The Elements of Greek Philosophy - Forgotten Books

ELEMENTS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY

Pk i ‘ os . H

P:

THE ELEMENTS OF

GREEK PH ILO SO PHY

FROM THALES TO ARISTOTLE

APPLETON, M .A .

LATE SCHOLAR OF CHRIST CHURCH , O X FORD , AND CLASS ICAL

AT THE PERS E SCHOO L, CAMBRlDGR

e’

df 3U0V c’

v3e’

xercu d flava‘n

'

few

M ETHUEN C O . LTD .

3 6 E S S E X S T R E E T W.C .

L O N D O N

THOSE MEMBERS OF THE SIX TH FORM

AT THE PERSE SCHOOL,CAM BRIDGE,

IN THE TEACH ING OF WHOM THE WRITING

OF THIS BOOK ORIGINATED

PREFACE

8 i ts t itle implies , thisbook i s intended asan intro

Aduction to the study of Greek philosophy , whether

begun at the Universi ties or in our school s . That ele

mentary philosophy makes an excellent school subjec t

has long been a convic tionof mine ; the growing m ind

of an inte lligent boy se ize s upon i t as upon nothinge lse ; i t he lps to formulate his ideas to a qu i te remark

able ex tent , and form s an educational instrum ent the

neglec t of which in England contras ts very unfavour

ably wi th cont inental usage. If thi s neglec t has been

d ue,as I be lieve that i t has, to the lack of a sui tab le

book upon the subjec t , i t i s my mod est hOpe that the

present work wi ll help forward the improvement of

classical ed ucationin thi s country. At anyrate i t should

enable a boy to take a more inte lligent interes t inmuch

of his c lassical reading. Al lu sions to the early ph il

OSOpherS are common in many of the au thors usually

read in schools , but tomost boys they are mere names .

This book wil l serve to give some significance to those

names,and should also make the reading of such d ia

lognes of Plato as are likely to be read in school more

readily comprehended by the class . In past years

viii i THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

there has been in the teaching of classics a tendency to

give an undue emphasi s to the pure ly linguistic s ide of

Latin and Greek ,which is now being rectified by the

more humani s ti c atti tude of those teachers who are

at tributing a greater and greater importance to the

content of these languages . I shal l be gratified i f these

find my book of some service to them .

I hope al so that undergraduates beginning the study

of Greek ph ilosophy wi l l find my simplified exposi tion

a real help towards the comprehension of more ad

vanced works upon the subject . If they once grasp

the general principle s of the movement of thought in

volved,they wi l l not have to worry their tutors for an

explanat ion of e lementary points to the ex tent which I

myse l f did in my student-days. Remembering thi s I

have attempted at the out se t to gi ve some idea, in

language assimple as I could c ommand , of what phil

Osophy i s. Then come two chapters dealing wi th the

Ionian physi ci sts and the Pre-Socratics , in dealingwith whom my main de sire has been simply to make

the philosophi cal deve lopment, which they represent ,c lear enough to render Plato intel ligible. At the same

t ime I have tried to bring out the general significance

of the philosophical posi tions , which they maintained , in

such a way that the student wi ll not lose s ight of main

principles ami d a mass of detai ls—will not, aswe say,fai l to see the wood for the trees . Moreover, as I

wanted tomake these philosophers real to the reader,and not a mere set of names uponwhich to hang thi s

or that doctrinal “tag, I have recorded the gi s t of

PREFACE ix

what we are told about them in the various clas sical

authors—all of which has led to a somewhat more

lengthy treatment thanone would at first imagine to be

necessary. After a chapter upon the Sophi sts , we come

to the main body of the book in the two chap ters upon

Socrates and Plato. Here alone have I gi ven trans

lations from the ancient authors to any ex tent, be cause

here alone are we deal ing wi th an author who has a

purely li terary , aswe l l as a phi losophical, value . For

the same reason I have given very few passages from

Aristotle— they wi ll just serve to give some idea of hi s

style— bu t confined myself to an analys i s (a very close

one asregards the early books of the “ E th ics ) c l such

teaching of his as i s both inte lligible to young m inds

and stimulating or he lpful in the ordering of our

thought .

I must here make what acknowledgment I can of

my indebtedness to others . What I owe , especial ly in

reference to the Pre-Socrati c s , toProfessor B urne t’

s two

books on “Early Greek Philosophy” and Greek Phi l

osophy from Thales to Plato”will be obviou s to all

who have read them. W i th regard to P lato I owe

almos t everyth ing toProfessor J. A. Stewart of Ox ford,

not only to hiswell-known books on The Myths of

Plato,”

The Platoni c Doc trine of Ideas,

and“ Note s

onthe NicomacheanE th ics , but al so to the inspiration

of hi s oral teaching. A sim i lar acknowled gment isd ue ,espe cially wi th reference to Ari s totle and to the ex

planationof reali ty on page 107 tomy form er tu tor, Mr.

H .W . B lunt of Chri st Church. Both of these have

x THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

been so kind as to read through mymanuscrip t , and I

have gained immensely from t heir valuable suggest ions

and cri ti ci sms. My quotations from the fragments of

the Pre-Socrati cs are , of course , taken from D iel s’

“Vorsocratiker. The Plato selections have been

translated by my former pupil , Mr. D . M . S immonds ,

now scholar of Christ Church , Ox ford , but at the time

a member of the six th form at the Perse School , Cam

bridge , and I am pleased to have thi s opportuni ty of

thanking him for the ungrudging way inwhich he has

gi ven me so much help. In particular I wi sh to thank

Mr. A. Watson B ain,educational edi tor to Messrs .

Me thuen, and Princi pal H . J . W . Hetherington, Uni

versi ty College , Ex e ter, the former for his most helpfu l

and sympathetic advice , wi thou t which i t i s not too

much to say that my book would never have been

published , and the latter for hi s patient and discerningcri ti ci sms , wi thout which the book would have been

even more imperfec t than i t now i s .

I grateful ly acknowledge the kindness of the delegates

of the C larendon Press for perm i ssion to use the trans

lationof Ari stotle ’s Me taphysics ” by Mr.W. D . Boss

inthe Ox ford Translations ofAri stot le for thequotationsinmy last chapter. My thanks are also d ue to Messrs.

Al len Unwin for their kind perm i ss ion to reprint

Wi ll iam Cory’

s “ M imnermus in Church” from

“ Ioni ca , on page 156.

Al though I have occasionally ventured to develop an

idea of my own, and have at tempted to bring out the

significance of the different movement s of Greek phi lo

PREFACE x i

sophical speculat ions in a manner which I have not

seenso explici tly traced el sewhere , th i s publi cat ion doe s

not imply anygreat claim tooriginali ty . I have wri t ten

the book because I know of no other which treats the

subject in a fashion simple enough to be understood by

those whom I have had primari ly inm ind .

F inally , I should like to thank two of my friends ,Dr. W. H . D . Rouse and Mr. H . Caldwel l Cook ,

for

their careful reading of the proofs .

R . B . A.

january,1 922

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION—(a) What Philosophy is

(b) The theological conceptionof the universe

I . The Ionian Physi cists and the materiali sti c conceptionof theuniverse

(1) Thales ofMi letus(2) Anax imander

(3 ) Anax imenes

(4) Heraclitu s of Ephesus

II. The earlierPre-Socrati cs

(a) The breakdownof materialisti c moni sm(1) Pythagoras of Samos(2) X enophanes of Colophon

(b) E leatic monists

(1) Parmenides oi E lse.

(2) Z eno

(c) The di screpancy betweenEleaticism and phenomena

(1) Empedoc les of Acragas .

(2) Anaxagoras of Clazomenm

(d ) The necessi ty for a theory of knowledge(1) Atomism

(2) Democri tus asanethicalphilos0plier

III. The Sophi sts

(1) Protagoras of Abdera

(2) Gorgias of Leontini .

(3 ) Thrasymachusof Chalcedon

(4) Euthyd emusoi Chios

(5) The phi losophi cal significance of the Sophists.

x iv THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

CHAPTER

IV. Socrates and a theory of Conduct

V. Plato and the idealistic interpretation of the universeGeneral characteristics—Psychology—Politics—MythsDoc trine of Ideas.

VI. Aristotle and the teleologi cal conceptionof the universeE thics Poli ti cs Psychology Logic and theory oi

knowled ge—Metaphysics.

CONCLUSION—The conceptionof God , and the immortality of soul 152

APPENDIx -(a) Ari stotle’s cri ticism of Plato’s Ideas

(b) Li st of techni cal terms with their philosophicalmeanings

INDEX—(a) Engli sh

(b) Greek

THE

ELEMENTS OF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

FROM THALES TO ARISTOTLE

INTRODUCTION

(a) WHAT PHILOSOPHY IS

OST ofus have heard the expressionTake itphilowphi

cally, and we understand the adverb to mean some

thing like wi th resignation. It comes to have this meaningbecause to take a thing philosophically is to consider it as a

whole,not asan isolated phenomenon peculiar toourselves ,

but in comparison with the whole of our l ife and assome

thing which might, and possibly does , happen to others as

well astoourselves. When a man realizes that a great per

sonal calam ity is not something peculiar to himself but

commonto the majority of his fe llow-be ings , in fact a strictly

necessary or inevitable incident in human l ife as such , or

when he succeeds in viewing it in relation to the whole of

his many-sided , wonderfully endowed life , i t no longer fi lls

the whole of his m ind and soul . In popular language we

say that he has become more resigned to it and i s taking it

philos0phically. Much of the philosophy of Epictetus 1 isdirected towards inculcating this attitude ofmind . He tells

1 A lame Greek slavewhogained considerable renownasa philosopherduring the latter half of the ”first century under the Roman Empire.His pupil Arrianhaspreserved notesofhislecturesfor us.

2 THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

us : for example , that a father should not say, upon the death

of his child,that he has lost it

,but rather that it is given

back. By this he means to rem ind us that life is, as it were ,

the gift of the gods , and that only the usufruct of it,as

lawyers would say,i s really ours.

We shall ex pect,then

,to find that philosophy is concerned

with viewing things in the ir context and with assigning a

right value to them in relation to the whole of that context.

Platod efined it asa speculationuponall time and all ex istence

—Oewpia 1rav1'6spév xpd vou mims82ed d ies Republic

,

"

It is concerned with our knowledge asa whole ; but before

we can define it more precisely we must briefly consider how

we come to have any knowledge at all. For man and beast

alike the senses are the avenues through which comes know

ledge of the external world . Sight, hearing,touch

,taste

,

and sm el l are senses which we share with the lower animals .

But man alone can draw general and universal conclusions

from the d a ta thus provided. Some animals— dogs , for

example —are endowed with a further faculty beyond the

sense-perception (aiaenois) which is common to the whole

animal kingdom . They remember that the whip smarts,and

are capable of visualizing the effects of turning the handle of

a d oor. Roughly Speaking,we may say that , in the scale of

animal life,

a rsona I.sis common to man and beast,and that many

animals have noother faculty

4sa. v-r a a i o. (visualization) and ji v 13p. 1] (memory) are

faculties which enable the more inte ll igent animals to acquire

some experience of life (éjm e ipia ) which extends beyond the

moment of sense -perception ;

X M ] (art or science) and x 6y 0 s(reason) are confined to

man alone , and enable him to acquire scientific kQQWledge.

https://www.forgottenbooks.com/join

Philosophy andSc i entificKnowledge .


wokktiwrfiséjure ipiasé vvo'

qjtd'

rwv, asAristotle says. It is this

that enables man to build up through a process of reasoning

(koywji ci

s) an art or science (réxm) , the possession of which

distinguishes him from the lower animals.

The knowled ge Which thi s p ic. Kaedhou bi rdh'

qili tsentail s is

in some sense a knowledge of laws or universals . The

scientist always wants toknow the reason (a iria) of things

the empirical person only knows a fact (7 6 an) , but the

scientist asks why the fact is so ; he tries to find out the

cause (1 6 Suin) of each particular phenomenon. Empirical

knowledge of the an apart from scientific knowledge of the

Si d-n may, in certain circumstances , be dangerous. For

example, an Opticianmay prescribe wrong treatment of the

eyes upon his empirical knowledge of the fact (7 6 an) that

this or the other lens makes an improvement in the sight ;whereas the oculist, who investigates the cause (1 6 Stein) of

the impaired vision,may tell us that such a lens

,although

causing an immediate improvement in the sight , would in

the long run prove very detrimental to the eyes . Every one

will be able to think of further practical examples of the

superiority of the knowledge of the Sui-ri over that of the

mere 3m.

Just asempiri cal knowledge is , strictly speaking, confined

to this or that phenomenon, so scientific knowledge is con

fined to its own department. It deals with its universals

only within this or that particular sphere— e lectricity, mathe

matice,or any ofthe applied sciences— but does not

,assuch

,

exam ine either the possibility or the validity of our know

ledge of such universals . It is, for example , quite beyond

the sphere of physics to exam ine either how man came to

formulate the “ law of gravity”or what justificationhe has

for believing in it. Logic , onthe"

other hand , is a science

INTRODUCTION

which deals with the workings of the human mind , and

quite apart from this or that subject-matter— formulates laws

for valid reasoning and examines the method by whi ch con

clusions may legitimately be drawn from given prem ises.

It is a branch ofphilosophy ina sense inwhich physics is not.

Metaphysics— asthe name implies—comes after, and goes be

yond , physics , because it takes the universals of physics , as

of all other departmental sciences , and exam ines what claim

they have to represent reality, or to be true. Philosophy

alone can answer Pilate’s question of “What is Truth ? and

it is in this sense that philosophy has been called sc ientia

scientiaru/n,'

the science of sciences , because it is , as it were ,arbiter of the claims of specific sciences to represent truth .

Scientific knowledge cannot determine this ; it is confined to

its own sphere,and cannot turn round upon itself inorder to

ask whence its knowledge comes. To d o this is the chief

function of philosophy— it has always to be asking“ How

do you know ?”and it must give some explanation of the

possibility of knowledge , and also some criterion by which to

judge the claims of that“ knowledge to represent reality.The

A simple analogy wil l make thi s olearf We all know howStuw‘im

old -fashioned people take the Bible for “

gospel (aswe say) , Validity.

and how the uncritical person is inclined to take everything“ in the paper for truth— the fact of its be ing

“ in the

paper makes it true. Perhaps some d ay he will read an

account of something ofwhich he has first-hand knowledge ,and will find such discrepancies between the newspaper

’

s

account and what he himself knows to have been the facts

that henceforth his belief in the infallibil ity of the paper

will be rudely shaken. Gradually he will come to real ize

that “the paper ” is written by journalists of l ike passions

with himself , and will begin to look for some other criterion


of the truth of a statement beyond that of its mere appear

ance “ in the paper. Similarly we realize,aswe grow up ,

that a statement is not necessarily true because it is in the

Bible ; and it is the same with the whole of our knowledge.

We cannot take it uponauthority, either from another person

or from a l iterary record . The exam ination towhich we are

thus led,of the criterion of truth

,is the main business of

philosophy, and is what is meant when it is said that philo

sophy alone can raise the question of validity. Such an

ex am inationwill nece ssarily be a long and difficult one,and

will take us far afield into the most abstract speculation.

But certain common-sense rules may be laid down from the

very beginning. We want,for example

,the whole of the

truth ; half-truths are m isleading enough inordinary life ,

and will not d o at all inphilosophical speculation. We must

consider every aspect of a thing and take every point of view

into account . A bigot cansee only one side of a question ;he is certain that he isright and simply cannot see the other

side,just as, in the old story of two knights coming upon a

shield (silver on one side , and gold on the other) suspended

from a pole , each knight wascertain that the shield wasof

the colour which he saw so plainly before his eyes , and took

his fellow for a liar and a knave , simply because he could

not see his point of view.

” Philosophy , on the other hand,will consider every point of view ; as Aristotle tells us , its

first concern is to consider ai fl pQ

rat d pxalex al ulriat , and he

defines these asfour innumber. They are

f) 060 50.or To‘

ri fir eivcu. (formal cause) .

filmor 7 6 buox eipevov (material cause) .

i; 6px?) Tijsmw‘joews(efli cient cause).

1

1 6 05 gra m (final cause) .

1 It wi l l be noticed that it isonly in thi s third cause that the word isused in itsusual or popular sense. In the other three cases the word

INTRODUCTION 7

Every subject may be considered under any or all of these

four causes , though some are more particularly concerned

with one than with another. Tanning,for example

,is con

cerned chiefly with leather, the material cause of a boot.

But we may al so consider a boot from each of the three

remaining points of view. Its effi cient cause is the labour

and skill of the cobbler ; its formal cause the general shape

and design which makes it more suitable asa covering for

the human foot than for a hand-bag ; whi le its final cause

is comfort in walking and the protection of the feet against

the harshness of the weather and of the ground. The dis

tinction between these four causes is a most important one ;and the confusion of two of them is a frequent source of

error. A certain type of scientific m ind , for example , is

inclined to think that the explanation of a thing rests in

showing how it arose . But this,of course, gives only the

efficient cause , and it maywel l be that the whole significance

of the thing in question resides in its final cause . The reader

will be able to think of examples for himself.

(6) THE THEOLOGIOAL CONCEPTION on THE UNIVERSE

Philosophy, asAristotle said , begins in wonder. Man,as

soon ashe begins to reflect upon the world inwhich he finds

himself,becomes conscious of the wonderof his environment,

and asks himself how it all came there and what it means.

Now this first attitude of reflection upon the external world

is,strange as it may seem , a theologica l one ; it peoples the

universe with a host ofOeoi external to man him self. Let us

see how thi s arises.

Prim itive man is conscious of himself asa living animal,

cause i s used ina special philosophical sense to denote what inordinary,everyday language might be called a point of view.


as a thinking person. His natural impulse,therefore

,is to

ascribe such personality to d ifferent aspects of the universe

external to himself. And Obviously these powersare much

greater, and more sublime,than he is himself

,for they are

beyond his control and greatly transcend anything which

either he or hisfellow-man canachieve. One needs to be as

mad as Salmoneus to attempt to im itate the thunder and

lightning of Zeus . Of course,a developed theogony— such

as that of which Zeus is at the head— does not suddenly

Spring into being. We are speaking for the moment of a

stage of civilization prior to all this,and one of which our

knowledge must , to a certain extent, be conjectural ; but the

science of anthropology hasduring recent generations taught

us a great deal . Roughly speaking,there are twomeans at

our disposal for studying the workings of the prim itive

mind

1 . The early workings of the m ind of a child.

2. The m inds of savages ex isting to-d ay.

Animi sm.In both of these we find a tendency to ascribe life to what

a more fully developed experience proves to be inanimate .

Most l ittle girls d o so with their doll s,and imaginative

children have been known to address lengthy monologues

to the man-in-the-moon. So,to the savage , thunder and

lightning are the manifestations of the wrath of a god , and i f

there is one unseen god in the universe— as thunder and

lightning clearly prove— thenwhy not many In fact there

is no check upon the savage imagination,which quickly

WEBM EJAID Pfi fl HHQPEJ

animate . This is what anthro

pologists call animism,because it is a be lief according to

which there is life or soul (cin/ipiapnfl ‘irl’tillnfi rwhether tree,river, or lake. The angry child who kicks the chair which

hurt ' him is probably responding to the prim itive instinct

INTRODUCTION

which made hissavage progenitor people the world with the

gods of his imagination. But,be thi s as it may, i t is well

established that anim ism was a very definite stage in the

development of the humanmind.

From this a systematic theology gradual ly ari ses : the sun, A Theo

for example, is a god who drives his chariot daily across they.

heavens,the moon a goddess who reigns by night , and so

on. M but not until the development of li terature—a

d efinjta hierarnhy ia emlyed , inwhich eachfl ggd hasnot only

his definite order but also ns this is

the god of heal ing, that the goddess of corn. These things

are settled by poets gradually bringing order into the con

fused mass of oral tradition. Thus Herodotus te lls us that

it wasHomer and Hesiod , for example , whofirst systematized

the Olympian theology.

“ These are they,”he says , who

formulated a theogony for the Greeks,and asc ribed the ir

names to the gods , and determined both their honours and

the ir crafts,and made clear the ir types (H erodotus ,

II .

In thinking of their g s the Greeks naturally visualized Anthropo

them as “supgrmen

”im which is what we ism

fi h

mean by saying that Greek re ligion wasanthropomorphic.

Within this ful ly developed Olympian theology , aswe may

term it , it is very interesting to find distinct survivals of

an earlier anim ism. Consider,for example

,the Metamor

phoses ofOvid . Stories such asthose ofProcne and Tereus,

and the existence of hamadryads and nymphs of stream and

lake , have no connexionwith the hierarchy of Olympus, but

are relics of a stage of bel ief prior to it.

But such an anthropomorphic theology , as this of the

Greeks, is , like other human things , liable to decay ; and we

know thatspepticism set inverya

eagly. Probably this wasso


as early as the time of Homer,who does not hesitate oc

casionally to exhibit the gods in a ridiculous light . Take , for

example,the song of the hard Demodocus in the Odyssey

,

"

which tells how Hephae stus cast his d po'

iw . heard over Ares

and Aphrodite in bed together; and then summoned the rest

of the gods to mock at their plight :“ And the gods, the

givers of good things , stood upon the threshold,and un

quenchable was the laughter that arose among the blessed

gods as they beheld the d evices of wily Hephaestus

VI II. 266 if ) . Such an episode would be im

possible among a people who did not take their theology

somewhat light-heartedly.

Before passing on to consider the effect of this scepticism

uponwhat we have called the theological conceptionof the

universe,perhaps it would be well to utter a warning against

any possible m isconceptionwhich m ight arise from the origin

to which we have traced it. It involves no disparagement

of later theological Speculations. If an anthropologi st tells

us that our most treasured belief in immortality arises from

the restless dreams of an over-gorged savage , who imagines

that he sees the Spirit of a dead friend come from the under

world to visit him by night , we ought not to be angry with

our anthropologist, but to thank him for tracing the originof

the belief, even while insisting that his researches can con

tribute nothing to our conception of its value. To trace the

originofa thing is to consider itsefficient cause (690 1 i, x ivrjcns)and hasnothing to do with the valuationof the thing itself

(1 6 f t fiv efva i ) . To confuse these two aspects would be to

confuse the efficient with the formal cause,against which we

have already issued a warning.


Mi letus.


Aristophanes regarded all such Speculations with disfavour,for they tended to displace the gods by material istic abstrac

tions, so that The vortex reigns , after having driven out

Zeus .” 1 Such unenlightened Opposition to scientific dis

coveriesis , of course , no part oftrue rel igion. The pursuit of

knowledge is ideally good , and there can be no Opposition

betweentruth and religion but it needed a teacher like Plato,

with“

hishigh conceptions both of knowledge and ofreligion,

to convince menof this. But philosophy has a long way to

go before it comes to Plato.

Scepticism,we have said, soon begins to have a d isinte

grating effect upon the early theological conceptions . It is

felt that we cannot knowwanything about t bs,gods; but we

kngwl fl aterufii

’

e, ‘

and __earth whenw we fi eejhcm, ” Let us

confine ourselves to the known,or at least to the knowable ,

and leave the unknown and unknowable to take care of

itse lf. Philosophy must concern itself with the material

cause,wi th the of things. This is various ; but the

“

con

viction ari ses that underneath the many formsp fu matter, as

known tous , thereh isone permanentfién, which only changes

its attributes— much as the GM ofwater is the same both

in steam and in ice . The first speculations of this nature

were made by the early Ionian physicists of the School of

Miletus .

Miletus was in early days the most prosperous of the

many, _Greek ,coloniessettled on the coast of Asia Minors

The reasons for this were partly geographical and partly

political. The hinterland ofAsia Minor is a great'

table-land,

or plateau , which was chiefly given up to sheep -farm ing ;the wool wassent down the two great river valleys which

1 Aristophanes , “ Clouds , 828.

THE ION IAN PHYS ICISTS 13

penetrate the interior, was dyed with the famous murea: dye

discovered by the t nic ians,and then exported to all

parts of the Mediterranean world . Miletus stood at the

mouth of one of these two great rivers . This was in itself

likely to give rise to great commercial prosperity, and it was

enhanced by another factor. Miletus had early entered into

an alliance with Alyattes , the King of Lydia,and this treaty

was renewed with Craasus. This freed the citizens of

Miletus from all political fear of the too powerful neighbour

at the ir back ,and thus they were enabled to indulge in that

leisure (axoM) which is sonecessary to culture .

1. THALES or M innrus

There are many scattered allusions in the classics to

Thales of Miletus . We are told that he was one of the

SevenWisex Meu ofantiqui ty ; and he wasevidently a figure

that appealed to the popular imagination. We must dis

ting uish this aspect of him from what we can determine

about him asa philosopher. The story of his having fallen

into a_ ,

well while star-gazing1 i s probably apocryphal , and

invented to illustrate the uselessness of erot ic ; just as the

other story about his having made a fortune through buyingup all the Olive-presses in Chios and Mile tus , at a time when

his knowledge of the stars warned him that there woul d be

a great harvest ofolives in the com ing year, is an improvingtale with the opposite moral .2 But there can be no doubt

that he wasaman very d ifferent from ourmodernconception

of a philosopher. Thus he was something of a m i l itary

engineer, and accompanied Crcesus in that capacity upon

his ill-fated campaign against the Medes . When Crcnsus

1 Plato, Thea t , 174a.3 Ari stotle, Poli tics,

” I. 11 , 10.


was in diffi culties about the crossing of the river Halys, it

was Thales who hit upon the ingenious plan of cutting a

canal to the rear oft he army , thus making the river flow

through two channels,which both became fordable.

1 He

wasal so an asM and his date is fixed by his havingforetold the ecl ipse of the sun which put an end to the

battle between the Lydians and Medes .2 Modern astronom i

cal calculations place this eclipse in the year 585 The

theory which attributed the periodic rise in the waters of

the Nile to the effect of the Etesian winds 3 was probably

d ue to Thales ; and certainly he wasm u n of some

repute. Thus we see him giving advice to the Ionians to

make Teos the ir capital .4 In fact , we know far more about

him inthese variousaspectsi hanasa philoswher pure and

S imple . All that we can saywith certainty in this regard is

that he taught :

1. That water is the material cause of things .

2. That the earth floats uponwater.

3 . That everything is full ofgods (i i-am wkfipqGsaw) .

That he should have chosenwater asthe one permanent

UM out of which all other forms of matter arise is very

natural , for d owe not see water inthe three forms of a solid ,a liquid , and a gas, in ice, water, and steam respectively ?

The second remark which is attributed to him,to the effect

that the earth floats upon water,need not worry us . It

does not seem to be of much significance, and is not incon

sistent with the first statement ; it is probably d ue to the

contemporary conception of the world"

as a fl at disk with

Oceanus running around it. But the third statement,that

m in e «Mp1; easy, cannot be so easily d ism issed . Of course

1Herodotus , I. 75 .11 I?) I . 74.

3 1h , II . 20.4 Ib., I. 170.

THE IONIAN PHYSICISTS 15

Get; d oes not imply personal ity ; but, even so, how i s this to

be reconciled with the doctrine that the 6 M of everything i s

water ? What happens to this if everything is full of Oeoi ?

The solution seems to be that this last statement was not

part of the definite ly philosophical teaching of Thales,but

rather a wise saw attributed to him in his capacity of one of

the SevenWise Men. We may compare it with the state

ment , recorded by Aristotle ,1 that Thales maintained that the

magnet possessed soul (tvxvi) , i .e . life,because i t attracted

iron; and we must remember that Thales lived in an age

impregnated with a bel ief in old nature -religion,which ,

though a considerable development of early animismJ wasquite ofa piece with such remarks asthis. It is

,at anyrate ,

quite inconsistent with his philosophi cal idea ofmaterial istic

monism ,nor canwe reconcile it by any conception on the

lines of Virgil’s mens agita i molemfi

’for that would involve

a terrible anachronism in the hi story of philosophical d e

velopment.

2. ANAX IMANDER

Anaximander also wasa native of Mi letus ; he was born

abou t 610 no ,and was a pupil or associate of Thales .

Like his master, he would seem to have been something of a

scientis. ; Diogenes Leert ius tel ls us that he invented the

yvoipwv, or ind ex of the sun-dial but,as it was known to

the Babylonians before this time,it is probable that Anaxi

mander merely introduced it to the Greeks from them .

We are also told that he wasone of the first to make a map

of the world , and H ecatseus,the later geographer whom

Herodotus loved so we ll , both used , and improved , this map .

This is all that we can affirm with confidence about the

1 D e Anima ,fine.

2 E neid ,” VI 727


personal life of Anaximander. In his philosophical signi

ficance‘he

‘

is the second of the great Ionian physicists .

Thales had found the permanent 8 M which underlies the

manifold variety of phenom ena,with which our senses

present us,inwater. But Anaximander seems to have felt

a difficulty in deriving all phenomena from someth ing which

is i tself one phenomena . Such a derivation looks

like a combinationof a conjuring trick with the fallacy whi ch

is known in logi c as a vicious circle . If all phenomena

arise from one permanent 3M and are merely different mani

festations of it , surely this 6M cannot itself be one of its

own many manifestations,but must be something over and

above them ,something which our senses, it is true , can

present to us only inone or other of its manifestations,but

which we nevertheless must not confuse with any one of

them . This vague“ something,

” which is thus posited at

the back of phenomena, Anaximander called thqwnd i armi

nate or Infini te (T6 d ue tpov) . This isthe material cause ofall

phm pecific things arise from it and return

to it . First of all by a process of separation, or Zx xpw is,

contrary pairs— such asthe wet, the d ry—are separated out

(é x xpiveofla t) . We must not think of this dnetpov as being in

itself e ither wet or d ry, or indeed as possessing any specific

quality whatsoever. It is at once everything and nothing ;for all possible “

contrary pairs are contained within it , not

actually as such (é vepye ig) but potentially (SUVd pELI) , in that

they are capable of arising from it . To give the dwe ipov anydefinite quality would be to fall into the error of Thales and

tomake the permanent din] of things itself one of the many

1 This distinction between the actual and the potential i s muchlater than Anax imander and comes from Ari stotle , but it seems to bewhat Anax imandermeant.

THE ION IAN PHYSICISTS 17

things which it has been-brought in to explain. Moreover,

if it were true,we should expec t to find in the world a

tendency for the different “elements ” (earth, air

,fire , and

water) to vanish into one. But thi s is not so ; they d o not

vanish into one of themselves,but only into the d r aw from

which they arose . Their specific qualities , whi le they exist,

seem to have been regarded by Anaximander as a sort of

violationof the neutral characterofhisanew . One definite

fragment of his writings has been preserved for us by

Theophrastus ; but it is in a form which makes it impossible

for us to be certainof the exact words of Anaximander. It

is asfollows

é§ div 83 15] yévea iséo'n Totsc6m , Ka i T ijvMopd v sis yiveofia t

«and Toxpea’

xv' 8t86va t yap ( 161 6, Show Kai. riow dMfiXmg ffis

d SLKiasKurd ‘

rfiv‘

roGxpd vou Td §w. Professor Burnet 1 takes the

first clause asoratioobliqua (i.s. asthe words ofTheophrastus

and not ofAnaximander himself) and translates thus :“And

into that from which things take their rise they pass away

once more , as is ordained ; for they make reparation and

satisfaction to one another for their injustice according to

the appointed time.

” It is difficul t for‘

us now to deter

m ine what induced Anaximander to conce ive of the spec ific

existence of things as an “ injustice but it seems

reasonable to refer it to the advance which,as he thought ,

his philosophical system had made upon that of Thales by

conceiving of the original“matter ”

out of which all things

are evolved as not itself possessing any definite qualities.

For this GM to be determ ined in any one specific way is a

sort of “ injustice ”to the numerous other ways in which it

might have been determ ined .

1 Burnet , Ear ly Greek Philosophy ,” p . 54.


Before we pass to his successor it should be stated that

Anaximander seems to have had vague inklings of what

nowadays we call the theory of evolution. If everythingarises from the d ue tpov, then, ofcourse, man is included , and

wasonce not ashe is now,but has been gradually evolved .

The reason which Anaximander gave as a proof that man

wasdescended from other animals has a peculiarly modern

ring about it. H e says that,if this were not so, man could

never have survived ; the human child,compared with the

young of other animals,needs such a lengthy period of

suckling that it would have stood no chance of living, in the

earlier and rougher days of the world , if it had always been

such aswe now know it .

3 . ANAX IMENES

Anaximenes , the pupil ofAnaximander, wasanother native

ofMiletus. His date is fixed for us by that of Anaximander,and we also have 9. terminusad quem in the destructionof

Miletus by the Persians in 494 The philosophical school

ofMiletus then came to an end , sowe must put thefiom it

ofAnaximenes before this date.

As with the otherMilesians,the chi ef concernofphilosophy

is stil l,for Anaximenes , to determ ine the one permanent

6M from which all things arise. He taught that this was:

(hip, and that things are evolved out of thi s e ither by a process

of condensation (miw ms) or ofrarefaction (d puiums, pd ms) .

By d v'jp we must probably understand something more akin

to fire than to what we call “air,

”for in the process of

d pa iwcnsfire is the next stage to chip, and in an example of

miw o-Lswe find that dfip is

“rarer thanavepos(WE ) . We

have air, wind, clouds, water, earth, stones in descendingscale. Moreover, that it was hardly our “

air is probable



system of Anaximander, the name of Anaximenes really

marks a great step forward in the history of philosophical

development . For in him we see the all-important idea of

process rising into prom inence in the functions which he

assigns to mi

xmms and d pa iwms. We are passing from a

1static to a dynam ic conceptionof things, and the ideas which

El ie behind these twowords are ideas which are destined toiplay a very important part in the development of philosophy.

4 . HERACLITUS or EPHESUS

Although not ofMiletus , Heraclitus really belongs to the

[Milesian school ; for it is inhim that we see the full exposi

tionofthat doctrine. He flourished about 500B .C. or abouti the middle ofthe re ignofDarius.i He wrote a book in a very obscure style

,and considerable

fragments of this are sti ll extant. W ithout going into d e

tail s of his many enigmat ic sayings , we can piece together.

suffi cient to obtain a fairly clear idea of his philosophical

significance. He gives‘

full expression to that doctrine of

process which is involved , but not explic itly stated , in the

early Ionian philosophy. Fire is the fundamental form of

existence ; but there is cont1nual change going ou- H w

-

d‘

v

—‘

r

-

dw

fiei .Fire passes by the 686; ndw (cf. the minimumsof Anaximenes)into water and earth ; these , in their turn, pass by the 6869

am (d pa lw cg inAnaximenes) back again into fire. Accordingto Anaximander the separating out of things from the

d uetpov was regarded as a sort of Edw in, for which recom

pense hasto be made . Heracl itus , on the contrary, regards

the existence of the manifold of phenomena asa d ppovla of

opposing tendencies such asthatof the lyre and of the bow.

It is,in fact

,just this continual strife whichh nakesthe ex

a.

istence gfthg world possible. “

Thisid eaw

i‘

sat the bottom a

qfu 0

‘ v—u w

THE IONIAN PHYSICISTS 21

his doctrine of the unity“

ofopposites and of the One and the-. o n 0 ' ~ q

fill

iny} Life is death ; sleeping iswaking we are and aret ; young and old are the same .

”So runs a fragment

which has been preserved in Plutarch. We must make

allowances for poetical language , and also for that tendencyto exaggerate which leads a great teacher or prophet to

attempt to gain attention for his doctrine by making it as

startling as possible . Such teaching must never, of course ,

be interpreted literally. There i s a Christianprec ept which

bids me take no thought for what I shall eat or what I shall

put on; but, however good a Christian I may be , I shall not

risk death from pneumonia by wearing the thinnest of mysummer clothes in m id -winter

,nor shall I , inreliance upon

this precept,appease myhunger or thirst at random from

the shelves of a chem ical laboratory . We must interpre t

the seeming contradictions of Heraclitus in a like spirit ;they are a symbolical wayofasserting the relativity ofthings .

Evemhing is relative to eveg thing else ; heat is impossiblewithout cold , young without old , and so on. This interpre ta

tion fits inwel l with his fundamental doctrine of minorpet,and is made certain by the words which immediate ly follow

those just quoted,viz “For these by changing become

those , and those again changing become these .

” Heraclitus

calls them the same,be cause they so readily pass the one

into the other. Change is , in fact , th“ great”r_eal1ty This

conviction lies at the bottom of all the Speculations of

Heraclitus ; and if we wonder why he chose fire as the

primary substance , i t is probably not too fanciful to answer

that he did so because asteadily burning flame,which looks

1 The speculations of Herac litu s upon the One and the Many werepurely physical . Later on they will have a very important logi calapplication.

22 THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY

constant (though all the time passing away seemed to

him the most stable thing in a world of continual flux.

The questionwith which philosophy started—What is the

world made of —hasnow been variously answered byThales ,Anaximander, Anaximenes , and Heraclitus . Al l these four

philOSOphem_pogcer_ged them selves primarilywith the material

cause,

of things ; but we notice a gradual development, finally

becoming eiplic it inHeraclitus, ofthe importance of the idea

of processor change. The “ how gradually displaces the“ what ” in philosophical importance. The world may be

made of earth ,air, fire , or water ; but we can rest satisfied

with no explanationwhich does not account for how the dif

ferent elements arise and pass into one another. Material

istic monism hasfailed to explainthis how,

"and materialism

asa philosophy contains within itse lf its own refutation. It

cannot account for motion, and motion is the great fact of

life.

l

1 Thi s criticism applies to the crudest form ofmaterial istic monismsuch as that which we have just ex am ined. Many shades of mechanistic ex planation d onot lie open to i t in su ch anobvious manner, butto exam ine such later speculations here would be to obscure the greatphilosophical truth which has emerged as a result of this firs t greatphilosophical movement. The specu lat ions of these M iles ianmonistsmay seem very crude when exam ined indivi dual ly , but their phi losophical importance lies in the course of speculationwhi ch they jointly represent—a course in which truth has, asi t were , beenworking itselfcut. The details of their individual theories are .of no significance as

compared with the gradual evolution of phi losophical truth towhicheach inhis turn contributed. We have nowreached the end of the firststage of that evolution, and if the reader has real ized what this stagemeans he i s beginning to understand the meaning of philosophy.

CHAPTER II

THE EARLIER PRE-SOCRATICS

(a) THE Banaxnown or MATERIALISTIC Momsu

HE breakdownofmaterialistic monismmarks the end of

the first stage of Greek philosophical speculation. Of

the four Aristotelian a iria t or spam apxal we have so far

confined our attentionto one , 1}6M. Subsequent speculation,though it does not confine itse lf definitely to any one of the

remaining three , yet takes on a new aspect. This change

coincides with a shifting of the scene of philOSOphical speen

lationfrom East toWest . The Pers ianadvance inAsia Minor

must have made the Ionians feel the insecuri ty oftheir position

for some time , and have induced them‘

to turn their thoughts

towards m igration to the West. We know that this wasWestern

actually suggested at least once 1 by Bias of Priene,who

Greece ’

recommended that all the Ionians should set sail in a bod y

and establish themselves in the island of Sardinia as a

common centre for all of them. This,of course

,wasnever

achieved ; but the Persian destructionof Miletus in 494 putan end to the philosophical school which had flourished there

for so long : and wecan imagine the philosophers escapingin various direc tions westward , just as the scholars fl ed to

1Herodotus , I. 170.23


different parts ofmodernEurope uponthe sack of Constanti

nOpIe by the Turks in 1453 . Let us glance , then, at the

conditions which obtained inthe West at this time . Through

out Greecewe find a sort gaggligious revival , al though there

has been no definite change-12 the State religion. As we

have said , a priesthood is naturally_c_op servative , and this is

pre-em inently so in the case ofan established priesthood,

aor State re ligion. But its influence wasalmost negligible in

Greec e and the Olympian theology had already lost what

little appeal it ever had for the hearts of the people . The

worship ofD ionysum peen introduced frppgEhraqep andthis with all its wild elements of romance

,of fervour

,and

even of licence , soon took a firm hold upon those who found

something lacking in the regular Olympian theology, some

thing cold and ,as it were , unreal. Then we have the

Eleusinian and other s,of which we know little.

But there canbe no that they formed a very practical

part of the religious life of the d ay ; to some m inds - they

would appeal most strongly owing to the sense of real ity,

almost of “earthiness,

”as seen in the significance given to

vegetation and the return of spring after winter ; toothers

of more mystical nature, they would appeal from the other

aspect of all “ vegetation cults ,” from what is symbolized by

the re-awakening of all vegetable-life , i .e . the prom ise of life

after death and the hr

opew

of immortality. It is probably thi s

double appeal, this unusual goumhinfi

ation of a sp iritual anda . an “

earthy ”accounted for the remarkable

hold which the mysteries undoubtedly had upon the m inds of

many. Nor must we forget Orphisgn,and all those

» ,

vagrant“medicine-men and religious teachers of every description

whowould have a great influence,especially upon the less

educated portionof a community.


Transplanted to such soil phi losophy most natural ly takes Philo

root rather as a way of life than as a body of academ ic

doctrine. Religious brotherhoods Spring up, and rules areL ife",

formulated for the guidance of the initiated ; one of the most

famous of these is that whi ch is assoc iated with the name of

Pythagoras.

1 . PYTHAGORAS or SAMOS

Al though a native ofSamos , Pythagoras did not l ive there

for the greater part of his l ife . H e disliked the rule of

Polycrates , who became tyrant in 532 B .o.— this fix es the

date of Pythagoras— and emigrated from Samos to Croton

in South Italy. Here he founded a re ligious brotherhood ,which gradually became very powerful ; there was definite

teaching in connexion with it , and i t seems to imply a

school with an esoteric doctrine,into the full mysteries of

whi ch the”novices were not initiated until after several years

’

service. The brotherhood established at Croton became

powerful enough to get embroiled in political agitations. It

wasowing to some contest between it and the democratic

party at Croton that Pythagoras had to fl ee the town and

retire toMetapontum , where he died.

To most of us the name of Pythagoras at once suggests

the transm igration of souls . We think of Shakespeare’s

suggestion that“ the soul of our grandam may haply inhabit

a bird.

”Classical students know that oi.nueayé pa oi is the

way to translate “ vegetarians . Let us begin with these

two scraps of information. There is no shadow of doubt

that the transmi formed part of the definite

teaching of Pythagoras. It was a doctrine that appealed to

the humour of the popular imagination, and Xenophanes (the


next philosopher whom we shal l consider) made fun of it

thus

They say that once asPythagoraswaspassing by he took pity upona d og that was being beaten and spoke asfol lows Hold

,strike not"

for i t isthe soul ofa man dear tome , which I recogni zed asI heard itscry.”

He is himself said to have bel ieved that his soul formerly

inhabited the body of Euphorbus , who fought in the Trojan

war and dedicated his shield in a certain temple , where

Pythagoras recognized it as the one whi ch he had worn

when Euphorbus.1 The story makes us think at once of

the doctrine ofRecollection (slaw ; but therem om 's.

seems to have beenno systematic development inPythagoras

of the implications of this doctrine as regards a theory of

knowledge. This be lief in the transm igration of souls , or

fl ahiyyevea ia3[p erep tllfixwms is a later word , and not good

Greek for it ; it should , of course , mean not the passing of

one soul intodifferent bod ies , which is what we want, but the

habitationofa successionof soul s in one body], is intimately

connected with a be lief in the kinship ofmanwith the beasts,

and with abstinence from fl e'

Shf“"

These always hangtogether,and the reason is obvious.

Hi s E thi Beyond this more popular Side of his teaching—wasthus

figTeB‘ch'

much the exoteric portion to which all members of the

brotherhood were immediately adm itted — it is d iflficult tobe

confident that we are not going wrong in ascribing further

doctrines to the personal teaching of Pythagoras. This

difficulty arises from the confusion inour authorities between

the doctrines of the immediate followers of Pythagoras and

1Horace , Odes , I . 28, 10. 2See below, p. 109.See Ovid , Metamorphoses ,” Book X V., for popular stories.

Beans need notworryus here,



analogies with the very different circumstances of modern

times. We must not imagine that the Spectators at the

Olympic gam es were at all like the crowd at a modern foot

ball match . Public ceremonies were always for the Greeks

occasions for the enjoyment of cultured conversation ; and

whenPythagoras compared such spectators with the highest

type of human l ife,he was insisting symbolically that the

highest activ itypj the humanm ind is disinterested speculaw u n

Those whopursue knowledge for its own sake, without—c.>

any are surely

following the highest ideals. We may conjecture , then,that

the ethical teaching of Pythagoras involved a true estimate

ofthe three “goods ofwealth or pleasure, of fame or renown,

and of knowledge or wisdom ; and such a doctrine will take

one a long way in ethics.

There is a further doctrine which canbe ascribed without

doubt toPythagoras himself. This is the doctrine ofnumbers ,according to which things are said to be numberL Bald ly

stated,it is a startling, if not an inconceivable, doctrine ; and

there are many fanciful developments of it , e .g. justice is

defined asfour, the first square number (tast esteam lads) ,becausefour so readily symbolizes the element of retribution

(1 6 em a na tes) which constitutes an essent ial part of the

popular idea of justice (61 é ‘n'oirjaev Ta dr’

dwamfieiv) .

Similarly three wasmarriage, the union of the od d and the

even (male and female) . But this is sheer symbol ism.

What induced Pythagoras ever to Speak of things asnumbers

at all ? There can be no doubt that he wasmuch interested

in the study ofmathematics ; it is recorded, for example , that

he was the discoverer of the 47th Proposition of the first

book of Euclid , and indeed some authorities ascribe most of

that book to him . Whenwe reflect upon it we real ize that

THE EARLIER PRE SOCRATICS 29

the idea of number is the one QL lituwhichW

isoommen“toall

thingsg

wg tsbever— everythmg isqualified by it , and it forms

a large element”

of the significance of very many things , of

y and music , for instance . That number, proportion,

form ,and harmony_

arev

yery important,

aspects of

thingsall wil l adm it . But to say that things are numbers ,it may be objected , i s a queer wayof stating this truth. We

must,however, remember firstly

,that exaggeration and

striking exposition are to be expected in the statement of a

new doctrine,

1and

,secondly, that the use of the verb to be is

peculiar in the history of philosophy. We shall find this

cropping up again later.2 Language hasnot yet distinguished

between the meaningsof isid entical wi th and isqualified by,but uses the verb to be to denote both relations. 80 the true

significance of the doctrine, that things are numbers , rests in

its recognitionof theformal aspect of things , of 1 6 f l fir ( Iva t

asopposed to 8M ? Pythagoras would be animportant figure

in the history of philosophy if he had done nomore than

enunciate this one doctrine , for it draws attention away from

the one aspect of things (the materia l one) towhich previous

philosophers had more or less confined themselves , and

attracts it to another aspect equally or more S ignificant .

Form is more important thanmatter ; we may have a very

ugly and a very beautiful thing made of exactly the same

material,and to consider nothing but the material of things

is often tomiss their most important qual ities .

Before passing on from Pythagoras we ought to make

1 Compare what was said above (p. 21 ) about the contradictions ofHeraclitu s.

2Cf. below, pp. 48, 107 .3 See below (p. 162) the il luminating comment of Aristotle in

Metaphysics , 987b.


mentionof the importance both of music and of medic ine in

his teaching. Music is closely al lied with “numbers inmore

senses than cnsf—thed iflerehdemagveen musical notes , for

example , is the difference between the number of vibrations

that produce the note,and soon. But more than this ; just

asmedicine is the purge of the ills of the body , soPythagoras

regarded music asthe purge of the ills of the soul . Aristotle

later on was to find in tragedy a x d eapmsof the emotions,and sim ilarly Pythagoras found i a great ennobling effect of

poummj1generally upon the soul.

2. X ENOPHANES OF COLOPHON

Xenophanes is sometimes regarded as the first of the

Eleatic monists , who come next. But it is doubtful whether

he ever went to Elea or not so it is best to treat him asa

precursor of that school . He precedes Herac litus in time,

but his philosophical significance is that of a precursor of a

school of philosophy definitely opposed toHeraclitus’

doctrine

of the flux of all things . He lived asan exile for the whole

of his life, and is dated by the fact that he dwelt for long at

the court of Hieroof Syracuse , who reigned from 478 to 467

He wrote elegies and satires unti l the ripe age of

ninety-two, and his philosophy is expressed incidentally in

these poems.2

The most striking feature of his writings is a reaction

against the anthropomorphic ideas of the gods made famil iar

1 The Greek word fis, of course , of a wider connotation than itsEnglish equivalent.

2We have already seen an ex ample of his satire in the l ines uponPythagoras. See above , p. 26.


by the older poets. Homer and Hesiod are espec ially blamed

for thi s.1

It is ridiculous of man to imagine that the gods are l ike Mono

himself ; he is acting no more intelligently than cows orthe i sm '

lions , who, if they represented gods , would make them intheir

own form . The Olympian theology , then,wil l not satisfy

Xenophanes ; but he does not follow that revival of the

primitive elements of religion which made itse lf felt in the

worship of D ionysus and in Orphism . He is, on the

contrary, the first great monothe ist ; there is one supreme

god ,l ike manneither in m ind nor in form ,

and we must not

assign to him the lim itations ofhuman personal ity.2

This monotheism is intimately bound up with the general

cosmology of Xenophanes ; in fact Gebs seems almost to be

the universe . But it i s not necessary for us to go into the

details of his cosmology, since such Speculations , after the

Milesian School hasserved its purpose of showing the innate

impossibility of material ism,are no longer our main interest

in the history of philosoPhical development . But the idea

of unity, which this monothe ism involves, is very important .

Aristotle says that Xenophanes wasone of the earliest phil

OSOphers to insist on this—wpfiros1 06e é vlaag (he wasthe

first partisanof the One) . By this is meant that he wasthe

first to graSp the unity of exi stence , that there is order and

system in the world, however much thi s may be obscured by

the seeming conflict and differences between the manifold of

1 “ Homer and Hesiod ,” he says , “ascribed to the 80d 3 all t1111183

such as are held a reproach and a di sgrace among men—theft andadultery and mutual decei t.”

1” There i s one God , the greatest among both men and gods, likeuntomortals nei ther in form nor in thought ; he is all see ing, all mind ,and all hearing.

”

3 2 THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

phenomena. The Many,that we see, is appearance ; the

One,that we don

’t see , is reality.

(6) THE ELEATIC MONIS’I‘S

1 . PARMENIDES OF ELEA

Parmenides is by no means a mere name to us he came

to Athens , along with his disciple Zeno, in 450 so,and

conversed with Socrates , who frequently went to see him

in his lodgings in the Ceramicus outside the walls of Athens.

Plato, in the dialogue called Parmenides,

"haspreserved for

us so vivid a picture of thi s visit that we can easily visualize

the pair—Parmenides already anoldishmanofabout sixty-five ,quite white with age , but sti ll handsome in features, Zeno

almost forty and of a fine and comely figure . But we must,

of course , be careful about attributing to the historical Par

menides anything which Plato puts into his mouth as a

d ramatisp ersona in his own dialogue ; and there is a further

diffi culty in drawing conclusions from the actual fragments

ofParmenides , which arises from the peculiar method which

he adopted for expounding his philosophy. This wasdonein a long hexameter poem in two parts . After an introd uc

tion in which the goddess tells him of the “way of truth”

and of the “ way of Opinion,”we have the two ways ex

pounded . There is no truth in the “ way of Opinion,” but

ignorant menwander along it in utter helplessness .1

In dealing with any fragment,then, it is of the first im

portance to determine whether it is a part of the way of

1 “ Mortals , knowing nothing, wander along it , facing both ways ;for helplessness in their ‘ breasts guides their wandering m ind , andthey are borne along no less deaf than blind , bemazed , and indistinguishable crowds.

”

THE EARLIER PRE-SOCRATICS 83

truth (‘rd wrpos amount ) or of the way of opinion (Td «pas

saga ) . Even so,Parmenides is rather difficult to under

stand ; but we ' shall get some help if we first attempt to

view him in his philosophical se tting.

The Pythagoreans , if not Pythagoras himself , seem to

have regarded what we cal l real ity as somehow consistingof a set of opposites , of antithetical pairs of things . Aris

totle , in his Metaphysics ,"haspreserved a l ist of these as

népas d uetpov fiP‘ POGv xwoxipcvov

weptrré v d pnov £696 xupmi

kov

é'

v 90s 4x}; axo‘rosSegtov d purrepov dyaflov x axovdppev Ofihu Terpd yw ov éfl pdp

'qneg

Heraclitus regarded the existence of such opposites, con

tinually passing the one into the other as necessary to the

d ppovia of the universe . He taught that we are,and are

not ; waking is sleeping, d ay night . But such a shiftingnature of phenomena, which this mivm in? theory involves ,makes it impossible to predicate anything about them .

Heraclitus said that a man could not step twice into the

same river ; it is a different river by the time he makes

his second step ; but , according to his own theories, he

m ight have made a more startling statement than this, as

Cratylus subsequently pointed out. We can’

t even step

once into a river, for by the time I put foot into the water

I am a different man from what I was a yard away from

the bank . In fact we can’t either say or d o anything ; how

can one affirm that A killed B if everything is changingso quickly that A is a different man before and after the

murder? Cratylus saw these difficulties so clearly that

3

3 4 THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY

he finally refrained from speech and contented himself with

pointing his finger i

Parmenides is at the opposite pole from this . Accordingto him theW What is, is—but more than

this we cannot say ; for to say that something has a qual ity

(e .g. that Socrates is tall) is to say that it is something else ,and so its unity is gone at once . If the senses show us

certain things which are inconsistent with unity, somuch the

worse for the senses . What is, i s ; and” anything e lse is

not. But What “ is not ” cannot be thought ; you cannot

think of nothing ; only that can be , which can be thought .

Popular suppositions about things invo.ve the existence of

what is not ; and so the philosophy of Parmenides d enies

reality to the negative members , as it were , of the Pytha

gorean pairs. In any physical sense it is hard to attach

much value to these Speculations, but they have a most

important bearing upon the theory of predication. They

make it absolutely essential for philosophy to settle once

for all what is designated by the copula is. Does it denote

existence at all ? If I say that Homer is a great poet ,does that imply that he is living now ? Or again,

does it

denote identity between the terms related by it ? If I saythat a cow is a four-footed beast

,does that imply that every

four-footed beast is a cow ? Obviously not ; the verb to be

has some other meaning which has not yet been settled .

This theory of predication forms an important part of logic ,and the speculations of Parmenides helped it on a stage

farther from the impossible flux of Heraclitus. Parmenides

but it is a unity

een decided what

we-‘

Eem thought that we could only say“What

(1 6 av é crriv) . His argument seems to have been


36 THE ELEMENTS or GREEK PHILOSOPHY

This is the object of all the riddles‘

; and the hearer is ex

pected to conclude from the absurdities involved , that the

appearance of motion is illusion,and that there really can

be no such thing.

1

The indirect support of Eleatic monism which this entails

wasthe sole object of Zeno—an object which Plato in the

Parmenides represents him asstating very clearly

I see , Parmenides ,” said Socrates , “ that Zenowould not only at tachhimself toyou in general friendship, but also with the support of hiswri tings , for, ina way, theymaintainthe same posi t ionasyou d o. Buthe tries to take usin by putting things ina different wav, asthough hismessage wasdifferent. For you inyour poem s say that the universe isOne , and of this you give ex ce llent and splendid proofs. He , for hispart , says that there isno Many , and in support of i t gives muchweighty evidence. For the one ofyou thus to affirm the One , and the

other to deny the Many , in such a way that , although your doctrinesare almost identi cal , you don

’t seem to be saying the same thing at all ,

isa use of language quite beyond the rest of us.“ Yes, Socrates ,” said Zeno, “ but you have not qui te grasped the

truth about my wri tings , al though you are asgood asa Spartan houndin following and tracking down the argument. For you forget tha t thetreatise had no s uch lofty obj ect as you impute to i t , deceivingmenas

though it were a bigger thing than in reali ty it was. Wha t you men

tioned i s an accident, but inpoint of fact these wri tingsare intend ed tosupport Parmenid es

’ contention aga inst scofiers, who object tha t manyrid iculous and inconsistent resultsfollow upon the afi rmation of the

One. My treatise isa retort upon those who afi rm the ex istence of theMany, and i t gives them asshrewd and better blows than they inflict ,

1 As amatter of fact the absurdities ari se from the fa lse conceptionofspace , as something infini te ly d ivisible into a series of discrete points(probably Pythagoreaninorigin) and oftime , asan infini te series of discre te nows . But time i s a continuum and so i s space ; nei ther canbe divided into an infinite number of discrete points or nows.”

Aristotle saw thi s , and says that the diffi culty arises from conceivingof time as composed of nows ,

‘

for if this is not granted the proof willnot hold good.

"

Theyare really, asKant says , Forms of the Sensibility.

THE EARLIER PRE-SOCRATICS 3 7

for i t shows that upon their hypothesi s—the ex istence of the Manystil l more ridiculous results follow than from the ex i stence of the One ,if i t be only exam ined adequate ly Parmenides ,” 128a) .

The italicized sentence , though it refers to the writings of

Zeno— and not to the riddles (which he is like ly to have

used to refute a recalc itrant adversary in conversation)—yet

undoubtedly applies to them , and gives us the clue needed

to determ ine his object in busying himse lf with what , at first

sight, appears such childish quibbling.

(c) THE DISCREPANCY BETWEEN ELEATICISM AND

PHENOMENA

1. EMPEDOCLES or AGRAGAS (circa 450

Matthew Arnold’

s poem “ Emped ocles on Etna hasmade

thisname familiar to all stud ents of English literature ; the

dramatic end of his life—he comm itted suicide by leapinginto the crater of E tna— gained him a certainnotoriety , and

throughout his life he seem s to have been a somewhat strik

ing figure . Lucretius,whowasa discerning man, expresses

great adm iration for him . In Speaking of Sicily, he says ,just after mentioning the marv els of Scylla and Charybdis ,that there is nothing in the whole of Sic ily so fine asEmpe

d ocles.l

His philosophical system is an attempt tomediate between 5m fi v- v e g “ ,

Eleaticism and the senses. Inopposition to the min e. pet of

Heraclitus wem s-

Sgi

r

-

i-

Parmenides insisting uponunity and

stability ; 1 6 a é c -riv, change and motion are unreal ; the

evidence ofour senses is illusory.

But this facile contempt'

of sense-perceptionwould not d ofor Empedocles . He was in fact much interested in it

,and

1 I. 726 .


evolved a theogy of—according to which we per

ceive“ like by like

,

”i .e. by means of m inute particles

(dnéppoi cTtT'

Or‘

efiiuences,which flow Off from things and

impinge upon a sim ilar property in the constitution Of the

human eye— which is no mean forerunner of Berkeley ’s

theory of vision. We have,in fact

,no road to knowledge .

except through the senses .1 H isconclusion i s that what the

senses te ll us is true in a way ; particular thingscome into

being and pass away ; but if we look at thein-ultirnate e ele’

M Q

ments or roots (fitgé pam ) we may say with Parmenides that

what is , is— uncreated and“ ind estructi ble . These filgé pa

‘

ra

are four innumber— earth,air

,fire

,and water—and each of

them is real in the Parmenidean sense . Thi s is the ' begin

ning of the idea of a reality,which is neither created nor

destroyed,underlying the shifting nature of phenomena .

Another important point in the system ofEmpedocles is that

of the two principlesof Love and Strife

he posited as alternate ly predom inating. In the combina

tion and d issolution of the fitlé pa‘

ra ,we have

,not perhaps a

very scientific explanation,but at any rate an Opening which

adm its of the possibility of motion,SO precipitately banished

from philosophy by the Eleatic monists. In the extant

fragments of Empedocles there are some interesting lines

which Show that he had considered the evolution of the

animal kingdom . We find a monstrous generationof parts

of animals,which only gradually coalesce , and then not

1 In speaking of the nature of the gods , which is not visible , Empedooles remarks that they don’t come withinour usual means of knowledge :

oi’

m30 1-1.wekd c ao‘oa t , 068’

6¢9ahpoiow alum-Ow

fiperépoms' fi x epc i.AaBei v, fiwep ye p eyfo

-f-q

d péfltrow'w d pagwossis¢p£va « inf er.

These l ines are im itated by Lucretius , Bk.V. 101 ff.

THE EARLIER PRE-SOCRATICS 39

always in accordance with the anatom ical principles of the

present d ay"We read,for example , that on the earth

Many heads sprung up without necks and arm s wandered barsandbereft of shoulders. Eyes strayed up and down inwant of foreheads.Many creature s with faces and breasts looking in different directionswere born; some

, Offspring of ox en with faces of men, while others ,again, arose asoffspring of men wi th the head s of ox en, and creaturesinwhom the nature of women and menwasmingled , furni shed withsterile parts.1

2. ANAX AGORAS OF CLAZ OMENE (500-428

For thirty years of his life (462-432) Anaxagoras l ived at

Athens , and he was the first great philosopher to d o SO .

Probably he had been brought there by Pericles inpursuance

of his dom inating idea ofIonizing the Athenians, and he must

have exercised a wide influence over the cultured classes of

the Periclean age . Euripides , among others,came under

his influence , and probably owed to him that rational iz ingtendency which is so prom inent in his plays. In Plato

’

s“Apology

”Socrates says that anyone can hear the views of

Anaxagoras for a drachma,i .e . by paying for a seat in the

theatre and so hearing his V iews expounded in the tragedies

of Euripides and others. Like Socrates , Anaxagoras wasao

cused On religious grounds for not practising the State re

ligion,and for teaching new ideas about the heavenly bodies

(1 6. perd pma) , e .g. that the sun is a red -hot stone and that the

moon is made of earth. But,unlike Socrates

,he had a

powerful friend and wassaved by the interventionof Pericles.

Yet the similarity of the case with that of Socrate s is most

striking ; so much so that Socrates in his defence exclaims

1 The translation i s takenfrom Bum et’s Early Greek Philosophy

40 THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PHILO SOPHY

that to listen toMeletusone would think that it wasAnaxs

goras whom he wasaccusing.1

There is some difficulty in constructing a consistent philo

sophical system out of the fragments of Anaxagoras which

have survived . It is highly probable that he was not very

consistent him self ; at any rate so much is mere matter of

interpretation that it seems best to limit ourselves to the

attempt to indicate the general lines uponwhich he attempted

to solve the problems that faced him. Like Empedocles,he

tried toreconcile the Eleatic doctrine that corporeal substance

is unchangeable with the appearance of change with which

our senses present us. The conclusions of Parmenides are

accepted ; nothing can be added tothe all,for there cannot

be more than all,and the all is always equal to the all (com

pare the scientific precept ofex nihtlonihilfi t) but what mencall coming into being and passing away is really mix ture and ,

separationof the component parts of things.

The Greeksare wrong,” he says , “ in thinking of the origin and

destruction Of things , for nothing comes into be ing and nothing is d estroyed , but is m ix ed and unm ix ed out ofpre-ex i sting things. And theywould be more correct in cal ling ‘ coming into being

’ compositionand ‘ destruction de composition.

"

But Anaxagoras di d not, like Empedocles , make a distinct

separationof the four elements. H e says that things are not

cut Off from one another as by a hatchet,but that there is

a portion of everything in everything. What we call the

creationof the world is the unm ixing-out,”of things from

Chaos . Specific things are derived from anoriginal med ley

which consists of mréppara Tat xpnpofm v (the seed s of things) ,each of which though infinitely smal l contains within itself

1 Plato, Apology , 26d (see below, p.

THE EARLIER PRE-SOCRATICS 4 1

particles of specific quality, e .g. gold , flesh , bone.1 In this

respect his speculations approximate closely to those of the

Atom ists,of whom we have next to Sp eak. But he differs

from them both in his conceptionof the anemi a-m themselves ,

and also -a far more important point— in his conception of

the force or principle which causes them ouppioyeofla t and

Staxpivecrea i . This is the Old diffi culty of how to introduce

movement into the world . The Atom ists proper ascribe it to

purely material causes, and it is because he introduced another

principle,which he called Intelligence (V009) , that Anaxagoras

cannot be regarded asanAtomist . Empedocles had ascribed

motion to the working of the two principles of nixog and

«(M ia Anaxagoras assumes only one. According to him ,in

the early days of the world everything was m ixed together

and order was made out of confusion by the actionof m6 ;

wand xpfiuara , he says , fiv 6906, elm 6 voGsékflc‘

uv afird Sundown“ .

This looks very promising surely here at last is that action

of Intelligence which hasbeenso conspicuous by its absence

in all the material istic theories which we have so far con

sid ered . But the hope is false ; voile does for Anaxagoras no

imore than what Love and Strife did for Empedocles. In

fact , in some sense , it does less for its action is only inter

mittent . It sets things inmotion, i t is true, and the motion

gradually ext'

ends and produces two great masses,called

Ether and Air. Ether,which is rare

,hot

,light , and d ry,

forms the outside of.

the universe ; while Air, which is dense,cold, heavy , and damp

,congregates towards the centre .

Then roilsonly enters again,like a d ensea: machina

,when a

difficulty arises which cannot be solved by other means .

1 These portions are often called dpowpepfi, but the word i sAri stotelian and does not belong to Anax agoras himself who speaksonly ofw éppa

'ra .


We have the explicit testimony ofAristotle for this criticism .

In the Metaphysics he says

Anaxagoras uses his voiig as a device for the generation of the

universe , and he drags it inwhenever he i s at a loss to provide a reasonfor i ts necessi ty , but in all other respects he attributes the causation Of

Awhat is created to anything rather than to vovs.”

Plato also mentions the disappointment of Socrates when

he found what little use Anaxagoras made of the principle of1

voGg. But we must not be too exacting ; Anax agoras marks

a distinct advance upon the speculations Ofprevious thinkers ,and Aristotle him self adm its that contrasted with his prede

cessorshe waslike a sober man among madmen.2

(d ) THE NECESSITY FOR A THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE

1 . ATOMISM

Leucippus and Democritus ofAbdera are coupled together

inour authorities asthe great exponents Ofthe atomic theory ;except that Leucippus was prior to Democritus we know

next to nothing about him ; he did exist ; but so far as our

knowledge of him (apart from Democritus) goes , he m ight

have stood inthe same re lation toDemocritus asMrs. Harris

d id to Mrs. Gamp . But he wasthe founder of the theory

of atom s,which may be thus described

3 “ In order to avoid

the d ifliculties connected with the supposition of prim itive

matter with definite qualities,without adm itting the com ing

into existence and annihilationasrealities , and without givingup

,asthe Eleatic philosophers did

,the reality of variety and

its changes , the atom ists derived all d efinitenessofphenomena,

1 Phaed o, 98b 11.

2 Metaphysics ,” A . 3 , 984b, 18.

3 The quotation i s from the'

art icle on Democritus in Sm ith ’sD ictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology



2. DEMOCRITUS As AN ETHICAL PHILOSOPHER

We cannot separate Democritus from Leucippus so far as

his atom ism is concerned ; but in many respects he is Oh

v iously a precursor of Socrates , of whom he was, so far as

dates go, a contemporary. He certainly be longed to the age

after Protagoras (ofw’

hom we have stil l to treat) , but owingto his connexionwith Leucippus it is convenient to consider

him here . He wasborn at Abdera about the year 460

and the date ofhis death is given in various years between

370and 35 7. He came ofa wealthy fam ily, and spent much

of his time in travelling about the world studying men and

cities. Perhaps he had something of the urbanity of the

cosmopolitan with its large tolerance for the foll ies of m en

—a trait which may have given rise to his nickname Of “ the

laughing philosopher,” just asHeraclitus was called “

the

weeping philosopher.

" 1

D iogenes Laertius tells us that in his ethical philosophy

Democritus regarded the summum bonum of life as peace of

m ind (edOupfa) such peace ofm ind and freedom from fear is

one Of the chief products of the study Of philosophy.

2 That

his teaching wasof a high order is Obvious from hi s remark

that there is no virtue in the abstaining from wrongdoingunless there is also the absence of the wish to d o wrongdyaOOv of: 7 6 pi] d burei v, dhhd Tb prise éOe

’

hew. H e had some

idea,too, Of the universality of the moral qual ities ; all men,

he says, respect goodness and truth— dwepoiu'

ow t 1rdm 068110 7 6

£01 1 7 5 dyaOOv Kai d h'

qeés' lfjsi) SEdhho dkhog. These are ideas

which we shal l find frequent in Socrates and Plato.

1 Cf. Juvenal , X . 28 if.

3 Of. the avowed object ofLucretius inwriting hisDe rerumnatura.

CHAPTER III

THE SOPHISTS

CCORDING to the derivationOf the word , the Sophists

were simply wise men; but they belong to a definite

period of Greek culture , and the word came to be used

largely as the result of Plato’s polemi c against them— in a

peculiar and derogatory sense . To-d ay the word is almos t a

synonym of quibbler,and we shall isee how such a Special

izationofmeaning hasset in. But first of all the use of the

word implied no such reproach (Socrates is a Sophist in this

sense) , and it wasonly gradually, along with the rise of it

definitely professional class of teacherswho taught for pay,i.e . made a living out of their profession, that the word came

to have any such connotation. These'

Sophists were partly The New

the cause and partly the result of the new social and intelCultu re .

lectual conditions which Obtained at Athens in the period

which we may call the period Of the New Culture— roughly

Speaking from about 450to400 They were originally not

themselves Athenians by birth,but flocked to Athens from

all parts of the Greek world,attracted thither by the growing

demand for higher education,and by the Scope which

Athenian political life gave to the art of rhetoric . In con

sid ering this new culture we must remember two things

(1) that general conversation and definite oral teachingsupplied the place of newspapers and books inour own

time ; (2) that every educated Athenian took a personal part45


in the government of his city (either asa Special magistrate,member of the BOule or of the Ecclesia) . These two fac ts

occasioned a general and a particular demand ; both ofwhich

were supplied by the sophists . By settling at Athens and

gathering the young menof the d ay around them they made

themselves responsible for the equivalent of a modern

university education; and , in particular, they professed to

teach the art ofcitizenship. Whensomuch political business

both inthe Boule and inthe Ecclesia wasconducted by means

Of speeches , it is not surprising tofind tremend ous importance

attached to the art of rhetoric ; skill in speaking would be

essential to getting on in life , for in a lawsuit,for example

—and the Athenians were very litigious— a skilful pleader

would have a very practical advantage over his less skilful

adversary ; he would be able to put his c ase in the best

possible light . This is What ismeant by “

rev fi‘

rrw héyov e i‘r‘rw

noi eiv, not in itself an immoral procedure . But,when it is

mad e the definite aim of instruction,we can readily under

stand how the ideals first ofthe pupil,and thenOfthe teacher

,

become quite estranged from any consideration of the truth ,or the pursuit ofknowledge for its own sake . And so the aim

Of Sophistical training becomes the rhetorical persuasion of

one’s fellow-men1 rather than the disinterested elucidation

of truth . From this it is but a short step to Sophistry in

the most d erogatory sense of the word. But we must not

allow such a connotation to enter into our ideas of the first

great Sophists such as

1. PROTAGORAS OF ABDERA

Though born,like Democritus , at Abdera

,Protagoras by

nomeans spent his life there l ike other SOphistshe travelled

1 P lato, Gorgias , 453a, Smu ovpyésEon-w 4] finn prmj.

THE SOPHISTS

about the world settling now in thi s centre and now in that ,

and giving a course of lectures to all who chose to come

and pay. He would probably be accompanied from place

to place by the more intimate of his pupils . One Of the

best-attested facts of his l ife is that he framed a code of laws

for the Athenian Colony of Thurii in S . Italy which was

founded in 444-3 B .C . H e made two visits to Athens , Of the

second of which we have a vivid record in Plato’

s dialogue

called after him , and thi s cannot well have taken place after

the outbreak of the Peloponnesian war in 432 We

may take it , then,that his l ife filled the greater part

'

of the

fifth century.

In Plato’s dialogue we find Protagoras professing to train

young men asvirtuous citi zens ; he is made to say :

If Hippocrates comes to me he wil l not ex perience what he wouldif he went to any other Sophist. For the rest of them treat young men

shamefully—when they have j ust escaped from the arts they lead themback again against their wil l and force them to resume cal culation and

astronomy and geometry and music (here he glanced atHi ppias) , whereasi f he comes tome he will Simply learnwhat he came for. And this isprudence

,both concerning the private and the publ ic affairs of l ife , how

tomanage hi s own household to the best advantage , and how tomakehimse lf most effi cient both inword and deed indirecting the affairs of theS tate. DO I understand you said I. I think you speak ofpol i ticalscience, and undertake tomake men good citi zens .

” That is just theundertaking,

” said he , which I d omake , Socrates.” 1

This at Once raises the question as to whether virtue can

be taught or not. Socrates confesses himself very sceptica l

upon the point ; but the question belongs to Socratic philoSophy and must not be treated here .

In the teaching of Protagoras himself the most outstand-wdw wv

ing feature was its subjectivity : there can be no ultimate

right and wrong ; things are what they seem tome to be ;

1 Plato, Protagoras, 318d .


man is the measure of all things—nanny q pé‘

rwv pé‘

rpov

d vflponros.

2. GORGIAS OF LEONTINI

Gorgias belongs to the same generation as Protagoras ; he

came asan ambassador from Leontini toAthens in 427

(much asMr. Balfour in 1917 went to America) to obtainhelp for the Ionic Sicilians against the Dorians . He was

perhaps more of a rhetorician than of a philosopher ; but

we have a triad of arguments said to have beenmaintained

Hi s Three by him . They are,firstly

,that nothing exists ; secondly, thatTheses '

if anything existed it could not be apprehended by us ; and ,thirdly

,that if these first two things were possible , yet our

thought could not be expressed in language and communi

cated to others . At first sight this looks very much like the

Sophistry which we have said wasnot typical of the earlier

Sophists ; but it only needs understanding to show that this

is not so.

1 .

“ That nothing exists is Simply d ue to the con

fusion be tween the existential and the propositional use of

as. From the statement “ Gorgias is an ambassador from

Leontini,

" I am not likely to acquire any doubts about is

denoting ex istence , but I am from the statement that “ A

griffin is a fire-breathing dragon,

” if I have any scepticism

inme at all.

2. The contention that if anything existed it could not be

apprehended is sim ilarly d ue to the total Opposition between

the subjective and the Objective Side of things , which had till

now been a distinctive mark of all philosophical thinking. I

can think Of the non-existent quite asreadily asOf the exist

ent. Thought is therefore no criterionof existence ,for there

isanunbridgeable gulf—or at least a gulf which philosophy

THE SOPHISTS

hasnot yet bridged—betweenme and the external universe or

non-ego.

3 . The third contention OfGorgias se em s to rest upon the

feeling Of the impossibility of identifying where there is a

d ifierence ;1a word cannot be a visual Object , so it seems

d ifli cult to imagine how words can give an adequate repre

sentation to a second personofmy perceptions .But without going into details we see a sufficient explana

fit ionofthese three contentions inthe relation inwhich Gorgias

stood to Eleaticism,and inparticular to Zeno. AS the reader

hasseen,Zeno attempted to support Parmenides by stressing

the inconsistencies involved inthe conceptions ofmultiplicity

and motion; Gorgias se izes upon the same arguments, and

concludes that, since existence involves such contradictions ,therefore nothing exists 1

But what is the use of such metaphysical Speculations ? wopmfi.

AsGrote says,

2 It mayfairly be presumed that these doctrines

were urged by Gorgias for the purpose of diverting his

disciples from stud ies which he considered as unprom isingand fruitless.

”And thus we see him in Plato

’

s dialogue,which bears his name

,maintaining the superiori ty offinroptm

'

]

to all such vain Speculations . To the question Of Socrates

astowhat is the greatest good ofman,and ofwhich he says

that he is the creator,he replies

What is really , Socrates , the greatest good , and the cause alike offreedom for individual s themselves and of rule over others in theirrespect ive cities.Socrates. What d oyou say that thi s i s

‘

e’

1We have already mentioned (see above , p . 85 ) that the idea of a

uni ty amid multiplici ty isa conceptionat which phi losophy hasnot

yet arrived. The lack of such a concep t ionexplains the whole siguificance ofE leatici sm in i tslogical aspect.

11 History of Greece ,” Vol. VI. p. 71 (18624


Gorgias. I should say the ability to persuade by one ’s speechesj udges inthe law-courts , counsellors inthe council-chamber , and citi zensin the assembly , or inwhatsoever other political meeting may be he ld.By means Of this power you wil l make the physicianyour Slave and thetrainer your Slave ; and the business man Of ourswill turn out to be

making money , not for himse lf, but for another—for you, who are abletomake a Speech and persuade the crowd.1

3 . THRASYMAOHUS OF CHALOEDON

Thrasymachus was a contemporary of Gorgias , and is

knowntous asaninterlocutor inPlato’s Republic

,

” where he

quite justifies his name asa bold, or even rash,fighter.

2 He

is mentioned in the earl iest comedy of Aristophanes (“ The

Banqueters,ofwhich only fragments are extant) , which was

produced in 427 B .o.—the year of Plato

’s birth and that in

which Gorgias came to Athens. Plato is not likely to have

attributed to him doctrines inconsistent with his actual

teaching— for as Thrasymachus was only one generation

removed from Plato the fraud would have been at once

denounced— sowe may take the words put into his mouth in

the “Republic assubstantially correct. He there maintains

the doctrine that Might is Right ; there i s no such thing as

abstract justice ; it is merely the interest Of the stronger

(1 6 1 06 e irrovog c upctépov) Which enables him to impose his

will upon the weaker. This is subjected to a searchingex am ination by the dialectic of Socrates unt il Thrasymachus

finally loses his temper and takes refuge in vulgar abuse .

But the statement is interesting to us here , as involving a

denial of anyultimate standard in morality ; it is part and

parcel of the whole subjectivism of the sophistic movement.

1 Plato, Gorgias,”452d . 2See below, p. 77 .



subjective factor inmy case is distorted, i .e. if something

goes wrong with my eyes . And SO with knowledge ; it is a

hopeless quest to ask about things-tn-themselves for,if we

did ever succeed in getting to know anything about them,

they would ipsofacto become things-in-relation-to-as Thi s

is what is meant by “the relativity of knowledge , and

means nomore than that , the humanmind being constituted

asit is,things can be apprehended by it only under certain

aspects,as it were , or in certain forms— in Space and time

for example. Try to think of something outside of Space ,or

beyond time,and you will see what is meant. Now the

Sophists seized upon this essential relationof things toman,and unduly stressed the subjective side. From the truth that

things are what they appear toman (inthe sense Ofmankind ,oi d vepw

'n'm) they falsely concluded that they are what they

appear to each individual man; for such seems to have been

the meaning attached by Protagoras to his wd v q pdw v

pérpov ayepem g . This hasimportant results asregards

1 . Epistemology , or the theory of knowledge.

2. Ethics , or the theory of conduct.

Such extreme subjectivism is as disastrous,inour desire

to build up a system of knowledge , aswas the supposed

perpetual flux of things in the Objective world according to

the theories ofHeraclitus. Neither Protagoras nor Gorgias

can give me any criterion of truth ; both are equally sub

jective ; the only difference is that , accord ing i to the one,

whatever man thinks is true ; while according to the other,whatever man thinks is false" It is the same in the Sphere

ofethics ; extreme subjectivism does away with the distinction

betweenright and wrong. There canbe noabsolute right and

wrong ; menmerely consider certain actions right and others

wrong, and what is wrong with one set of people may be

THE SOPHISTS 5 3

right with another. In fact, it is all a matter of convention

(vépo) and there is no such natural difference (Man) between

the two classes of acts which we respectively call right and

wrong.

This is the ethical doctrine which we Shal l find attacked

by Socrates , the world’

s greatest moral teacher ; but we must

adm i t that it does contain an element of truth ,which has

been very much stressed by modern ethical wri ters with an

anthropological turn of mind. They have been influenced

by the reports of anthropologi sts as to the very divergent

ideas about right and wrong among the different races of

mankind. But such writers , as is usually the case ,tend to

imagine that their discoveries—which are true in certain

cases— must necessarily be true in all cases ; whereas the

truth of the matter is that all actions,which are usually re

garded asmoral actions (wpdgers) , are not ofone type . They

are,in fact

, of at least two 1 distinct kinds— there i are those

whi ch are only conventionally (yew) right and wrong (e .g.

monogamy among Christians , and polygamy among Mo

hammed ans) , and it is tothese alone that the anthropologi cal”

arguments apply ; and there are those which are absolutely

(oliv es) right and wrong according to the eternal, unwritten,

laws of humanity, to which Antigone appeals in the noble

l ines of Sophocles .2

1We leave out of account actions which are right or wrong only invirtue of some humanordinance orAct of Parl iament , asi t were . Suchactions have no pecu liar moral sanction of their own (whether con

ventional or absolute) and their connex ion wi th moral i ty resides onlyin the obed ience to law, assuch , which i s part of the duty of every goodciti zen.

2 Antigone ,”450 ff.

CHAPTER IV

SOCRATES AND A THEORY OE CONDUCT

FTER the age of the Sophists , with all its subjectivity,

it is not surprising to find that the interest of philosophy

hasshifted from the objective world to the m icrocosm Ofman.

Just as the purely physical or cosmological speculations of

philosophy , from the crude suppositions of Thales to the

matured atomism ofDemocritus,led inevitably from a Theory

ofBeing to a Theory of Knowledge , so the subjective nature

of that theory of knowledge— as presented by the Sophists-with all its stress upon the individual

,inevitably centres

the whole interest of philosophy inman him self. The social

conditions of the time— the close connexion between rhetoric

and political power, and the great importance of Speech in

the higher education of the d ay— all tended in the same

direction. From the very conditions ofhis age , then Socrates

(470-399 was bound to have a great interest In ethics .

This interest was not, however, predom inant with him at

first ; inhis youth he wasmuch interested in the cosmological

speculations Of the earlier philosophy,and this explains one

of the two great mysteries connected with him .

The twomysteries are (1) the attack which is made upon

him inthe Clouds ofAristophanes , and (2) his condemnation

at the hands ofthe Athenians for impiety. Now the Clouds

wasproduced in 423 B C It cannot therefore refer to any

54

SOCRATES AND A THEORY OF CONDUCT 5 5

thing in the last twenty-five years in the life of Socrates

the quarter of a century of his maturity— and the philosopher

whom Aristophanes caricatures so ludicrously “walking the

air,

” 1and studying 1

-6. peréwpa from a basket slung inm id

air, is the young Socrates whom we know to have been a

student of the cosmological theories of Anaxagoras and

others. The second mystery (the condemnationfor impiety)is evenmore puzzling ; how did such a great moral teacher

asSocrates,a manwho led a blameless personal l ife , and in

histeaching held up the highest ideals of conduct to others ,come himself to be condemned to death

,and that for impiety

of all things ? The charge was one of “corrupting the

youth and “recognizing strange gods , and we cannot

understand it at all unless we bear in m ind two things ( 1)that in the M tg or city-state the manwho took no part in

politics was regarded with extreme suspicion (2) that re 33

21

123311

ligion in such a smal l community asthat of the mm; is much tion formore a matter of cultns—Of definite religious

sanctioned and directed by the State— than it is with us to

d ay. Now we know that Socrates abstained from politi cal

life (his Se rpé vrov, for which see be low ,he himse lf te ll s us

,

forbade his participation) , and contented himsel f with con

versing onall occasions and in all places with such aschose

to attach themselves to him asdi sciples . In the Apology

of Plato (23a) Socrates is made to describe how these youngmen loved to come around him and listen to his exam ination

of would-be wiseacres , and how they themselves would

imitate him and expose the ignorance of people who were

reputed to be wise . Plato represents this asa contributory

cause of the od ium into whi ch he would have us be lieve that

1 6epOBa 'rG it al.creputpovéi ‘rev fih ov. Aristoph. ,

“ Clouds,

”225 .

56 THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PHILO SOPHY

Socrates had fal len with his fellow-men but it more prob

ably contains only a half-truth , the whole of which we can

fil l out for ourselves whenwe remember that the disciples of

Socrates included such men asCritias and Alcibiades. For

what is more likely than that the Athenians should have

come to regard Socrates as the head of an anti-democratic

cu’

que, who purpose ly abstained himself from all participation

in the affairs of his city— in itself,according to Greek ideas ,

a sufficiently suspicious circumstance— in order to work the

more efiectively as a“ power behind the scenes ” through

the medium ofhis disciples ? 1 Whenwe realize the condi

tions of the age , the idea seem s by nomeans unreasonable

nomore unreasonable , at least , than that even good Roman

Emperors should have persecuted the Christians under the

impression that people who held secret clandestine meetings

must be pol itical malcontents plotting to overturn the newly

established Empire . Then,asto the second point

,Professor

A . E . Taylorhasshown2 that “ the Platonic ‘ Apology’ vindi

cates Socrates triumphantly on the score of atheism ,

’ but

silently owns that he wasguilty on the real charge of un

l icensed innovation in religion. Socrate s was on friendly

terms with many of the Pythagorean-

sof his time,and was

certainly a devout bel iever in many Pythagorean doctrines

1 It used to be assumed that the accusation was a“ trumped up

charge , an act of poli tical revenge for Socrates’ action in the debateabout the condemnationof the generals who fai led to pick up the deadand wounded after the battle ofArginusse, which brought him into di sfavour with the d emos, and for his di sobedience of the Thirty (see“ Apology , which brought upon him odium with the oligarchi cparty ; but A. E . Taylor has shown in his “ Varia Socratica ”

(FirstSeries) that thi s cannot be the true ex planation. I am much indebtedto his paper inwhat I have suggested above.

2 In Varia Socratica (supra).


(e .g. l ife after death) . I t is not somuch that these doctrineswere themselves discredited , asthat those who held them

the Pythagoreans—were regarded with suspicion. They

were “ foreigners ; many of them too had played an anti

democratic part in the pol it ical troubles at Croton, which

led tothe break-up ofthe Pythagoreanbrotherhood inMagna

Grascia. Anyone , then, who embraced doctrines which

were obviously Pythagorean in origin would easily be in

volved in the odi um in which the Pythagoreans were un

doubtedly held by the Athenian democracy. The ir political

action was, not unnaturally, regarded as intimately bound

up with their religious bel iefs ; and so, startling as the con

d emnationof Socrates for impiety does at first sight appear,there is really no reason to convict e ither Anytusor Meletus

of insincerity or of any bad motive in the charge which they

brought against him .

In considering Socrates asa philosopher it would be im-H is Per

possible to attach too much importance to his personality as80mm)"

a man. When we think of him conversing daily in the

market-place upon topics of every description,but always

bringing the conversation round to some great moral issue ,such as

“What i s virtue ? ” or“What is justice ? ” and

always with his habitual eipwve ia disclaim ing knowled ge

himself , but attempting toelicit the Opinions ofothers , we can

not doubt that we have here to deal with one of the strongest

personalities in the history of the world . Snub-nosed him se lf

and by no means wel l featured— if not positively ugly— he

yet fascinated the é'

cq or of his d ay and,among them ,

the

handsome and careless Alcibiades. A particularmark of his

strong personal ity is tobe found in that“ heavenly sign

1 6 Sa tpovwv— Of which he himself makes frequent mention. 7 6 8am

Voice of conscience , intuition,or whatever i t may have been,

"6mm “

5 3 THE ELEMENTS oF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

it is certainly the sign of a unique personal ity. He tells us

that he hashad it from childhood,and that it is an inward

monitor which warns him whenever he is about to d o any

thing wrong.

1(It should be noted that it is always deterrent

in its promptings , and never impel s to action.) And,surely

,

it wasno ordinary man who neglected the usual affairs of

life— to such anextent that evenby the end ofhisl ife he had

no possessions— inorder that he m ight devote him self to in

stigating his fellow-men to a more whole -hearted pursuit of

virtue. Well m ight he tell his judges that , if they killed him ,

they would not find another like him to act as a sort of

gad fiy sent by heaven to stir into life the great and noble

but sluggish“ steed ”

of Athens .2 It may read ily be bel ieved

that the personal ity of such a manmust count for evenmore

than his actual doctrine.

Whenwe come to consider his doctrine , we have first to

distinguish between the historical Socrates and the d ramatis

p ersona of that name in the dialogues of Plato. Of recent

years 3 we have come to regard much more of what we read

about Socrates in the pages ofPlato as being truly represen

tative of Socratic doctrine thanwe formerly did . In short ,we perceive that Plato the disciple has interp reted the

teachings of his great master Socrates , and not used his

name as a convenient peg upon which to hang his own

doctrines . Nevertheless,i t is unfortunate that Socrates

never comm itted anything towriting, though we canobtain

an absolutely certainminimum ofSocratic doctrine by follow

ing the time-honoured planof comparing our two authorities“ X enOphon and Plato—and concluding that that at least is

1 “ Apology, 81d .3 Ib 306 .

3 Largelyowing to the ex egesi s ofA. E. Taylor and JohnBurnet.



by means of the most general ly admitted truths , consid ering that safetyin argument lay in such a procedure. And so, whenever he conversed ,he obtained the agreement of his listeners far more than any otherman whom I know. And he said that Homer himsel f attributed toOdysseus the power of being an irrefutable plead er, in that he wasableto conduct his arguments by means of pleas which all men conceded .

IV. 6.13-15 )

Such is Xenophon’s account ofwhat Aristotle calls é fl axfl xo

’

t

Myer (notice the verbs ém vfiyev and éwavayouém v) ; let us now

see wha t account he gives of Aristotle’

s second point (7 6

6pi§eaea t a o’

hou)

I w il l al so try to show that he made his associates more ski lfuldialecticians . For Socrates held that those who knew the nature of

ex isting things could ex pound it to others al so, but that in the case ofthose who did not know it wasnot to be wondered at that they shouldboth be dece ived themselves and dece ive others . And so he neverceased to exam ine , along with his assoc iates , into the nature of ex i stingthings . It would be a heavy task to recount all of his definitions ; butI wi ll mention such as I consider to show the method of his inquiry.And first concerning piety he would inquire asfol lows

Tel l me , Euthyd emus,”he said , what sort ofa thing d oyou think

piety is ? And he replied , A very fine thing, by Heavens Can

you state what sort of a man the pious man is?” “ The man, as I

think , whohonours the gods ,”he replied. Is it al lowable to honour

the gods inwhatsoever fashion a manpleases No,there are laws

in accordance with which we must honour them . So the manwho

knows these laws would know how he ought to honour the gods,

wouldn’t he ? ” I think so,” he said . Now, surely he who knowshow he ought to honour the gods does not imagine that he ought to d oso in a m anner different from what he knows to be right , does he ? ”

By no m eans,

” he said . And does a man honour the gods in a

manner different from what he thinks he should ? ” I think not,”

he said. So the manwho knows the lawfu l enactment s about the

gods would honour the gods in a lawful manner ?” “ Certainly.”

And he who honours them ina lawfulmanner does so ashe should ?Surely.” And he whohonours them ashe should i s a pious man?

said. Sowe should be r ight , shouldn’t we , indefining

the pious man as he who knows the lawful enactments about the

gods ?”

So I at least think,” he repli ed Memorabi lia,” IV. 6 , 1


By such dialectic, which he may have learnt from Zeno,Socrates tries to find the One in the Many,

that unity which

is not identity, but a unity am id diversity— a principle the

lack ofwhich we have seen causing difficulties in the theory

of predication as hitherto understood—which is , perhaps ,the greatest contributionof Socrate s to the progress of logic ,and a great step towards the final epistemology of Plato.

The nature of this is clear even from Xenophon’s brief ao

count of the attempt to determine the nature of etaeBefa but

we will give a longer example of the fully developed Stakex fl xfiasshown inone ofPlato’s dialogues. We will take i t from

the Meno, because that dialogue contains many very

Socratic things. It is,for example

,the best commentary

uponhis playful comparison1 betweenhis ownart (Sunken-uni)

and that of hismother (pareunxfi) . Just ashismother helped gu m m i.

others to bring children into the world,so Socrates helps

others to bring their thoughts to birth for example , he tells

Theeetetus,at the end of the dialogue which bears his name

,

that he must not be disappointed at the unsatisfactory nature

ofthe conclusionsreached ; he maychance to conceive again,

and inany case he will be the better for having got rid of a

good many misconceptions . The young slave of Menon

would seem tohave beena very good subject , for a knowledge

of Euclid,I . 47 , i s evolved from one who had never studied

geometry 12

At the outset of the dialogue Socrates, who is seeking forAm )“a definition of dperfi— after causing surprise by confessing,with his usual e ipwveia , that he doe s not know what it is from

is given by his interlocutor nothing but instances, as it

1 Theeetetus,”2100.

2This isa good illustration of d vcipmms (see below , under Plato,p.


were, nothing but particular d pera i, or, as he himself ex

claims , c pfivdsfl d pe‘

ré‘

w—a whole bee -hive ofVirtues— Whereas

he wants to know what virtue itself is , to find that which

makes us call all these particular virtues by the name of

d perr'

j— the %v 63509 St

’

8 eioi v d pe'

ra i.1 He wants the general

definition,as Aristotle calls it (re eneaem a éXou) , and he

attempts to find it by a series of é ‘

lraxnxoi.Myc i asfollows

M. Inmy opinion, then, Socrates , virtue, asthe post has it , i s To

rejoice in what is fair and to have the power to d o so ; ” and this iswhat I think virtue i s , to long for what i s fair and to be able to gainit. S . Doyou mean that he who longs for the fair al so longs for thegood ? M. Certainly I d o. S . And when you speak thus d o you

suppose that some there are who long for what i s evil , others forwhat is fair ? You d o not behave , my friend , that everybody longsfor what is good ? M. I d o not. S . Then some long for the evil ?M. Yes. S . Do you mean that they think the evi l good , or thatthey are not ignorant of what i s evi l but stil l long for i t ? M . Imean both. S . Then d o you think , Menon

,that there are people

who real ize that evi l i s evi l , but neverthel ess long for it ? M. Cer

tainly. S . What d o you mean by “ long for”? Doyou m ean “ long

to have M. Yes, to have. What el se d o you think ? S . Thend o they think that evil benefits him whohas it , or d o they real ize thatit injures whom soever i t approaches ? M. There are some who thinkthat evil benefits them , others who real i ze that i t does them harm.

S . Do you think that those who imagine that evil benefits them ,

real ize evi l to be evi l ? M. I hardly think so. S . Then i s it notobvious that these m en d onot long for evi l , who are ignorant ofwhatit is , but rather long for things which they imagine to be good , butwhi ch are real ly evil ? So that those who are ignorant of this , andthink that these things are good , obviously long for what is good.Is it not so ? M. It seems to be the case. S . What follows ? Thosewho long for evi l things , as you say, and bel ieve that evil thingswill harm whomsoever they approach , rea l ize surely that they willthemsel ves receive harm from such things ? M. Undoubtedly. S .

Then d o they not know that those who rece ive harm are m i serable ,in so far as they are harmed ? M. Thi s too they undoubted ly know.

1 The full significance of this expressionwi ll not be apparent unti lwe have considered the Platonic Ideas (see be low , p.

SOCRATES AND A THEORY OF CONDUCT 63

S . And the m i serable are unhappy ? M. I suppose so. S . Thenis there anybody who wishes to be m i serable and unhappy ? M. Id o not think so. S . Then nobody , Menon, wi shes for evil things ,unless he wishes to be in such a plight. For what e lse i s i t to bem iserable , i f not to long for evi l things and to acquire them ? M.

What you say seems to be true , Socrates , and no man wishes forevil. S . Now you said just now, did you not

, tha t virtue i s "to

wish for good things , and to have power over them ? ” M. I saidso. S . But from what we have just said , all menmay wish for goodthings , so in thi s respect one man i s no better than another ? M. Itseem s so. S . Then i t is obvious that if one man is be tter thananother, it i s with respect to having power over them that he wouldbe better. M. Certainly. S . This , then, ac cording to your definition,i s virtue , the power of gaining good things. M. Yes, i t seems tome to be exactly as you understand it now. S . Now let us see ifwhat you say now is true : for you may speak aright. To be ableto gain good things you say is vi rtue ? M. I d o. 8 . And by goodthings d o you not mean such things as heal th and weal th ? M . And

to gain silver and gold in the city, and honours and offi ces. S .

You d o not mean anything e lse , when you speak of good things ,than such as these ? M . No. I mean all such things. S . Verywel l . Togain silver and gold i s virtue ; sosays Menon,

the hereditaryguest of the great king. But wou ld you not make an addi tion to

this acquisition, Menon, and say to gain j ustly and piously ? Or

i s i t all the same to you, and even if a man gains these things nuj ustly, you call it virtue none the less ? M. Certainly not , Socrates ,I call it vice . S . Then this acquisi tion, so it seem s , must by all

means be accompanied by j ustice , or temperance , or piety , or some

other part of virtue ; otherwise i t wi ll not be virtue , even though itprovides good things. M. How could it be vi rtue without ? S . Thennot to gain si lver and gold , neither for onese lf nor for anybody else,when i t would not be just , i s not this non-acquisition al so virtue ?M. I t seems so. S . Then the acquisition of such good things , so i tseem s , i s no more virtue than the non-acqu isition, but what is gainedwith j ustice is virtue , what i s gained without any such thing i s vi ce .

M. I think it must be as you say. S . Now did we not say a momentago that each of these things i s a part of virtue , j ustice ,

temperance ,and the like M. Yes. S . So you are playing with me , Menon?

M . What d o you mean, Socrates ? 8 . Because when I begged younot long ago, not to break up virtue and chop i t into pieces, and

when I gave you ex amples according to whi ch you should answer,


you took nonotice of it , but you say now that virtue i s to be ableto ga in good things wi th j ust ice ,” and this you say i s a part of virtu e.M. I d o. S . Then does it not follow from what you say, that tod o whatever one does with a part of vi rtue , i s virtue ? For justice

you say i s but a part of virtue , and so with each of these things.M. What then? S . I m ean this , that , although I begged you to talkof virtue as a whole , you are far from tell ing m e what virtue i tse lfi s

,but you say that every act is virtue i f only it i s performed with

a part of virt ue ; as i f you had already told m e what virtue is as a

whole , and as if I understand even though you chop i t up intopieces. Now you must start again from the beginning with thisquestion, my dear Menon,

What isv irtue ? or should it be said thatevery act performed with a part of virtue , i s virtue ? For i t is tosay thi s , when one says that every ac t perform ed with j ustice , i svirtue. Do you not think we ought to s tart again with the same

question ? Do you think a man can know what a part of virtue i s ,but not know what virtue i s i tself ? M . I d onot think so77b-790,

If we analyse the above argument we find , as so often

with Socrates, three definite stages , three successive pro

positions put forward ; or, rather,an original proposition

twice amended under stress of

1 . First, virtue is said to consist in the love and attain

ment of the honourable (ém eupofirra 7 6511 x ahé‘

w 8uva ‘

rev eiva t

m pigeaea r) , and Menon ad m its that he makesno distinction

betweendyaOd and x ahd .

2. Secondly , as all men desire what seems good to them

the objects ofsome ém eup iw. are x ax d,but they are not desired

asnumb—the first half ofthe definition is a negligible constant ,and the rest of it may be more briefly put as Sé vaprg TOG

uopigeaea t rdyaed .

3 . But , seeing that things may be acquired both justly

and u’

njustly,we must emend this definition to something

like cidr T6 eiva t Td yaed tropiLecOat nerd Sinatoc dms(which is

itse lf a part of dpnfi). This is equivalent to attempting to

SOCRATES AND A THEORY OF CONDUCT 65

define the whole in terms of a part , and so we must d ropthis l ine of inquiry and make a fresh start.

These same three movements , as it were, of Socratic (b) The

Stakex rm’

, may be illustrated from the Euthyd emus,”that

exciting match against a couple of Sophists which is asgood

asany comedy. Socrate s there begins, asusual , with some

commonly accepted statement,

1 such asthat all men desire

to be happy and prosperous—minesd v9pw1r0 t Bouképefia <6

upd fl ew ; thenwe get asa prel iminary definition the propos i

tion that he 5 6 upd r'

ret Who hasmany dyaed such as 1101067 05 ,

(mate and outta . Eeruxfa is at first included , but is at once

ruled out as being included in M id,for in any art it is

knowledge that brings success . But noge of these goods

helps a man by its mere existence ; he only derives benefit

from them if he employs them . So we get, asa beginningof the second movement of the argument, the definition of

edSa ipovia as 7 6 Te x exrficOat‘

rdyaed Kai. rd xpfic fla t aG-roig.

Now, there is a wrong and a right use of everything, and

these dyafld are likely to make a man happy only if he uses

them correctly (é d v specsxpfira i ) . So the third stage of the

argument results in the conclusion that cro¢£a is an ayaeev

and assets a Kandy. Such a conclusion'

is part of the main

principle of Socrates’ ethical teaching. H e maintained that

virtue i s knowledge (d perfi Noman,” said he , Virtue i s

“ is willingly evil (oGSeissa y x ax és) . We have Xenophon’

s1

1

231

2:evidence for this . He states quite explicitly

H e said that ju stice and every other virtue waswisdom. For justactions and everything done with virtue washonourable and good , andnoone who knew these things would ever choose anything else in preference to them , but those who knew them not could not perform them ,

1 Cf. X enophon,

“Memorabilia ,

” IV. 6 , 15 , 8rd raw puma-re

epokoyw ahw h omer-re , quoted above, p. 60.

5


but even if they tried , would go wrong ; and that the w ise accordinglydid what was honourable and good , bu t that those whowere not wisecould not d o so, but went wrong even i f they tried . S ince therefore allj ust actions , and all actions that are honourable and good , are donewith virtue , i t i s clear that justice and every other virtue i s wisdomMemorabi lia,” III. 9 , 5 )

This sounds like a very paradoxical doctrine ; and it will

be objected at once that intellectual achievements have,often

enough, nothing to d o with moral virtue . But,rightly

understood, it contains a great deal of truth surely there is

a moral value in education ; no one will maintain that , if a

boyhasbeen brought up on“the best that has been thought

and said in the world —to use Matthew Arnold’

s ex pression-his readingwill have had noennobling effect upon his char

acter ; and ignorance isgenerally adm itted to be a great cause

of vice. If a man really understands what a bad action is,clearly perce ives its badnessand its harmful effects both upon

others and upon himself , he will abstain from it,so long as

that realization is vividly present to his m ind . The trouble

is that he does not real ize what he is actually doing in com

mitting a bad action ; he does not know that he is sullyinghisown splendour andmaking himself a worse man. If he

did,he wouldn

’

t do it , for 068519 saw KGK6; .1 Man is so fine

1 There canbe no doubt that this i s the true explanationof the Sec .

ratio doc trine that virtue i s knowledge. It does not,however, take

any account of the weakness of the wi ll. I may know what i s rightand wish to d o it , but be _

so dazzled , asi t were , by the allurements ofvice that my wil l refusestoobey the di ctates ofmy intel lect. CompareOvid ’s famous

Videome liora proboque ;Deteriora sequor.

”

Aristotle cri ti cized the doctrine on these lines , objecting that i t i s disproved by the exi stence of incontinence or want of se lf-control (d xpw ia ) .

But perhaps some one wil l rai se the difficu lty as to how a manwho

rightly comprehendscanbe incontinent. For some denythat theman



human life . But no manworthy of the name of manwill

shirk the responsibility of this investigation,for mere ex is

tence— life without reflection and examination into its mean

ing and possibilities— is no life for a man— 6 yep engam og

B ios of: Brands d vepcfimp (ill , 38a) . At such a height Of

moral grandeur we have no difficulty in understanding things

such as the contention in the Gorgias that it is preferable

to be the victim of injustice rather than to commit injustice

(d bt x eic fla t pdkhov fi d btx giv) , for to suffer injustice does our

own moral nature no harm,but to commit injustice is to

sul ly our own spiritual splendour,to fall from our ideal state ,

to forget whowe are . All this is contained in the Socratic

equationof knowled ge with virtue , of ém infipqwith

CHAPTER V

PLATO AND THE IDEALISTIC INTERPRETATION OF THEUNIVERSE

LATO (427-347 B .C.) is the world’s greatest philosopher.H isLi fe.

He was born in Athens of a noble line of ancestors,of

whom he seems to have been justly proud. Upon the death

of Socrates (399 he left Athens , possibly because he

could not bear to live among those whohad put his master

to death , and spent several years in travelling about and

studying under the various menof learning in different parts

of the world. Thus he is said to have l ived for some years

in Egypt under the instruction of the native priests ; prob

ably he also went to Italy and studied under the Pythago

reans there. After his return from his travels,he founded

the famous academy at Athens , where he began to lec ture .

Subsequently he made two visits toSicily,upon the invitation

ofD io, who wasanxious to trainhisnephew ,

D ionysius the

younger, as a philosopher-K ing.

” W ith this object in

view he taught at Syracuse for several years , under the

patronage of D io ; but the project ended ina fiascoand Plato

barely escaped with his life .

Indiscussing Socrates we commented upon the paramount H isPerimportance ofhispersonality. No distinction can be drawn

sonal’w'

between the personality and the doc trine of Plato ; they are

inextricable e lements , warp and woof of the same texture .

69


Whenwe pass tohim from the pre-Socratics we feel at once

the remarkable richness of his m ind “Of Plato it may

justly be said that he reduced into a beautiful whole the

scattered results of the earlier Greek philosophy,reconciling

the ir seem ing differences and conflicting tendencies . From

this fountain,as well as from the abundant sources of his

own good powers , flowed the rich e lements of his philosophy.

In fact,when we compare the barrenness of the earlier

philosophers with the fertil ity ofPlato,that love , which Plato

knows sowe ll how to inspire inus,warms almost to venera

tion ; sorich , so varied, and so abundant are his observations,

‘

and so profound his knowledge of man and the world"Hisacquisitionof these intellectual stores , however, becomes at

once conceivable , if we call to m ind that he had the good

fortune , in the freshness and energy of youth , to fall inwith

a Socrates,the success ofwhose excel lent and happy method

for the improvement of man is singularly attested by the

wonderful success with which he trained this his worthiest

disciple to sound the innermost depth of the heart and

m ind, and the hiddenprinciples ofman

’s nature.

” 1 H e was

by no means a pure intel lectualist,and contrasts

,in this

respe ct,with the much harder ” type of m ind possessed by

his successor Aristotle . But it is not only that , inPlato, the

pure intellect wasnot the whole of the man ; asmuch m ight

be said of Epictetus ; but there could be no greater contrast

than exists between the somewhat unreal virtue of Epictetus,on the one hand , aloof from the world

,as it were , and

despising all the ills that flesh is heir to,because seclusion

hasmade it rather etiolated,and the rich learning of Plato,

on the other, throbbing with life, and full of sympathy for,

1 R i tter’s “ History of Ancient Philosophy ,” Vol. II. p . 155 (inMorrison’s translation,

IDEALISTIC INTERPRETATION OF UNIVERSE 7 1

and adm irationof, the humanity ofman. His philosophical

dialogues are full of human interest. To this Platowasled

by the very form ofdialogue , for, while he introduces Socrates

and his contemporaries d isputing and conversing, we have

represented before us a progressive actionof living characters ;a truly dramatic group is raised before the imagination, and

awakens intense and deep interest. It is tothis charm ofcom

position,nodoubt

,that he is indebted formany ofhisadmirers .

He is a consummate master in painting those m inute trai ts

which constantly attract and detain the reader’

s attention,by

bringing visibly before him the peculiarities of the speakers,

and by the charm of trifling incidents in advancing the

progress of the dialogue ; and thus doe s he acquire the

Opportunity of displaying the splendour of his eloquence , and

his skill to touch the heart aswell as to inform the under

standing.

To Platophilosophy wasno narrow ,departmental interest ,

but a speculation,as he himself describe s it , upon all time

and all existence— Oewpia wavrcg pé v xpd vou, mine 82 odoiag .

And,more than this

,it wasnot only something to be thought,

but something to be lived , a way of life which gave to man,

qua man, guidance and ideals in the direc tion of his inter

course with his fel lows . Consequently the first step towards

understanding Plato’

s greatness asa philosopher is to appre

ciate his greatness asa man.

There breathes through his dialogues a very humane spirit ,a very intimate sympathy for humanity assuch . Whenwe

think of him in comparison with the figures of his prede

cessors,we are rem inded of a parallel which may be taken

from the history ofGreek sculpture . For,just as the repro

sentationsof the gods.

by the great fifth-century artists seem

1 R itter’s History ofAncient Phi losophy ,”Vol. II. p. 158.


somewhat cold and aloof in all the dignity and majesty of

the ir Olympian greatness , when compared with the more

kindly, almost human,benignity of, say, the Hermes of

Praxiteles,or the Asclepius from Melos

,so does Platoseem

a warm and kindly human figure when contrasted with the

rather forbidding, almost Hebrew-prophet-like, sternness of

a predecessor such asEmpedocles.

Homo sum, nihil humani alienam a me puto is asapplic

able to Plato asto anyone. Hence the delightful introd uc

tions to his dialogues , inwhich ,before the philosophical

argument is begun,we are givena very real and very human

setting to the conversationwhich is to follow. And with a

few masterful strokes— for Plato is a great artist—he will

give us the character and tone, as it were , of the d ramatic

personals,so that we are enabled to give the more significance

to the respective doctrines soon to be maintained—much in

the same way asThomas Hardy brings us_straight into the

atmosphere ofhisnovels by introducing a character walkingalong a lonely country road , generally in the evening, pass

ing,or being overtaken by

, one of those fam iliar carrier’s

carts,so that we are in the mood tofeel the character before

a single word has been Spoken. Sim ilarly the l ittle intro

d uctionsinPlatoare not irrelevant to the philosophical argu

ment which is to follow ; they are asessential for the right

attuning of our minds to Plato’s conception of what philo

Sophy is as is the literal ,tuning of his instrument in the

musician s hands be fore he begins his piece. This will be

obvious from a considerationof the “ setting of the stage”

preparatory to the long dialogue of the“ Republ ic .

Yesterday I went down to the Piraeus wi th G laucon, sonof Ari ston,

to pray to the goddess , and also because I wished to view the festival ,and tosee how i t wascelebrated , as it wasto be held for the first time .

IDEALISTIC lINTERPRETATION OF UNIVERSE 73

I thought the processionof the natives of Athens was pretty , but thatof the Thracians pleased me no less. Whenwe had prayed and lookedon

,we left togoback to the city , but Polemarchus, the sonof Cephalus ,

noticed us from a distance , wending our way homeward,and told his

slave to run and to ask usto wai t for him . So the servant , coming upbehind me , took hold ofmy cloak and said , Polemarchusasks you towai t for him .

” Then I turned round and asked where his masterwas.“ That is he ,” he replied , “ com ing along behind. Wi l l you wait forhim ? We wi ll wai t for him , Glaucon answered. Soon afterPolemarchus came up , and wi th him Ad eimantus, the brother of

Glaucon,and Niceratus the son of N icias , and several other men,

apparently coming from the procession. Polemarchussaid , “Well ,Socrates , you two seem tome to be leaving and making for the city.

”

You are quite right ,” I answered .

“Now you see howmany of usthere are said he. I d o.” Well , he said , either prove yourse lves our masters , or stay here. But there i s sti ll an al ternativele ft

,

” I replied. “What if we persuade you that you ought to let u s

go? But could you persuade us whenwe will not li sten Cer

tainly not l answered Glaucon. Well , we are not going to listen

you may aswel l understand that.” Then Ad eimantus said , Do you

not know that there will be a torch-race onhorseback in the evening,i nthe celebrationof the goddes s Onhorseback I cried. Thatis something new. Wil l they have torches in their hands , and passthem onone to the other, while the horses are gal loping I asked .

Yes,”answered Polemarchus, and besides this there will be a night

festival worth seeing. We will ri se after dinner and go to see the

night festival ; there we wi l l meet many of our young friends , withwhom we will converse. So please stay , and d o aswe ask.

” ThenG laucon said , It seems as if we will have to s tay.” We ll , Ianswered , if you wish we will d oso.

” We went home therefore withPolemarchus, and there we found Lysiasand Euthyd emus, the brothersofPolemarchus, and alsoThrasymachusofChalcedonand Charmantid es

of Pasania and Cleitophon, son of Aristonymus. Cephalus , the fatherof Polemarchus, wasal so at home ; and he seemed qui te aged to me

,

for i t wasa long time since I had seenhim. He wassi tting on a chairwith a cushion

, and onhis head he had a chaplet , for he had j ust beensacrificing in the courtyard. We seated ourselves by him , as therewere chairs ranged round him in a circle . The moment Cephalus sawm e , he greeted m e and said , 1

‘ You d onot often vi si t us at the Piraeus ,Socrates . You have no ex cu se. If my strength would a llow me towalkto the city with case , you would not need to come here , but we would


vi sit you. As it i s,however , you ought to come here more often. For

I tel l you, the more all the pleasures of the body waste away , the moremy desire for intellectual di scu ssion and my deligh t in it increases.80 d o asI ask you, and spend your time with these young men, and

come to visit u s here as we are most intimate friends." -“ Indeed ,Cephalus ,

” I repli ed , “ I find great pleasure in conversing with oldpeople. S ince they have passed along a road which we too perhapswil l have to follow , I think we ought todiscover what it i s l ike , whetherit is rough and hard , or easy and smooth of passage. Now I , for mypart , would be glad to learn from you what your opinion i s , now that

you are , as the poets say, on the threshold of old age , whether thisperiod of l ife i s hard , or what your report of it is.”—“ Yes, indeed ,Socrates

,I wi ll tel l you what it seem s like to me. Often several of us

who are nearly of the same age , bearing out the old proverb , gathertogether. And when we are met, most of them lam ent because theym iss the pleasures of youth

, and cal l to m ind their love affairs , theirdrinking parties , their feastings , and suchl ike , and they are vex edbecause they imagine they have lost great advantages , saying that thenthey lived wel l , but now they d o not even live at all. Some of thembewai l the insults of their relatives cast at the ir old age , and on thi sscore they reproach old age asthe cause of somany ill s. But I think

,

Socrates , that these men d onot blame the right thing. For if old agewere to blame

,then I too would have suffered these very things , and

so would all menwhohave reached this stage of l ife. As it i s , however,I have met others who d i d not hold thi s view,

and in particular thepoet Sophocles , who, whi le I was present , was asked by somebody ,What d oyou think about love now, Sophocles ? Are you stil l able tolove a woman?

’—H e answered , ‘ Hush i my friend. I am most gladtosay I have escaped from it , asI would from a raving, savage mas ter.’

I though t then, and none the less now,that he spoke wi sely. For inold

age com es complete peace and de li verance from such things. Forwhenlust strains no longer and looses i ts grip , then the saying of Sophoclescom es true. I t i s indeed like del iverance from a great number of

raving masters. Of such things, and of the suffering caused by the irre latives, there i s but one cause , not old age , Socrates , but the men

’sdisposition. For if they are orderly and easy-tempered , old age i s noex cessive trouble. But if not , such m en find both old age and youthpainful.”

I admired what he had said , and asI wi shed him to continue,I tried

tomove him by saying, O Cephalus , I think that whenyou say suchthings , the majori ty of men d onot agree wi th you,

but bel ieve that you


76 THE ELEMENTS O F GREEK PHILOSOPHY

his sleep , aschildren do, and i s terrified and lives with the ex pe ctationof evi l. But he who i s conscious that there i s no injustice in him is

accompani ed ever by sweet hope , the kindly nourisher of old age ,’as

Pindar says. Yes, i t was charm ingly sai d by him of the man who

passes his li fe in j ustness and hol iness, that ‘ sweet hepe i s ever withhim fostering his heart , the nourisher of old age , hope whi ch above allgoverns the changeful m ind of mortal man.

’ It is true , wonderfu llytrue. And i t is with reference to this that I state that weal th is mostvaluable

,I d o not say to everybody , but to the good . For it plays a

great part in saving us from unwilling tri ckery and deceit , from owingsacrifices to the gods or money to men and from going to the nex tworld in fear. It has many other uses too. But when I weigh one

thing against another , I would hold that it iswith reference to this thatweal th is most useful to a sensible man.

” You have spokenwonderfully wel l , Cephalus ,

” I said. “ But this justice that you mentionare we to cal l i t simply truth

,and the paying back of what one

receives, or i s it possible for the very same acts to be sometimes j ust ,sometimes unj u st ? This i s what I mean. Everybody would agree thatif a man receives weapons from a fri end in his senses , when the same

friend is mad and asks them back , he ought not to return such things ,norwould he be acting j ustly if he d id , or told the whole truth to aman

in such a state.” What you say i s true ,” he answered . Then truth

and the paying back ofwhat one receivesis not the definitionof j ustice.

-“ But it is indeed,

” interrupte d Polemarchus,“ if we are to be l ieve

S imonides.” We ll , sai d Cephalus , I wil l pass the discussionon toyou. It i s time forme to look after the sacrifices.” Then

,

” said I , isPolemarchusthe heir to your part in i t Yes, he answered , witha sm i le , and went away to the sacrifices (327a -381d 9) .

Sometimes at a lull in the argument , or whenone aspect

of the case hasbeenfinished with—whenone or other of the

interlocutors has been hopelessly defeated by Socratesin his

untiring play of question and answer— we are once more

brought back , foramoment,toa visualizationofthe characters

asliving human beings. This serves partly asa relief to the

strenuous intellectual effort of following the argument —a

relief which we may compare with that which Shakespeare

gives us by interposing a comic episode (e .g. the porter scene in

Macbeth ”) at one ofthe most intense points inhistragedies ,

IDEALISTIC INTERPRETATION OF UNIVERSE 77

—but it is much more part and parcel of Plato’

s whole con

ceptionof philosophy asa living matter. The introductions

first bring the characters before us , and although , of course ,they live and unfold themselves , asit were , inthe disquisitions

which follow ,these l ittle interludes, inwhich we see the par

ticipantsshifting their positions and re-settling them se lves in

the circle of disputants before the next round of argument

begins , d o serve largely to keep up our realization of them as

men, to keep them before us asliving be ings . Thus in the

first book of the Republic,” upon the conclusionof the first

round betweenSocrates and Polemarchuson the Simonid ean

definition of justice asthe rendering of what is d ue—1 6 ‘

rd

d¢e th6peva ind ofl p d fl '

08L86va t— the interruption Of Thrasy

machusprovides an oc casion upon which we cansee all the

disputants sitting round spe ll-bound and not a l ittle discon

certed at the brusqueness ofThrasymachus’

manner

Very oftenwhi le we were conversing, Thrasymachus attempted tointerrupt us in the m iddle ofour d iscussion inorder tomake an objec

tion,but he wasrestrained by those whowere si tting around , be cause

they were eager tohear the discu ssionright to the end . But whenwepaused and I had fini shed saying these things , he could keep quiet nolonger, but gathering himse lf toge ther l ike a wild beast he hurled himself upon us , as i f wi th the intent of tearing u s to pieces. I and

Polemarchus were startled and panic-stri cken ; then Thrasymachus

bawling out in the middle of usall said , “What nonsense has takenhold of you two all thi s time

, Socrates ? Why d o you play the fooltogether , and give way thus one to the other ? If asyou sayyou d o

indeed wish to know what j ustice i s , d o not only ask questions andpride yoursel f thus upon your refutations , when anybody gives an

answer, because you know wel l that it i s easier to ask questions than toanswer them ; but answer yoursel f too and te ll us what you thinkjustice is; and be careful not to define it aswhat i s binding , or ad vantageous, or profitable , or gainful , or ex pedi ent , but te ll me clearly andex actly whatever you have tosay ; and be sure I wi l l not accept whatyou say i f you talk such rubbi sh.

” When I heard thi s I wasamazed ,and looked on him with fear, and had I not set eyes onhim before he


looked at me I bel ieve I should have been dumb. As i t was, howeve r ,whenhe first began to be ex asperated by the di scussion, I had glancedat him the first so that I wasable to answer him , and said not withouttrembling, Oh , Thrasymachus, d o not be hard on us . If I and myfriend here have made mistakes inour considerationof the qu estion ;he assured that they were quite unintended. You d o not imagine i fwe were looking for a gold coin that we would voluntari ly give way oneto the other inour search and destroy our chances of d iscovering i tand now thatwe are searching after justice , a thing more prec iou s thanmany coins of gold , d o not imagine that we would thus foolishly giveway to each other , instead of taking great pains todiscover i t , d o notimagine that , my friend. But my opinion i s that it i s beyond us.Therefore i t i s more mee t that we should be pitied , rather than sternlytreated , by such wonderful men asyou. Onhearing this he burst outlaughing very mockingly and said , “ Oh , Hercules"here you see thataffected ignorance of Socrates. I knew it, and warned those present thatyou would not wi sh to answer, but would affect ignorance and d o any

thing but reply when asked a question.

” You are wise , Thrasymachus,

” I answered thus you knewwe ll tha t i f you asked a manwhatmake s twelve , and at the same tim e warned him ,

‘ Now, my friend ,take care not to say that twice six istwe lve.or three times four

, or six

times two, or four times three ; because be sure I shall not accept whatyou say i f you talk any su ch nonsense. I t wasclear toyou,

I suppose ,that nobody would answer such a question. But if he answered youthus , Oh l Thrasymachus, what d o you mean? Even i f one of thesei s the answer, am I , my dear sir , tosay something el se which isnot inaccordance with the truth ? Is this what youmean? What wouldyou say to him then?

” Very good ,” said he ; “ as if there i s any

sim ilarity between this case and that.” There i s nothing to preventi t

,

” I answered .“ But even i f there isnosimi larity , if i t appears some

such thing to the man questioned , d oyou think he i s any the less likelyto answer what appears right to him , whether we forbid it or not ?“ D oyou mean that this i s what you will d o? W i ll you give asan

answer one of the things which I have banned ? I should notwonder ,” I replied , “ if it seemed right tome after consideration.

”

What then, sa idhe, ifI showyouanother answer about justice d ifi erentfrom all these and better than them What d oyou deserve to sufferWhat else ,” I answered , ifnot that which it befits the ignorant to

suffer ? That is to learnfrom the manwhodoes know. Th is , therefore ,i s what I too deserve to sufi er.”—“ You are an engaging person,

”he

said. “ But,besides learning, you must pay some money aswelL

”


Yes, whenI have some ,” I replied . But you have , cried Glaucon.

Now speak for money , Thrasymachus, for we will all contribute to,

Socrates." Of course ,” he answered , so that Socrates , I suppose ,in his usual manner maynot answer him self , but may catch up and

ref ute the answers of somebody else.” My worthy friend ,” I answered ,how can a man answer who in the first place does not know and con

fesses that he does not, and i f he has any ideas on the subjec t is forhid d en by one not to be de spi sed , tosay what he thinks ? It i s you rplace rather to speak. Foryou say that you know , and have somethingto say. So d o not refuse , but please me by answering, and d o not

grudge to teach Glauconhere and the se others.” When I had spokenthus, G lauconand the others begged him not to decline. Thrasymachus

obviously longed to speak so asto gainglory , for he thought he had a

beauti fu l answer , but he pretended to contend tomake me the one to

answer. Final ly he yielded and said , “ This , then,isthe wisdom of

Socrate s , to refuse to teach him self , and to go about learning fromothers , and then not even to return thanks for what he learns .”

When you say I learn from others , Thrasymachus, you speak the

truth ; but whenyousay I d onot returnthanks , you speak fa lsely. For

I pay requital in so far as I can. I cangive praise alone , for I haveno money. But with what read iness I do thi s , i f I th ink a person hasspokenwi se ly , you wil l soon know for yoursel f , whenyou have spoken.

For I feel sure that you wi l l speak wisely.” Then l i sten,

”he

answered. My opinion is that justi ce is nothing e l se than the

interest of the stronger. Why d o you not prai se me ? But you Wi llrefuse Republic ,” 836b1

It is this human element in Plato that particularly Thought

distinguishes him from his great successor Aristotle . It has£22110g.beensaid that everymanis either a Platonist or anAristote lian,and although it will be pointed out in thi s survey that there

is more of what we may provisionally cal l idealism in

Aristotle than is often imagined , it yet remains true that

with him the “ thought element predominates over “ fee l

ing the intellectual side ofman's nature tends to confine ,

if it does not entirely eliminate , the emotional . Whereas

with Plato this is by nomeans the case ; with him the

“ feeling”element is asgreat as is the

“ thought element,

ConcreteInstancesto

clinchAbstractPrinciples.

Vivid d escriptions.

80 THE ELEMENTS or GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

and he produces inus the conviction thatwith him ‘

j

‘ fee l ingcomes in as a sort of guarantee , asit were , of the rightness

of “ thought ,”not analienfeeling of satisfactionsuperinduced

d onep m pfam é v n , as Aristotle would say, upon the intel

lectual conviction,but a feel ing of moral enthusiasm suffus

ing the whole di scussion. This is why,in discussing such

abstract moral qual ities asjustice and injustice , for ex ample ,he will often throw abstractions overboard

,asthough it were

that he feared otherwise to lose something of the real signifi

cance of such qualities in their human values.1 To bring out

the real significance of these qualities , he brings the just and

the unjust manvividly before our eyes . In the Gorgi as,for example

,Polus gives a very lurid description of the

excesses of Archelaus , tyrant of Macedonia , as though un

l im ited power meant unl im ited happiness ; but the picture is

sodrawn that Socrates finds it aneasy task toconvince Polus

that noman, who is such asArchelaus hasbeen described to

be, can for a moment he thought happy . He simply asfs

Polus whether he considers the Archelaus, whom he has

described,to be a just or an unjust man. Polus adm its that

he is smog? and then Socrates proves , in accordance with

his ownmoral teaching (see above,p . that no d StKoscan

possibly be edba ipwv, and that it is better d btx eiaea t fi datx ei v.

Another outstanding element in the style of Plato is his

love of vivid descriptions . We think of his description of

1 Compare the remark about j ustice in Republic,” 432d : “My goodsir

, it seem s to have been roll ing before our fee t right from the beginning , and we d i d not see i t , but were in a most ri diculous plight. J ustasmen sometimes search for what they hold in their hands, sowe didnot cast our eyes upon i t , but kept our gaze upon some distant object ,in doing which it hasperhaps escaped our notice.

”

2The English word unrighteous corresponds rather better thanunjust to the connotationof the Greek word.

IDEALISTIC INTERPRETATION or UNIVERSE 81

the “ business man (6 xpmrarum rjs) stooping inhis walk and

pretending not even tosee the manwhom he hasswindled,

and ofall those many concrete instances of cobblers , potters ,bridle-makers

,and what not. But two short quotations

must suffice. In the “ Republic (361e) Glaucon has been

maintaining that it pays to be unjust —it is the old complaint

that the wicked prosper and the good suffer in this world

and inorder to “ draw ”Socrates he te lls him of the many

occasions upon which he has heard injustice , in effect, be

lauded , inasmuch asit is appearances that count ; it matters

not to be just,but only to appear so, and these are the vivid

words which he puts into the mouths of the eulogi sts of

appearances

They will tel l you this , that the just man who isso conditioned

(i .e. thought unj ust) will be s courged , crucified , cast into chains , wi l lhave his eyes burnt out, and finally , af ter undergoing all kinds of suffering, will be impaled and so brought to unders tand that hisdesire shouldbe to seem j ust , and not to be so. In fact the words of E schyluswerefar more appl icable to the unj ust , than to the j ust , man. For they wil lsay that the unj ust man,

inso far ashe ispursuing something real andnot living with a view to appearances, real ly wantsto be unj ust and notmerely toseem so

And from the culture ofhismodest worthBear s the rich frui t ofgreat and glorious deed s.

” 1

For, firstly, he is thought just and so rules in the city , then he can

marry from whatsoever fam i ly he chooses ; he cangive inmarriage towhomsoever he l ikes , can enter into contracts and partnerships at wi ll ,and always to his own profit , taking advantage of the fac t that hisconscience i s not worried about injustice. When he enters into any

competition e ither public or private he always gets the be tter of hisrival and proves the superior, and asa re sul t he becomes weal thy andcanserve his friends and inj ure his enem ies ; he cangive adequate and

magnificent sacrifices and offerings to the god s , and so curry favourmuch better than the j ust man wi th whomsoever he wi shes e ither of

1 E schylus, Sevenagainst Thebes ,” 593 .

‘


gods or of men, so it is only reasonable to suppose that he , rather thanthe j ust man

,is the more beloved of heaven.” 1

In a later passage of the Republic 2 Socrates replies to

all this inno less vivid language

You must let m e now say of them j ust) all'

that you

yoursel f were saying about the unj ust. For I shall say that the just ,when they grow up , hold offi ce in their own cities , if so they choose ,marry from whatsoever family they desire , and give inmarriage wharever they like. And all that you said about the others , I now say aboutthese. And , on the other hand , I say of the unj ust that the majority ofthem , even if they escape in youth , are caught at the end of the ircourse and look fooli sh, and when they become old are subjected .towretched insul ts at the hands of strangers and citizens al ike , beingscourged and subjected to all those things which you rightly declaredwere unfi t for pol ite ears to l i sten to—they wil l be crucified and burntbut imagine that you have heard the full descriptionof their sufieringsfrom me.

But, fond ashe is of such concrete instances , of thus bringing vividly before our eyes the particular manifestations of

some general principle , Plato never“ fails to see the wood

for the trees. H e takes the particular instance partly, no

doubt,because it is a check uponthose airy nothings towhich

abstract philosophical speculation is only too prone , but it is

with him always not merelyparticular it is an instance, sym

bolical,as it were

,of something beyond itself. As Aristotle

would say, Plato sees the universal in the particular ;3 with

something of the poet’s vision he passes beyond the mere

phenomena and sees in them the embodiment of eternal

principles. Lovers ofWordsworth are well acquainted with

this power of quiet contemplation,when things are seen for

what they really are by the inward eye of the soul so that

1 Republic ,” 361e. 2613d .

3 In fact , none ofhis particu lar instances is a mere 1 68: 11 , it is

always a TOt6V8€ TL.



sc ience , is still but rarely found to dom inate the character

and mould the l ife , asPlato conceived that it might do.

When he spoke of ‘the truth

,

’

or of ‘ what is,

’

we see that

there entered into his feeling not only the enthusiasm of the

scientific discoverer, but also the passion of the poet for

beauty and the devotion of the saint to the object of his

worship .

” Plato himself describes the philosopher as one

who hasno concern with earthly matters as such ; is never

filled with malice or envy in strife against men. His eye is

always looking to fixed,immutable principles which he see s

neither suffering nor causing injury to one another,but

always regulated in order according to reason. So he tries

to adapt him self to these princ iples,’

and mould his character

inaccordance with them for he cannot help wanting tomake

him self l ike What he adm ires so much—4 ] oi'

e t fwd jinxa vijv

( Iva r, drop TLS éjuhei dydjrevos, pi] p tpeioea t é x eivo1 W ith us the

love of truth” is a phrase ; with Plato it was, as love

should be , a passion his philosophic impulse is an ideal eu

thusiasm for the things of the mind and of the soul it makes

him one of those lords of philosophy who,ashe says in

the Theaatetus,

have never from their youth upward known the way to the marketplace , nor where the law court s are , or the counci l chamber,

’

or whereanyother municipal assembly is held. They neither see nor hear thelaws or decrees of the State recited or wri tten; the seeking of office bypolitical organi zations , meetings and dinners and reve ls with singingmaidens are things which never come into their m inds even in dream s.Whether any city affair hasturned out wel l or i l l , what scandal hasbefal len a man from hisancestry, ei ther male or female, are things ofwhich he knows nomore than he knows—as the saying goes—howmany pint s the sea contains. Nor i s b e aware of his ignorance . For

he does not neglect th ese things for the sake ofbe ing thought a fine man,

but because , as a matter of fact , i t i s only his outward form that is

1 “Republ ic , socc .


dwel ling in the city. H ismind , thinking all these things of smal l orofno account , and consequently despising them , is flying all around ,

”as

Pindar says , above the world measuring all things on earth and in

the heavens above ,” ex am ining the whole nature of each and all, butnot lending itse l f toanything lowly at hand .1

It is this impassioned contemplation— whenonly the out-”Epwg as

ward form of the philosopher i s “ in the city - that con igii

ielmstitutes the real philosophic impulse , which , beginning with P0186

our natural love of beauty , of fair form s , leads us on to see

the beauty of the m ind , until we final ly attain satisfaction in

the contemplationofTruth ; for, asKeats tell s us ,

Beauty istruth , truth beauty ; that i s allYe know on earth , and all ye need to know

the best commentary upon which is to be found in the

Symposium .

”

Now he whowould pursue this matter aright ought from hisearl iestyouth to begin to v isit beautiful forms , and at first , if his instructor

guides him aright , he should love one form only and there generatebeauteous thoughts thenhe should real ize that the beauty which appears ih one form isbrother tothe beauty inanother form then if i t i sbeauty ingeneral that he mu st seek, i t would be the height of fol ly notto rea l ize that the beauty of all forms isone and the sam e thing. Whenhe hasperce ived this he wil l make himsel f a lover of all beautifu l forms ,and slackening his love for the one form , he will contemn it and thinkit a smal l thing. After this he should considerthe beauty of the soula more preciou s thing than the beauty of the form , so that him whohasa sweet sou l but little bloom of form he wi l l be content to love and

cherish , and to create and search for those thoughts by which the youngare improved ; and thence he will be compelled to perceive the beautyof laws and pursuits , and to real i ze the fact that all thi s beauty is akin,

and accordingly to think but little of the beauty of the form . After pursuits he should be introd uced to the sciences

, so that he may see the

beauty of knowledge too ; and , looking on a wide beauty , no longer wil lhe

, like a slave, be held in love by the beauty ofone thing, of one boy,or man

,or pursuit , and in his enslavement become paltry and mean of

m ind , but turning to the wide sea of beauty and contemplating i t he

1 “Theaetetus, l 73d .


wi ll give birth to many lovely and ennobling thoughts and notions, inbounteous love ofwisdom -unti l thus strengthened and increased he willsurvey one science,which is the science of universal beauty. Now, he

said , try to attend to m e as keenly asyou can. H e who hasreceivedguidance thus far toward s the things of love , and has contemplatedbeauti ful things aright and in due order, ashe arrives at the end ofthese things on a suddenhe beholds a beauty of wondrous nature , the

very thing, Socrates , which was the end of all his form er labours , a

beauty which in the first place is eternal , which is not produced nordestroyed , which wax es not and wanes not , which is not beautiful inone way and deformed inanother , nor sometimes beautiful and at othertimes not , nor beautifu l inone respect and deformed in another , norbeautiful inone place and inanother deformed , beautiful in the opinionof some and deformed in the opinionofothers ; nor can it be accordedbeauty in the l ikeness ofa face or of hands , or ofany other portionofthe body, nor of Speech , nor of a science , nor does it ex ist in any otherthing , as in an animal

,or in the earth or sky or any other thing, but

it is very beauty by itself and of itsel f , it isof one form and enduresfor ever , of such a nature that , asall the other things of beauty whichparticipate in it are created or destroyed , it does not itself become e ithergreater or less , but sufi ersinnoway. Now whena man through beingtaught to love aright , starting from these things ofbeauty and ascending,begins to gaze upon this beauty , he hasalmost reached the goal. For

this is the tru e way to approach the thingsof love , or to be guided thereby another, beginning from these things of beauty to ascend for thesake of that one beauty , ascending, asonsteps , from one thing of beautyto two, and from two to all beautiful form s , and from beautiful formsto beautiful pu rsuits , and from beautiful pursuits to beautiful sciences ,unti l from these sciences he comes final ly to that science which is nothinge lse thanthe science of beauty itsel f , and comprehends the essence ofbeauty. This l ife , my dear Socrates, said the stranger of Mantineia,above all others should be lived by man, a l ife Sp ent inthe contemplationof beauty itself. And this beauty, i f ever you see it , wil l not appear toyou as gold and raiment , and lovely boys and youths on whom you

now gaze with adm iration, and are prepared, both you and others , tolook onand be with , and ,

if i t were possible , neither to eat nor drink ifonly you could gaze on them and be their companions . What if man

perchance could see absolute beauty, clear, pure , and uncontam inated ,not fil led out with fl eshly and mortal things , and colours , and all the

inanities ofmortal ity, but to gaze on the divine beauty i tsel f in it s oneform ? Is that man

’s l ife unworthy , think you, who gazes thu s, and



and I agree with him who dedicated this remark at Delphi . For Ithink that the dedicationof the remark is m eant asa salu tation fromthe god to those who enter the temple—instead of the usual Hailsince the salutation of ‘ Hai l ’ i s not a right one , and we should not

greet one another thus , bu t bid each other to ‘ be temperate .

’And

so it i s that the god addresses those who enter his temple with a greeting different from that of men- such was the idea

,I think

,in the

m ind of the ded icator. And he accosts each worshipper ashe entersthe temple with no other greeting than this of B e temperate Buthe ex presses himsel f in riddles l ike a seer ; for Know thysel f ’ and‘ B e temperate ’

are one and the same thing, as the inscription indicates and I maintain, but others may think them different , as I thinkis the case with those who dedicated the later inscriptions of Nothingin ex cess , ’ and Evil follows on a pledge ,

’for they took ‘ Know thy

self ’ as a piece of advice and not the salu tation of the god to thosewho entered his temple (l 64d ) .

From such quotations the reader will perceive how Plato’s ‘

ethical teaching permeate s the whole of his writings. We

will not, therefore , give a separate section uponhis ethics , his

definition of Stxa roa dm1 —the ostensible subject of inquiry in

the Republic - but take up one or twoaspects ofhis teach

in‘

g which more readily lend themselves to separate treat

ment .

I. PSYCHOLOGY

It is usual to Speak of the tripartite divisionof the soul

in Plato but we must never forget that such a divisiondoes

1 It is givenas7 6 r d a irroii «pd -n ew Kai.ju‘

jwokvvrpaypove’

i v R epublic

,438a) —in vulgar parlance M ind your own busine ss ,” but inPlato

denoting a realization of onesel f as, on the one hand , a man (Le .

capable of the hi ghest activities of m ind and soul) and , on the other ,asa member of a communi ty wi th both rights and duties in referenceto others. It is that social conscience without which no organi zedsociety is possible ; it isnot evenso defini te a thing asare the virtuesof awcbpocniv

’

q, d pefa , and ¢p6vnm s, but rather that which makespossible the reali zationof these—8 «d e w é x eivorsrijv Bevapw 17 0.960 e

60 7 6 éyyevé trfla t , Kai. éyyevoyi vou; ye c w'r'

qpfav wapéxew, gunfi re}: d v évfi


not imply any actual divisionof the soul into three separate

parts or faculties ; the whole soul is involved , and as it were

functions , in all ouracts, whether they come within the low

est or the highest category in the scale ofworth . In a word ,

the division i s purely logical , made for the sake of conveni

ence of presentation. These three “ parts are

1. Toémeupnfl xev pi pesor émeupia (desire or appetite) .

2. 7 6 Oupoett ésor Oupés (spirit, or the sense ofhonour) .

3 . Tohoyw‘

rtx d v pépos(the rational element).

These are often referred to by different names in different

passages of Plato’s writings , but the above are the most re

presentative terms. By em eupca he means the desire of

satisfying some natural appetite— it is usually confined e ither

to the things of the body , such as food and drink , or to the

material good things of the world , summed up,in the case

of man,under the desire for wealth—which is common to

man and beast alike .1 The second part i s something

superior to this . It is fostered and stimulated by hard ath

letio exercise , and corresponds , in some at least , of its aspects ,to that “ pluck ”

or“

grit” which it is the claim of our

modern public-school education to develop by the promin

ence which it gives to games. The Royta‘

rtx d v pipe ; is the

highest development of the soul , that which is concerned

with art,science , and literature. Plato expounds thi s doctrine

under the figure ofa tripartite monsterwhich is thus built up

after suggesting the'

analogy between such an image and the

human soul , Socrates , in the“Republic

,

"replies to the ques

tion astowhat kind of an image he hasinm ind, asfollows

One of that kind of creatures , said I , which are fabled to have beenofold , such as the Ohimaira , Scylla ,

and Cerberus , and others wheremany form s grew and combined together into one.

1 It thus corresponds to Aristotle’s a loe-max i; {mi (see below,p.


There are such fables , sai d he.Now mould the one form of a many-headed manifold beast

,whi ch

hasin a ci rcle the heads of tame animal s and wild animals , and whichi s able to put forth from itsel f and vary all the se at will.It is the work of a m arvel lous moulder, said b e , but , as a story i s

more easily fashioned thanwax and such substances,let i t be moulded .

‘

Nowmould the form of a lion, and another form of a man,but let

the first form be far the largest , and the second be second.These two are easier, sa id he . They are moulded . Now fi x the

three together into one, so that they all grow together.I have fix ed them together , said he .

Last of all mould around them on the outside the form of one of

them , that of the man, so that to one who i s unable to see the inside ,but who can see only the outside covering, i t may appear to

‘

be one

animal , 8.man.

I have moulded it around , he answered .And now to the one who affi rm s that it is profitable for man to act

unjustly , but that to be j ust does not benefit him ,let us reply that he

says nothing more nor less than that it i s profitable for him to feast themanifold beast and make i t strong, along with the l ion and all i ts parts ,bu t to starve the man to death and make him weak , so that he isdragged about wherever e ither of the others leads him ,

and makes noattempt to accustom the one to the other , or tomake them pleasingto each other, but allows them to bite and fight among themse lves , anddevour each other.Yes, he said , the man who praises inj ustice wi l l be saying that

ex actly.Again, would not he who says that justice is profitable , say that

everything should be done , and everythi ng said , to the end that theinner man may have the ful lest command over the whole man, and

look after the many-headed beast , l ike a farm er, nursing and domesticating the tame parts , and preventing the wild parts from growingand with the l ionasanally, caring for each and all in common,

makingthem friendly to each other and to him sel f , i s it not thus that he wil lrear themThat i s ex actly what he who prai ses j ustice says.So in every way he who praises ju stice will speak the truth , but he

who praises inj ustice wil l li e. For whenone considers e ither pleasureor fam e

,or advantage , he who praises justice speaks the truth , but he

who blames it , knows nothing, and his blaming is in no way soundR epublic ,” 588d ) .



subject of that last discourse of Socrates in pri son,which is

d escribed so vividly in the Phaedo, where we find Socrates

describing the hindrance which the body is to the soul 1 in

the pursuit of knowledge and the release which death will

bring from all such trammels.

II. POLITICS

Anyone who hasstudied the barest elements of philology

will be acquainted with the way inwhich a S ingle word Often

bears silent witness to the degenerationofmanor of society

and the word politics is a notable example Of this.

Trench’s “ Study of Words ” abounds with such examples

(e.g. villain,

” “rival , and

,whatever the cause of this

SO-called pejorative tendency,” 2 there can be no doubt that

“ pol itics generally means to us tod ay something very

different from what 13woh nxfi— the science of statesmanship— meant for Plato. His pol itical ideal s are set forth in the

Republic under the form Of a description of an imaginary

commonwealth , such as is famil iar to English readers from

W illiam Morris’s News from Nowhere , or Butler’

s

“ Erewhon,

”or H . G. Wells

’

s “Modern Utopia 3— the last

l Cf. Gorgias , 492-3 , where he quotes with approval Euripides ’

7 ‘s8’

oiSev ct TO {fiv pév écr'rt xarOavei v ,

7 6 x arflavei v 83 {fiv gand says that the body is

,asi t were , the tomb of the soul—Top év a é pé

écr'rw fipi v o-

fipa .

2Perhaps i t should be mentioned that more recent writers on thesubj ect Object to thi s tracing of “ tendencies ” in words themse lves ;the causes for the changes in the meaning of words should be foundrather in the predisposi tions ofour ownhumannature (e.g. the naturaldesire to avoid giving offence , human malice, euphem ism , See

B réal’

s Semantics ,” chapter ix . (Engli sh translation by Mrs.

Henry Oust) .3 The idea is common, and there are many earl ier examples inEnglish

Li terature ; of. Bacon’s “NewAtlantis ,” Hobbes’s Leviathan,”More’s

Utopia.

”


ofwhich indeed would seem to have borrowed a good deal

from Plato.

Plato i s led to describe hi s ideal State asa resu lt of the

desire to define Stx a tomi

v'

q, for i t i s inthe ideal State , if anywhere , that Justice will be found ; and i t i s one of Plato’s

deepe st convictions that it is a m istake to try to determ ine

anymoral qual ity in the abstract,apart from i ts context in

the life ofman. SO we must consider the conditions, the

environment , necessary to the development and fullest

manifestationof re Xoyw‘

ruuSv— the highest psychic part ”

- ih the individual . This ideal State— called m hrre io. simply—is described at length in the earl ier books of the “ Re

public ” it i s based upon a sort‘

of caste system ,but one

Ofworth,not of birth. The finest natures are to be carefully

selected and trained from youth upwards , for they are to

constitute the highest class in the State —that ofGuardians

or dniha x es. The rest of the community consists of inferior

natures ; and inorder toget a sanction for this necessary

subm issionof the inferior to the superior, Plato tells us that

recourse will have to be had to a fable Or myth ,

laccording

to which the (Wham ; are earth-born and have gold in the ir

souls , whereas the “ lower classes have souls composed,

partly or entirely, Of the baser metal s . Provision is , of

course , made for the promotion of a“golden soul out

of the “ silver class to the “golden,

and vice versa . InThe

what follows we must not forget that Plato is deal ing only“M “ Q'

with the ¢6hax eg or highest class ; the main principle by

which the regulations laid down for these is directed is the

1 This , of course , though not li terally tru e and knownassuch to the

fi rm s, is tru e in effect. We may compare many Chri stian dogmas,which , because they inspire good id eals, we have to present to lessintelligent people asthough they were true

'

faots.

94. THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY

desire that they Should have no inducements toneglect the

public interests . Hence theymust have noprivate property,

for it i s material possessions which so readi ly lead a man’s

soul away from the pursuit Of the highest ideal s . They

have been chosen with extreme care in infancy, and the

greatest importance i s attached to their education ; a pro

gramme of studies is laid down for them ; their external life

is regulated by the State, they live and have meals in

common (Plato much adm ired the c oc a in e. at Sparta) , and

are brought up—apart from their parents- am id surround ings

that wil l save them from all degrading influences . Thus

there is some hOpe that they wi ll be able to despise the

Objects of émeup ia and Quads, and to attain to the love Of

wisdom and of beauty, much in the manner described by

D iotima in the Symposium .

” 1 When they have grown up ,the communal mode of l iving is stil l maintained . It must

be adm itted that there are d etails in the scheme which/

are

repugnant to our modern ideas ; the same education i s laid

downfor women as for men,and the scheme involves the

abol ition Of the family and a community of women and

children”—for the best men must be allowed to associate

with the best women, and the childrenmust be the chi ldren

of the State,brought up to serve its best interests apart from

the idiosyncracies of their human parents. We are given

ful l details Of the m il itary training, and rules for procedure

in war, when the women accompany the men as camp

followers .2 All is planned to lead up to the crowning d e

velopment— the ideal State under the leadership of the

philosopher-K ing,”inwhom political power and the Spirit

of true science are united,apparently under the convic

1 Above,p. 85 .

3 This once sounded ridiculous, but cf. our



the polities in their logical (not historical) Order of d e

generation from the ideal pol ity.1

Polity. Qualityof the Soul.

1 . Ttpoxparia Goydg2. Ohtyapxia

3 . q oxpa'

ria émOupi a4 . p ayns

Under ol igarchy—which is the“ highest expression Of

émOupfa— some sort of order and di scipline is maintained ;

the “appetites of the many are checked in that they have

to subm it to the dom inion of the few ; whereas under

democracy they find free play for the unrestrained indulgence

of their appetites. The smash ,which is embodied under

tyranny,is the m et als Of an individual who is suddenly

given power to real ize it to the full . Anpoxpa‘

rla hardly

corresponds to what we mean by “ democracy tod ay. We

are all influenced by the conditions of our age, and, Plato’s

ideas ofqoxpa'

ria were derived from the excessive licence

indulged in by the Athenian democracy, or ochlocracy, asit

m ight more rightly be styled , when once the restraininghand ofPericles had been removed .

If we ask how these degenerate polities have ari sen, the

answer is that they are simply political manifestations of

the fact that man is not perfect. In some sense a people

hasthe government which it deserves ; and the ideal polity

has never been real ized in the Sphere of practice simply

because society does not yet consist Of ideal individuals.

1 Apro-roxparfa

—the embodiment of 6p6vota and Myos—is om ittedfrom the table

,for i t i s not very clear how i t differs from the true

wohwefo. inWhich 7 6 Xoyw'

fl KOV pfposfinds it s ex pression.“ Birth ,”

of course , predom inates under aristocracy, but it seem s to differ chieflyin that it was practical ly realized , to some ex tent , whereas fi «ohm-d cispure ly ideal .


WhenPlato Speaks of the degeneration Of such politicsfrom

hisideal , he is Speaking logically , Or philOSOphically,Of the

failure to realize his ideal , and not of any actual process Of

degeneration in time. It comes about because the hoywn x d v

pe’

posof the soul has not yet succeeded in doing its proper

work Ofcontrolling the baser activities ofOust ; and émeupfa ;hence (" d ong arises , which , as all readers of Greek history

know ,i s a very real factor in the troubles ofGreek pol itical

life . The “ transition from one pol ity to another becomes

clear if we exam ine how the timocrat ic man degeneratesinto the oligarchic man when in the individual the less

worthy manifestations of each Of the three parts ” of the

soul gradually acquire more and more power, until they are

the only manifestations of that “ part then that “ part

itself degenerates intothe one below it, and Oupé g, for example ,is no longer Gustsbut émOupfa . And as i t is with man—the

m icrocosmos—so it is with the macrocosmos of the State .1

III. MYTHS

In the conversationof the uneducated we have all noticed III. Thean attempt to eke out their inabil ity to express themse lves

by appending the word “ like to their statements ;“ I

was all in a muddle,like , and “He was quite done up

,

like ,”

are undoubtedly the outcome of very vivid impres

sions in the m ind of the speaker, and the “ l ike ” is,as it

were , an appeal to the bearer to eke out the imperfections

of the words with his own thoughts that very “as it were

"

is prompted by a d iffid ence in the possibil ity Of conveyingthe exact meaning intended through the medium Of language .

It is the same feeling that promptsthe use of the words so

1 Upon thi s subject the reader shou ld refer to chapter x iii . of R . L.

Nettleship’

s Lectures onthe Republic of Plato7

Myths ofPlato.


to speak tomake a qualificationor to soften a strong word.

And how Often in any argument , at all abstruse,do we

not find ourselves , in despair of conveying our meaningin any other way, exclaim ing Let me put it to you in

a figure" This is the function of the myth in Plato ;it comes in to expound something which cannot adequately

be described in logical argument , something which trans

cende our ordinary categories of thought (it is expressed in

language ,of course , but it is picture-language) ; it is Plato

’s

means Of succeeding in the attempt which most of us give

up with the exclamation of “ I can feel it, but I can’t

explain it .” Professor Stewart 1 has well expounded this

Significance Of the 9000s: Plato,he says

,

“appeals to the

major part Of man’s nature which is not articulate and

logical , but feel s, and wills and acts— to that part whi ch

cannot explain what a thing is , or how it happens,but

feel s that a thing is good or bad,and expresses itself

,not

scientifically in ‘existential

’

or‘ theoretic judgments

,

’ but

practically in ‘ value-judgments’—or rather ‘ value-feel

ings Thi s effect which Plato produces by the Myth

in the D ialogue is , it is hardly necessary to say, produced

in various degrees by Nature herself, without the aid of

literary or other art. The sense of “m ight , majesty, and

dom inion” which comes over us aswe look into the depths

of the starry sky, the sense of our own Short time passing,passing, with which we see the lilacs bloom again- these

,

and many like them , are natural experiences which closely

resemble the effect produced in the reader’s m ind by Plato’s

art. When these natural mood s are experienced,we feel

“That which was, and is , and ever shall be ”overshadowing

l u The Myths Of Plato,” p . 21.



It is by means of the pesos that Plato sets forth his

inmost convictions about the soul and immortal ity ; in

the t d o,”for example , with its doctrine of ofipa

—that the body is a tomb withinwhich the soul is cabined,

cribb’

d,confined , bound in

” during its appearance on earth ,

clogged and impeded by all the material lim itations of

the corporeal,— the “ inte llectual arguments for its im

mortality are clinched,as it were , by the myth with which

the dialogue closes. In the “ Phaedrus ” the soul is d e

scribed as that which moves itself (re whosome xwoav) ,and its immortality can be “ intellectually deduced from

this defini tion ; for that which has “mechanical ” motion,

aswe say, whi ch is impelled by some other thing, and itself

imparts motion to a third thing ,may be conceived of as

ceasing to move ; but that which moves itself can never

cease tomove , for i t is the source Ofmotion (dPXfi Ktvrjc ews) .1

Such a source of motion can never have come into being,for everything that comes into be ing hashad a beginning,but the soul is itself the beginning (apxn

’

) of motion. Sim i

larly, it can never come to an end , for, if it ceased to be ,then everything in the world would cease moving. There

fore the soul is immortal . But such a proof leaves us rather

cold ; and sowe are made tofeel the immortality Of the soul

in the myth which follows , where in it is likened unto a

charioteer driving two winged horses. The myths usually

come at the end of the dialogues , for the Simple reason

that their function commences where that of émom'

uqends

when all that intellectual argument can d o has been done,

1 Thus, at last, is motion ex plained,after i t has troubled the history

of philosophy for so long. I t is found to be a spiritual thing ; nowonder , then, that it evaded all the efforts of the earlier materialis ticspeculations to account for it.

IDEALISTIC INTERPRETATION . OF UNIVERSE 101

then the myth comes in to make us feel what we have

been attempting to think fee l ing—asso Oftenwith Plato

comes in asa sort of guarantee of the t ightnessof thought .

The discourse of Diotima in the Symposium ,of which

the conclusion has already been quoted , is Of the nature

of a myth ; and we have also re ferred to the brief indica

tion of the platesin the “ Republic” by which it i s sought

to sanction the regime of the ¢6hax es. The most famous

of all is the myth of Er with which the Republic closes

Er is supposed to have been killed in battle , but , havingcome to life again when laid on the funeral pyre , be d e

scribes how his soul journeyed to the celestial region,where

he saw judgment given upon the different souls of men

according to the lives which they had led On earth . In

course of time they are summoned together to make fresh

choice of l ives , according as each would wish to be in his

second appearance upon earth . They appear before the

thrones ofthe Fates— those daughters of N ece ssity, Lachesis ,Clotho

,and Atropos—marshalled by a prophet who, taking

lots from the lap of Lachesis together with ensamples of

different l ives,bids the souls cast lots for the order of their

choosing and then choose, of the ir own free will , the kind

of life which they would like— d if fs. {hopé vow fleos d vafrtos.

The “ensamples " are Of all kinds— tyrannies fame asan

athlete or for personal beauty ; wealth and poverty ; health

and disease— and most of the souls choose a life asdifferent

aspossible from that which they experienced intheir previous

appearance upon earth . Thus Plato,while incidentally

animadverting upon the insubstantial ity of the commonly

rece ived opinions about human happiness,is really dealing

with the great problemof “ free wil l " -a problem about

which more convictionmay be gained by the adumbrations


Of a myth than from the most reasoned of dialectical argu

ments .

Most of the myths are,unfortunately

,rather too long for

quotatation in this book , but they have been collected , trans

lated ,and expounded by Prof. J .A . Stewart in his Myths of

Plato,to which we must refer the reader. But in order to

give some idea of their nature we append one of the Shorter

ones . It is the myth from the Protagoras” which deals

with such things as the ouvomwpo’

s of the mine and with

what constitutes the difference between man and the beasts

and makes for his kinship with the gods .

There wasonce a time when there were gods , but no race ofmorta ls.Now when the des tined time cam e for these too to be created

,the gods

fashioned them in the centre of the earth , with a m ix ture of earth and

fire and all the thingswhich fire and earth blend into. And when theywere ready to lead them up to the light , they ordered Prometheus andEpimetheus to furnish and distribute to each suitable powers Epime

theus begged Prometheus to let him make the distribution. When Ihave distributed them ,

” said he , you inspect them . Sowhenhe hadpersuaded him thus , he made the distribution. And in the distributionhe endowed some with strength without Speed , and those that wereweaker he furnished w ith speed : to some he gave arm s , and for thosethat were unarmed he contrived some other power which would keepthem safe to those whi ch he clothed in small bodies , he assignedwinged flight or a retreat under the earth those which he made largewere to be saved by their very size and SO with other things he madean equal distribut ion. H e devi sed things thus so that noone speciesshould disappear. Then whenhe had prov ided for them a means ofescape from each other’s slaugh ter , he contrived to give them com fortagainst the seasons sent by Zeus , by clothing them in thick fur and

tough Skins, su itable for keeping out the cold and the heat, and which ,when they sought S leep , would furnish for them their own natural bed :under the feet to some he gave hoofs , to others hair and tough bloodlessskin. Nex t he provided different nou ri shment foreach , for some the herbsofthe earth , forothers the frui ts of trees , for others roots and some the rewere whose food wasother animals. But these he afl i ic ted with barrenness in birth ; to their prey he gave fecundity , as a safeguard for the



the crafts. Shal l I then give reverence and j ustice to men in likemanner, or shal l I distribute them to all To all,

”answered Zeus :

let all have a share. Forotherwise ci ties could not ex ist, i f aswith thecrafts only a few had a share. Further, lay down this law from me

,

that he who cannot share in reverence and j ustice i s to be killed asapest to the city.” This i s the reason then, Socrates, why the Atheniansand others , whenever ski ll in carpentry or any other handicraft is inquestion, think that only a few are capable of advising, and i f any otherthan these few gives advice they will not l isten to him asyou say and

inmy opinion i t is quite natural. But when they come to de liberateupon political virtue, which depends entirely upon j ustice and moderation, they listen quite rightly to anyman, deem ing that it befits everyman to share in th is virtue without which there canbe no cities. This ,Socrates , isthe true cause of this fact (32008-323a3 ).

In dealing with a writer like Plato, especially when one

has in view readers such as those for whom this book is

primarily intended,one must be eclectic

,but one must try to

preserve something l ike a d ue balance in the exposition of

so many-sided an author. Nevertheless , most of the later

intellectual dialogues are quite unsuited for school read

ing, though they are,in some respects

,Plato

’s greatest

contribution to philosophy. They set forth the later devel

0pmentsof his epistemology, or science of knowledge , whi ch

is far too important to be entirely om itted here . But inorder

tomake a diffi cult subject more easy to follow we will , before

deal ing with our fourth , and last , aspect ofPlatonic doctrine ,make a brief survey of the development of philosophical

Speculation,especially with reference to its bearing upon

epistemology , from the earliest times of Thales up to the

point at which Plato takes up the development . We shall

thus be more readily able to understand the significance of

his contribution.

We saw at the beginning of this book how the first

attitude of man towards the external universe is what


we have called a theological interpretationof things . It m ight

equally wel l be called mythological, for it is largely the pro

duct of imagination,and is real ly prior to anything that can

rightly be called philosophy. It is soon felt tobe inadequate

for,in so far asit is an explanationof things at all , it is an

explanation in term s of. another world from this inwhich wel ive. Man wants an explanation of his everyday world , of

the things which he can touch and see ; and sowe get asour

first philosophical speculation a frank material ism,asseen in

the early Ionian philosophers . The diffi culty ofmaterialism

is that it cannot explainmotion the é’

mcpunsof“ the pairs

in Anaximander, the «Lin e ar; and d pafwms of Anaximenes,

are really tacit admissions of this difficulty. In Heraclitus

motion,though stil l unexplained , is everywhere— minor tel

“

.

This constitutes a complete breakdown of materialistic

monism ; and we see in Pythagoras and Xenophanes phil

osophy no longer confining itself to 1 6 fi g 6M; altos. Inci

dentally , it is Xenophanes who gives us the first real ly

philosophical speculations upon theology— he objects alike to

anthrOpomorphism and to polytheism ; and it is inhim that

the id ea of unity first becomes prom inent. The continual

flux ofphenomena according to the a dj/To. (Set theory, is such

that it becomes qui te impossible to predicate anything about

them the very possibility ofknowledge slips from our grasp.

But we doknow something about the world ; there is a certain

permanence and stability both inour knowledge and inthings.

Eleatic monism stresses this unity to the extent of denyingthe reality ofmotion, which it cannot explainonmaterialistic

suppositions . It is a unity,however, which belongs rather

to the sphere of 1 6 f t fiv etvm than to that of GM but there

is stil l an attempt to find an explanationwithin this sphere

though philosophy by nomeans confines itself thereto. Both


Empedocles and Anaxagoras , the one with his Love and

Strife,and the other with his vofis, bring into prom inence

what lay hid more or less in Anaximander and Anaximenes .

But material istic monism is hopeless ; sowe get a material

istic pluralism inthe atoms of Leucippus and D emocritus, by

whom what is reality is explained as something so entirely

different from our sense-presentations that we are driven to

reflect upon the nature ofour sense -perception. Up to this

point the ex ternal world had been taken,asit were

,d e facto

for granted, as being such as it is presented to us in sense

perception. But with the stage of reflection,to which

Eleaticism on the one hand and atom i sm on the other,have

driven us,we get a very clear distinction between sense-p er

cep tion and thought henceforth epistemology becomes the

main concernofphilOSOphy.1 It is realized that inmyattempt

to learn about the world I am,in some sense

,confined to the

Sphere ofmy own ideas . On what grounds can I say that

these ideas represent real ity ? What about illusion and

fallacy ? Of the twofaculties of sense-perceptionand thought

the latter is accepted assomehow the higher and less fallible

faculty ; hence comes a period of dialectical or eristic play of

thought, without any considerationof the truth, or otherwise ,of the data supplied by the senses . This is the age of the

Sophists,ofProtagoras W i th his mi vrwv pé

‘

rpov d veponros. NOW

in order to get over such extreme subjectivism we must ex

am ine thought and see what claim it hasto represent real ity.

When I reflect upon the phenomenal world presented tome

1 This is somewhat obscured by the predominately ethi cal interests ofSocrates , so that the theoryof cond uct, which is more interesting to theaverage man than i s epistemology, occupies the foreground for som e

tim e ; but philosophy returns inevitably to its natural deve lopment inP lato.



idea (iSéa , eiSos) . Thus any ind ividual chair, for example ,conforms to the general shape and design of the

“ idea of a

chair,”to that visionary patternwhich makes it more sui table

for sitting on thanfor packing books in ; or— anexample from

the moral sphere— anyact ofbravery is a Specific action, per

formed by an individual,in this place, and at this time , but the

quality which it exhibits passes beyond chronological and geo

graphical lim itations it is a general idea ,a universal notion, of

which my particular act of bravery is but one manifestation,here and now, one case out ofmany acts ofbravery. The rela

tion between the particular and the universal , betweenpheno

mena and the ideas , is variously expressed by Plato. At one

time phenomena are said to be representations (ptpfipa‘

ra)which participate in (pteréxer) the idea ; at other times the

idea is said “to be present in (wapeivm) the particular, and it

is al so Spoken of asthe archetype (fl apd betyua ) ofwhich the

particular is a cOpy.1 We must make allowances for the

d ifli culty of expressing a new philosophical conception in

language , especially inlanguage which hasnot yet developed

a technical phraseology. But there can be no doubt that

the Platonic “ idea corresponds,in many of its aspects , to

what is called , inmodern logic , the concep tornotion. Looked

at from one point of view, such a concept is gained by

abstractionfrom concrete particulars but from another point

ofview this is not so. Plato’s ibe'a t are said to exist apart

from,and prior to

,all concrete embodiment. It is because

the soul already knows the archetype that it can recognize

it in a concrete particular. Hence we see the connexion

between the doctrine of ideas and the doctrine that all know

1 Prof. Jacksonmaintainsthat these are not different ways of speaking of the same thing , and sees a development inPlato from an earl ier ,m imetic

,to a later (parad eigmatic ) theory of ideas.


ledge is recollection (steamers) . Let us examine this

doctrine . It Springs from the old Pythagorean be lief in

wahtyyeveoia and is associated in Plato both W ith the pre

existence of the soul and with its survival after death . But

there are two possible meanings of d vduvqmswhich it is im avo’

rjrvq

portant to distinguish. That “ knowledge is recollection” “ 9 °

maymean that I know a particular thing because I saw that

particular thing inmyprevious existence and now remember

it,much asPythagoras recognized the shield ofEuphorbus in

the temple where he had dedicated it. Inother words,I re

collect knowledge which I had acquired inmy pre-existence

through the ordinary human channel of atoq sof pheno

mena ; my portionof the waters ofLe the , that is to say, has

not been permanently effective . The reader wil l noti ce that

such an interpretation as this of the d vd py‘

qmsdoc trine is no

contribution to the theory of knowledge at all ; it only ex

plains my knowledge now by re ferring it back to a previous ,entirely sim ilar

,and unexplained knowledge on a different

occasion. But Plato obviously did mean it asa part of his

theory of knowledge. The second possible meaning of

recollection,

”and undoubtedly the one intended , and indeed

specifically described, by Plato, is that in the spiri t world , as

it were,the soul has seen the archetypes of things , and thus ,

when it enters into the human bod y it i s able to recognize

the things of which it has previously known those arche

types . It is thus that Platoexpresses symbolical ly that aspe ct

of the “ ideas ” inwhich they cannot be said to be derived

by generalization from concrete particulars . The m ind is

such as to be able to comprehend ideas , or, as Aristotle

would say, they exist in it potentially (Sowing ) though notactually (évepyeiq) . It is in this sense that the Platonic“ ideas are said to exist apart from any particular mani


festationof them . As we have already seen,in the simplest

act of perception there is an e lement contributed by the

subjective side , by the perce iving subject ; and in the

act of knowledge there is an “ interpretation”ofwhat is

presented by the senses .1 Sim ilarly with the “ ideas of the

moral virtues ; we may be said to know them when we“ interpret ” them correctly and can see them in all their

bearings , refer them to their correct places in the system,

giving them their right values in relation tothe whole of

human conduct. As Prof. Stewart says,

“ to find the 5281] of

the moral virtues is “to exp lain the moral virtues by ex

hibiting each in its special context—by assigning to each its

Special place and use in the‘

social system .

‘ Context

grasped ,’ scientific point of view taken,

’

ciSosdiscovered— these are equivalent

There is another aspect of the Platonic ideas—what Prof.

Stewart calls their “aesthetic ” aspect— in which the eiSos

appears as an object of rapt contemplation when we are

brought face to face with the very Presence ofBeauty. Com

pare what was said above about the love of beauty in the

quotation from the Symposium ,and that “ transcendental

feeling’

to which the pfieos appeals. But it would only

confuse the issue to describe this aspect at length here .“

This doctrine of ideas will be seen to contain a solutionof

the previous difficulties about the One and the Many, and

gives a clear and intell igible meaning to that“ unity am id

diversity which we have mentioned before . It is Plato’s

great contribution to the theory of knowledge and plays a

prom inent part in the metaphysical speculations of his later

critical ” or“ inte llectual dialogues , such as the “Par

1 See above , p . 52. 2Plato’s “Doctrine of Ideas,” p. 7.3 Cf. alsothe “ contemplation of instancesabove , p. 82.



entirely upon the meaning attached to the pe aktyou. Doe s

this only amount to a judgment about the trueness ofthe

Opinion? If so,it does not help at all, forwe have decided

that judgment ” is no criterionof truth . If, on the other

hand,the hdyosisknowledge , thenwe are arguing in a circle.

W ith this the dialogue ends,without

,asis so frequent with

Plato, a definite answer being given to all the diffi culties

raised ; but it hastaught us that émorfiuqis neither sensa

tionnor the independent activity of the m ind.

CHAPTER VI

ARISTOTLE AND THE TELEOLOGICAL CONCEPTION OF

THE UNIVERSE

RISTOTLE (384-322 wasnot anAthenianby birth , Life.

having been born at Stagira, a Greek colony in Thrace .

But he came to Athens when barely an zcuBos, and studied

under Plato for nearly twenty years . Upon the latter’s

death in 347 he left Athens,and subsequently became

,

at the request of Philip of Macedon,tutor to his young son

Alexander, the boywhowasto become famous as Alexander

the Great. WhenAlexander set out upon his great Persian

expedition in 335 B .C .,Aristotle returned to Athens

,where

he taugh t, until shortly before his death ,at the Lyceum .

There could scarcely be a greater difference of style thancon

that which exists betweenPlato and Aristotle,the one almostga

g

ged

a philosophical dreamer,the other a

“h ard intellectualist. Plato

Plato’s human interest is , aswe have remarked , indicated by

the very form of his writings— that of the dialogue ,peopled ,

as it always is with him,by very real and often by very

lovable personce. In the words of a great adm irer of thi s

aspect of him :1 “ If Plato did not create the Socrates

’

of

his D ialogues ,’

he has created other characters hardly less

life-l ike. The young Charmid es, the incarnationof natural,asthe aged Cephalus ofacquired temperance his Sophoclean

1Wal ter Pater inhis Plato and Platonism ,p . 129.

113


amenity ashe sits there pontifi cally at the altar,in the court

of his peaceful house ; the large company, of varied character

and of every age , which moves in those‘ Dialogues ,

’ though

stil l oftenest the young in all their youthful l iveliness

who that knows them at all can doubt Plato’

s hold on

persons, that of persons on him? Sometimes,even when

they are not formal ly introduced into his work,characters

that had interested , impressed , or touched him ,inform and

colour it , asif with the ir personal influence,showing through

what purports to be the wholly abstract analysis of some

wholly abstract moral s ituation.

” There is nothing of this

sort inAristotle,who did not favour the dialogue form . His

teaching isset forth in a series of reasoned treatises,of set

hand-books upon ethics,politics , or metaphysics.1

I. The E thicsof Aristotle— One of the most prom inent

features ofAristotelian doctrine is the conceptionof 1 6 7 0 mg ,

1Not only is Aristotle ’s philosophy ex pounded in a seri es of settreatises , but it i s often put in very techni cal language. As instancesof this we may adduce1 . Kurt; c upBeBrjx és, or accidenta l thi s is opposed to a

’a im-6 for

ex ample , i f a manwho i s a musician builds a house , thenhe does soKaro. c upBeBni ,

he need not necessarily , or indeed usually , do so.S im ilarly a sculptor , for example , may be accidentally bald.2. d vaym

‘

iov ég tw osom e , or hypothetically necessary, i .s. a pre

requisite for something e l se desi red ; a sine qua non, or, as Ari stotlehimsel f defines it , div d vev Tod yaeov uhi vSe

'

xe'ra t fi d ramfl yevéa

'ea t , e.g.

if an ail ing man wants to get wel l i t is d vaym‘

tov srtaroOéo-ws to takemed icine , though taking m edicine is nonecessary part of heal th.3. Sw ain“ (potentia lly) isopposed to évepyeiq. (actually) . A child i s

potentially an adult, because it has the power (Si yanis) of developingintoone . Sim i larly a manwho knows how to play the harp is évepyetq.a harp-player only when doing so.4 . e psn pov Tfi¢6<Tfl ,

or logicallyprior. The whole i s logically priorto i ts parts , though it maynot be prior in time. In taking a railwayjourney my destination islogical ly prior tomy departure from home.



fe llow-men,honour (nail) or worthiness fd penfi) seems to be

the chief good , much asit is to-d ay for the man whose ideal

in l ife is to become a town-councillor, or mayor of his city.

But the aim of the highest or eewp‘

q‘

rtkos B ios—the life of

Speculation— is stamped e ,a term which it will be ourbusiness

to explain later. We can see at once,however, that nut]

will not do asa conception of the good ,”for we desire to

be honoured not for anything or by anyone, but by discerningpeople (oi opé mpot) , and for our good qualities (e

’

rr’

M ) .

It is nopleasure tome tobe respected by small boys,because

I carry a“ swagger cane

,or have a fine

,silkenmoustache .

not nyai . And there is a further objection to taking rqnjas“ the good ,

”

for it seems to belong rather to the personwhohonours than

to the person honoured (80e yap é v‘ro

'

isnud e ; pakhowei va t i)Ev 7 6}

‘npwpé vcp,“ E thics ,

”1095b

,whereas my good

must be something which is essentially m ine,something

Which no one can take from me (oix e'

i d v T I. x ai Suc a¢afperov) .1

nor d pefi j.Nor can it be d penj, for a good man maym eet with great

m isfortune,or he may be virtuous and yet inactive or asleep

all his life . Now we must make our inquiry in a practical

way, and avoid all such highly abstract conceptions asthe

Platonic iSé a ‘

rd yaOoG we may be able to make our way up

to some general principle, but we must start from palpable

facts and proceed inductively (Eni. Tag d pxds) . The“

good”

of every art and of everything else is of: xd pw 1 6. tome

upd'

rre‘

ra t,i.s. ToTéhos, so that if there is any 70mg of all that

1 The idea isthe same asthat wh ich made Socrates (see above , p. 67)say that no evil can befal l a good man so long as he remains such.The human“

good is a disposition of the soul , which renders a man

happy, nomatterwhat adventi tious circumstancesmay d o. Cf.Henley’sI am the captain of my soul ,

”and Epictetus passim. Aristotle ’s

doctrine is , however, a modification upon the ex trem e idealism of

Socrates , as appears inthe remark immediately fol lowing about ape-h i.

TELEOLOGICAL CONCEPTION OF UNIVERSE 1 17

man does,of all 1rpax

'

rd , this Wi ll be re a pe x-rowd yaedv, aswas

said before . Al l are not the same in kind ; some,for

example,are subordinate to others , mere 3pyava , such asflutes

or wealth. The raw; of the art ofthe flute -maker is flutes,

but these are mere instruments of happiness in the hands of

the flute-p layer ; wealth ,though pursued by many people as

though it were anend in life,is merely ameans to enjoyment

,

and— asindeed we often,or rather

,always

,see in the case

of those who d onot realize that it is a mere means— may con

ceivably fai l to bring what we desire . Our good must be

no such means ; it must be final and complete in itsel f

(réhetov) , something which is chosen for its own sake . This

is,somewhat dogmatically

,here stated to be cota ipovfa ,

which

is selfssufficing (adrapx r'

js) and is something which cannot be

equated with other goods”

(p i; auvaptOpouném) and such a

quality is necessary in the final good which we are seeking,for otherwise the least additionofany other good thing would

make it more desirable,so that it would no longer, in itself ,

be of; mi vr’

éofera t . But before we can fully comprehend the

nature of eGSa tpovfa we must make a long investiga tion with

the object of obtaining a more precise definition of it . Now

the good of a thing always lies in itsfunction,1and so we The

may begin by asking What is the"function ofman? It i s

not simply l ife,for that he shares with the vegetableKilian.

kingdom ; nor is it conscious or percipient l ife ,for that is

commontoall animals but manis a rational being, an active

agent , and sowe may define his function as an activity of

the soul inaccordance with reason (tuxfig é ve’

pyeta Ka‘rd Nyoy) .

Man’

s life is the highest type of the three1 . f] Ope

‘m’

tkfi Kai a tgqm fi leq(common tomanand plants) .

1A principle which Aris totle owed to his biological studies.


2. f] a iobnnx i] Loot, (common to all animals) .

3 . (gun'

j) npaxnxr’

, 7 06 hdyov 3xowos(peculiar to man) .

But the function of a thing is done well when it is done in

accordance with the proper excellence («are n‘

qv oinefav d pefi jv)of that thing. Hence we can define man

’s good as419x519

é ve’

pyeta x a'

r’

d pe'

rfiv. Perhaps we Should ad d é v Bit? Tehe iq» ,for a manmust live a reasonable length of time inorder to“real ize him self

,

”aswe say, and he must be adequately

supplied with the xopqyia of virtue.

As this is one of the most important portions ofAristotle’s

ethical d octrine we will quote what he says

Nowperhaps to cal l the Good etSa tuovfa. seems one ofthose pointsuponwhich all wou ld agree , but its nature nee ds defining a l it tle moreclearly. We m ight d o this by defining the functionof man. For as

with the flute player and with the sc u lptor and with every artis t—and

indeed wi th all whohave functions and are concerned with action—iti s adm i tted that the good and ex cellence of a thing rests in the workdone , so i t would seem tobe with man

, if he hasany parti cular function.

Now are there particular functions and actions ofa carpenter and a shoemaker, and yet none of man

,but he i s by nature funct ion-less ? Or,

ju st asthe eye , and the hand , and the foot , and every m ember of thebody generally hasi ts peculiar function, so i s there a defini te functionbeyond all these which one could ascribe toman What then can thi sbe ? Life appears commontoplants [aswell astoman] , and we are in

search of a function pecu liar toman. We must therefore dismi s s thel ife ofnourishment and growth. Nex t wou ld be percipient life , whichal so seem s common to horses and ox en and all animals. There i s lefta li fe consisting in the actionof the rational part. This part is twofold—asobeying reason, and aspossessing and ex ercising reason. And ,

as there are two possible ways of possessing and ex ercising reason,

” 1

we must take for our defini tion the active sense , for this seems thehighest sense. So i f the function of man i s an act ivity of the soulaccording to reason,

or not Wi thout reason,

2and i f we say that the

1 I .o., asa state and asa function.

2“ weM yov seem s to mean under the control of an inward reasonactual ly residing inthe individual , while pal; d Myov means inobedience to the dictates of anex ternal reason.



our soul (x dpm t 8’

eiolv ai x a '

r’

d pe‘

rfiv é vépy’

eta t‘

rfisefifimpovfas,

Ethi cs,l lOOb

,and cannot be brought about by ad venti

tious circum stances. H e adm its,however, that we cannot d o

without favourable circumstances (dxlvi. wpoaSeim t 1 ozie [se .

Tuxov] 6 d vepa'

mwos Small m isfortunes will have l ittle or

no effect uponus ; but a big one wi ll have , blacause it impedes

our activities (ép fl obfget q a'

ig é vepyefa ts) . But,even so,

there is a certain moral grandeur in a man's “ bearing up ,

”

aswe say, under adversity ; his true worth shines out even

in such circum stances (Stak i pm'

et Tox aké v) for the efi8afpmv is

no chame leon-like person (woud kos Kai edpe'

rdfiolxos) , takinghis character from external ruxa i.

The Moral At the commencement of the second book ofhis “ EthicsVirtues .

Aristotle begins his account ofthe moral virtues (fifi mal d pem i)and asks whether they are implanted in us by nature or

whether they are acquired . The answer is that they

are acquired , for that which exists 4mm cannot be changed

by habituation and training Nature gives us

the capacity for acquiring them,and this capacity is

developed by training. As proof that there are no innate

apen i we have only to consider the d ifference between the

moral virtues and those things which we d o possess

was . In such cases,the faculties of sight and hearing

for example , we have the faculty (d ap i g) first and ex

bibit the é vépyeta t later no one sees or hears before he has

eye s or ears . But we acquire virtue by d oing virtuous deeds ;the virtuous condition (sag) is produced inus by our actions

according asour actions are , such does our character become

Character (e’

x Té‘

wopofwv é vepyeté‘

wa i Egg syfvorra t, Ethics,

"1103b, 21) a

I) eter

m ined by maniswhat he does. If our actions 1 (mi d gets) , then, determ ineActions.

1 Not every action is , of course, a «passor moral act. Putting on

my boots in the morning is an action,but it isnot a «pass; i t hasno

TELEOLOGICAL CONCEPTION OF UNIVERSE 121

our characters , it is important to define what these should

be . We may say two things about them : (1) They should

observe the mean (KaTd. fewapeay Myov)— compare the modern

precept,

“moderation in all things” —f0r excess and defect

are alike bad ; the peodfi ] ; is good. (2) They are in a way

both cause and effect of the i ts, e .g. by be ing temperate we

can abstainfrom pleasures,and by abstaining from pleasures

we become temperate ; by taking much nourishment we can

endure toi l , and by enduring toil we be come strong. The

test of the format ionof a 8g ; rests in the pleasure, or pain,

accompanying the act. If a man is happy in abstainingfrom bodily pleasure

,thenhe is M y but , if m iserable , he

is d x ékac fos. Consequently, as Plato said , a man should be

trained from youth to find his pleasures and pains in the

right objects (xa ipew 7 6 not Xum ioflm and he must

choose those objects of deliberate purpose (wpoa ipems) . Virtue 8.

There is no moral value in a good ac t done accidentally zMean'

it must be intentional (é x wpompéows) . Combining these

two characteristics— that it must be intended and that it

must avoid extremes— we get a definitionof moral virtue as

é’

fitg upoa tpe‘nx l) é v pea émn 06cm . This i s What i s meant

when we say that Ari stotle regarded the moral virtues as

means between two extremes. Consider the following table .

Sometimes the abstract quality is given, and sometimes the

personwho exhibits the quality. It has been thought well

to retain Aristotle’

s exact words,even when there is in

Greek an abstract noun for the adjective he used .

moral significance and does not help to d etermine my character ; it is amomentary action without any permanency of value . Moral actions

,

onthe contrary , are not over and done with as soon ascompleted ; infact , their significance begins upon their completion, or

— to put i t

grammatical ly- they belong to the Perfect and not to the Aori st tense .


Sfisu

gsav

fi

dw

bad

éuna

3

a

nn

e

seo

é

dw

b

abw

du

bd‘

mwh—E



The first kind Of ignorance , that which produces an uncon

scious act,is anignorance Of the things and persons affected

by the act,not an ignorance Of the nature of the act itself. It

is a particular” ignorance (of circumstances , f, a

’

gnacr‘

ra ayvora ,and not a general ignorance (i; Kaeékou dyvora)

Of the principles involved . Hence Aristotle defines a

“ voluntary act”as that which originates in oneself

,hav

ing knowledge of the circum stances (of: 1] d pxi] é v aura? eiSén

7 anaO’

gxao‘

ra) . Seeing that moral actions are concerned with

peod‘

rn‘

res, which are the Object Of our will and choice

(upoa ipea ts) , both v irtue and vice depend upon ourselves .

The proverb O t’

ibeis é x d wwompbs 068’

61w pax d ptos is partly

false and partly true it may be objected that a man’s char

acter is such astobe bad , therefore he cannot be blamed evenfor actions of which the find, is in him self. But a man is

responsible for his character, having made it such by his re

peated é vépyewu.

It will be noticed that there is nomentionof am m tmthe moral virtue par ex cellence, one might think— ln the above

Si aypaofi. This is because Justice is with Aristotle,asit was

with Plato,not a particular moral virtue , but co-extensive

with the whole of virtue . It is,in fact

,the highest expression

of virtue— f] Teketa d perfifi the realized é'gisOf d pe‘n

'

] inman’s

dealings with his fellow-men. It is essentially fl pOg Erepov, a

xpfimsTfis d pe‘

rfis. There is,however

,a more limited sense

of the word Smawmim,according towhich it is a particular ”

virtue , and is the Opposite ofni eovegta } Thisjustice is equi

valent to what we mean by assigning to a man his d ue,

”in

accordance with his worth (x ar’

agia v) and,just aswe speak

of doing unto others as we would be done by,

”so 7 6

1The word isnot used by Aristotle.

. TELEOLOGICAL CONCEPTION OF UNIVERSE 125

d wm euovOOs—in the sense of Ta dwm ei rovfiéva t,suffering one

self what one hasinfl icted onothers—is an essential part Of

justice in its retributive aspect . But it is not so auras, with

out qualification,without taking into account all the circum

stances , the motive both Of the wrong-doer and Of society in

exacting retribution from him . As Prof. Stewart 1 comments

Rece iving the same in return is an erroneous account of

distributive justice,because in it the dividend which a man

receives d ‘n'o7 06 norm ? is not the same in kind asthe contribu

tion which he makes to the common capital e .g. the

musician is not paid in music,but in money according to

his skill . It is al soanerroneous account Of corrective justice ,because it makes punishment merely a matter Of immediate

personal revenge , ignoring the intere sts Of society, which d e

mand the establishment Of an impartial court able to take ao

count Of the position and circumstances of the parties as

members of the State,and to estimate carefully degrees of

responsibil ity. These considerations caused Aristotle to d e

fine it,not asrt d wureuovOOQ alone , but asTodwmm ovfid g new

"

d wakoyiav, i .e . the suffering of somethingwhich is not id entical

with what I have inflicted onanother,but somethingwhich is ,

inme, equivalent to the injury which I have caused ,

not only

in another individual,but

,possibly

,in soc iety asa whole .

Aristotle arrives at his account of eGSa ipovia asthe good «$80v{a

ofmanby exam ining the doctrine ofEudoxus , whomaintainedLeil

a,

that pleasure (fibovfi) is the Good ,in that it is 06 min

"

é tbie ra t ,

and if added to any other good (upocm eepém) it makes it

more desirable . But Plato used exactly this argument to

prove that floon‘.is not the Good , and we have already ad

m itted that it must be pi] aumptepoupém,something Which

1 Notes onNicomacheanEthics ,” Vol. I. p. 445 .


cannot be equated with other goods. Moreover,there are

different kinds of pleasure ; they are qualitatively different

(Si actépouaa i up eta ) , some better thanothers , which implies

a criterion beyond that of pleasure itself. This standard is

supplied by the character of the good man, the n ouoa

’

ios.

The fact that man is not mere sensibility,that his life is

upon-rind ] u s1 00 hOyov e

’

s’

xowosand not the mere ( 116 9111 1iis a sufficient refutation of Hedonism. There are pleasures

of the SOll l— lllux tkal fiSova i—aswell aspleasures Ofthe body,

owpanxal fiSova i, which are very di fferent inkind if they are

both pleasures they cannot differ in “ pleasurableness,

”

but must d o so invirtue Of some other quality. The best Of

them resides in the unimpeded activity Of man’

s highest

faculties ; thi s, and this alone,constitutes eGSatuovia or

Happiness. It belongs to the Oeapnnxts B log , to the l ife of

contemplation, which is the end and aim Ofall our activities

that cultivated leisure inwhi ch a man finds expressionof his

finest self,the goal of all his efforts ; aaxoxott eea yap i va

axokd gwpev. This ideal of humanlife is described by Aristotle

as the effort to become as immortal as possible,é¢

’

Sorov

é vbéxera t d eava‘

rilew. By this he means something different

from the Christian idea of immortality, which, whatever its

nature , is certainly concerned with our l ife beyond the grave.

Aristotle ’s immortality is here and now ; it is that real iza

tion Of ourselves as,in some sense , divine, those moments of

transcendental feeling towhich Plato appeals inhisMyths,

that uplift Of the soul which we feel when brought fac e to

face with the very Presence of Beauty which Diotima d e

scribes in the Symposium'

ofPlato it is,aswe find in the

paraphrase of Eudoxus , the contemplationand service ofGod— 1

'OV 95 6V Oepa'n'e i

i

ew Kai Oewpe'

iv. We conclude this sectionon

Aristotle’

s “ Ethics ” with his descriptionof this “ life



pol itical science , and we Obviously desire i t asbeing di fferent . If thenOfactions in accordance with virtues

,the poli ti cal and m i li tary exce l

inbeauty and greatness , but are themsel ves void of lei sure , aim ing at

some ex ternal end and not desirable for their own sakes , whi le the

activi ty of the intel lect , which is contemplation,seem s to ex cel in in

tensity and to aim at nothing beyond itself, and to have a pleasure of itsown—this helps to increase the activity—together with independenceand leisure and , humanly speaking, indefatigability, and all the other ingred ients of blessedness which are seen to belong to thi s activity, i tfollows that thiswil l be man

’s perfect happiness , so long asthe full spanof l ife is granted. For no part Of happiness is imperfect. Such a

life may seem more than human ; for a manwill not live this lifequaman

, but in virtue of some divini ty within him ; but in proportion as

this di vine part ex cel s man’s concrete nature , its ac tivity ex cels the

activi ties Of the other virtues. If then intellect is a divine thing in com

pari sonwith a man,the intellectual l i fe isal so divine in comparison

with human l ife. We ought not, as some advi se , to entertainhuman

thoughts because we are human,or mortal thoughts because we are

mortal , but so far asmay be to put Off our mortal ity and make everyeffort to live in accordance with the best that i s within us. Though itbe small in bulk, it far ex cels all our other faculties in power and valu e.And it i s thi s part which would seem to be our real selves , for it is theru ling and better part. It would be absurd for a man to choose the lifeof som e other thing, and not the l ife of that which is himself. Whatwassaid before will hold good here too; for that whi ch is peculiarlysuited to each by nature isthe highest and most pleasu rable thing foreach ; consequently for man the inte llectual l ife is the most pleasureable

,if intellect be the chief mark of man. And so this life is also the

happiest (1177a ,12—1178a,

II. The Poli ticsofAristotle —All students OfGreek history

know that the “ city-state (mine) is a peculiarly Greek

institution historical ly considered it is a union Of “ village

communities ,’

a ouvom apos Of Kaua i , which are collections

of fam ilies . This is how it com es into being,1 i ts apxi] rfis

xwfioems. For the sake Of protection against wild animal s 2

1 Theseus , for example , is said to have made the o-w omwptSsof

Athens.2Of. the myth from the Protagoras , above , p. 102.


and , possibly, the attacks of his fellows , prim itive man

banded him self together in these Kaua i ; then,as civilization

advanced , the needs of commerce and the convenience of

social intercourse led to the further “ banding together of

the «this. But this util itarian Origin does not explain its

real significance ; for that we must look at i ts 7 0Ti fiv ei va i .

What is it essentially ?“It “ comes into be ing

”aswe have

described ; but it exists , or“ is

,

”asthe environment within

which man can realize himself as capable of a life higher

than that of the brutes—ytyvoire'

v'

qpé v TOG {fir dream , ofiaa 82

7 00 a fl u is how Aristotle describes it . Man i s endowed

with a political”nature

,which can only be realized in the

i rons; he is a nohtnxdv tiger. The “ final cause (Ta00Zvexa)of the is the realizationofman

’s essential nature , and

in our exam ination Of a thing we must never neglect thi s“ cause "— 6pi§era t yd p i x am ov rig» n

’

het. A lthough , then,

historically considered,the individual exists prior to the

institution Of the wdhts, the M tg is , logically considered ,“

prior to the individual , as that which is assumed by , or in

volved in, his existence (wpdvepov ‘

rfi (Maul M tg fi Oix ia x ai.

Em a csstay) . This is how Aristotle describes it

Since we see that every State is a communi ty, and that every community isestablished for some good (forall men d o everything that theyd o for the sake ofwhat seems to them to be good) , i t is clear that allcommuni ties aim at some good , and that the comm uni ty whi ch is thehighest Of all and includes the res t does so in particular , and aims atthe highest good of all. And this iswhat we call a S tate or poli ticalcommuni ty.

As to its size, we are told that it must be ne ither too large

nor too small,neither men nor 10

,but such ascan

1 This word hasvarious meanings inAri stot le ; here it means in the

essential nature Ofa thing as considered under the aspec t of 7 6 v i fivelves.

9

Plato’sRepubl ic oritic ized .

ThreeTypes ofConstitu

tions.


readily be taken in at a glance (efiud vom -o

'

s) by which Aristotlereal ly means that it must not be too vast for a man to “ find

him self ” readily within ; it must not overwhelm him,but

simply provide the environment that gives adequate scope

to his personality. In accordance with his usual plan,of

considering first the opinions of others, Aristotle is led ,be

fore recounting his own ideas,to an exam ination Of the

“ Republic ” of Plato,and makes some adverse criticisms

uponthe community of wives , of children,and of property

,

which is there advocated. Plato advocated the community

ofwives and children for the sake of the unity of the State

but excessive,literal unity is inconsistent with the nature of

a “this, which is a xowwviu of a plurality Ofdifferent elements,

kept together by the bond of reciprocal ” equal ity , i .s. by

an equal ity which takes account of the different services Of

different ind ividuals to the State . Excessive unity (ToMow

é vofiv Tip' mikw) does not recognize these variations, and is

,

therefore , bad . . Moreover, the abolition of the fam ily will

result in there being less (bthta in the State,and this is

necessary for the inculcating Of Obedience and the avoidance

of revolution. The community of property may sound an

ideal thing ; nowa ‘

rd.ma y,as the proverb says , but there

are many practical diffi culties involved . W ithout private

property one cannot show favour to friends , or give help to

strangers , and its existence encourages self-control (owdapomim)in abstaining from what is another

’s and generosity

(éheueeptd f ‘

qs) in deal ing with one’s own goods. It would

therefore seem best tohave personal property but a common

use Of it, whatever thi s maymean.

An ex am inat ion of the different constitutions which have

actually been established in such places as Crete,Sparta

,

and Athens , leads to the elucidation of three different types



uoht ‘reia Which is called wol d-refer simply , than to the meaningof the nape

’

KBacns, 8npoxparia .1

Its characteristics are given as,

firstly,the election by lot

to all Offices in the State from among the whole body of the

people without any consid eration of a man’s qualifications

for an Office,and

,secondly , the paym ent of m embers for

their services. Freedom (ekeueepia) is supposed tobe its basis

(uwéeemg) but it is a base kind Of freedom ,the freedom to d o

as one likes (ToLfiv (tsBOJXe‘

ra i u s) , which ,among modern

writers , Matthew Arnold in his Culture and Anarchy ”has

exposed asno true freedom at all. True freedom takes into

account differences Ofworth 2 it is not merely numerical,or

“ quantitative,

” but “ qualitative whereas the exeueepca

Which is the 6111595 0 19 ofSnpoxpa ‘

ria is non" d pieuc‘

w dhlxd pi] Ka i"

d fia v. It comprises no right conceptionof equality ; because

the Sfiuog is equal ” inone respect (the freedom to live) , it

claims equality in all respects,just as oligarchs, because

unequal in one respec t (wealth) , claim inequality,i .e .

superiority , in all.

In determ ining what is the best State for ordinary citizens—not

,perhaps

,the ideal State, but the best that is practically

possible— we must be guided by our conception Of what is

the best life. In the“ Ethics we saw that this consists Of

é vépyeta t x a‘

r’

d perfiv, and that d pe'

rfi,is a 11 6 067 119 ; if this is

1 Compare Plato, above , p. 96.2Compare the Ari stoteli anidea Ofdistributive J ustice as proportional

equality ,”not simple equal ity

,for the bettermani s worthy of the bet ter

hire. “ What i s distributively j ust ” may be ex pressed by a fourfoldratio, or d vakoyia , inwhich twoterms represent things (or rewards) andtwo others the persons who are entitled to those things , a :Bzzy 8.

The reward or the remuneration y is to the reward or remuneration 8asthe person a is to the personB, and he who contribute s more to thewelfare of the State is j ustly entitled to a greater share in the benefitsof the State.


true Of the individual,it must apply also to States ; for the

State or “ constitution (R OM-reia) is only an embodiment of

the life of the mime— fl yap uohi reia B iosrig e’

a‘

ri uohewr —an

expression Of the principles upon which it is organized , just

as the itself is an embodiment of the lives of the

individuals within it, the environment within which alone

they can “realize themselves. Our ethical ” conclusions

,

then, will apply to our politics. Now of the three classes

Of “

goodsj’

1. 7 6. em ; ayaea (ex terna l goods, such aswealth)2. Ta é v autumn (bod i ly goods, such ashea lth)3. Td év Tfi 4’Uxf] (moral, intellectual, and sp iritual good s)

we have seen that external goods are only“ useful ” (xpfimpa ) ,

mere means to an end . It is only the goods Of the soul that

are ends in themselves, and the goods of the three classes

stand in the same relation to themselves— are in the same

scale ofvalue— asdothe things ofwhich they are the goods .

For example,class (3) is as superior to class (2) as the soul

is superior to the body ; and the best life is the B ios per‘

dpfl'

fis, with just that provision (xop'

qyia ) of external goods

which is necessary for its proper realization in external

upd §e ts. The “ ideal State , then,i s that inWhich edba tpovia.

can find expression. Not all the prerequisite e lements of the

State will necessarily have a share in the polity— some things

are merely avuyxaiu a; successes,“necessary in the sense

that we cannot d o without them ,but not entering essentially

into the To 7 5fiv elven. of a thing.

1 Such things are no more

parts of a State than a chise l is Of a statue , or than anyother

means is a part Of the final cause (76 06 Emma) . We must,

for example,have slaves to perform the menial work

,for we

1 Thus some proportionof 7 a£10n ayaea, for ex ample , is d vaynuiovlg{m oeéo'

ewsin the life of the cia8a tpew.


cannot have our citizens Spending their lives in such things

(06 yap Sci d auoov Biov Lfiv 7 009 uohiras) .

In the final portion of his “Politics Aristotle insists upon

the importance of education. 1 080 11101401, although ,perhaps

,

not entirely independent of 7 5. emasawed , is not determ ined

by them ; as with man,so with States

,i t is énwnjunand

upoa ipemswhich make them good or bad . A man becomes,

or is,a good man (0 11 owing to three things—odors

(his natural endowment) , 200g (habituation,or training) , and

luSyos (reasoning) . Of these three elements 4160 19 is a factor

in determ ining the character of beasts , 2901; also, with some

animal s ; but Myog is the peculiarly human factor. Of thetwo parts of the human soul

,the rational and intellectual

(faAcyov 3xoy a’

0161-6) and the volitional (rt 16W ominouov) ,the first determ ines the for the second , for the inferior

always exists for the sake of the superior,war for the sake of

peace,a xons for the sake of examand , indeed, all d vayx aia

Kai xpficnua for the sake of ‘

rd. m ad . The law-

giver must

consider all these things , but especially Ta x akd , and educa

tion must look to this. The Spartan is an example Of the

neglect of this principle ; being trained only for war, he fails

when not at war, 06 Suvduevos axokdgew. Education must

therefore be a State affair, for it is too important to entrust

to private enterprise . Aristotle lays down a fourfold cur

riculum

1 . ypapuafl m’

]

2. t vpavmfi3 . f] poum xfi4 . fi yupvacrrimj

of which the last is directed towards the production of

bravery (d pe ia)— the essentially manly qual ity- and must

not,therefore , have its efforts baulked by any efi

'

eminacy



Long ago the Sophists taught us— byimplicationand criticism

rather than by explicit teaching— that in our search for

knowledge we must not take (bawojusva for granted ; they are ,in some sense

,relative to a percipient subject ; there is a sub

jective aswell asan objective factor in all knowledge. We

must therefore not only direct our gaze towards the external

universe,but also turnour eyes inward uponourselves. We

must be mindful ofWhat isman? Just as all objects are

combinations ofmatter (6M) and form soman him

The Soul. self is a compound nature a union ofmatter

and form,of body and soul , and of these two it is the soul

that gives to man his real significance. We are alread y

familiar with the Aristotelian doctrine that the inferior exists

for the sake of the superior ; if then the soul is superior to the

body,the latter maybe said to exist for the sake ofthe former.

In other words,the soul is the “ final cause ”

of the body ;and it is also its “

efficient cause,

”for the body is set in

motion by it.1 Moreover,it is al so the “ formal cause

Ti fiv £IVGL2—Of the body, that whi ch , aswe have just said ,

gives tomanhis real significance. The soul is Spiritual , inthe

sense that the body is material ; a l iving body is very different

from the most life-like statue a statue mayhave the external

form of the human body,but it has not that whi ch gives

real significance to the body, that which it essentially is it

hasnot got soul , Which is the To ‘

ri fiv Given. of the body, as

Aristotle says inhis Metaphysics ,”or the “

actuality ” of the

body (éwehexeia 1 00 ooLm-os) , as he puts it in the present

treatise .

Now can we give any scientific account of this “ soul

1 “Motion is not only spatial change , but includes quantitative

growth and al so qual i tative development.2 “Metaphysics , l035b, 16.


It may be regarded under three aspects, or as having three

parts.” 1

l . 1 6 9 p e 1r 1 I. x o’

v Commontoplants, animals , and men.

2. 1' 6 o. i 0' 9n1

'

l. x o’

v- Commontomanand all animals Itis sometimes called Taopexnxov, because

“per

ception” produces desire ; desire i s

impossible without arsena ls. Sometimes also

the phrase xw'

qnxov x a'

rd 7 61m is used to d e

scribe that which i s common toman and most

animal s.

3 . To S t a v oqn x o'

v Peculiar toman.

The identity of this table with the corresponding goal

which we saw at the beginning of the Ethics ” will not os

cape notice.

We need say nothing about the “nutritive part of the arc ane “.

soul ; but 1 5 a ioeqnxo’

v calls for a few remarks,for it involves

an exam inationof sense-perception in a waymore akin to

ourmodern associations of the wordpsychology thandoes anything else in the account so far givenofthe soul . The nature

of steam ,says Aristotle, is not properly understood in the

popular View,which regards i t as a form of transformation

(dhhofwm g) involving passive impression (rsud axewf. But

we must distinguish two senses of mi crxew : i t may involve

the destructionof a thing by something which is the opposite

of it,aswhen pleasure banishes sorrow from the m ind , or

health disease from the body or i t may involve the mod ifica

tion only of a thing, and such modification may amount

1 Aristotle understood Plato tomake anactual, and not merely logical,divisionof the soul into three parts , bu t him self guards against such ami sapprehension in the words MY? p é vov xwpur rtiv.

1 The reader will recal l the early Empedoclean theory of«imippom t

which impinge uponthe eye and make us perceive l ike by l ike (seeabove, p.


to the bringing to full development of something which

was latent in the one body until aroused into actuality

by the actionof the other, somethingwhich previously existed

potentially (Suvd p et) , but not actually (é vepyefq. or éwehexe iq) .

This is the distinctionwhich Aristotle makes between

(a) ¢Oopd‘ns61rd é vavrfou

,and

(b) ow'

r'

rjpia 7 00Suvo’

tpet c’

iV‘

rog {ms7 06 éwehexe ig. fir ms,

and (6) cannot rightly be called an M owe rs. This is the

element in sense-perception which is contributed by the

percipient subject,

1and makes a i

’

oOqcnsnot a mere act of

passive receptivity. Here at last we canstrike a true balance

between the claims of the subjective and the objective

factor in the building up ofour knowledge. Perception is

not the mere passivity of the sense-organ, but the functioningof armor; through the sense-organ. Its object is implicitly

a universal,a TOLdVSG n and not a mere 1 6815 n . The senses

may be our only means of perception,but it would be more

correct to say that we perce ive through them ,rather than by

them . They are the channels which lead to the «pony

a iO‘Onfi'

jptov of the soul , where the“ perception really takes

place.2 This is illustrated by the fact that

,although the

particular senses,such as sight and hearing, have their own

individual objects (i8m a la rd )— such ascolours and sounds— there are also common sensibles (nowa arson

-ré ) which

canbe perceived by more than one faculty , e .g. movem ent,

which canbe perceived by both sight and touch.

Aristotle’s treatment of “ thought”in the “ De Anima

gives scoPe for a variety of interpretations , but it will be

sufficient to put the matter very simply here . We may ex

1 In some sense,then, the ex ternal object is*not the cause, but the

occasion, of the perception.

2Of. the doctrine in the Theaetetus of Plato, above p. 111.



content ourselves with moving a finger. Parmenides and

Zeno reduced things to such a logical impasse that the

meaning of “ is had to be cleared up before any ad vance

was possible. This was,of course

,done by Plato

,whose

later “ intel lectual dialogues are a great contribution to the

theory of knowledge ; but Aristotle is the first— consistently

with his more precise and orderly type ofm ind— to put the

matter in a cut and dried form,and sowe have reserved

it for explicit mention here .

There are several senses in which we may say that one

thing is something else,and these are set forth by Aristotle

in his “ forms of predication,

or“ categories , as they are

generally Styled— “Ta axfipara rfisnamyopiag.1 There are ten

ofthese categories , i .e . tenpossible meanings ofthe word“ is ”

inthe statement a isb. If it defines the nature,or substance

,

of a (i.e . te lls us what it is) , it falls under the first category

of substance (1 5 i on ) ; but it mayonly define a quality of a,

when it falls under the category of quality (noté v) or it may

tell us how large or small it is, when it comes und er that of

quantity (wood y) , and so on. The next most important cate

gory is that of relation (wpé g n) , aswhenwe say that Critias

is a disciple of Socrates. The other six are those of place,

time , activity , passivity , state ( x eioem ) , e .g. a man is sittingdown

,and condition e .g. a man has his armour on.

2

Thus is the ambiguity of that troublesome little word isonce

and for all cleared up .

Aristotle is the first wri ter to attempt a scientific account‘

of thought-processes In his “ Prior Analytics he d eals

with the syllogism ,which is thus defined c ukkoyw

-

jiog Sé

e’

o'

rl. hdyog e’

v of» Teee'

wwv ‘

rtvélv grepd v‘

ré'

w Ke tpé vwv d vdyxng

1 “Metaphysics,1017a, 28, and Categories 6.

2These last two d onot seem to differ very much.


aupfiafvei 1 6} 111 67 0. elven— a syllogism is a method of reasoning

inwhich from certainpresuppositions something else different

from the premisses nece ssarily followslfrom their truth .1 The

syllogism is of the famil iar form

All men are mortal ,Soc rates is a man

,

Socrate s is mortal ,

and is not of much use in the acquisition of knowledge ,though it is the common form of the proof (61:68am) of anything. In our search for knowledge induction (ém yoyfi) is h aywi

offargreater importance thandeduction, and we have already

found Socrates normally employing it.2 It is an argument

from the particular to the general , concluding from the fact

that something is true in thi s and that case , in all case s

known to us,that it is therefore universally true . Such an

inductionby simple enumeration,

”as it is called , cannever

be exhaustive, and is open, asBaconpointed out, torefutation

by a single“ contrary instance . But it i s a mistake to

imagine that Aristotle thought we could argue thus from

particulars to universals . Let us examine one of those

éuannxoi Myot of which be approved so much in the

Si akcxnxfi of Socrates. ‘ There is a very simple one in the

early chapters of the “Republic.” 3 Thrasymachushas been

maintaining that it is just to help one’s friends and harm

one’

s enem ies. Socrates thinks that the just man will not

d o harm to anyone,and proceeds thus : Horses which suffer

harm become worse qua horses ; dogs which suffer harm be

come worse qua dogs menwho suffer harm become worsequa men; justice is the human d pe

'

rfi par ex cellence, and so

menwho suffer harm'

become more unjust,i.e. justice makes

1 Analytics , 24b, 18.1 See above, p. 60. 3 335b.

dwé Setgts.


menmore unjust,which is absurd. Here the proof does not

really rest uponthe three particular instances of horses,dogs ,

and men, but rather upon the universal principle , imp licitlyadmitted , that harm is a bad thing and anything harmedbecomes ipso facto worse. And so it is generally with

Aristotle’

s use of which therefore does not lie Open

toBacon’

s criticism .

We find the same thing at the bottom ofAristotle ’s theory

of knowledge , which, in spite of what , at first glance , seem s

its more empirical nature , does not really differ very much

from Plato’

s. We have seen already 1 three elementsof

Plato’

s epistemology —the distinction between 6901) 8tge and

ém ofi jjnj, the doctrine of d vd pc is, and the Ideas— and it is

unnecessary to repeat them here . Now Aristotle’s greatest

contention is that scientific knowledge is demonstrated

truth inductionmay collect facts , but it is deductionwhich

is the real proof (av dtugi g) . We know a thing scientifically

whenwe know the reason for it,the 8161 1 and not the more

81 1. But all truths cannot be thus demonstrated to be true

because of the truth of something else ; thi s would lead to an

infinite regress ,”or to an all-inclusive circular proof. We

must eventually come to some ultimate principles , the truth

of which we perceive , so to speak , intuitively, and these in

demonstrable first principles (avairé tetxroi d pxa£)—e .g. that

the nature of number is such that 2 2 4— are the

foundation of his d uofie tgtg, just as his énaywyr'

j really rests

upon the adm issionof the truth of a principle which the in

stances merely illustrate but d onot prove .

(V) The Metaphysics

11 Aristotle. —We have already dealt

with a variety of themes that come within the Scope of this

treatise,for it deals with the most general or universal aspect

1 Above , pp. 104-111.


14 4 THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PH ILOSOPHY

otoio éo-ri 1—and no universal,or common predicate ,

designates a particular as such ,a 7 685 1 1

,but a particular in

virtue,asPlato would say, of its

“ participation”in the idea

,

or,as Aristotle says , in virtue of its being also a Totovte n

(ofibé v (muc h/en. TOV Kowfi Kamyopouué vwv 7 68€ n , m a1 0161555 2

-no common predicate indicates a“ this

,

” but rather a

Just asPlato regarded his ideas as eternal,not

affected,that is to say,

by the “ com ing into being”or

destruction of any particular phenomena,but independent

(Xop tord ) of such vicissitudes , so Aristotle regards his uni

versal —so essential to the possibility of definition at all— as

independent ofseepsand yéveots a particular house maybe

built or demolished , but my concept ” of house does not

come into being or vanish therewith (oil yap yiyvera t T6 oix iqelven. dhhd Toffibe Tfi oinfa W ithout such ideas —Platonic

ideas,as it seems tome— there can be no knowledge in the

sense of émmfipn(d veu ji é v yap Kaechou 06x E'

o'

rw émm'

fijnjv

haBei v,)4 but only vague impressions of sense to which the

Heraclitean doctrine of flux would entitle us . So far asthe

“ theory of predication is concerned , Aristotle’s “ univer

sals and Plato’s “ ideas ” serve the same purpose . When

we say“ Man is an animal we mean

,inmodern logi c , that

our concept of “man includes that of animal —the con

cept man” is a particular instance of the concept “animal

—Plato would say that man pere’

xe i , or participates in, the

idea of animal . Aristotle says that man is one of the class“animals,

”and the only difference— apart from -

xthe verbal

one—between him and Plato is a difference in the assump

tions, or presuppositions , of his whole philosophical system

rather than in his analysis of the proposition. For Aristotle

regarded the world ascomposed of a fixed number of “natural .

1 1038b, 35.111039a , 1.

3 1039b, 25 .4 1086b, 5 .


kinds —concrete and definite divisions in Nature, which it is

the object of our knowledge to d iscover and to classify pro

perly,i .e . asthey actually are grouped in the external world.

Thus Aristotle takes a somewhat more objective view of

things than Plato does1— just as SOphists like Protagoras

took a more subjective view than Plato did. Plato’

s exposi

tion seems nearer to the truth than e ither,at any rate so far

asthe building-up ofour knowledge is concerned—which has

more to d o with the right fram ing of.our“ concepts ” than

with the discovery of “ natural kinds.”

But let us turn to broad er issues . We saw, when con Motion.

sid ering Aristotle’s psychology, how he maintained that the

soul wasthe d px 'l] xwfioeog of the body,1and this discovery of

the source of motion is a most far-reaching one , for we have

seen that the great objection to material ism is its inability to

explainmotionor to account for life . Stretch out your hand

and move a finger to and fro ; now, whenyou come to think

about it,is not that a very wonderful thing ? Obviously

your body is “material -

you can touch it,and cut it—but

it is a very wonderful material , informed and made different

from all inanimate material by the soul or spirit. What

can we say about this ? Aristotle calls it ammo; otoia,

which is not itself “ moved ,” but i s the cause of motion in

the limbs . It must be eternal,or it would have been

“ brought into be ing by something e l se ; then we should

have to ask what brought the something else into being,and sowe Should have an infinite regress of causes , positingd pxfi Kwfic ews behind dpxij xwfic ewg for ever. And , if thus

eternal , it must be immaterial , for all matter is subject to

1 I t is thisgeneral trend of his m ind which , most likely, preventedhim from seeing the sim ilarity of hisrt r tfiv elvesto Plato’s

9 Above , p . 136.

10


com ing intobeing and to decay. We must believe, then,in a

“first cause ”the essence of which is energy (é vépyeto)

— Se'

i d pa elven d px'ljv

‘

rocadmv fig is, 060 501 é vépye ta .

1 It is

essentially— which is to say, by the very essence of the case

energy, é ve’

pyeta Aristotle d escribes.this —you

may call it God , Spirit, or What you will— as5 06 Ktvoéji evov

xwei,and explains how it does so from the analogy of human

desire (xwe'

i 83 (385 f t opex'

rc‘

w Kai Towon-ro'

v Desire for a

thing causes me to strive after i t, one.

“ notion or“ idea

that I have formed directs,and ind eed originates, all my

endeavours ; but one could. not say that the desire or the

notion is “moved,

” though it is the cause of motion in me

—xwe’

£ xwoii

uevov. S im ilarly with regard to the universal

Spirit of the world ; it is the cause of motion as belng that

which is aimed at, the final cause of all things it moves

by being loved— K i ra? 82(in; époi

pevov.

This is how Aristotle describes it

On such a principle , then, depend the heavens and the world of

nature. And i ts l ife i s such asthe best which we enjoy, and enjoy forbut a short time. For i t i s ever in this state (which we cannot be)since its actuali ty is also pleasure. (And therefore [se. because theyare activities or actual ities] are waking , perception,

and thinking mostpleasant , and hopes and memories are so because of the ir reference tothese.) And thought in i tsel f deals with that which i s best in itself,and that which is thought in the fullest sense with that which i s bestin the fullest sense. And thought thinks i tsel f because i t Shares thenature of the object of thought ; for i t becomes an object of thoughtin com ing into contact with and thinking its obj ects , so that thoughtand object of thought are the same. For that which i s capable of

receiving the obj ect of thought , i .e. the essence , i s thought. And i ti s active when it p ossessesthis object. Therefore the latter ( possession>rather than the former < receptivity>i s the divine elementwhich thought seems to contain,

and the act of contemplation is whatismost pleasant and best. If

,then, God is always in that good state

1 u Metaphysics , 20,

2 1071b, 26.3 lo7zhi 8'



substance i s the faculty of thought or the act of thinking, what does i tthink ? Either itself or something el se ; and if something else , ei therthe same always or something different. Does i t matter, then, ornot,

whether i t thinks the good or any chance thing Are there not some

things about which it i s incredible that it should think ? Evidently ,then,

i t thinks that which is most divine and precious, and i t does notchange ; for change would be change for the worse , and thi s would bealready a movement . First

,then, if “ thought is not the act of think

ing , but a potency, it would be reasonable to suppose that the continuityof i ts thinking i s wearisome to it. Secondly , there would evidently besomething alsomore precious than thought, vi z. that which is thought .For both thinking and the act of thought wi ll belong even to one whohasthe worst of thoughts. Therefore i f this ought to be avoided (andit ought , for there are even some things which it is bet ter not toseethan tosee) , the ac t of thinking cannot be the best of things. Therefore i t must be i tse lf that thought thinks (since i t is the most ex cellentof things) , and i ts thinking i s a thinking on thinking.

1(1074b , 1

There is no difference here between Aristotle and Plato’s

conceptionof the soul as d pxi‘

] Kwr'

jaewg, and who,if he d id

not know that it was Aristotle’s , would hesitate to attribute

the following remark to Plato - 3n pév 03

V 307 W 060 501 1 19

Kai d x imro9 Kai x exwptapémTé’

wa icro'

qri’

w,2M vepov inraw

It is in this one principle— ouc h 6 06

xwoupevov R i vet— that we find the Unity of the world ofwhi ch

we first heard among the Eleatics . It belongs not to the

material,but to the spiritual , sphere, for unity of principles is

a |good , just asa diversity is bad . O lind yaec‘

w Trohuxorpavfrj, ( is

xolpavosem u,

”asAristotle quotesfrom Homer.4

Whatever we may make of Aristotle’s words— and they

are,asperhaps the nature of the subject necessarily entails ,

somewhat vague—there can be no doubt that they involve

conceptions inconsistent with the popular idea of the lim ita

1 Translated by W. D . Ross (Ox ford Translations ofAri stot le).2I .e . separate from sensible things.3 “Metaphysics ,” 1073s, 3 . 4 u I liad ,” II. 204 .


tions of paganphilosophy. Ari

stotle,ashasbeen remarked ,

l

“m ight , indeed , seem to coincide with the utterance of the

Psalm ist,What is man in comparison with the Heavens ?

’

But with him the Heavens were not a more physical creation;rather the eternal Sphere of Reason, the abode of pure In

telligences, the source of all emanations of Reasonand In

telligence throughout the world. Compared with this higher

Sphere individual man,with his practical and moral life ,

appeared insignificant ; and yet the End -ih -itse lf , even for

the individual,Aristotle acknowledged to be worth an effort ,

while man in organi zed societies, in the city or the nation,

he recognized asaffording momfor the realizationof some

thing more noble and divine . The individual man,

according to Aristotle , Shared in that Reason, which is the

divinest part of the Universe , and by development of this

into philosophy he could become l ike to God (see‘ Ethics

,

’

X . 7 , Thus there were two human things about which

Aristotle could be enthusiastic—the life of an ideally we ll

ordered State, and the moments of philosophical conscious

ness in the m ind of an individual thinker. Prof. Stewart

comments to the same effect :11 The form ofGod is reali zed

in one Eternal Being : the form of man in a multitude of

contemporary and successive examples . Each individual

man realizes himself only by looking away from his own

mere particularity,and assimilating into his consciousness

the form ofman’s reasonasother examples— his friends and

fellow-citizens— by their cumulative influence impress it

more purely upon him . The great embodiment of human

1 Grant , “ Ethics ofAri stotle , Vol. I. p. 286.1 The reference isto the 34

9

50 0V i vSe’

xera t d OavarCfiew quoted above(see p.

3 Notes onthe NicomacheanE th ics, Vol. II. p. 387.


reason, the social order intowhich he hasbeen born, exists

independently of himself. It is there already as an objectfor him to contemplate and identify himself with. To

contemplate, and in contemplating to identify himself with ,the social life is a thing which a man can d o almost continu

ously, because his otofa or qui

e tsisto be a personwho sees

himse lf inothers and lives inothers . But to identify himself

with won-rd which involve no social reference is a gode act,

which he can only at rare intervals,and for a Short time ,

perform . We give yet another quotation from the same

il luminating commentator Inman’s composite nature the

principle of Form asserts itself with difficulty against Matter.

No'

rjcn9 , the purest expressionof this principle , cannot be longkept up

,for it i s soon checked

,and the pleasure attending it

destroyed , by the resistance ofthe material part of his nature .

Before vo'

nmscanbe resumed,and its attendant pleasure ex

perienced again,the material resistance must have had time

to subside —matter must have its own way, for a while and

be al lowed its own pleasure . Thus the life of the 1ndi

vidual man i s brokenup into short periods of vo’

qoi g, properly

so-called,alternating with times during which the material

vehicle asserts itsel f on its own account ; and this experience

of the individual is paralleled , on a great scale , in the life of

the race,the Specific form of whi ch is not realized in one

immortal individual,but asserts itself, more or less perfectly,

for a short time in the adults of one generation,is eclipsed

by their decay and death,regains force in their young d e

scend ants,and again asserts itself, more or less perfectly, in

these when they reach adult age. But God is not thus dis

crete , like the higher moments ofman, or the individuals of

a Species.” 1

1 Stewart , Notesonthe NicomacheanEthics, Vol. II. p. 259 .


CONCLUSION

N the concluding portionof the last chapterwe insensibly

passed from the sphere of knowledge to that of religion ;and

,although thi s is not— ih the accepted sense- a religious

work , it will not be out of place to try to determ ine the ex

tent to which knowledge can— and,for some of us

,must

enter into our religion.1 Re ligion, it is true , transcends

knowledge ; and even in the Sphere which is common to

both,rel igion carries a certainwarm th and fervour with it

,

which contrasts strongly with the cold light of the intel lect.

It is the passionate apprehensionof things , not only by the

intellect , but al so by the imagination and yet, inso far asit

is apprehension,that “ apprehension must be made in the

same way aswe “apprehend anything e lse . Consequently

we nrast examine that part of religion which consists of

knowledge by the ordinary criteria of truth, without any

reference to “revelation.

'

What is commonly called “re

vealed truth is so different innature from what we associ

ate with the Aristotelian dno’

Setgtg that the epithet seems

almost to have robbed the substantive of all meaning.

Matthew Arnold defined religion as moral ity tinged with

emotion but this seems to be only a half-truth ; for“ morality to modern ears , at least, does not connote any

3

1 On this subject G. Lowes D ickinson’s ex cellent little volume ,

R eligion: a Cri tici sm and a Forecast ,” inDent’s ModernProblems

seri es , should be read.

CONCLUSION 15 3

intellectual apprehensionof things, and we cannot accept a

definition which allots no place to man’

s highest faculties,

to the Stavorj'nxov pi p09 of the soul , to that Ocio

'

v 1 1 in us ,which Aristotle call s voile. That this is so may be seen

from a considerationof two incontestable facts , (1) that the

religious views of most of us are considerably modified by

our education, (2) that we feel whenwe read Plato that he

is one of the world’s greatest religious teachers. If

“morality meant all that we have seen to be connoted by

the Socratic formula d pe'nj émom

’

p'

q, then the definition

might stand ; but , asit is , we must ad d to it something like

and knowled ge passionately imagined . By this we mean

knowledge which becomes a part of us,which no longer

remains information,but enters into our very souls and helps

to make us something different from what we were before

we acquired it . It is something which we commonly feel

rather than think but , nevertheless , i t does adm it ofd Se igtg ,

when called for. We may have difficulties in expressing i t

inwords , difficulties which lead us to resort tomythologi cal

language— just asPlatowill leave intellectual arguments and

lapse into a myth—but we must never interpret our mythology literally , anymore thanwe would take a Platonic myth

literally. The mythology is not part of the truth , but a

device to bring the truth home toour fee l ing, a sort of M 1906 ;

Squioupyés. So it is always with Plato ; feeling , aswe have

said , comes in as a sort of guarantee of the rightness of

thought. But the thought must be there , and must, to

some extent , admi t of dmiSetfits.

When we reflect upon some of the developments of

religion to-d ay, we are inclined to imagine that the e lement

of “ feeling has almost ousted “ thought” from its true

domain ; so that we really need a reconstructionof religion

15 4

“

THE ELEMENTS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY

which Shall strike the balance between feel ing and thought ,much asSocrates and Plato struck the balance betwe en the

subjective and the objective elements,alike in our knowledge

and inour ethics,after the SOphistshad laid such emphasis

upon the subjective Side . Feeling is of vast importance ;knowledge which leaves us cold is of no use.

“The tigers

of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction,

” says

Blake ; 1 but the present age is one which rather needs the

stress to be put upon the other half of the truth— that feel ing,without thought to guide it, easily

“runs amuck ; that en

thusiasm and the will -for-good may be all we canexpect from

the crowd,but its leaders must have intelligence—vopeqxocbpot

pév nohhoi, d xoz Sé Te na0p01.2

The brief exam ination in this book of the developm ent of

philosophical Speculationamong the Greeks Showed us roughly

the following facts. Man’s first attitude towards things is a

theological one ; anything which he cannot understand he

puts down to the account of some god or d aemon. A mytho

logy is gradually evolved,largely through the influence of

poets , which , though Often very crude and primitive , yet is

the reposi tory of a certain amount of religiousfeeling. We

must never interpret such a mythology literally, or we shall

miss its whole Significance from a religious point of view ,

which is,briefly

,simply this that man finds something

superhuman in his environm ent,something whi ch passeth

his understanding and this feeling the poets and other great

m inds of the age body forth in legends which ,however liter

ally they may be interpreted by the undiscerning mind, are ,to the poets and . seers who formulated them , figurative ex

pressions of the great mystery of life . The l iteral interpreta

1 In “The Marriage ofHeaven and Hell.1 Plato, Phaedo,” 690.



knowledge will not entail any lowering of my ideals in life .

On the contrary , it will in some ways greatly enhance the

value ofmy life to me. The ordinary Christian conception

of immortality insome sense shifts the value of life to a sphere

beyond death ; but, if this l ife is my only life , thenmust I

make the very best of it,l ive up tomy highest ideals , and see

that I d owel l all that I undertake,for I shall have no oppor

tunity of remedying matters hereafter. Inour every-d ay l ife

if we have little of a thing we appreciate it all the more and

there seems no reasonwhy this should not apply toour own

mortal ity. I will not rashly throw life away or despise it as

a mean thing, simply because I d onot know that it is to go

on for ever. Rather will I feel about it asWil liam Cory

(Johnson) expresses himself in Mimnermus in Church

(a poem in Ionica

You promise heavensfree from strife ,Pure truth , and perfect change ofwill ;But sweet , sweet i s this human l ife ,So sweet I fainwould breathe it stil l

Your chi lly stars I can forego,This warm kind world is all I know.

You say there isno substance here ,One great real ity aboveBack from that void I shrink in fear ,And child-like hide mysel f in love.

Show me what angel s feel ti ll then,I cling, a m ere weak man,

tomen.

You bid me li ft mym ean desiresFrom fal tering l ips and fi tful veins

To sex less soul s , ideal quires ,Unwearied voices , wordless strains

My m ind with fonder welcome ownsOne dear dead friend ’s remembered tones.

CONCLUSION

Forsooth the present we must giveTo that which cannot pass away ;

A ll beauteous things for which we l iveBy laws of time and space decay.But , oh , the very reasonwhyI clasp them is because they d ie.

The second conception which we have undertaken to ex -God .

amine is that of God . Most of us,if asked to d o this, would

find ourselves in some difficulty ; but we will get what help

we can from a brief historical survey of the growth of the

idea. It begins wi th that earliest theologi cal conception of

things which is by now quite familiar to us,and

,through a

period of anim ism,very naturally crystallizes

,asit were , into

a frank anthropomorphism. We saw this ridiculed by

Xenophanes,who objected that man

,in formulating such a

conception,wasbehaving exactly as lions and cows would , if

they had Speech,for they would make gods like themselves.

We must give up all anthropomorphic ideas and with them

the belief in a“ personal

”

god in so far as such a belief is

necessarily anthrOpomorphic . But if a personal god ,who

is not at the same time anthrOpomorphic , is a possible con

ception, then it is one towhich we may still hold . Human

personality ” is the greatest and the finest thing whi ch we

know on thi s sub-lunary world , and it may well be that some

m inds can conceive of an analogous“ divine personal ity.

Others will find themse lves unable to give any connotation

to the word God over and above that of the Spiritual force in

the world which we have seen to be necessarily entai led in

our knowledge of the immortality of soul . Some may object

that this is far too impersonal a conception; it is somethingtowhich they could not pray , and they know from experience

that they have derived great benefit from prayer. But ad

vanced theologians frankly admit that the greatest benefit of


prayer is a psychological one— that peculiar ennobling of

the soul which comes from communionwith the divine ; and

psychic things are not yet sufficiently understood by us for

even the most hard-head ed of intellectualists to deride the

idea ofanyindividual soul being benefited and strengthened ,asit were

,by putting itself into contact with the great reservoir

of universal soul , much in the same way as Anteeusreceived

renewed strength by contact with the earth . Nor is such an

impersonal conceptionnecessari ly one that takes the warm th

entirely out of life . On the contrary,it adds a fresh glow

toour ideals for we realize that it is we ourselves who have

tod oGod’s work here onearth . We only know thi s spiritual

force as it is manifested in the lives of the human beings

around us ; we know ofno other channels through which it

is able to work . And soour cc -Operation is essential before

it can affect anything here ; it works in us by inspiring us

with lofty ideals , and the more God -like we make ourselves

the more easily canwe realize those ideals. This,then

,must

be our endeavour—64? doowé vbéxe‘

ra l. dOava '

rlgew,which is Tow

Geov Oeparre iiew Kai. Oewpei v, for it is only so that What c ? £59

épo'

apevov canwork upon us.

The love of God passeth all understanding.



Plato] éxofipw a v x al rd Torafi‘

ra 1 6 V dwwv'

npoonydpeuoavMetaph. 1078b, 30) —but insisted upontaking the xwpwpds

of the Platonic iSéar in a sense that reduced them to selfsubsisting,

“ particular ”entities . Und er this m isapprehen

sion,sopuerile

,it would seem

,in a philosopher of his ability

,

he proceed s to give a detailed attack uprm them in the firstbook of his “Metaphysics —1

But asfor those who posi t the Ideas ascauses , firstly , in seeking tograsp the causes of the things around us , they introduced others equalinnumber to these , asif a manwho wanted to count things thoughthe could not d o i t while they were few,

but tried to count them wh enhe had added to their number. For the Forms are practical ly equalto or not fewer than the things, in trying to ex plain whi ch thesethinkers proceeded from them to the Form s. For to each set of substances there answers a Form whi ch has the same name and ex istsapart from the substances , and so also in the case of all other groups inwhich there i s one character common to many things , whether thethings are in this changeable world or are eternal . Further , of theways inwhich we prove that the Forms ex ist , none i s convincing for

from some no inference necessarily follows , and from some i t fol lowsthat there are Form s of things ofwhich we think there are no Form s.For according to the arguments from the ex istence of the sciencesthere will be Form s of all thingsof which there are sciences , and ac

cording to the argument that there i s anobj ect for thought evenwhenthe th ing has peri shed , there will be Forms of perishable things ; forwe can have an image of these. Further , of the more accura te arguments , some lead to Ideas of relations , ofwhich we say there i s no independent class , and others involve the difficul ty of the third man.

” 2

Aristotle goes on to urge a number of other objections tothe Id eas , but the whole chapter is so irrelevant asa criticismupon the doctrine aswe have described it in Plato himself

,

that we can only conclude that upon Plato’

s death his disciples (oi m p1 nXo

’

iw va) developed the doctrine , under a

m isapprehensionof Plato’s real meaning ,

into a form whi chrendered it liable to objections of this nature . [It is asoneof these later Platonists that Aristotle speaks of we in

the above passage ] This conclusion is confirmed by twoconsiderations : (1) That many points in Aristotle

’s criticismd o not apply to Plato himself, and (2) that Aristotle e lsewhere gives a more correct account of the Platonic doctrine.

1 And this in spite of the fact that he recogni zed Metaph. 987a

32) the significance of the Platonic doctrine in providing an answer tothe diffi cu lt ies rai sed by Cratylusand the Heraclitean flux of things"

2“ Metaphysi cs ,” 990b (translationby Ross) .

APPENDIX 161

(1) The objection that ascauses of d efacto things the Ideasintroduce a second class of entities equally numerous withthem does not apply toPlato himself. This interpretation isexposed to the “ third man

”refutation

,which is briefly as

follows : The third man is the difficulty known inmodernlogic asthe

‘ indefinite regress It runs thus : If the likeness between Socrates , Plato, and other persons proves thatthey are all ‘ copies ’

of a common archetype , the‘ Idea of

Man,

’ then the likeness between this Idea and Socrates mustalso prove that both Socrates and the Idea are

‘ copies ’

of

another common archetype ,which will be a second and

more ultimate Idea of Man ; and the likeness between the

first and second Ideas of Man proves the existence of a thirdIdea

,which is their commonarchetype ,

and soon in ind efinitwm. (The real solution of the puzzle is that the relationbetween Socrates and ‘ man is not the same asthe relationbetween Socrates and Plato. Socrates and Plato are bothmembers of the class men; ‘ man

’ is not a member of theclass ‘ men So far is Plato’s doctrine of ideas frombeing exposed to such a refutation

,that the win g amm o;

argument is actually taken from him ? Again,Aristotle

objects that there are sciences of objects for which the

Platonists themselves d onot posi t correspond ing ideas, e .g.

of relatives and of artificial products ; but in Plato we d ofind ideas of these things , e .g. of “ bigness

”and “

equality in

the “ Phaedo, and in the “ Republic ” there is the “ idea of abed Repub .

”

(2) Aristotle himself elsewhere describe s the Platonicdoctrine in terms which show a much truer appreciationofit . In chapter six of the first book of his “Metaphysics " hementions that Socrates was familiar in his youth withCratylusand the teachings ofHeraclitus to the effect that thethings of sense are in such a perpetual flux that it is quiteimpossible for us to have any ém rrrfip

'qof them . Socrate shimself attempted to find universal s and general d efinit ions

,

” but he confined his speculations to the moral sphere .

Plato comes next, and he saw that such definitions are impossible in the “ sense ” sphere . Hence he called things of

1 I take thi s description from A. E. Taylor’s Aristotle on hisPred ecessors,

” p. 119 (note).9 Parmenides ,” 132; cf. “Republi c , 597.

11


Whi ch a Kowosdposcould be given'

by the Side ofWhichaloerrrd (sensible objects) exist and are called by their severalnames in virtue of their connexion with these («are n ewHyman ) . This “ connexion” Plato termed peace;

Things of this other sort , then, he called Ideas, and sensiblethings , he said , were apar t from these and were all called after these ;for the multitude of things which have the same name as the Formex i st by participation in i t. Only the name

“ participation (Feasts)wasnew ; for the Pythagoreans say that things ex ist by “ im i tation

”

(WP ofnumbers , and Plato says they ex i st by participation, changing the name. But what the participation or the imitatlon of the

Forms could be they left anopen question.1

A few l ines farther onAristotle remarks that the introd uctionof the doctrine of ideas wasd ue to Plato’s logical studies

(171 7 61V e’

iSoweioaywyi] 81d Tijv é v Totshdymséyé ve‘

ro ox éd uv) , and

yet he can goon to interpret the“ how of the péeegts, which

he says was left “an Open question,

”in a manner which is

no contribution to logic at all"This in itself should be sufficient to convince us that his criticisms are directed not

against the doc trine of Plato himself— the origin and philosophical bearing of which be here fully a preciates

— butagainst a perversionof that doctrine by the ater Platonistsof his own age .

1 “Metaphysics, 987b (translationby Ross).



Dynamic. Possessed of power (Su’

vaui é) or latent force . A

dynam ic conception is one which regards things ascon

taining the possibility of motion or change . It is theOpposite ofstatic .

Emp iri cal. Based solely on ex perience (é pfl etpia ) withoutany

“ theory to explain that experience . The knowled ge of a quack is empirical , whi le that of a qualifieddoctor is scientific .

Entity. That which exists,or has objective existence , as

distinguished from itsqil alities or relations,whi ch may

be purelyisubjective .

Ep istemology. The science (hdyos) which exam ines and

explains the possibility and nature of human knowledge(m a rten)

Esoteric . Revealed only to the inner few (a t,within) who

are initiated into mysteries beyond the comprehensionof the many ; the Opposite of exoteric.

Ethical. Concerned with morals , treating of moral questions , rules of conduct (1,9.s relating to character or

to“)Exoteric. The opposite of esoteric.

Hedonism . The philosophy according to which pleasure

(fitom) 1sthe summum bonum of life .

Id ealism. The representationof things 1nideal form . Con

trast , in this sense, rea lism. In philosophy it is thesystem of thought which gives a higher ideal to human

life than that contained in hedonism ,and in itsex plana

tionof the universe asa whole it takes account ofotherthan material principles. Subjective id eal ism is the

system of thought in which the object of external perception is held to consist of ideas.

Ind uct ion. The logical process by which we proceed froma number of part icular cases to a general rule— évrl Ta;d pxds, asAristotle says. From the observation that thismanhastwo legs , and that man has two legs , and thatevery ind ividual man whom I have ever seen has twolegs , I conclude by induction

“ that all men (even thosewhom I have not seen) have two legs . It is the oppositeof d eduction.

SOME PHILOSOPHICAL TERMS .165

Logically. Implied , though not necessarily stated , in the

nature of the case . Logically prior is contrasted withwhat isprlor in time, but not in id ea. In taking a railway journey, for ex aiznple , my first act in time is to go tothe station,

but my first act logically is to decide uponthe place to which I want to go. My destination islogically prior tomy point of departure .

Materialism. The philosophy which takes account of nothing but matter.

Metaphysics. The science which takes us beyond mere

physical or cosmological Speculations .

Monism . The doctrine that there is only one principle , orsubstance

,in the universe (wives, alone , only) .

Object ive. Externa l topercipient personality. The Oppositeofsubjec tive.

Phenomena. External objects asthey appear to my sense s

(rd. (pawdjusva) .

Physic ist. Student of physics or of natural science in

general . In its philosophical sense the word denotes a

philosopher who examines the nature (Wars) of the universe in its material istic aspect ; his science is calledcosmology.

Pluralism . The opposite ofmonism.

Polit ics. A much wider term , in philosophy, than in everyd ay speech. It means the science of the art of government—i.m km xfi— and is concerned with the wholeobject of organized communities , and not only with themeansof carrying out some particular project.

Potential. That which is capable of doing, or being, something ; thus a child is potentially an adult , though notactuallyso.

Psychology. The science which examines the human soul(fi xpuxfi) . In ancient times it included speculation uponthe whole nature of the soul

,but inmodern speech it is

confined to the workingsof the soul , without involvingany theory about its nature .


Qualitat ive ly. In the aspec t of possessing a quality ; theOpposite of quantitatively. Thus if I have two sets ofsix balls

, one ofwood , and the other of iron, the two setsare quantitatively identical but qualitatively d ifl erent.

S tat ic . The Opposite of d ynamic (ord e rs, standing, station) .

Subjecti ve . Belonging to percipient personality ; the op

posite of objective. To make the distinction clearimagine a desert island in the m iddle of the Pacifi c

,or

elsewhere,entirely removed from all percipient life . An

explosion takes place on the island . What actuallyoccurs (i .e . the explosion) is objective , but the noise ofthe ex plosion is subjective .

Subjec t iv ism . The doctrine that knowledge is merely sub

jective and can give no criterionofobjective truth .

Syllog ism . A deductive argument (auhkoyv'

j, gathering,col lecting) . V. d ed uction.

Transcend ental. Excelling or surpassing experience ; notsubject to the lim itations of the material universe ; oftenina Spiritual and semi-mystical sense.



LEUCIPPUS , 42-43 . REALITY , 107.Lucretiu s , 38, 44. R e ligion, 11 , 152.

MANILIUS , 15 1 . Rhetoric, 46 , 49 .

Many, and the One , 21,Material cause , 6 .

Material ism , 12, 22.

Miletu s , 12.

Monism,22.

Monothei sm , 31 .

Motion, 22, 145 .

Myths , of Plato, 97-104.

NUMBERS , doctrine of, 28.

OLIGARCHY, 96.One , and the Many, 21 , 32, 61 , 110Orphi sm ,

24.

Ovid, 9 , 66.

PABMENIDES , 32-35 .

Pericle s , 39.Philosophy, what it is , 1.

assci entia.scientiarum ,5.

asa way of l ife , 25 .Plato, 69-112.

the introductions to the

lognes , 72.ideas of, 107-110.myths of, 97 -104 .poli tics of, 92-97.ps

achologyof, 88-92

epublic of,cri ticized

Ari stotle, 130.

Pre-Socratics , 23-44.Prim itive man, 8.

Protagoras , 46-48.Pythagoras , 25 -30

Pythagorean pairs , 33. Z ENO, 35 -37.

SCEPTICISM , 9.

Science , 11S cientia sci entiarfwrn, 5 .Scientific knowledge , 3 .Sensation, theory of, 38.Socrates , 54-68.Sophists , 45 -53 .

Sophocles , Antigone of, 53 .

Soul , as d px i] mwja‘

ews, 100,145 .

asév‘rehcxeia of body , 136.

three parts of,89 , 137 .

Subjectivi sm , 47 , 50, 51 .

THALEB, 13-15 .

Theogony, 9 .

Theological conception, 7 .

Theology, Olympian, 9.

Thrasymachus, 50.

Timocracy , 96.Transmigrationofsouls, 25.Truth . 5 .

Tyranny, 96.

UNIVERSALS , 4 , 148.

VALID ITY , 5 .Virgil , 15 , 151.Virtue , asknowled ge, 65.Voluntary actions , 123 .

X ENOPHANES , 25 , 30-32.X enophon, 59-60.

(B) GREEK

three classe s of, 119 , 13 3 . 7 6 8167 1 , 3 , 4 .

d rip, 18, 19 .86§a ,

apes, 111.016 9110 15 , 2, 137 .

v inet , 16 , 114 .

G iv en'rd , 18m. Ka i. Kowd , 138.Silvap-ls, 190

a io'O'

qfl x i] £0113, 118.To a iO'On'

rt xbv (pi pes rfig q fig) , 1 010 1163 ,120.

137 . 6 80 3 , 62, 108.

a ir ing hoyto'

pés, 87 ,eipwveia (Im pd rovs) , 57 , 61 .

a ir im , 6 . é’xnpw i c , 16 .

d x paa' ia ,

66. Reveepfa ,122.

d vayna iov ifi inroOi c cws, 114 , 133 ,inwetpia ,

2, 3 .

d va ffl os9669 , 101. Evepyeiq, 16 , 114 .

d vd pv ens, 26 , 109 .é vépye i a Ka

'r’

ri pe-My , 118.

d mi cum-0 1 d pxa f, 142.

Evrekex c ia , 136 .

1 5 d v'rurei roveog , 28, 125 .3113 , 120.

7 6 dwetpov , 16 .inaywyfi. 64 , 141.

dwdfietgts, 142. l i ra x 'rucol.hoym , 59 .

d nohaum mbsBios, 27 , 115 ,Ewi fivp ia ,

89 .

pou t , 38, 43 .inro 'n

ip'

q, 3 , 87 , 111.

d po. we re, 18. peni , 65 .

ape—mi, Aristotle’s definitionof, 121. we, asphilosophic impulse.85é i rw 'rrjp

'

q,65 .

Sa tpov ia , 116 , 118.

asa m ean, 121. “ Beta , 60.

Mimi , 120.

d pw'rox pa

'ria ,

96 , 131.‘

Hsoyfi, 125 ,

49i “09.6 , 100. 7 6V firm) hoyov x peir rmwou‘

iv , 46.

d pxm ,6 .

Baowhcia , 131.

l'

véiei a eau'

rov , 88.

yvpvm txfi, 134 .

Aa tpowov I on: 57 , 62-64.

S'

qpox pa'ria , 9 13 1.

Stakex fl mi , 59 .

7 6 Stavoqfl x bv (p e’

posrfisdruxfig) , Kaedhov , r d , 3 .

137 . Kamyopias, «p ipe/re. f ile , 140.

Sina tom'

w'

q, 88, 124 . r d.Kowfi KamYOpod peva , 144 .

11* 169

Oewp'

qfl xbsBios, 27 , 115 .O

gefl

'

fl x ij£0116, 117 .1 Opem mbv (pi pes

‘rfis v fis) .137 .

014465 , 89 .

| 8£a , 108.


xpei‘r-rovos, Tb 0 rail, 50. mi d gets,

upei'rrw, 7 0V fir m

"hoyov «c rew , 46. wpoa ipems, 121 .

nvw ms, 18.Aoyw

'

p.

hoym mov pi pes (rfis¢vxfis) 8

Mau v fl mi, 61.perepdrtixwm s, see wahtyyevec ia .

pe'rfxew (p éeegis) , 108.

“6 0 611 9 , 121-123.Fianna , 108.

”will”, 2

pomnmq, 30, 134 .

pesos, 97 -104 .

Nc‘

i xos, 38.

wimp, 53 .

vote (in Anaxagoras) , 41.noOnn x d g , 139 .

’

0Myapx ia , 96 , 131.

6poropepfi, 41 , 43.6

§i§6 0 0a 1 x aflohov , 59.

1 67 1 , 3 4 .

7 0of: E'

vex a ,6 .

c irc le , 6

fl ahiwevea ia , 26 , 109.wapd Suypa , 108.

wapei va t , 108.

wape’

xfla c ts, 95 , 131.wohts, 128.woht 'reia ,

6p61j, 13 1.wokwmbsBios,

38.

p'

rrroptmj, 46 , 49 .

I vM o 140.

w nfiegnxos, ica/rd , 114.

( rup tpe‘pov , 7 09 upei

'r'rovos, 50.

O'

v vomw juis, 102, 128.

o'

xoluj, 126 .

afipa ,100.

M pw wn, 87.

Téltos, 115.‘réxvq, 2.r tpoxpa

‘

ria , 96 , 131 .

7 6 ‘n'

.fiv elven, 6 , 143.

7 686 n ,82, 144 .

7 0 16v8¢ 7 1 , 82, 144.‘rpi

'rOg d vflpw os, 161.

nipavvrs, 96 , 131.

film6 .

inrepov pd vros 101 , 159.

rd inrox eipevov , 6.

¢ av7 w ia,2.

chitin (Empedoclean) , 38.di dka x es, inPlato

’s Republic, 93 .53.

X op'qyfa ,

133.

xwpto'

ros, 144 , 159.


PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT THE UNIVERS ITY PRESS ,

A SELECTION FROM

M E S S R S . M E T H UE N’

S

PUBLICAT IONSThis Ca talogue conta insonly a se lec tion of the more important bookspubl ished by M essrs. Me thuen. A comple te cata logue of then publica tions

may be obtained onappl ication.

Bain (F.W .)A D IG IT OF THE MOON : A H ind oo LoveS tory. THE D ESCENT OF THE SUN : ACyc le ofB irth. A HE I FER or THE DAWN.IN THE GREAT GOD’S HA I R. A DRAUGHTOF THE BLUE. AN ESSENCE OF THE DUSK .AN INCARNAT IO N OF THE SNow. A M I NEor FAULTS . THE AS HES or A GOD .

BUBBLES OF THE FOAM . A SYRU P on THEBEES. THE Li vERv or EVE. THE SUBSTANCE OF A D REAM. A ll Fcap . 5s.net. AN ECHO OF THE SPHERES . Wi d eD ewy. 1 2s. 6d net.

Baker (0. H. Col l ins) . CROME. Illustrated . uarto. 5 . 53 . net .

Ba lfour lr Graham THE LIFE OFROBERT LOUIS TEVENSON. Fffteenth Ed i tion. In one Volume. Cr. Boo.

Buckram , 7s. 6d . net.

PARIs sr. 6d .net. H I LLS AND THE SEA ,6s.

net. ON NOTH ING AND K INDRED S U BJECTS ,65 .net. ON EVERYTH ING , 63 .net. O N SOMETH I NG , 61 . net. FI RST AND LAST, 63 . ne t.TH I S AND THAT AND THE OTHER , 63 . net.MAR I E ANTOINETTE, 1 8s. net. TH E PYRENEES , 1 0s. 6d . net.

B lackmore (8. Powe l l). LAWN TENNISUP-TO Il lustrated . D emy Boo.

ms. 6d . net.

Cam be l l (Norman R.) WHAT ISSC ENCE ? Cr. 8vo. sa n d .chand ler (Arthur), D.D., late Lord Bishop of

B loemfonte inARA OcELI AnEssay inMystica l Theology,

net. FA ITH AND EX PER IENCE , sr. net.THE CULT OF THE PASS I NG MOMENT , 5s.net. THE ENGL IS H CHURCH AND R EUN ION ,55 . net. S CALA M UND I , 45 . 6d net .

Chesterton(G. B .)THE BALLAD or THE WH ITE HORSE.ALL TH INGS CONS IDERED. T REMENDOUSTR I FLES. ALARMS AND D ISCURS IONS . AM ISCELLANY OF M EN. THE USES OFD IVERS ITY. A ll Fa e 800. 63 . net.

W INE, WATER, AND ONG. Ferry. Boo.

1s. 6d . net.

Clutton-Brock (L ).WHAT IS THE KINGD OM OF HEAVEN ? F ifth Ed ition.

Fcap . Svo. 5s. net.

ESSAYS ON ART. S econd Ed i tion. Fcajo.87 m. s. net.

ESSAY ON BOOKS . Third E d i tion.Fee: 800. 6s.net.

MOR ESSAYS ON BOOKS. Fm} . 800.

63 . net.

Cole (G. D. IL). SOCIAL THEORY .

S econd Ed i tion, rev ised . Cr. 800 . 63 . net.

Conrad (Joseph). THE MIRROR -O FTHE SEA : Memories and Impressions.Fourth E d it ion. Feat . 800. 63 . net.

Drover (James) . THE PSYCHO LOGYO F EVERYDAY LIFE . Cr. 800 . 6 7. net .

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF INDUSTRY.

Cr. 800. se. net.

Einste in (IL). RELATIVITY THESPECIAL AND THE GENERALTHEORY. Translated by ROBERT W.

LAWSON . S ixth Ed ition Cr. 800. 55 .

net.

O ther Bookson the ElnsteinTheory.SPACE—TIME—MATTER . ByHERMANNWEYL. D emy 800. an. net.

EINSTEIN THE SEARCHER :H isWORKEe AINED I N D IALOG UES W ITH E I NSTEIN.By ALEX ANDE R Moszx owsx x. D emy 800.

1 2s. 6d . net.

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE THEORYOF RELATIVITY. By LYNDON BOLTON .Cr. 800. 55 . ne t.

RELATIVITY AN GRAVITATION . Byvarious Writers. iled by J . MALCOLMB IRD. Cr. 800. 7s.6d . ne t.

RELATIVITY AND THE UNIVERSE.

By Dr. HARRY SCHM IDT. Cr. 800. 53 .

net.

Fyleman(Rose ). FAIRIES AND CHIMNEYS . Feat . 800. N inth E d i tion.3 . 6d .ne t.

T E FAIRY GREEN. Fourth E d ition.

Feat . 800 . 35 . 6 d. ne t.

THE FAIRY FLUTE. Feat . 800. 3 3 . 6d .

net.

Gibb ins (H. d e INDUSTRY INENGLAND : H I S T O R I C A L OUTLINES. W ith Maps and Plans. TenthE d i tion. D emy 800. 1 25 . 6d .net.

THE I N D U S T R I A L HISTORY O FENGLAND. W ith 5 Mz

zps and a P lan.

Twenty-seventh E d ition. r. 800. 53 .

Gibbon(Ed u ard ). THE DECLINE ANDFALL O F THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

Ed ited ,with Notes, Append ices, and Maps,

b J.B . BURY. S evenVoinmes. D emy 800 .

Iiiustrated . E ach 1 23 . 6d . net. A lso inS e wn Volumes. Unil lustrated . Cr. 800,E ach 75 . 6d . net.

2 MESSRS. METHUEN’

S PUBLICATIONS

Glover (T. B.)THE CONFLICT OF R ELIGIONsIN THE EARLYROMAN EMP I RE , 105 . 6d . net. POETS ANDPUR ITANS , Ios. 6d . net. FROM PER ICLESTo PH IL I P , 1 05 . 6d . ne t. V I RG I L, 1 05 . 6d .

net. THE CHR I ST IAN TRAD IT ION AND IT S

VER IF ICAT ION (The AngusLecture for63 . net.

Grahame (Kenneth). THE WIND IN

THE WILLOWS. E leventh E d ition. Cr.

800. 75 . 6d . net .

Hall (H. THE ANCIENT HISTORYOF THE NEAR EAST FROM THE

EARLIEST TIMES TO THE BATTLEO F SALAMIS . Illustrated . Fifth E d i

tion. D emy 800. 21 5 . net .

Hawthorne (Bathanie l) . THE SCAR LETLETTER . W ith 3 1 Illustrations inColourby H UGH THOMSON. Wid e R oya l 800.

3 1s. 6d . ne t.Herbert (A. B ) . THE WHEREFOREAND THE WHY : N EW R HYMES FOR OLDCHILDREN . Illustra ted byGEORGE MORRow.

Feat . 4t0. 3s. 6d . ne t.LIGHT ARTICLES ONLY. Il lustrate d byGEORGE MoRRow. Cr. 800. 65 . net.

Hol d sworth (W. A HISTORY O F

ENGLISH LAW. Vols. 111, 111.

E ach S econd E d ition. D ewy 800. Each

I s. ne t.In em. CHRISTIAN MYSTICISM.

he Bampton Le ctures of Fifi /tE d i tion. Cr. 800. 3 . 6d . net.

Jenks AN O TLINE OF ENG.

LISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT. Fourth

E d i t ion. R evise d by R . C. K. ENSOR . Cr.

800. s. net.

A SH RT HISTORY OF ENGLISHLAW : FROM THE EARLI EST T IMES To

THE END or THE YEAR -Ion . Second

E d ition, rev ised . D ewy 800. 1 25 . 6d . net.

Julian (Lad y) of Norwich. REVELATION S OF D IVINE LOVE. Ed ited by

GRACE WA RRACK . S eventh Ed i tion. Cr.

800. s. net.

.

Slohn POEMS . Ed ited , with Intro

d uction an Notes, by E . DE SELINCOURT.W ith a Frontispiec e in Photo ravnre .

Fourth E d ition. D enny 800 . 1 2s. net.

Ki d d (Benjamin) . THE SCIENCE OF

POWER . N inth E d i tion. Crown 800.

7 3 . 6d . net.

SOCIAL EVOLUTION . D emy 800. 85 . 6d .

net.A PHILOSOPHER WITH NATURE .

Cr. 800. 73 . 6d . net.

Ki Iin (Rud yard ) BARRACK-ROOML AD S. 2 1 5th Thousand . Cr. 800.

Bnekrann. 7s. 6d . net. A lso Feat . 800.

Cloth, 63 . net lea ther , 7s. 6d . net.

Also a Service Ed ition. Two Valum

S ua refeat . 800. E ach 3s. net.

TH SEVEN SEAS. 1s7 th Thousand .

Cr. 800. Buchanan, 7s. 6d . net. A lsoFeat .

800. Cloth, 65 . net ; lea ther, 7s. 6d . net.

Also a Service Ed ition. Two Volumes.

Square/”cap. 800. Each 31 . net.

Kip l ing (Rud yard k eontinned .THE FIVE NATIONS . 1 26thCr. 8190. B ack) am , 7s. 6d . net. A lsoFeap

'

.

8zro. Cloth, 63 . net ; lea ther , 7s. 6d . net.Also a Serv ice Ed ition. TwoSgea refeap . 800. E ach 3s. net.

DE ARTMENTAL D ITTIES. mendThousand . Cr. 800. Buckram , 7s. 6d .net.A lso Fa y}. 80a. Cloth, 65 . net ; lea ther ,7s. 6d .net.

'Also a Service Ed ition. Two Volumes

rigi d ” e 8210. Ea ch 3s. net.

T S BETWEEN. 95th Thonsand . Cr. 800. Buckram , 7s. 6d . net.Feat . 800. B lue elat/a 6s. net ; Limolambskin 73 . 6d . ne t.Also a ervice E d ition. Two Volum es

S nare feat . 800. E ach 3s. net.HYlVIN BEFORE ACTION. IlluminatedFea d o. Is. 661. net .

REC IONAL. Illtuuiaated . Feat. 4to

1s. 6d . ne t.TWENTY POEMS FROM RUDYARDKIPLING. 360 th Thousand . Feat . have .

net .SELECTED PO EMS. Cr. 800. 5s. net .

Knox (E. Y. f‘ l Yoe

’of Punch.)

PAR OD IES REGAINED . Il lustrated byGEORGE MORROW. Fay}. Boo. 6s. net .

Lamb Char les and Mary). THE COMPLE EWORKS. Ed ited by E . V . LUCAS .Wi th Frontr

'

sfi'

eees. Feat .Boo. Each 6s. net.The volumesare zI. M ISCELLANEOUS PRO SE. I I. EL IA ANDTHE LAST ESSAY OF ELIA. I I I. BOOKSFOR CHILDREN. Iv. PLAYS AND POEMS .v . and V I. LETTERS .

THE ESSAYS OF ELIA. With anIntrod uctionby E . V . LUCAS , and 28 Illustrationby A. GARTH JONES . Fen} . Sw . 5s. ne t .

Lankester (5 1? Ba SCIENCE FROMAN EASY CHAI Il lustrated . ThirteenthE d it ion. Cr. 800. 73 . 6d . net.

SCIENCE FROM AN EASY CHAIR .

S econd S eries. Illustrate d . Third Ed itionCr. Svo. 7s. 6d . net.DIVERSIONS OF A NATURALIST.

Il lustrated . Third E d i t ion. Cr. 800 .

7s. 6d . net.SECRETS OF EARTH AND SEA. Cr.

800. 8s. 6d not .

Lod ge ( Sir Oliver). MAN AND THEUNIVER SE :A STUD Y or THE IN FLUENCEOR THE ADVANCE PN SCIENT IPPC KNOWLEDGE U PON OUR UNDER STAND I NG OFCHRIST IAN ITY. N inthE d i tion. CrownBw .

s. M . net.

T E SURVIVAL OF MAN : A STUDY INUNRECOGN ISED HUMAN FACULTY. S eventhEd ition. Cr. 8190. 7s. 6d . net.

MODERN PROBLEMS. Cr. Boo. 7s. 6d .

RAYMOND ; OR L I FE AND DEATH. Illustrated . Twelfth Ed i tion. D emy 800. 1 53.

net


4 MESSRS. METHUEN ’

S PUBLICATIONS

Smi th (Ad am) . THE WEALTH OFNATIONS . Ed ited by EDW I N CANNAN .Two Volumes. S econd E d i tion. D en/y800. £ 1 Ios. net.

Smi th (8. 0. Kaines) . LOOKING AT

PICTURES . Il lustrated . F cap . 8710.

és. ne t.

Stevenson (R. THE LETTERS OFROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. Ed itedby Sir S IDNEY COLV IN. A New R e

arrang ed E d ition infour volumes. FourthE d ition. Feat . 800. Each 6 9.net.

Surtees (R.

HANDLEY CROSS , 7s. 6d . net. M R .

S PONGE'S S PORT ING TOU R , 7s. 6d . net.

ASK MAMMA : or, The Richest Commone rin Eng land , 7s. 6d . net. JO RROCE S

’

S

AUNTS AND joLLIT IES , 63 . net. M R .

ACEY ROM FO RD ’

S HOUNDS , 7s. 6d . net.HAWBUC K GRANGE ; or, The S portingAd ventures of Thomas Scott , Esq. , 6s.

net. PLA I N OR R I NGLETS ? 7s. 6d . net.

H ILL I NGDON HALL, 7s. 6d . net.

Ti l d en (W. THE ART O F LAWNTENNIS . Il lustrate d . Third E d it ion.

Cr . 800. net. 5

Tlleaton(Mary DAILY STRENGTHFOR DAILY NEEDS . M enty

-seventh

Und erhlll (Eve lyn) . MYSTICISM. AStud y in the Nature and D e ve lopment O I

Man'

s Spiritual Consc iousness. E ig hthEd i t ion. D emy 800. 1 53 . ne t.

Yard on(Harry). HOW TO PLAY GOLF.

Il lustrated . Fourteenth E d i tion.

3 . 6d . net.aterhouse (El izabeth). A LITTLEBOOK OF LIFE AND DEATH .

Twenty-fi rst E d ition. Sma ll Pott 800.

Cloth, as. 6d . net.

Wells A SHORT HISTORY O FROME . .S

‘

eoenteenth E d ition. With 3Maps. Cr. 63 .

Wi ld e (Oscar). THE WORKS OF OSCARWILDE . Feat . 800. E ach 63 . 6d . ne t.I . LORD ARTHUR SAV ILE ’

S CR IME ANDTHE PORTRA IT OF M R. W . H . I I . THE

D UCHESS OF PADUA. I I I. POEM S. Iv .

LADY W INDERMERE’

S FAN. V. A WOMANOF NO IM PORTANCE . V I . A N IDEAL HUSBAND. V I I . THE IM PORTANCE OF BEINGEARNEST. V I I I . A HOUSE OF POMEGRANATES . Ix . INTENT IONS . x. D E PROFUND IS AND PR ISON LETTERS . X I. ESSAYS .X II. SALOME, A FLORENT INE TRAGEDY

,

and LA SA INTE COURT ISANE. x uI. ACR IT IC IN PALL MALL. X IV. SELECTEDPROSE OF O SCAR W I LDE. x v . ART ANDD ECORAT ION .

Il lusA HOUSE O F POMEGRANATES .

Yeats (w. A BOO K OF IRISHtrate d . Cr. 4to. ne t.

VERSE. FourthE d i tion. Cr. 8710. 7s. net.

PART II. —A SELECTION OF SERIES

Ancient CitiesGeneral Ed itor, S IR B . C. A . WINDLE

‘

61 . net each volume

With Illustrations by E. H. NEW , and other Artists

Ed it ion. M ed ium I 6mo. 3s. 6d . net.

Townshend (R. B . ) INSPIRED GOLF.

Feat . 800. 6d . net.

Turner (W . MUSIC AND LIFE.

Crown 800. 73 . 6d . net .

Cr. 8210.

BR ISTOL.LIN.

CANTERB URY. CHESTER. D UB-

lED INBURGH . L I NCOLN . SH REWSBURY.

The Antiquary’sBooks

D emy 800. 10s. 6d . net each volume

With Numerous IllustrationsANC I ENT PA I NTED GLASS IN ENGLAND.ARCHE OLOGY AND FALSE ANT IQU IT I ES.THE BELLS OF ENGLAND. THE B RASSESOF ENGLAND. THE CASTLES AND WALLEDTOWNS OF ENGLAND. CELT IC ART I NPAGAN AND CHR IST IAN T I MES . CHU RCHWARDEN S ' ACCOUNTS . TH E DOMESDAYINQUEST. ENGLISH CHURCH FURN IT URE.ENGLIS H COSTUME. ENGLISH MONA ST ICL I FE. ENGLI SH SEALS . FOLK-LOR E AS

AN H ISTORICAL SC IENCE. THE G ILDsAN DCOM PANIES OF LONDON. THE HERM ITSAND ANCHOR ITES OF ENGLAND. THE

MANOR AND MANOR IAL RECORDS. THEM ED LE VA L HOS P ITALS OF ENGLAND.O LD ENGLIS H INSTRUMENTS OF M US IC.O LD ENGLI SH LIBRAR I ES. O LD SERV ICEBOOK S OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH. PAR ISHLI FE I N MED I /EVAL ENGLAND . THEPAR ISH R EG ISTERS OF ENGLAND. R E

MA I NS O F THE PREH ISTOR IC AGE IN ENGLAND. THE R OMAN E RA I N BR ITA I N .RoMANo-BR IT I S H BU I LD INGS AND EARTH ~WORKS. THE ROYAL FORESTS OF ENGLAND. THE SCHOOLS OF MED I EVAL ENGLAND. SHR INES OF BR IT ISH SA I NTS.

MESSRS . METHUEN ’

S PUBLICATIONS 5

The Ard en Shakespeare

General Ed itor, R . H . CASED emy 87 m. 6s. net each volume

Aned itionOfShakespeare inS ingle Plays each edited with a full Introd uction,Tex tual Notes, and a Commentary at the foot of the page .

Classicsof ArtEd ited by D R. J. H . w. LAING

With numerous Illustrations.THE ART OF THE G REEKS , 1 53 . net. THEART OF THE R OMANS , 16s. net. C IIARD IN ,

1 5s. net. D ONATELLO , 1 6s. net. GEORGEROMNEY, 1ss. net. GH I R LAN DA I O , 1 5s. net.LAWRENCE , net. M ICHEL/ANGELO , 1953 .

Wid e Royal 800ne t. RAPHAEL , 1 5s. net.’ REM BRAND T ‘ SETCH INGS , 3 1s. 6d . ne t. REM BRANDT ’

S

PA I NT ING S , 4as. net . T I NTOR ETTO, 1os.net.

T IT IAN , i os. net. TURNER'S SKETCHES ANDD RAW I NGS , 1 53 . net. VELAzQUEz, 3 5s. net.

The Comp lete Series

Fully Illustrated . D emy 800

THE COM PLETE A I RMAN , ios. net. T HE

COM PLETE AMATEU R BOX ER , ms. 64 . net.

THE COM PLETE ASSOC IAT I ON FOOTBALLER

,1 0s. 6d . net. THE COM PLETE

ATHLET IC T RA IN ER, 10s. 6d . net. T HE

COM PLETE B I LL IARD PLAYE R , ms. 6d .

net. T HE COM PLETE COOK , 10s. 6d . ne t.

THE COMPLETE CR ICK ETER , 10s. 6d . net.

T HE COM PLETE FO X IIUN '

I‘

ER , 16s. net.

THE COM PLETE GOLFER , 1 2s. 6d . net.

THE COM PLETE HOCK EY-PLAYER , Ios. 6d .

net . THE COM PLETE HORSEMAN , 1 2s. 6d .

net. THE COM PLETE{DJIT SUAM Cr . Boo. 53 .

ne t. THE COM PLETE AWN TENN IS PLAYE R ,1 9s. 6d . net. T I I E’ COM PLETE MO I

‘

O RIS‘

I‘

10s. 6d . net. THE COM PLETE MOUNTA INFER , I6 r. net. THE CO M PLETE OARSMAN ,1 5s. net. TH E COM PLETE PHOTOGRA PHER ,I 5s. ne t. T HE COM P I ETE R UGBY FOOT o

BALLER , ON THE NEW Z EALAN D SYSTEM ,1 zs. 6 d. net. THE COM PLETE S HOT

, 16s.

ne t . THE COM PLETE SWIMMER , ros. 6d .

ne t. THE COM PLETE YACHTSMAN, 1 8s.

net.

The Connois seur’sLibraryWith numerous Illustrations.

ENGLISH COLOURED BOOKS . ETCH INGS .EUROPEAN ENAMELS . FI N E BOOKSGLAS S . GOLDSM IT HS ' AND S I LVERSM ITHS\VORK . ILLUM INATED M ANUSCR I PTS .

Wid e Royal 87m. 25s. net each volume

IVOR IES . JEWE LLERY. ME Z Z OT INTS.M IN IATURES . PORCELA I N. SEALS .WOO D SCUL PTURE.

Hand booksof TheologyD emy 8m

THE D OCTRINE OF THE INCARNAT ION , rss.net. A H ISTORY OF EARLY CHR I ST IAND OCTR I N E , I6s. net . INTRODUCT ION TOTHE H I STORY OF R ELIG ION , 1 2s. 6d . net.

AN INTRODUCT ION TO THE H ISTORY OF

THE CREEDS , 1 2s. 6d . net. THE PH ILOSOPHYOF RELIG ION I N ENGLAND AND AMER ICA

,

1 2s. 6d . net. THE X X X IX ART ICLES OFTHE CHURCH OF ENGLAND , 1 55 . net.

Health SeriesFeap. 8110.

THE BABY. THE CARE OF THE BODY. THECARE OF THE TEETH . THE ‘EYES OF OU RCH I LDREN. HEALTH FOR THE M IDDLEAGED . THE HEALTH OF A WOMAN . THE

HEALTH OF THE SK I N . How TO L IVE

2s. 6d . net

LONG. THE PREVENT I ON OF THE COMMONCOLD. STAYING THE PLAGUE. THROATAND EAR TROU BLES. TU BERCULOS IS. THEHEALTH OF THE CH I LD , as. net.


S PUBLICATIONS

The Library of Devotion

Handy Ed itions of the great D evotional Books, well ed ited.W i th Introductions and (where necessary ) NotesSmall Pott 87m, cloth, net and 3s. 6d . net

Little Books on Art

W’

z’

t/z many Illustrations. D ewy 16mo. 5s. net each volume

Each volume consistsofabout 200 pages, and containsfrom 30 to40 Illustrations,includ ing a Frontispiece inPhotogravure

ALBRECHT DURER. THE ARTS OF JAPAN. BOUCHER. HOLBE IN. lLLUM i NATEDBoox PLATEs. BOTT ICELL I. BURNE ONEs. MANUSCR IPTS. JEWELLERY. joHN H OPP

CELL IN I . CH RIST IAN SYM BOLISM . B R IST NER. S ir JOSHUA REYNOLDS . M i LLET .

IN ART . CLAUDE. CoNSTA BLE. COROT. M i NrATUREs. OUR LADY rN ART . RAPHAEL .EARLY ENGL ISH WATER-CO I OUR. ENA R OD rN. TURNER. VANDc . VELAZ QUEz.

MELS . FREDEc LE lGHTON. GEORGE WATTS.ROMNEY. GREEK ART . GREUZE AND

The Little Guid es

With many Illustrationsby E. H . NEW and other artists,and from photographs

Small Fall 8710. 45 . net, net, and net

Guidesto the Engi ish and Welsh Counties, and some well-known d istricts

The main features of these Guid es are ( I ) a hand y and charming form (2)i llustrations from photographs and by well

-known artists; (3 ) good plans and

maps (4 ) anad equate but compact presentationof everything that isinterestingin the natural features, h istory, archaeology, and arch itecture of the town or

d istric t treated .

The Little Quarto Shakespeare

Ed i ted by W. I. CRAIG . With Introd uctions and Notes

Pott I6mo. 40 Volumes. Leatlzer , price Is. 9d . net eaelz volume

Clot/z, IS. 6d .

Plays

Feap . Sw . 3s. 6d . net

M ILESTONES. Arnold Benne tt and Ed ward TYPHOON . A Play in Four Acts. Me lchiorKnoblock. N inth E d ition. Lengye l . Engl ish Version by Laurence

IDEAL HUSBAND, AN. OscarW ild e . A cting Irv ing. S econd E d ition.

E d ition. WARE CASE , THE. George Pleyd e ll.K ISMET . Ed ward Knoblock. Fourth Ed z

'

GENERAL POST. j. E . Harold Terry. S econdtion.

E d ition.

THE GREAT ADVENTURE. Arnold Benne tt. THE HONEYMOON. Arnold Benne tt . Tld rd

Fz'

ft/e E d z’

tz’

on.



S PUBLICATIONS

Hope (Anthony)A CHANGE OF AIR. A MAN or MARK.THE CHRON ICLES OF COUNT ANTON IO.S I MON DALE. THE K ING’S M IRROR.

QU ISANTE. THE DOLLY D IALOGUES .ALES OF Two PEOPLE. A SERVANT OFTHE PUBL IC. M RS. MAx 0N PROTESTS.A YOUNG MAN ’S YEAR. BEAUMAROY

HOME FROM THE WARS . A ll 73 . 6d . net.

Jacobo(W .W .)MANY CARGOES , 53 . net. SEA URCHINS ,53 . net and 3s. 6d . net. A MASTER OFCRAFT

, 53 . net. L IGHT FRE IGHTS, net.

THE SK I PPER’S WOO ING , 53 . net. AT SUN

W ICH PORT , 53 . net. D IALSTONE LANE ,53 . net. ODD CRAFT , se. net. THE LADYOF THE BARGE, 53 . net. SALTHAVEN, 5s.

net. SA ILORS’ K NOTS , 53 . net. SHORTCRU ISES , 6s. net.Lond on (Jack) . WH ITE FANG. Ninth

E d ition. Cr. 800. 73 . 6d . net.

Lucas(E.Y.)L ISTENER'S LU RE An Ob l ique Narration,63 . net. OVER BEMERTO N

’S : An Easy

going Chronicle , 65 . net. MR. INGLES I DE,65 . net. LONDON LAVENDER , 63 . ne t.

LANDMARKS, 73 . 6d . net. THE VERM IL ION

Box , 3 . 6d . net. VERENA IN THE M IDST,83 . 6d

7net. ROSE AND ROSE , 73 . 6d . net.

McKenna (Stephen)SON IA : Be twe en Two World s, 83 . net.

N INETY-e HOURS’ LEAVE, 7s. 6d . net.

THE S lX TH SENSE, 63 .net. M I DAS SON ,

Malet (Luoae)THE H ISTORY OF S IR R ICHARD CALMADYA Romance . Ioe. net. THE CAR ISS IMA.

THE GATELESS BARR IER. D EADHAM

HARD. A ll 7s. 6d . net. THE WAGES OFS IN. 83 . net.

Mason (A. E. W .) CLEMENTINA.

Il lustrated . N inth E d ition. Cr. 800. 7s.

6d . net.

Maxwe l l (W. B.)V IV IEN. THE GUARDED FLAME. ODDLENGTH S. H ILL RISE. THE REST CU RE .

A ll 7s. 6d . net.

Ox enham (John)PROF IT AND LO SS. THE SONG OF HYAC INTH , and O ther S tori es. THE CO IL OFCARNE. THE QUEST OF THE GOLDEN ROSE.MARY ALL-ALONE. BROK EN SHACKLES.

All 73 . 6d . ne t.

Parker (Gi lbert)P IERRE AND H IS PEOPLE. M RS .FALCH ION.THE TRANSLAT ION OF A SAVAGE. WHENVALM OND CAME To PONT IAC The S tory ofa Lost Na leon. AN ADVENTURER OF THENORTH : he Last Ad venturesof “Pre ttyPierre .

’ THE SEATS OF THE M IGHTY. THEBATTLE OF THE STRONG : A Romanceof Two K ingd oms. THE POM P OF THELAYILETTES. NORTHERN L IGHTS. A ll

7s. 6d . net.

Methuen’s Two-Shilling Novels

Cheap Ed itions of many of the most Popular Novels of the d ayWrite for Complete List

Phlllpotts(Ed emCH ILDREN OF THE M IST. THE RIVER .DEMETER’S DAUGHTER. THE HUMAN BOYAND THE WAR. A ll 7s. 6d . net.

RId ge (w. Pett)A SON OF THE STATE , 7s. 6d . net. THEREM INGTON SENTENCE , 7 3 . 6d . ne t.

MADAME PR INCE , 7s. 6d . net. TOP S PEED ,73 . 6d . net . S PEC IAL PERFORMANCES

,63 .

net. THE BUSTL ING HOURS , 73 . 6d . net.BANNERTONS AGENCY , 7s. 6d . net . WELLTO-DO ARTHU R , 7s. 6d . net.

Rohmer (Sax )THE DEV IL DOCTOR. TALES OF SECRETEGYPT. THE ORCHARD OF TEARS. THEGOLDEN SCORP ION. A ll 73 . 6d .net.

Swinnerton(E ). SHOPS AND HOUSES.Third E d ition. Cr. 800. 75 . 6d . net.

SEPTEMBER. Third Ed ition. Cr. 800.

75 . 6d . net.

THE HAPPY FAMILY. S econd Ed ition.

7s. 6d . ne t.

ON THE STAIRCASE. Thi rd E d ition.

3 . 6d . net.

C QUETTE. Cr. 800. 7s. 6d . net.

We ll"(H. BEALBY. Fourt/t Ed ition.

Cr. 800. 73 . 6d . net.

Wi lliamson (0. N. and A. M.)THE L IGHTN ING CONDUCTOR : The StrangeAd ventures of a Motor Car. LADY BETTYACROSS THE WATER. LORD LOVELANDDISCOVERS AMER ICA. THE GUESTS OFHERCULES. IT HAP PENED IN EGYPT. ASOLDIER OF THE LEG ION . THE SHOPG IRL. THE L IGHTN ING CONDUCT RESS.SECRET H ISTORY. THE LOVE P I RATE.A ll 7s. 6d . net. CRUCIFIx CORNER. és.

Documents

The Elements of Greek Philosophy - Forgotten Books