177Plato, Republic, v. p. 473, vi. p. 503 B. τοὺς ἀκριβεστάτους φύλακας φιλοσόφους δεῖ καθιστάναι.
177Plato, Republic, v. p. 473, vi. p. 503 B. τοὺς ἀκριβεστάτους φύλακας φιλοσόφους δεῖ καθιστάναι.
178Plato, Repub. v. p. 474 B. τοῖς μὲν προσήκει φύει, ἅπτεσθαί τε φιλοσοφίας, ἡγεμονεύειν τ’ ἐν πόλει· τοῖς δ’ ἄλλοις μήτε ἅπτεσθαι, ἀκολουθεῖν τε τῷ ἡγουμένῳ.476 B: σπάνιοι ἂν εἶεν. Also vi. 503, vii. 535. They are to be ἐκ τῶν προκρίτων πρόκριτοι, vii. 537 D.
178Plato, Repub. v. p. 474 B. τοῖς μὲν προσήκει φύει, ἅπτεσθαί τε φιλοσοφίας, ἡγεμονεύειν τ’ ἐν πόλει· τοῖς δ’ ἄλλοις μήτε ἅπτεσθαι, ἀκολουθεῖν τε τῷ ἡγουμένῳ.
476 B: σπάνιοι ἂν εἶεν. Also vi. 503, vii. 535. They are to be ἐκ τῶν προκρίτων πρόκριτοι, vii. 537 D.
Comprehensive curriculum for aspirants to philosophy — consummation by means of Dialectic.
I have already given, inChap. XXXV., a short summary of the peculiar scientific training which Sokrates prescribes for ripening these heroic aspirants into complete philosophers. They pass years of intellectual labour, all by their own spontaneous impulse, over and above the full training of Guardians. They study Arithmetic, Geometry, Stereometry, Astronomy, Acoustics, &c., until the age of thirty: they then continue in the exercise of Dialectic, with all the test of question and answer, for five years longer: after which they enter upon the duties of practice and administration, succeeding ultimately to the position of chiefs if found competent. It is assumed that this long course of study, consummated by Dialectic, has operated within them that great mental revolution which Plato calls, turning the eye from the shadows in the cave to the realities of clear daylight: that they will no longer be absorbed in the sensible world or in passing phenomena, but will become familiar with the unchangeable Ideas or Forms of the Intelligible world, knowable only by intellectual intuition. Reason has with them been exalted to its highest power: not only strengthening them to surmount all intellectual difficulties and to deal with the most complicated conjectures of practice — butalso ennobling their dispositions, so as to overcome all the disturbing temptations and narrow misguiding prejudices inherent in the unregenerate man. Upon the perfection of character, emotional and intellectual, imparted to these few philosophers, depends the Platonic Commonwealth.
Valuable remarks on the effects of these preparatory studies.
The remarks made by Plato on the effect of this preparatory curriculum, and on the various studies composing it, are highly interesting and instructive — even when they cannot be defended as exact. Much of what he so eloquently enunciates respecting philosophy and the philosophical character, is in fact just and profound, whatever view we may take as to Universals: whether we regard them (like Plato) as the only Real Entia, cognizable by the mental eye, and radically disparate from particulars — or whether we hold them to be only general Concepts, abstracted and generalised more or less exactly from particulars. The remarks made by Plato on the educational effect produced by Arithmetic and the other studies, are valuable and suggestive. Even the discredit which he throws on observations of fact, in Astronomy and Acoustics — the great antithesis between him and modern times — is useful as enabling us to enter into his point of view.179
179Plato, Repub. vii. p. 529 C-D.The manner in which Plato here depreciates astronomical observation is not easily reconcileable with his doctrine in the Timæus. He there tells us that the rotations of the Nous (intellective soul) in the interior of the human cranium, are cognate or analogous to those of the cosmical spheres, but more confused and less perfect: our eyesight being expressly intended for the purpose, that we might contemplate the perfect and unerring rotations of the cosmical spheres, so as to correct thereby the disturbed rotations in our own brain (Timæus, pp. 46-47).Malebranche shares the feeling of Plato on the subject of astronomical observation. Recherche de la Vérité, liv. iv. ch. vii. vol. ii. p. 219, ed. 1772 (p. 278, ed. 1721).“Car enfin qu’y a-t-il de grand dans la connoissance des mouvemens des planètes? et n’en sçavons nous pas assez présentement pour régler nos mois et nos années? Qu’avons nous tant à faire de sçavoir, si Saturne est environné d’un anneau ou d’un grand nombre de petites lunes, et pourquoi prendre parti là-dessus? Pourquoi se glorifier d’avoir prédit la grandeur d’une éclipse, où l’on a peut-être mieux rencontré qu’un autre, parcequ’on a été plus heureux? Il y a des personnes destinées, par l’ordre du Prince, à observer les astres; contentons nous de leurs observations… Nous devons être pleinement satisfaits sur une matière qui nous touche si peu, lorsqu’ils nous font partie de leurs découvertes.”
179Plato, Repub. vii. p. 529 C-D.
The manner in which Plato here depreciates astronomical observation is not easily reconcileable with his doctrine in the Timæus. He there tells us that the rotations of the Nous (intellective soul) in the interior of the human cranium, are cognate or analogous to those of the cosmical spheres, but more confused and less perfect: our eyesight being expressly intended for the purpose, that we might contemplate the perfect and unerring rotations of the cosmical spheres, so as to correct thereby the disturbed rotations in our own brain (Timæus, pp. 46-47).
Malebranche shares the feeling of Plato on the subject of astronomical observation. Recherche de la Vérité, liv. iv. ch. vii. vol. ii. p. 219, ed. 1772 (p. 278, ed. 1721).
“Car enfin qu’y a-t-il de grand dans la connoissance des mouvemens des planètes? et n’en sçavons nous pas assez présentement pour régler nos mois et nos années? Qu’avons nous tant à faire de sçavoir, si Saturne est environné d’un anneau ou d’un grand nombre de petites lunes, et pourquoi prendre parti là-dessus? Pourquoi se glorifier d’avoir prédit la grandeur d’une éclipse, où l’on a peut-être mieux rencontré qu’un autre, parcequ’on a été plus heureux? Il y a des personnes destinées, par l’ordre du Prince, à observer les astres; contentons nous de leurs observations… Nous devons être pleinement satisfaits sur une matière qui nous touche si peu, lorsqu’ils nous font partie de leurs découvertes.”
Differences between the Republic and other dialogues — no mention of reminiscence nor of the Elenchus.
But his point of view in the Republic differs materially from that which we read in other dialogues: especially in two ways.
First, The scientific and long-continued Quadrivium, through which Plato here conducts the studentto philosophy, is very different from the road to philosophy as indicated elsewhere. Nothing is here said about reminiscence — which in the Menon, Phædon, Phædrus, and elsewhere, stands in the foreground of his theory, as the engine for reviving in the mind Forms or Ideas. With these Forms it had been familiar during a prior state of existence, but they had become buried under the sensible impressions arising from its conjunction with the body. Nor do we find in the Republic any mention of that electric shock of the negative Elenchus, which (in the Theætêtus, Sophistês, and several other dialogues) is declared indispensable for stirring up the natural mind not merely from ignorance and torpor, but even from a state positively distempered — the false persuasion of knowledge.
Different view taken by Plato in the Republic about Dialectic — and different place assigned to it.
Secondly, following out this last observation, we perceive another discrepancy yet more striking, in the directions given by Plato respecting the study of Dialectic. He prescribes that it shall upon no account be taught to young men: and that it shall come last of all in teaching, only after the full preceding Quadrivium. He censures severely the prevalent practice of applying it to young men, as pregnant with mischief. Young men (he says) brought up in certain opinions inculcated by the lawgiver, as to what is just and honourable, are interrogated on these subjects, and have questions put to them. When asked What is the just and the honourable, they reply in the manner which they have learnt from authority: but this reply, being exposed to farther interrogatories, is shown to be untenable and inconsistent, such as they cannot defend to their own satisfaction. Hence they lose all respect for the established ethical creed, which however stands opposed in their minds to the seductions of immediate enjoyment: yet they acquire no new or better conviction in its place. Instead of following an established law, they thus come to live without any law.180Besides, young men when initiated in dialectic debate,take great delight in the process, as a means of exposing and puzzling the respondent. Copying the skilful interrogators whom they have found themselves unable to answer, they interrogate others in their turn, dispute everything, and pride themselves on exhibiting all the negative force of the Elenchus. Instead of employing dialectic debate for the discovery of truth, they use it merely as a disputatious pastime, and thus bring themselves as well as philosophy into discredit.181
180Plato, Republic, vii. pp. 538 D-539. ὅταν τὸν οὕτως ἔχοντα ἐλθὸν ἐρώτημα ἔρηται, τί ἐστι τὸ καλόν, καὶ ἀποκρινάμενον ὃ τοῦ νομοθετοῦ ἤκουεν ἐξελεγχῇ ὁ λόγος, καὶ πολλάκις καὶ πολλαχῆ ἐλέγχων εἰς δόξαν καταβαλῇ ὡς τοῦτο οὐδὲν μάλλον καλὸν ἢ αἰσχρὸν, καὶ περὶ δικαίου ὡσαύτως καὶ ἀδίκου, καὶ ἃ μάλιστα ἦγεν ἐν τιμῇ, &c.
180Plato, Republic, vii. pp. 538 D-539. ὅταν τὸν οὕτως ἔχοντα ἐλθὸν ἐρώτημα ἔρηται, τί ἐστι τὸ καλόν, καὶ ἀποκρινάμενον ὃ τοῦ νομοθετοῦ ἤκουεν ἐξελεγχῇ ὁ λόγος, καὶ πολλάκις καὶ πολλαχῆ ἐλέγχων εἰς δόξαν καταβαλῇ ὡς τοῦτο οὐδὲν μάλλον καλὸν ἢ αἰσχρὸν, καὶ περὶ δικαίου ὡσαύτως καὶ ἀδίκου, καὶ ἃ μάλιστα ἦγεν ἐν τιμῇ, &c.
181Plato, Repub. vii. p. 539 B.
181Plato, Repub. vii. p. 539 B.
Accordingly, we must not admit (says Plato) either young men, or men of ordinary untrained minds, to dialectic debate. We must admit none but mature persons, of sedate disposition, properly prepared: who will employ it not for mere disputation, but for the investigation of truth.182
182Plato, Repub. vii. p. 539 D.
182Plato, Repub. vii. p. 539 D.
Contradiction with the spirit of other dialogues — Parmenidês, &c.
Now the doctrine thus proclaimed, with the grounds upon which it rests — That dialectic debate is unsuitable and prejudicial to young men — distinctly contradict both the principles laid down by himself elsewhere, and the frequent indications of his own dialogues: not to mention the practice of Sokrates as described by Xenophon. In the Platonic Parmenidês, and Theætêtus, the season of youth is expressly pronounced to be that in which dialectic exercise is not merely appropriate, but indispensable to the subsequent attainment of truth.183Moreover, Plato puts into the mouth of Parmenides a specimen intentionally given to represent that dialectic exercise which will be profitable to youth. The specimen is one full of perplexing, though ingenious, subtleties:ending in establishing, by different trains of reasoning, the affirmative, as well as the negative, of several distinct conclusions. Not only it supplies no new positive certainty, but it appears to render any such consummation more distant and less attainable than ever.184It is therefore eminently open to the censure which Plato pronounces, in the passage just cited from his Republic, against dialectic as addressed to young men. The like remark may be made upon the numerous other dialogues (though less extreme in negative subtlety than the Parmenidês), wherein the Platonic Sokrates interrogates youths (or interrogates others, in the presence of youths) without any positive result: as in the Theætêtus, Charmidês, Lysis, Alkibiadês, Hippias, &c., to which we may add the conversations of the Xenophontic Sokrates with Euthydemus and others.185
183Plato, Parmenidês, pp. 135 D, 137 B. Theætêt. 146 A.Proklus, in his Commentary on the Parmenidês (p. 778, Stallbaum), adverts to the passage of the Republic here discussed, and endeavours to show that it is not inconsistent with the Parmenidês. He states that the exhortation to practise dialectic debate in youth, as the appropriate season, must be understood as specially and exclusively addressed to a youth of the extraordinary mental qualities of Sokrates; while the passage in the Republic applies the prohibition only to the general regiment of Guardians. But this justification is noway satisfactory; for Plato in the Republic makes no exception in favour of the most promising Guardians. He lays down the position generally. Again, in the Parmenidês, we find the encouragement to dialectic debate addressed not merely to the youthful Sokrates, but to the youthful Aristoteles (p. 137 B). Moreover, we are not to imagine that all the youths who are introduced as respondents in the Platonic dialogues are implied as equal to Sokrates himself, though they are naturally represented as superior and promising subjects. Compare Plato, Sophistês, p. 217 E; Politikus, p. 257 E.
183Plato, Parmenidês, pp. 135 D, 137 B. Theætêt. 146 A.
Proklus, in his Commentary on the Parmenidês (p. 778, Stallbaum), adverts to the passage of the Republic here discussed, and endeavours to show that it is not inconsistent with the Parmenidês. He states that the exhortation to practise dialectic debate in youth, as the appropriate season, must be understood as specially and exclusively addressed to a youth of the extraordinary mental qualities of Sokrates; while the passage in the Republic applies the prohibition only to the general regiment of Guardians. But this justification is noway satisfactory; for Plato in the Republic makes no exception in favour of the most promising Guardians. He lays down the position generally. Again, in the Parmenidês, we find the encouragement to dialectic debate addressed not merely to the youthful Sokrates, but to the youthful Aristoteles (p. 137 B). Moreover, we are not to imagine that all the youths who are introduced as respondents in the Platonic dialogues are implied as equal to Sokrates himself, though they are naturally represented as superior and promising subjects. Compare Plato, Sophistês, p. 217 E; Politikus, p. 257 E.
184Plato, Parmenid. p. 166 ad fin. εἰρήσθω τοίνυν τοῦτό τε καὶ ὅτι, ὡς ἔοικεν, ἓν εἴτ’ ἔστιν, εἰτε μὴ ἔστιν, αὐτό τε καὶ τἄλλα καὶ πρὸς αὐτὰ καὶ πρὸς ἄλληλα πάντα πάντως ἔστι τε καὶ οὐκ ἔστι, καὶ φαίνεται τε καὶ οὐ φαίνεται. Ἀληθέστατα.
184Plato, Parmenid. p. 166 ad fin. εἰρήσθω τοίνυν τοῦτό τε καὶ ὅτι, ὡς ἔοικεν, ἓν εἴτ’ ἔστιν, εἰτε μὴ ἔστιν, αὐτό τε καὶ τἄλλα καὶ πρὸς αὐτὰ καὶ πρὸς ἄλληλα πάντα πάντως ἔστι τε καὶ οὐκ ἔστι, καὶ φαίνεται τε καὶ οὐ φαίνεται. Ἀληθέστατα.
185Xenophon, Memorab. iv. 2.
185Xenophon, Memorab. iv. 2.
Contradiction with the character and declarations of Sokrates.
In fact, the Platonic Sokrates expressly proclaims himself (in the Apology as well as in the other dialogues just named) to be ignorant and incapable of teaching anything. His mission was to expose the ignorance of those, who fancy that they know without really knowing: he taught no one anything, but he cross-examined every one who would submit to it, before all the world, and in a manner especially interesting to young men. Sokrates mentions that these young men not only listened with delight, but tried to imitate him as well as they could, by cross-examining others in the same manner:186and in mentioning the fact, he expresses neither censure nor regret, but satisfaction in the thought that the chance would be thereby increased, of exposing that false persuasion of knowledge which prevailed so widely everywhere. Now Plato, in the passage just cited from the Republic, blames this contagious spirit of cross-examination on the part of young men, as a vice which proved the mischief of dialectic debate addressed to them at that age. He farther deprecates the disturbance of “those opinions which they have heard from the lawgiver respecting what is just and honourable”.But it is precisely these opinions which, in the Alkibiadês, Menon, Protagoras, and other dialogues, the Platonic Sokrates treats as untaught, if not unteachable:— as having been acquired, no man knew how, without the lessons of any assignable master and without any known period of study:— lastly, as constituting that very illusion of false knowledge without real knowledge, of which Sokrates undertakes to purge the youthful mind, and which must be dispelled before any improvement can be effected in it.187
186Plato, Apolog. Sokrat c. 10, p. 23 D, c. 22, p. 33 C, c. 27, p. 37 E, c. 30, p. 39 C.
186Plato, Apolog. Sokrat c. 10, p. 23 D, c. 22, p. 33 C, c. 27, p. 37 E, c. 30, p. 39 C.
187Plato, Sophist. p. 230.
187Plato, Sophist. p. 230.
The remarks here made upon the effect of Dialectic upon youth coincide with the accusation of Melêtus against Sokrates.
We thus see, that the dictum forbidding dialectic debate with youth — cited from the seventh book of the Republic, which Plato there puts into the mouth of Sokrates — is decidedly anti-Sokratic; and anti-Platonic, in so far as Plato represents Sokrates. It belongs indeed to the case of Melêtus and Anytus, in their indictment against Sokrates before the Athenian dikastery. It is identical with their charge against him, of corrupting youth, and inducing them to fancy themselves superior to the authority of established customs and opinions heard from their elders.188Now the Platonic Sokrates is here made to declare explicitly, that dialectic debate addressed to youth does really tend to produce this effect:— to render them lawless, immoral, disputatious. And when we find him forbidding all such discourse at an earlier age than thirty years — we remark as a singular coincidence, that this is the exact prohibition which Kritias and Charikles actually imposed upon Sokrates himself, during the shortlived dominion of the Thirty Oligarchs at Athens.189
188Xenophon, Memorab. i. 2, 19-49. Compare Aristophanes, Nubes, 1042-1382.
188Xenophon, Memorab. i. 2, 19-49. Compare Aristophanes, Nubes, 1042-1382.
189Xenophon, Memorab. i. 2, 33-38.Isokrates complains that youthful students took more delight in disputation than he thought suitable; nevertheless he declares that youth, and not mature age, is the proper season for such exercises, as well as for Geometry and Astronomy (Orat. xii. Panathen. s. 29-31, p. 239).
189Xenophon, Memorab. i. 2, 33-38.
Isokrates complains that youthful students took more delight in disputation than he thought suitable; nevertheless he declares that youth, and not mature age, is the proper season for such exercises, as well as for Geometry and Astronomy (Orat. xii. Panathen. s. 29-31, p. 239).
Contrast between the real Sokrates, as a dissenter at Athens, and the Platonic Sokrates, framer and dictator of the Platonic Republic.
The matter to which I here advert, illustrates a material distinction between some writings of Plato as compared with others, and between different points of view which his mind took on at different times. In the Platonic Apology, we find Sokrates confessing his own ignorance, and proclaiming himself to be isolatedamong an uncongenial public falsely persuaded of their own knowledge. In several other dialogues, he is the same: he cannot teach anything, but can only cross-examine, test, and apply the spur to respondents. But the Republic presents him in a new character. He is no longer a dissenter amidst a community of fixed, inherited, convictions.190He is himself on the throne of King Nomos: the infallible authority, temporal as well as spiritual, from whom all public sentiment emanates, and by whom orthodoxy is determined. Hence we now find him passing to the opposite pole; taking up the orthodox, conservative, point of view, the same as Melêtus and Anytus maintained in their accusation against Sokrates at Athens. He now expects every individual to fall into the place, and contract the opinions, prescribed by authority: including among those opinions deliberate ethical and political fictions, such as that about the gold and silver earthborn men. Free-thinking minds, who take views of their own, and enquire into the evidence of these beliefs, become inconvenient and dangerous. Neither the Sokrates of the Platonic Apology, nor his negative Dialectic, could be allowed to exist in the Platonic Republic.
190Plato, Repub. vii. p. 541.
190Plato, Repub. vii. p. 541.
Idea of Good — The Chiefs alone know what it is — If they did not they would be unfit for their functions.
One word more must be said respecting a subject which figures conspicuously in the Republic — the Idea or Form of Good. The chiefs alone (we read) at the end of their long term of study, having ascended gradually from the phenomena of sense to intellectual contemplation and familiarity with the unchangeable Ideas — will come to discern and embrace the highest of all Ideas — the Form of Good:191by the help of which alone, Justice, Temperance, and the other virtues, become useful and profitable.192If the Archons do not know how and why just and honourable things are good, they will not be fit for their duty.193In regard to Good (Plato tells us) no man is satisfied with mere appearance. Here every man desires and postulates that which is really good: while as to the just and the honourable, many are satisfied with the appearance, without caring for the reality.194
191Plato, Republic, vii. pp. 533-534.
191Plato, Republic, vii. pp. 533-534.
192Plato, Republic, vi. p. 505 A.
192Plato, Republic, vi. p. 505 A.
193Plato, Republic, vi. p. 506 A.
193Plato, Republic, vi. p. 506 A.
194Plato, Republic, vi. p. 505 D.
194Plato, Republic, vi. p. 505 D.
What is the Good? Plato does not know; but he requires the Chiefs to know it. Without this the Republic would be a failure.
Plato proclaims this Real Good, as distinguished from Apparent Good, to be the paramount and indispensable object of knowledge, without which all other knowledge is useless. It is that which every man divines to exist, yearns for, and does everything with a view to obtain: but which he misses, from not knowing where to seek; missing also along with it that which gives value to other acquisitions.195What then is this Real Good — the Noumenon, Idea, or form of Good?
195Plato, Republic, vi. p. 505 A-E. Ὃ δὴ διώκει μὲν ἅπασα ψυχὴ καὶ τούτου ἕνεκα πάντα πράττει, ἀπομαντευομένη τὶ εἶναι, ἀποροῦσα δὲ καὶ οὐκ ἔχουσα λαβεῖν ἱκανῶς τί ποτ’ ἐστὶν οὐδὲ πίστει χρήσασθαι μονίμῳ, οἵᾳ καὶ περὶ τἄλλα, διὰ τοῦτο δὲ ἀποτυγχάνει καὶ τῶν ἄλλων εἴ τι ὄφελος ἦν, &c.
195Plato, Republic, vi. p. 505 A-E. Ὃ δὴ διώκει μὲν ἅπασα ψυχὴ καὶ τούτου ἕνεκα πάντα πράττει, ἀπομαντευομένη τὶ εἶναι, ἀποροῦσα δὲ καὶ οὐκ ἔχουσα λαβεῖν ἱκανῶς τί ποτ’ ἐστὶν οὐδὲ πίστει χρήσασθαι μονίμῳ, οἵᾳ καὶ περὶ τἄλλα, διὰ τοῦτο δὲ ἀποτυγχάνει καὶ τῶν ἄλλων εἴ τι ὄφελος ἦν, &c.
This question is put by Glaukon to Sokrates, with much earnestness, in the dialogue of the Republic. But unfortunately it remains unanswered. Plato declines all categorical reply; though the question is one, as he himself emphatically announces, upon which all the positive consequences of his philosophy turn.196He conducts us to the chamber wherein this precious and indispensable secret is locked up, but he has no key to open the door. In describing the condition of other men’s minds — that they divine a Real Good — Αὐτὸ-ἀγαθὸν or Bonumper se— do everything in order to obtain it, but puzzle themselves in vain tograsp and determine what it is197— he has unconsciously described the condition of his own.
196Certainly when we see the way in which Plato deals with the ἰδέα ἀγαθοῦ, we cannot exempt him from the criticism which he addresses to others, vi. p. 493 E. ὡς δὲ καὶ ἀγαθὰ καὶ καλὰ ταῦτα τῇ ἀληθείᾳ, ἤδη πωποτέ τοῦ ἤκουσας αὐτῶν λόγον διδόντος οὐ καταγέλαστον;We may illustrate this procedure of Plato by an Oriental fable, cited in an instructive Dissertation of M. Ernest Renan.“Aristoteles primum sub Almamuno (813-833,A.D.) arabicè factus est. Somniumque effictum à credulis hominibus: vidisse Almamunum in somno virum aspectu venerabili, solio insidentem: mirantem Almamunum quæsivisse, quisnam ille esset? responsum, Aristotelem esse. Quo audito, Chalifam ab eo quæsivisse, Quidnam Bonum esset? respondisse Aristotelem: Quod sapientiores probarent. Quærenti Chalifæ quid hoc esset? Quod lex divina probat — dixisse. Interroganti porro illi, Quid hoc? Quod omnes probarent — respondisse:neque alii ultra quæstioni respondere voluisse. Quo somnio permotum Almamunum à Græcorum imperatore veniam petiisse, ut libri philosophici in ipsius regno quærerentur: hujusque rei gratiâ viros doctos misisse.” Ernest Renan, De Philosophiâ Peripateticâ apud Syros, commentatio Historica, p. 57; Paris, 1852.Among the various remarks which might be made upon this curious dream, one is, that Bonum is always determined as having relation to the appreciative apprehension of some mind — the Wise Men, the Divine Mind, the Mind of the general public.Bonumis that which some mind or minds conceive and appreciate as such. The word has no meaning except in relation to some apprehending Subject.
196Certainly when we see the way in which Plato deals with the ἰδέα ἀγαθοῦ, we cannot exempt him from the criticism which he addresses to others, vi. p. 493 E. ὡς δὲ καὶ ἀγαθὰ καὶ καλὰ ταῦτα τῇ ἀληθείᾳ, ἤδη πωποτέ τοῦ ἤκουσας αὐτῶν λόγον διδόντος οὐ καταγέλαστον;
We may illustrate this procedure of Plato by an Oriental fable, cited in an instructive Dissertation of M. Ernest Renan.
“Aristoteles primum sub Almamuno (813-833,A.D.) arabicè factus est. Somniumque effictum à credulis hominibus: vidisse Almamunum in somno virum aspectu venerabili, solio insidentem: mirantem Almamunum quæsivisse, quisnam ille esset? responsum, Aristotelem esse. Quo audito, Chalifam ab eo quæsivisse, Quidnam Bonum esset? respondisse Aristotelem: Quod sapientiores probarent. Quærenti Chalifæ quid hoc esset? Quod lex divina probat — dixisse. Interroganti porro illi, Quid hoc? Quod omnes probarent — respondisse:neque alii ultra quæstioni respondere voluisse. Quo somnio permotum Almamunum à Græcorum imperatore veniam petiisse, ut libri philosophici in ipsius regno quærerentur: hujusque rei gratiâ viros doctos misisse.” Ernest Renan, De Philosophiâ Peripateticâ apud Syros, commentatio Historica, p. 57; Paris, 1852.
Among the various remarks which might be made upon this curious dream, one is, that Bonum is always determined as having relation to the appreciative apprehension of some mind — the Wise Men, the Divine Mind, the Mind of the general public.Bonumis that which some mind or minds conceive and appreciate as such. The word has no meaning except in relation to some apprehending Subject.
197Plato, Republ. vi. p. 505 E. ἀπομαντευομένη τι εἶναι, ἀποροῦσα δὲ καὶ οὐκ ἔχουσα λαβεῖν ἱκανῶς τί ποτ’ ἐστίν, &c.The remarks of Aristotle in impugning the Platonic ἰδέαν ἀγαθοῦ are very instructive, Ethic. Nikom. i. p. 1096-1097; Ethic. Eudem. i. p. 1217-1218. He maintains that there exists nothing corresponding to the word; and that even if it did exist, it would neither be πρακτὸν nor κτητὸν ἀνθρώπῳ. Aristotle here looks upon Good as being essentially relative or phenomenal: he understands τὸ ἁπλῶς ἀγαθὸν to mean τὸ ἀγαθὸν τὸ φαινόμενον τῷ σπουδαίῳ (Eth. Nik. iii. p. 1113, b. 16-32). But he does not uniformly adhere to this meaning.
197Plato, Republ. vi. p. 505 E. ἀπομαντευομένη τι εἶναι, ἀποροῦσα δὲ καὶ οὐκ ἔχουσα λαβεῖν ἱκανῶς τί ποτ’ ἐστίν, &c.
The remarks of Aristotle in impugning the Platonic ἰδέαν ἀγαθοῦ are very instructive, Ethic. Nikom. i. p. 1096-1097; Ethic. Eudem. i. p. 1217-1218. He maintains that there exists nothing corresponding to the word; and that even if it did exist, it would neither be πρακτὸν nor κτητὸν ἀνθρώπῳ. Aristotle here looks upon Good as being essentially relative or phenomenal: he understands τὸ ἁπλῶς ἀγαθὸν to mean τὸ ἀγαθὸν τὸ φαινόμενον τῷ σπουδαίῳ (Eth. Nik. iii. p. 1113, b. 16-32). But he does not uniformly adhere to this meaning.
Persons and scheme of the Timæus and Kritias.
Though the Republic of Plato appears as a substantive composition, not including in itself any promise of an intended sequel — yet the Timæus and Kritias are introduced by Plato as constituting a sequel to the Republic. Timæus the Pythagorean philosopher of Lokri, the Athenian Kritias, and Hermokrates, are now introduced, as having been the listeners while Sokrates was recounting his long conversation of ten Books, first with Thrasymachus, next with Glaukon and Adeimantus. The portion of that conversation, which described the theory of a model commonwealth, is recapitulated in its main characteristics: and Sokrates now claims from the two listeners some requital for the treat which he has afforded to them. He desires to see the citizens, whose training he has described at length, and whom he has brought up to the stage of mature capacity — exhibited by some one else as living, acting, and affording some brilliant evidence of courage and military discipline.1Kritias undertakes to satisfy his demand, by recounting a glorious achievement of the ancient citizens of Attica, who had once rescued Europe from an inroad of countless and almost irresistible invaders, pouring in from the vast island of Atlantis in the Western Ocean. This exploit is supposed to have been performed nearly 10,000 years before; and though lost out of the memory of the Athenians themselves, to have been commemorated and still preserved in the more ancient records of Sais in Egypt, and handed down through Solon by a family tradition to Kritias. But it is agreed between Kritias and Timæus,2that before the former enters upon his quasi-historical or mythical recital about the invasion from Atlantis, the latter shall deliver an expository discourse, upon a subject very different and of far greater magnitude. Unfortunately the narrative promised by Kritias stands before us only as a fragment. There is reason to believe that Plato never completed it.3But the discourse assigned to Timæus was finished, and still remains, as a valuable record of ancient philosophy.
1Plato, Timæus, p. 20 B.
1Plato, Timæus, p. 20 B.
2Plato, Timæus, p. 27 A.
2Plato, Timæus, p. 27 A.
3Plutarch, Solon, c. 33.Another discourse appears to have been contemplated by Plato, to be delivered by Hermokrates after Kritias had concluded (Plato, Timæus, p. 20 A; Kritias, p. 108). But nothing of this was probably ever composed.
3Plutarch, Solon, c. 33.
Another discourse appears to have been contemplated by Plato, to be delivered by Hermokrates after Kritias had concluded (Plato, Timæus, p. 20 A; Kritias, p. 108). But nothing of this was probably ever composed.
The Timæus is the earliest ancient physical theory, which we possess in the words of its author.
For us, modern readers, the Timæus of Plato possesses a species of interest which it did not possess either for the contemporaries of its author, or for the ancient world generally. We read in it a system — at least the sketch of a system — of universal philosophy, the earliest that has come to us in the words of the author himself. Among the many other systems, anterior or simultaneous — those of Thales and the other Ionic philosophers, of Herakleitus, Pythagoras, Parmenides, Empedokles, Anaxagoras, Demokritus — not one remains to us as it was promulgated by its original author or supporters. We know all of them only in fragments and through the criticisms of others: fragments always scanty — criticisms generally dissentient, often harsh, sometimes unfair, introduced by the critic to illustrate opposing doctrines of his own. Here, however, the Platonic system is made known to us, not in this fragmentary and half-attested form, but in the full exposition which Plato himself deemed sufficient for it. This is a remarkable peculiarity.
Positionand character of the Pythagorean Timæus.
Timæus is extolled by Sokrates as combining the character of a statesman with that of a philosopher: as being of distinguished wealth and family in his native city (the Epizephyrian Lokri), where he had exercised the leading political functions:— and as having attained besides, the highest excellence in science, astronomical as well as physical.4We know from other sources (though Plato omits to tell us so, according to his usual undefined manner of designating contemporaries) that he was of the Pythagorean school. Much of the exposition assigned to him is founded on Pythagoreanprinciples, though blended by Plato with other doctrines, either his own or borrowed elsewhere. Timæus undertakes to requite Sokrates by giving a discourse respecting “The Nature of the Universe”; beginning at the genesis of the Kosmos, and ending with the constitution of man.5This is to serve as an historical or mythical introduction to the Platonic Republic recently described; wherein Sokrates had set forth the education and discipline proper for man when located as an inhabitant of the earth. Neither during the exposition of Timæus, nor after it, does Sokrates make any remark. But the commencement of the Kritias (which is evidently intended as a second part or continuation of the Timæus) contains, first, a prayer from Timæus that the Gods will pardon the defects of his preceding discourse and help him to amend them — next an emphatic commendation bestowed by Sokrates upon the discourse: thus supplying that recognition which is not found in the first part.6
4Plato, Timæus, pp. 20 A, 27 A.
4Plato, Timæus, pp. 20 A, 27 A.
5Plato, Timæus, p. 27 A. ἔδοξε γὰρ ἡμῖν Τίμαιον μέν, ἅτε ἀστρονομικώτατον ἡμῶν, καὶπερὶ φύσεως τοῦ παντὸςεἰδέναι μάλιστα ἔργον πεποιημένον, πρῶτον λέγειν ἀρχόμενον ἀπὸ τῆς τοῦ κόσμου γενέσεως, τελευτᾷν δὲ εἰς ἀνθρώπων φύσιν.
5Plato, Timæus, p. 27 A. ἔδοξε γὰρ ἡμῖν Τίμαιον μέν, ἅτε ἀστρονομικώτατον ἡμῶν, καὶπερὶ φύσεως τοῦ παντὸςεἰδέναι μάλιστα ἔργον πεποιημένον, πρῶτον λέγειν ἀρχόμενον ἀπὸ τῆς τοῦ κόσμου γενέσεως, τελευτᾷν δὲ εἰς ἀνθρώπων φύσιν.
6Plato, Kritias, p. 108 B.
6Plato, Kritias, p. 108 B.
Poetical imagination displayed by Plato. He pretends to nothing more than probability. Contrast with Sokrates, Isokrates, Xenophon.
In this Hymn of the Universe (to use a phrase of the rhetor Menander7respecting the Platonic Timæus) the prose of Plato is quite as much the vehicle of poetical imagination as the hexameters of Hesiod, Empedokles, or Parmenides. The Gods and Goddesses, whom Timæus invokes at the commencement,8supply him with superhuman revelations, like the Muses to Hesiod, or the Goddess of Wisdom to Parmenides. Plato expressly recognises the multiplicity of different statements current, respecting the Gods and the generation of the Universe. He claims no superior credibility for his own. He professes to give us a new doctrine, not less probable than the numerous dissentient opinions already advanced by others, and more acceptable to his own mind. He bids us be content with such a measure of probability, because the limits of our human nature preclude any fuller approach to certainty.9It is important to note the modest pretensionshere unreservedly announced by Plato as to the conviction and assent of hearers:— so different from the confidence manifested in the Republic, where he hires a herald to proclaim his conclusion — and from the overbearing dogmatism which we read in his Treatise De Legibus, where he is providing a catechism for the schooling of citizens, rather than proofs to be sifted by opponents. He delivers, respecting matters which he admits to be unfathomable, the theory most in harmony with his own religious and poetical predispositions, which he declares to be as probable as any other yet proclaimed. The Xenophontic Sokrates, who disapproved all speculation respecting the origin and structure of the Kosmos, would probably have granted this equal probability, and equal absence of any satisfactory grounds of preferential belief — both to Plato on one side and to the opposing theorists on the other. And another intelligent contemporary, Isokrates, would probably have considered the Platonic Timæus as one among the same class of unprofitable extravagancies, to which he assigns the theories of Herakleitus, Empedokles, Alkmæon, Parmenides, and others.10Plato himself (in the Sophistês)11characterises the theories of these philosophers as fables recited to an audience of children, withoutany care to ensure a rational comprehension and assent.Theywould probably have made the like criticism upon his Timæus. While he treats it as fable to apply to the Gods the human analogy of generation and parentage — they would have considered it only another variety of fable, to apply to them the equally human analogy of constructive fabrication or mixture of ingredients. The language of Xenophon shows that he agreed with his master Sokrates in considering such speculations as not merely unprofitable, but impious.12And if the mission from the Gods — constituting Sokrates Cross-Examiner General against the prevailing fancy of knowledge without the reality of knowledge — drove him to court perpetual controversy with the statesmen, poets, and Sophists of Athens; the same mission would have compelled him, on hearing the sweeping affirmations of Timæus, to apply the test of his Elenchus, and to appear in his well-known character of confessed13but inquisitive ignorance. The Platonic Timæus is positively anti-Sokratic. It places us at the opposite or dogmatic pole of Plato’s character.14
7Menander, De Encomiis, i. 5, p. 39. Compare Karsten, De Empedoclis Vitâ, p. 72; De Parmenidis Vitâ, p. 21.
7Menander, De Encomiis, i. 5, p. 39. Compare Karsten, De Empedoclis Vitâ, p. 72; De Parmenidis Vitâ, p. 21.
8Plato, Timæus, p. 27 D; Hesiod, Theogon, 22-35-105.
8Plato, Timæus, p. 27 D; Hesiod, Theogon, 22-35-105.
9Plato, Timæus, pp. 29 D, 28 D, 59 C-D, 68 C, 72 D. κατ’ ἐμὴν δόξαν — παρὰ τῆς ἐμῆς ψήφου (p. 52 D). In many parts of the dialogue he repeats that he is delivering hisown opinion— that he is affirming what is probable. In the Phædon, however, we find that εἰκότες λόγοι are set aside as deceptive and dangerous, Phædon, p. 92 D. In the remarkable passage of the Timæus, p. 48 C-D, Plato intimates that he will not in the present discourse attempt to go to the bottom of the subject — τὴν μὲν περὶ ἁπάντων εἴτε ἀρχὴν εἴτε ἀρχὰς εἴτε ὅπῃ δοκεῖ τούτων πέρι, τὸ νῦν οὐ ῥητέον — but that he will confine himself to εἰκότες λόγοι — τὸ δὲ κατ’ ἀρχὰς ῥηθὲν διαφυλάττων, τὴντῶν εἰκότων λόγων δύναμιν, πειράσομαι μηδενὸς ἧττον εἰκότα, μᾶλλον δὲ καὶ ἔμπροσθεν ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς περὶ ἑκάστων καὶ ξυμπάντων λέγειν.What theseprincipiaare, which Plato here keeps in the background, I do not clearly understand. Susemihl (Entwickelung der Plat. Phil. ii. p. 405) and Martin (Études sur le Timée, ii. p. 173, note 56) have both given elucidations of this passage, but neither of them appear to me satisfactory. Simplikius says:— Ὁ Πλάτων τὴν φυσιολογίαν εἰκοτολογίαν ἔλεγεν εἶναι, ᾧ καὶ Ἀριστοτέλης συμμαρτυρεῖ, Schol. Aristot. Phys. 325, a. 25 Brandis.
9Plato, Timæus, pp. 29 D, 28 D, 59 C-D, 68 C, 72 D. κατ’ ἐμὴν δόξαν — παρὰ τῆς ἐμῆς ψήφου (p. 52 D). In many parts of the dialogue he repeats that he is delivering hisown opinion— that he is affirming what is probable. In the Phædon, however, we find that εἰκότες λόγοι are set aside as deceptive and dangerous, Phædon, p. 92 D. In the remarkable passage of the Timæus, p. 48 C-D, Plato intimates that he will not in the present discourse attempt to go to the bottom of the subject — τὴν μὲν περὶ ἁπάντων εἴτε ἀρχὴν εἴτε ἀρχὰς εἴτε ὅπῃ δοκεῖ τούτων πέρι, τὸ νῦν οὐ ῥητέον — but that he will confine himself to εἰκότες λόγοι — τὸ δὲ κατ’ ἀρχὰς ῥηθὲν διαφυλάττων, τὴντῶν εἰκότων λόγων δύναμιν, πειράσομαι μηδενὸς ἧττον εἰκότα, μᾶλλον δὲ καὶ ἔμπροσθεν ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς περὶ ἑκάστων καὶ ξυμπάντων λέγειν.
What theseprincipiaare, which Plato here keeps in the background, I do not clearly understand. Susemihl (Entwickelung der Plat. Phil. ii. p. 405) and Martin (Études sur le Timée, ii. p. 173, note 56) have both given elucidations of this passage, but neither of them appear to me satisfactory. Simplikius says:— Ὁ Πλάτων τὴν φυσιολογίαν εἰκοτολογίαν ἔλεγεν εἶναι, ᾧ καὶ Ἀριστοτέλης συμμαρτυρεῖ, Schol. Aristot. Phys. 325, a. 25 Brandis.