealist.
These two schools have again been the subject of a further subdivision based upon diverse habits of thought. The Ionian school sought to explain the universe byphysical analogies.Of these there are two clear and obvious divisions--analogies suggested by living organisms, and analogies suggested by mechanical arrangements. One class of philosophers in the Ionian school laid hold on the first analogy. They regarded the world as a living being, spontaneously evolving itself--a vital organism whose successive developments and transformations constitute all visible phenomena. A second class laid hold on the analogy suggested by mechanical arrangements. For them the universe was a grand superstructure, built up from elemental particles, arranged and united by some ab-extra power or force, or else aggregated by some inherent mutualaffinity. Thus we have two sects of the Ionian school; the first,Dynamicalor vital; the second,Mechanical.400
Footnote 400:(return)Ritter's "Ancient Philosophy," vol. i. pp. 191, 192.
The Italian school sought to explain the universe by rational conceptions andà prioriideas. Now to those who seek, by simple reflection, to investigate the relations of the external world this marked distinction will present itself: some are relationsbetweensensible phenomena--relations of time, of place, of number, of proportion, and of harmony; others are relationsofphenomena to essential being--relations of qualities to substance, of becoming to being, of the finite to the infinite. The former constituted the field of Pythagorean the latter of Eleatic contemplation. The Pythagoreans sought to explain the universe by numbers, forms, and harmonies; the Eleatics by theà prioriideas of unity, substance, Beingin se, the Infinite. Thus were constituted aMathematicaland aMetaphysicalsect in the Italian school. The pre-Socratic schools may, therefore, be tabulated in the following order:
I. IONIAN (Sensational), (1.) PHYSICAL {Dynamical or Vital.{Mechanical.II. Italian (Idealist), {(2.) MATHEMATICAL Pythagoreans.{(3.) METAPHYSICAL Eleatics.
I.The Ionian or Physical School.--We have premised that the philosophers of this school attempted the explanation of the universe by physical analogies.
One class of these early speculators, theDynamical, or vital theorists, proceeded on the supposition of a living energy infolded in nature, which in its spontaneous development continuously undergoes alteration both of quality and form. This imperfect analogy is the first hypothesis of childhood. The child personifies the stone that hurts him, and his first impulse is to resent the injury as though he imagined it to be endowed with consciousness, and to be acting with design. The childhood of superstition (whose genius is multiplicity) personifies each individual existence--a rude Fetichism, which imagines a supernatural power and presence enshrined in every object ofnature, in every plant, and stock, and stone. The childhood of philosophy (whose genius is unity) personifies the universe. It regards the earth as one vast organism, animated by one soul, and this soul of the world as a "created god."401The first efforts of philosophy were, therefore, simply an attempt to explain the universe in harmony with the popular theological beliefs. The cosmogonies of the early speculators in the Ionian school were an elaboration of the ancient theogonies, but still an elaboration conducted under the guidance of that law of thought which constrains man to seek forunity, and reduce the many to the one.
Therefore, in attempting to construct a theory of the universe they commenced by postulating an ἀρχή--a first principle or element out of which, by avitalprocess, all else should be produced. "Accordingly, whatever seemed the most subtle or pliable, as well asuniversalelement in the mass of the visible world, was marked as the seminal principle whose successive developments and transformations produced all the rest."402With this seminal principle the living,animatingprinciple seems to have been associated--in some instances perhaps confounded, and in most instances called by the same name. And having pursued this analogy so far, we shall find themost decided and conclusiveevidence of a tendency to regard the soul of man as similar, in its nature, to the soul which animates the world.
Footnote 401:(return)Plato's "Laws," bk. x. ch. i.; "Timæus," ch. xii.
Footnote 402:(return)Butler's "Lectures on Ancient Philosophy," vol. 1. p. 292.
Thales of Miletus(B.C. 636-542) was the first to lead the way in the perilous inquiry after an ἀρχή, or first principle, which should furnish a rational explanation of the universe. Following, as it would seem, the genealogy of Hesiod, he supposedwaterto be the primal element out of which all material things were produced. Aristotle supposes he was impressed with this idea from observing that all things are nourished by moisture; warmth itself, he declared, proceeded from moisture; the seeds of all things are moist; water, when condensed, becomes earth.Thus convinced of the universal presence of water, he declared it to be the first principle of things.403
And now, from this brief statement of the Thalean physics, are we to conclude that he recognized only amaterialcause of the universe? Such is the impression we receive from the reading of the First Book of Aristotle's Metaphysics. His evident purpose is to prove that the first philosophers of the Ionian school did not recognize anefficientcause. In his opinion, they were decidedly materialistic. Now to question the authority of Aristotle may appear to many an act of presumption. But Aristotle was not infallible; and nothing is more certain than that in more than one instance he does great injustice to his predecessors.404To him, unquestionably, belongs the honor of having made a complete and exhaustive classification of causes, but there certainly does appear something more than vanity in the assumption that he, of all the Greek philosophers, was the only one who recognized them all. His sagacious classification was simply a resumè of the labors of his predecessors. His "principles" or "causes" were incipient in the thought of the first speculators in philosophy. Their accurate definition and clearer presentation was the work of ages of analytic thought. The phrases "efficient," "formal," "final" cause, are, we grant, peculiar to Aristotle; the ideas were equally the possession of his predecessors.
Footnote 403:(return)Aristotle's "Metaphysics," bk. i. ch. iii.
Footnote 404:(return)Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 77; Cousin's "The True, the Beautiful, and the Good," p. 77.
The evidence, we think, is conclusive that, with this primal element (water), Thales associated a formative principle of motion; to the "material" he added the "efficient" cause. A strong presumption in favor of this opinion is grounded on the psychological views of Thales. The author of "De Placitis Philosophorum" associates him with Pythagoras and Plato, in teaching that the soul is incorporeal, making it naturally self-active, and an intelligent substance.405And it is admitted byAristotle (rather unwillingly, we grant, but his testimony is all the more valuable on that account) that, in his time, the opinion that the soul is a principle, ἀεικίνητον--ever moving, or essentially self-active, was currently ascribed to Thales. "If we may rely on the notices of Thales, he too would seem to have conceived the soul as amoving principle."406Extending this idea, that the soul is a moving principle, he held that all motion in the universe was due to the presence of a living soul. "He is reported to have said that the loadstone possessed a soul because it could move iron."407And he taught that "the world itself isanimated, and full of gods."408"Some think thatsoulandlifeis mingled with the whole universe; and thence, perhaps, was that [opinion] of Thales that all things are full of gods,"409portions, as Aristotle said, of the universal soul. These views are quite in harmony with the theology which makes the Deity the moving energy of the universe--the energy which wrought the successive transformations of the primitive aqueous element. They also furnish a strong corroboration of the positive statement of Cicero--"Aquam, dixit Thales, esse initium rerum, Deum autem eam mentem quæ ex aqua cuncta fingeret." Thales said that water is the first principle of things, but God was that mind which formed all things out of water;410as also that still more remarkable saying of Thales, recorded by Diogenes Laertius; "God is the most ancient of all things, for he had no birth; the world is the most beautiful of all things, for it is the workmanship of God."411We are aware that some historians of philosophy reject the statement of Cicero, because, say they, "it does violence to the chronology of speculation."412Following Hegel, they assert that Thales could have no conception of God as Intelligence, since that is a conception of a more advanced philosophy. Such an opinion may be naturally expected from the philosopher who places God, notat the commencement, but at theendof things, God becoming conscious and intelligent in humanity. If, then, Hegel teaches that God himself has had a progressive development, it is no wonder he should assert that the idea of God has also had an historic development, thelastterm of which is anintelligent God. But he who believes that the idea of God as the infinite and the perfect is native to the human mind, and that God stands at the beginning of the entire system of things, will feel there is a strongà prioriground for the belief that Thales recognized the existence of anintelligent God who fashioned the universe.
Footnote 405:(return)Cudworth's "Intellectual System," vol. i. p. 71.
Footnote 406:(return)Aristotle, "De Anima," i. 2, 17.
Footnote 407:(return)Id., ib., i. 2, 17.
Footnote 408:(return)Diogenes Laertius, "Lives of the Philosophers," p. 18 (Bohn's ed.).
Footnote 409:(return)Aristotle, "De Anima," i. 17.
Footnote 410:(return)"De Natura Deor.," bk. i. ch. x.
Footnote 411:(return)"Lives," etc., p. 19.
Footnote 412:(return)Lewes's "Hist. Philos.," p. 4.
Anaximenes of Miletus(B.C. 529-480) we place next to Thales in the consecutive history of thought. It has been usual to rank Anaximander next to the founder of the Ionian School. The entire complexion of his system is, however, unlike that of a pupil of Thales. And we think a careful consideration of his views will justify our placing him at the head of the Mechanical or Atomic division of the Ionian school. Anaximenes is the historical successor of Thales; he was unquestionably a vitalist. He took up the speculation where Thales had left it, and he carried it a step forward in its development.413
Pursuing the same method as Thales, he was not, however, satisfied with the conclusion he had reached. Water was not to Anaximenes the most significant, neither was it the most universal element. But air seemed universally present. "The earth was a broad leaf resting upon it. All things were produced from it; all things were resolved into it. When he breathed he drew in a part of this universal life. All things are nourished by air."414Was not, therefore,airthe ἀρχή, or primal element of things?
Footnote 413:(return)Ritter's "History of Ancient Philosophy," vol. i. p. 203.
Footnote 414:(return)Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 7.
This brief notice of the physical speculations of Anaximenes is all that has survived of his opinions. We search in vain for some intimations of his theological views. On this merelynegative ground, some writers have unjustly charged him with Atheism. Were we to venture a conjecture, we would rather say that there are indications of a tendency to Pantheism in that form of it which associates God necessarily with the universe, but does not utterly confound them. His fixing upon "air" as the primal element, seems an effort to reconcile, in some apparently intermediate substance, the opposite qualities of corporeal and spiritual natures. Air is invisible, impalpable, all-penetrating, and yet in some manner appreciable to sense. May not the vital transformations of this element have produced all the rest? The writer of the Article on Anaximenes in the Encyclopædia Britannica tells us (on what ancient authorities he saith not) that "he asserted this air was God, since the divine power resides in it and agitates it."
Some indications of the views of Anaximenes may perhaps be gathered from the teachings of Diogenes of Apollonia (B.C. 520-490,) who was the disciple, and is generally regarded as the commentator and expounder of the views of Anaximenes. The air of Diogenes was a soul; therefore it wasliving, and not only living, but conscious andintelligent. "It knows much," says he; "for withoutreasonit would be impossible for all to be arranged duly and proportionately; and whatever objects we consider will be found to be so arranged and ordered in the best and most beautiful manner."415Here we have a distinct recognition of the fundamental axiom thatmind is the only valid explanation of the order and harmony which pervades the universe. With Diogenes the first principle is a "divine air," which is vital, conscious, and intelligent, which spontaneously evolves itself, and which, by its ceaseless transformations, produces all phenomena. The soul of man is a detached portion of this divine element; his body is developed or evolved therefrom. The theology of Diogenes, and, as we believe, of his master, Anaximenes also, was a species of Materialistic Pantheism.
Footnote 415:(return)Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 8; Ritter's "History of Ancient Philosophy," vol. i. p. 214.
Heraclitus of Ephesus(B.C. 503-420) comes next in the order of speculative thought. In his philosophy,fireis the ἀρχή, or first principle; but not fire in the usual acceptation of that term. The Heraclitean "fire" is not flame, which is only an intensity of fire, but a warm, dry vapor--anether, which may be illustrated, perhaps, by the "caloric" of modern chemistry. This "ether" was the primal element out of which the universe was formed; it was also a vital power or principle which animated the universe, and, in fact, thecauseof all its successive phenomenal changes. "The world," he said, "was neither made by the gods nor men, and it was, and is, and ever shall be, anever-living fire, in due proportion self-enkindled, and in due measure self-extinguished."416The universe is thus reduced to "an eternal fire," whose ceaseless energy is manifested openly in the work of dissolution, and yet secretly, but universally, in the work of renovation. The phenomena of the universe are explained by Heraclitus as "the concurrence of opposite tendencies and efforts in the motions of this ever-living fire, out of which results the most beautiful harmony. This harmony of the world is one of conflicting impulses, like the lyre and the bow. The strife between opposite tendencies is the parent of all things. All life is change, and change is strife."417
Footnote 416:(return)Ritter's "History of Ancient Philosophy," vol. i. p. 235.
Footnote 417:(return)Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 70; Ritter's "History of Ancient Philosophy," vol. i. p. 244.
Heraclitus was the first to proclaim the doctrine of the perpetual fluxion of the universe (τὸ ῥέον, τὸ γιγνόµενον--Unrest and Development), the endless changes of matter, and the mutability and perishability of all individual things. This restless, changing flow of things, which neverare, but always arebecoming, he pronounced to be theOneand theAll.
From this statement of the physical theory of Heraclitus we might naturally infer that he was a Hylopathean Atheist. Such an hypothesis would not, however, be truthful or legitimate. On a more careful examination, his system will be found to stand half-way between the materialistic and the spiritual conceptionof the Author of the universe, and marks, indeed, a transition from the one to the other. Heraclitus unquestionably held that all substance is material, for a philosopher who proclaims, as he did, that the senses are the only source of knowledge, must necessarily attach himself to a material element as the primary one. And yet he seems to havespiritualizedmatter. "The moving unit of Heraclitus--the Becoming--is as immaterial as the resting unit of the Eleatics--the Being."418The Heraclitean "fire" is endowed withspiritualattributes. "Aristotle calls it ψυχή--soul, and says that it is ἀσωµατώτατον, or absolutely incorporeal ("De Anima," i. 2. 16). It is, in effect, the common ground of the phenomena both of mind and matter it is not only the animating, but also the intelligent and regulating principle of the universe; the Ξυνὸς Λόγος, or universal Word or Reason, which it behooves all men to follow."419The psychology of Heraclitus throws additional light upon his theological opinions. With him human intelligence is a detached portion of the Universal Reason. "Inhaling," said he, "through the breath the Universal Ether, which is Divine Reason, we become conscious." The errors and imperfections of humanity are consequently to be ascribed to a deficiency of the Divine Reason in man. Whilst, therefore, the theory of Heraclitus seems to materialize mind, it may, with equal fairness, be said to spiritualize matter.
Footnote 418:(return)Zeller's "History of Greek Philosophy," vol. i. p. 57.
Footnote 419:(return)Butler's "Lectures," vol. i. p. 297, note.
The general inference, therefore, from all that remains of the doctrine of Heraclitus is that he was a Materialistic Pantheist. His God was a living, rational, intelligent Ether--a soul pervading the universe. The form of the universe, its ever-changing phenomena, were a necessary emanation from, or a perpetual transformation of, this universal soul.
With Heraclitus we close our survey of that sect of the physical school which regarded the world as a living organism.
The second subdivision of the physical school,the MechanicalorAtomist theorists, attempted the explanation of the universe by analogies derived from mechanical collocations, arrangements, and movements. The universe was regarded by them as a vast superstructure built up from elemental particles, aggregated by some inherent force or mutual affinity.
Anaximander of Miletus(born B.C. 610) we place at the head of the Mechanical sect of the Ionian school; first, on the authority of Aristotle, who intimates that the philosophic dogmata of Anaximander "resemble those of Democritus," who was certainly an Atomist; and, secondly, because we can clearly trace a genetic connection between the opinions of Democritus and Leucippus and those of Anaximander.
The ἀρχή, or first principle of Anaximander, was τὸ ἄπειρον,the boundless, the illimitable, the infinite. Some historians of philosophy have imagined that the infinite of Anaximander was the "unlimited all," and have therefore placed him at the head of the Italian or "idealistic school." These writers are manifestly in error. Anaximander was unquestionably a sensationalist. Whatever his "infinite" may be found to be, one thing is clear, it was not a "metaphysical infinite"--it did not include infinite power, much less infinite mind.
The testimony of Aristotle is conclusive that by "the infinite" Anaximander understood the multitude of primary, material particles. He calls it "a µῖγµα, or mixture of elements."420It was, in fact, achaos--an original state in which the primary elements existed in a chaotic combination withoutlimitationor division. He assumed a certain "prima materia," which was neither air, nor water, nor fire, but a "mixture" of all, to be the first principle of the universe. The account of the opinions of Anaximander which is given by Plutarch ("De Placita," etc.) is a further confirmation of our interpretation of his infinite. "Anaximander, the Milesian, affirmed the infinite to be the first principle, and that all things are generated out of it, and corrupted again into it.His infinite is nothing else but matter." "Whence," says Cudworth, "we conclude that Anaximander'sinfinite was nothing else but an infinite chaos of matter, in which were actually or potentially contained all manner of qualities, by the fortuitous secretion and segregation of which he supposed infinite worlds to be successively generated and corrupted. So that we may easily guess whence Leucippus and Democritus had their infinite worlds, and perceive how near akin these two Atheistic hypotheses were."421The reader, whose curiosity may lead him to consult the authorities collected by Cudworth (pp. 185-188), will find in the doctrine of Anaximander a rude anticipation of the modern theories of "spontaneous generation" and "the transmutation of species." In the fragments of Anaximander that remain we find no recognition of an ordering Mind, and his philosophy is the dawn of a Materialistic school.
Footnote 420:(return)Aristotle's "Metaphysics," bk. xi. ch. ii.
Footnote 421:(return)Cudworth's "Intellectual System," vol. i. pp. 186, 187.
Leucippus of Miletus(B.C. 500-400) appears, in the order of speculation, as the successor of Anaximander.Atomsandspaceare, in his philosophy, the ἀρχαί, or first principles of all things. "Leucippus (and his companion, Democritus) assert that the plenum and the vacuum [i.e., body and space] are the first principles, whereof one is the Ens, the other Non-ens; the differences of the body, which are only figure, order, and position, are the causes of all others."422
Footnote 422:(return)Aristotle's "Metaphysics," p. 21 (Bohn's edition).
He also taught that the elements, and the worlds derived from them, areinfinite. He describes the manner in which the worlds are produced as follows: "Many bodies of various kinds and shapes are borne by amputation from the infinite [i.e., the chaotic µῖγµα of Anaximander] into a vast vacuum, and then they, being collected together, produce a vortex; according to which, they, dashing against each other, and whirling about in every direction, are separated in such a way that like attaches itself to like; bodies are thus, without ceasing, united according to the impulse given by the vortex, and in this way the earth was produced."423Thus, through a boundlessvoid, atoms infinite in number and endlessly diversified in form are eternally wandering; and, by their aggregation, infinite worlds are successively produced. These atoms are governed in their movements by a dark negation of intelligence, designated "Fate," and all traces of a Supreme Mind disappear in his philosophy. It is a system of pure materialism, which, in fact, is Atheism.
Footnote 423:(return)Diogenes Laertius, "Lives," p. 389.
Democritus of Abdera(B.C. 460-357), the companion of Leucippus, also taught "thatatomsand thevacuumwere the beginning of the universe."424These atoms, he taught, were infinite in number, homogeneous, extended, and possessed of those primary qualities of matter which are necessarily involved in extension in space--as size, figure, situation, divisibility, and mobility. From the combination of these atoms all other existences are produced; fire, air, earth, and water; sun, moon, and stars; plants, animals, and men; the soul itself is an aggregation of round, moving atoms. And "motion, which is the cause of the production of every thing, he callsnecessity."425Atoms are thus the only real existences; these, without any pre-existent mind, or intelligence, were the original of all things.
Footnote 424:(return)Diogenes Laertius, "Lives," p. 395.
Footnote 425:(return)Id, ib., p. 394.
The psychological opinions of Democritus were as decidedly materialistic as his physical theories. All knowledge is derived from sensation. It is only by material impact that we can know the external world, and every sense is, in reality, a kind of touch. Material images are being continually thrown off from the surface of external objects which come into actual contact with the organs of sense. The primary qualities of matter, that is, those which are involved in extension in space, are the only objects of real knowledge; the secondary qualities of matter, as softness, hardness, sweetness, bitterness, and the like, are but modifications of the human sensibilities. "The sweet exists only in form--the bitter in form, hot in form, color in form; but in causal reality only atoms and space exist. The sensible things which are supposed by opinionto exist have no real existence, but atoms and space alone exist."426
Footnote 426:(return)Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 96. The words of Democritus, as reported by Sextus Empiricus.
Thus by Democritus was laid the basis of a system of absolute materialism, which was elaborated and completed by Epicurus, and has been transmitted to our times. It has undergone some slight modifications, adapting it to the progress of physical science; but it is to-day substantially the theory of Democritus. In Democritus we have the culmination of the mechanical theory of the Ionian or Physical school. In physics and psychology it terminated in pure materialism. In theology it ends in positive Atheism.
The fundamental error of all the philosophers of the physical school was the assumption, tacitly or avowedly, that sense-perception is the only source of knowledge. This was the fruitful source of all their erroneous conclusions, the parent of all their materialistic tendencies. This led them continually to seek an ἀρχή, or first principle of the universe, which should, under some form, be appreciable tosense; and consequently the course of thought tended naturally towards materialism.
Thales was unquestionably a dualist. Instructed by traditional intimations, or more probably guided by the spontaneous apperceptions of reason, he recognized, with more or less distinctness, an incorporeal Deity as the moving, animating, and organizing cause of the universe. The idea of God is a truth so self-evident as to need no demonstration. The human mind does not attain to the idea of a God as the last consequence of a series of antecedent principles. It comes at once, by an inherent and necessary movement of thought, to the recognition of God as the First Principle of all principles. But when, instead of hearkening to the simple and spontaneous intuitions of the mind, man turns to the world of sense, and loses himself in discursive thought, the conviction of a personal God becomes obscured. Then, amid the endlessly diversified phenomena of the universe, he seeks for a cause or origin which in some formshall be appreciable to sense. The mere study of material phenomena, scientifically or unscientifically conducted, will never yield the sense of the living God. Nature must be interpreted, can only be interpreted in the light of certainà prioriprinciples of reason, or we can never "ascend from nature up to nature's God." Within the circle of mere sense-perception, the dim and undeveloped consciousness of God will be confounded with the universe. Thus, in Anaximenes, God is partially confounded with "air," which becomes a symbol; then a vehicle of the informing mind; and the result is a semi-pantheism. In Heraclitus, the "ether" is, at first, a semi-symbol of the Deity; at length, God is utterly confounded with this ether, or "rational fire," and the result is a definitematerialistic pantheism. And, finally, when this feeling or dim consciousness of God, which dwells in all human souls, is not only disregarded, but pronounced to be an illusion--a phantasy; when all the analogies which intelligence suggests are disregarded, and a purely mechanical theory of the universe is adopted, the result is the utter negation of an Intelligent Cause, that is,absolute Atheism, as in Leucippus and Democritus.
In the previous chapter we commenced our inquiry with the assumption that, in the absence of the true inductive method of philosophy which observes, and classifies, and generalizes facts, and thence attains a general principle or law, two only methods were possible to the early speculators who sought an explanation of the universe--1st, That of reasoning from physical analogies; or, 2d, That of deduction from rational conceptions, orà prioriideas.
Accordingly we found that one class of speculators fixed their attention solely on the mere phenomena of nature, and endeavored, amid sensible things, to find asingleelement which, being more subtile, and pliable, and universally diffused, could be regarded as the ground and original of all the rest, and from which, by a vital transformation, or by a mechanical combination and arrangement of parts, all the rest should be evolved. The other class passed beyond the simple phenomena, and considered only the abstractrelationsof phenomena among themselves, or the relations of phenomena to the necessary and universal ideas of the reason, and supposed that, in these relations, they had found an explanation of the universe. The former was the Ionian or Sensation school; the latter was the Italian or Idealist school.
We have traced the method according to which the Ionianschool proceeded, and estimated the results attained. We now come to consider the method and results of
THE ITALIAN OR IDEALIST SCHOOL.
This school we have found to be naturally subdivided into--1st, TheMathematicalsect, which attempted the explanation of the universe by the abstract conceptions of number, proportion, order, and harmony; and, 2d, TheMetaphysicalschool, which attempted the interpretation of the universe according to theà prioriideas of unity, of Beingin se, of the Infinite, and the Absolute.
Pythagoras of Samos(born B.C. 605) was the founder of the Mathematical school.
We are conscious of the difficulties which are to be encountered by the student who seeks to attain a definite comprehension of the real opinions of Pythagoras. The genuineness of many of those writings which were once supposed to represent his views, is now questioned. "Modern criticism has clearly shown that the works ascribed to Timæus and Archytas are spurious; and the treatise of Ocellus Lucanus on 'The Nature of the All' can not have been written by a Pythagorean."427The only writers who can be regarded as at all reliable are Plato and Aristotle; and the opinions they represent are not so much those of Pythagoras as "the Pythagoreans." This is at once accounted for by the fact that Pythagoras taught in secret, and did not commit his opinions to writing. His disciples, therefore, represent thetendencyrather than the actual tenets of his system; these were no doubt modified by the mental habits and tastes of his successors.
Footnote 427:(return)Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 24.
We may safely assume that the proposition from which Pythagoras started was the fundamental idea of all Greek speculation--that beneath the fleeting forms and successive changes of the universe there is some permanent principle of unity428TheIonian school sought that principle in some common physical element; Pythagoras sought, not for "elements," but for "relations," and through these relations for ultimate laws indicating primal forces.
Footnote 428:(return)See Plato, "Timæus," ch. ix. p. 331 (Bohn's edition); Aristotle's "Metaphysics," bk. v. ch. iii.
Aristotle affirms that Pythagoras taught "thatnumbersare the first principles of all entities," and, "as it were, amaterialcause of things,"429or, in other words, "that numbers are substances that involve a separate subsistence, and are primary causes of entities."430
Footnote 429:(return)Aristotle's "Metaphysics," bk. i. ch. v.
Footnote 430:(return)Id., ib., bk. xii. ch. vi.
Are we then required to accept the dictum of Aristotle as final and decisive? Did Pythagoras really teach that numbers are real entities--thesubstanceand cause of all other existences? The reader may be aware that this is a point upon which the historians of philosophy are not agreed. Ritter is decidedly of opinion that the Pythagorean formula "can only be taken symbolically."431Lewes insists it must be understood literally.432On a careful review of all the arguments, we are constrained to regard the conclusion of Ritter as most reasonable. The hypothesis "that numbers are real entities" does violence to every principle of common sense. This alone constitutes a strongà prioripresumption that Pythagoras did not entertain so glaring an absurdity. The man who contributed so much towards perfecting the mathematical sciences, who played so conspicuous a part in the development of ancient philosophy, and who exerted so powerful a determining influence on the entire current of speculative thought, did not obtain his ascendency over the intellectual manhood of Greece by the utterance of such enigmas. And further, in interpreting the philosophic opinions of the ancients, we must be guided by this fundamental canon--"The human mind has, under the necessary operation of its own laws, been compelled to entertain the same fundamental ideas, and the human heart to cherish the same feelings in all ages." Now if a careful philosophiccriticism can not render thereportedopinions of an ancient teacher into the universal language of the reason and heart of humanity, we must conclude either that his opinions were misunderstood and misrepresented by some of his successors, or else that he stands in utter isolation, both from the present and the past. His doctrine has, then, no relation to the successions of thought, and no place in the history of philosophy. Nay, more, such a doctrine has in it no element of vitality, no germ of eternal truth, and must speedily perish. Now it is well known that the teaching of Pythagoras awakened the deepest intellectual sympathy of his age; that his doctrine exerted a powerful influence on the mind of Plato, and, through him, upon succeeding ages; and that, in some of its aspects, it now survives, and is more influential to-day than in any previous age; but this element of immutable and eternal truth was certainly not contained in the inane and empty formula, "that numbers are real existences, the causes of all other existences!" If the fame of Pythagoras had rested on such "airy nothings," it would have melted away before the time of Plato.
Footnote 431:(return)"History of Ancient Philosophy," vol. i. p. 359.
Footnote 432:(return)"Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 38.
We grant there is considerable force in the argument of Lewes. He urges, with some pertinence, the unquestionable fact that Aristotle asserts, again and again, that the Pythagoreans taught "that numbers are the principles and substance of things as well as the causes of their modifications;" and he argues that we are not justified in rejecting the authority of Aristotle, unless better evidence can be produced.
So far, however, as the authority of Aristotle is concerned, even Lewes himself charges him, in more than one instance, with strangely misrepresenting the opinions of his predecessors.433Aristotle is evidently wanting in that impartiality whichought to characterize the historian of philosophy, and, sometimes, we are compelled to question his integrity. Indeed, throughout his "Metaphysics" he exhibits the egotism and vanity of one who imagines that he alone, of all men, has the full vision of the truth. In Books I. and XII. he uniformly associates the "numbers" of Pythagoras with the "forms" and "ideas" of Plato. He asserts that Plato identifies "forms" and "numbers," and regards them as real entities--substances, and causes of all other things. "Forms are numbers434... so Plato affirmed, similar with the Pythagoreans; and the dogma that numbers are causes to other things--of their substance-he, in like manner, asserted with them."435And then, finally, he employs thesamearguments in refuting the doctrines of both.
Footnote 433:(return)"Aristotle uniformly speaks disparagingly of Anaxagoras" (Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy"). He represents him as employing mind (νοῦς) simply as "amachine" for the production of the world;--"when he finds himself in perplexity as to the cause of its being necessarily an orderly system, he then drags it (mind) in by force to his assistance" "Metaphysics," (bk. i. ch. iv.). But he is evidently inconsistent with himself, for in "De Anima" (bk. i. ch. ii.) he tells us that "Anaxagoras saith that mind is at once acause of motionin the whole universe, and also ofwellandfit." We may further ask, is not the idea of fitness--of the good and the befitting--the final cause, even according to Aristotle?He also totally misrepresents Plato's doctrine of "Ideas." "Plato's Ideas," he says, "are substantial existences--real beings" ("Metaphysics," bk. i. ch. ix.). Whereas, as we shall subsequently show, "they are objects of pure conception for human reason, and they are attributes of the Divine Reason. It is there they substantially exist." (Cousin, "History of Philosophy," vol. i. p. 415). It is also pertinent to inquire, what is the difference between the "formal cause" of Aristotle and the archetypal ideas of Plato? and is not Plato's τὸ ἀγαθόν the "final cause?" Yet Aristotle is forever congratulating himself that he alone has properly treated the "formal" and the "final cause!"
He also totally misrepresents Plato's doctrine of "Ideas." "Plato's Ideas," he says, "are substantial existences--real beings" ("Metaphysics," bk. i. ch. ix.). Whereas, as we shall subsequently show, "they are objects of pure conception for human reason, and they are attributes of the Divine Reason. It is there they substantially exist." (Cousin, "History of Philosophy," vol. i. p. 415). It is also pertinent to inquire, what is the difference between the "formal cause" of Aristotle and the archetypal ideas of Plato? and is not Plato's τὸ ἀγαθόν the "final cause?" Yet Aristotle is forever congratulating himself that he alone has properly treated the "formal" and the "final cause!"
Footnote 434:(return)This, however, was not the doctrine of Plato. He does not say "forms are numbers." He says: "God formed things as they first arose according to formsandnumbers." See "Timaeus," ch. xiv. and xxvii.
Footnote 435:(return)Aristotle's "Metaphysics," bk. i. ch. vi.
Now the writings of Plato are all extant to-day, and accessible in an excellent English translation to any of our readers. Cousin has shown,436most conclusively (and we can verify his conclusions for ourselves), that Aristotle has totally misrepresented Plato. And if, in the same connection, and in the course of the same argument, and in regard to the same subjects, he misrepresents Plato, it is most probable he also misrepresents Pythagoras.
Footnote 436:(return)"The True, the Beautiful, and the Good," pp. 77-81.