No More Learning

The creations of these three heroes of Greek thought differ from the doctrines of all their predecessors by reason of their systematic char acter. Each of the three gave to the world an all-embracing system of science complete in itself. Their teachings gained this character, eo the one hand, through the all-sidedness of their problems, and on *<hr other, through the conscious unity in their treatment of them.
While each of the earlier thinkers had seized upon but a limited 00
100 The Philosophy of the Greeks. [Part I.
circle of questions, and in like manner had shown himself informed only in certain departments of actual reality, while especially no one had as yet shown interest in both physical and psychological investigation, these three men directed their work in like measure to the entire compass of scientific problems. They brought together what experience and observation had won ; they examined and com pared the conceptions which had been formed from these, and they brought that which up to this time had been isolated, into fruitful union and relation. This all-sidedness of their scientific interest appears in the compass and varied character of their literary activ ity, and the great amount of material elaborated is in part explained only through the vigorous co-operation of their extended schools, in which a division of labour in accordance with inclination and endow ment was allowed.
But this work thus shared in common did not result in a mass of unrelated material. This was guarded against by the fact that each of these three men undertook and conducted the working over of the entire material of knowledge with a unity of purpose and method derived from the principle which formed his fundamental thought. This, indeed, led at more than one point to a one-sided conception, and to a kind of violation of individual domains, and thereby to the inter-weaving of problems in ways which do not stand criticism. But on the other hand, just by means of the adjustment which must take place in this process between the forms of cognition in differ ent departments of knowledge, the formation of metaphysical concep tions was so furthered, abstract thought was so refined and deepened, that in the short time of scarcely two generations the typical out
lines of three different conceptions of the world were worked out. Thus the advantages and the disadvantages of philosophical system- building appear in like measure in the case of these men of genius who were the first founders of systems.
The systematising of knowledge so that it should become an all-in- clusive philosophical doctrine was achieved with increasing success by Democritus, Plato, and Aristotle, and with the last first found the form of an organic articulation of science into the individual disciplines. With this Aristotle concluded the development of Greek philosophy and inaugurated the age of the special sciences.
The course of this development was more particularly this : the two opposing systems of Democritus and Plato arose from the application to cosmological and metaphysical problems, of the prin ciples gained through the doctrines of the Sophists and of Socrates ; from the attempt to reconcile these opposites proceeded the conclud ing doctrine of Aristotle.
The Systematic Period. 101
Cmjlp. 3. ]
The essential feature in the work of Democritus and Plato was that they used the insight into the theory of knowledge, gained by the philosophy of the Enlightenment, to ground metaphysics anew. Their common dependence upon the doctrines of the cosinological period and upon the Sophistic teaching, in particular upon the the ory of Protagoras, stamps upon the two doctrines a certain parallel ism and a partial relationship, — a relationship the more interesting, the deeper the contrast between the two in other respects. This contrast, however, is due to the fact that the Socratic teacliing had no effect upon Democritus, while its influence on Plato was decisive ; hence the ethical factor is as preponderant in the system of the latter as it is unimportant in that of the former. Thus in parallel lines from the same source developed the materialism of Democritus and the idealism of Plato.
From this contrast is explained, too, the difference in their work ing. The purely theoretical conception of science which prevails with Democritus did not suit the age ; his school soon disappeared. Plato, on the contrary, whose scientific teaching furnished at the same time the basis for a principle of life, had the pleasure of form ing in the Academy An extensive and lasting school. Hut this school, the so-called Older Academy, following the general tendency of the time, *oon ran out partly into special investigation, partly into pop ular moralising.
Out of it rose then the great form of Aristotle, the most influential thinker that history has seen. The powerful concentration with which he caused the entire content of thought in Greek science to crystallise about the conception of development (ivrtXi^ua) in order to adjust the opposition discovered between his two great predeces sors, made him the philosophical teacher of the future, and his system the most perfect expression of Greek thought.
DwWBOCiitaa of Abdera (about 460-360) was educated in the scientific asso ciation of his home and by journeys lasting many years, led the life of a quiet, ■n—uming investigator in his native city during the turmoil of the Sophistic ptiod. and remained far from the noisy activity of Athens. He did not impart aoT special ability, political or otherwise, by his teaching, but was essentially 4Mfrjm-d to theoretical thought, and particularly inclined to the investigation of Sature. With gigantic learning and comprehensive information he united great rlranvaa of abstract thought and apparently a strong inclination to simplify prob- tnns schematically. The number of his works proves that he stood at the head tit an extended school, of which some unimportant names are preserved, yet
fcxtuns; u m>'re characteristic of the way in which his age turned aside from rwjia that was not interesting to it than the indifference with which his sya- wm of the mechanical explanation of Nature was met. His doctrine was forced ■to ib* background for two thousand years by the teleological systems, and prniuoged its existence only in the Kpicurean school, while even there it was not wsAamoodL
Antiquity honoured Democritus as a great writer also, and for this reason the Imni complete loss of his works is all the more to be lamented, as aside from
102 The Philosophy of the Greeks. [Part L
the numerous titles only very unimportant and in part doubtful fragments are extant. The most important writings seem to have been, theoretically, the M*ya. - and Miicpdj StdmatuH, xepl rod and rcpl iStwv ; practically, re/>i ev6vfil-r]s and irro&ij- Ktu. W. Kahl (Diedenhofen, 1889) has begun to work through the sources which had been collected by \V. Burchard (Minden, 1830 and 1834) and Lort- zing (Berlin, 1873). P. Natorp has edited the Ethics (Leips. 1893).
Cf. P. Natorp, Forschungen zur Qeschicht? des Erkenntnissproblems im Alter- thum (Berlin, 1884); G. Hart, Zur tieelen- und Erkenntnisslehre des Demokrit (Leips. 1886).
Plato of Athens (427-347), of distinguished family, had most successfully assimilated the artistic and scientific culture of his time when the personality of Socrates made so decisive an impression upon him that he abandoned his at tempts at poetry and devoted himself entirely to the society of the master. He was his truest and most intelligent, and yet at the same time his most indepen dent disciple. The execution of Socrates occasioned his acceptance of Euclid's invitation to Megara ; then he journeyed to Cyrene and Egypt, returned for a time to Athens, and here began to teach through his writings, and perhaps also orally. About 390 we find him in Magna Gracia and Sicily, where he became connected with the Pythagoreans and took part also in political action. This brought him into serious danger at the court of the ruler of Syracuse, the elder Dionysius, whom he sought to influence with the help of his friend Dion ; he was delivered as prisoner of war to the Spartans and ransomed only by the help of a friend. This attempt at practical politics in Sicily was twice repeated later (367 and 361), but always with unfortunate results.
After the first Sicilian journey, he founded his school in the grove Akademos, and soon united about him a great number of prominent men for the purpose of common scientific work. Yet the bond of this society was to be sought still more in a friendship based upon community of ethical ideals. His teaching activity at the beginning had, like that of Socrates, that character of a common search for truth which finds expression in the dialogue. It was not until his old age that it took on more the form of the didactic lecture.
This life finds its aesthetic and literary embodiment in Plato's works, ' in which the process itself of philosophising is set forth with dramatic vividness and plastic portraiture of personalities and their views of life. As works of art, the Symposium and the Phatdo are most successful ; the grandest impression of the system, as a whole, is afforded by the Republic. With the exception of the Apology of Socrates, the form is everywhere that of the dialogue. Yet the artistic treatment suffers in Plato's old age, and the dialogue remains only as the sphematic setting of a lecture, as in the Timatus and the Laws. For the most part, Socrates leads the conversation, and it is into his mouth that Plato puts his own decision when he comes to one. Exceptions to this are not found until in the latest writings.
The mode of presentation is also on the whole more artistic than scientific. It exhibits extreme vividness and plasticity of imagination in perfect language, but no strictness in separating problems or in methodical investigation. The con tents of any individual dialogue is to be designated only by the prominent sub ject of inquiry. Where abstract presentation is not possible or not in place Plato takes to his aid the so-called myths, allegorical presentations which utilise motives from fables and tales of the gods in free, poetic form.
The transmission of his works is only in part certain, and it is just as doubtful in what order they originated and what relation they bear to one another.
gave an impulse in that direction :
* Translated into German by Hier. Mflller, with introductions by K. Steinhart. 8 vols. Leips. 1850-1860. As ninth volume of the series Platan's Leben, by K. Steinhart. Leips. 1873. [English by Jowett, third ed. 6 vols. Oxford,
Among more recent editions, in which the paging of that of Stephanus (Paris, 1578), employed in citations, is always repeated, are to be noted those of J. Bekker (Berlin, 1816 f. ), Stallbaum (Leips. 1850), Schneider and Hirschig (Paris: Didot, 1846 ff. ), M. Schanz (Leips. 1875 ff. ).
The following are among the most important names of those who have worked over these questions since Schleiermacher in his translation (Berlin, 1804 ff. )
1893. ]
J. Socher (Munich, 1820), C. Fr. Hermann
Chat. 3. ] The Systematic Period. 103
Heidelberg, 1839), E. Zeller (Tubingen, 1830), Fr. Suckow (Berlin, 1866), Fr. Susemihl (Berlin, 1866-58), E. Munk (Berlin, 1886), Fr. Ueberweg (Vienna, 1*«1), K. Schaarschmidt (Bonn, 1866), H. Bonitz (Berlin, 1876), G. Teich- afiller (Gotha, 1876 ; Leipsic, 1879; Breslau, 1881), A. Krohn (Halle, 1878), W. Lhuenberger (in Hermes, 1881), H. Siebeck (Freiburg i. B. 1889). [H. Jack- no in Jour. Phil. , X. , XL, and XIII. ; Archer-Hind's editions of Phcedo and
Timatms; reviewed critically by P. Shorey in Am. Jour. Phttol, IX. and X. ] [On Plato's philosophy, in addition to the above, W. Pater, Plato and Platon-'
us (Lond. and N. Y. 189;! ) ; J. Martineau, in Types of Ethical Theory (Lond. ud N. Y. 1886), also in Essays; Art. Plato in Enc. Brit. , by L. Campbell ; R. L. Neoleship, The Theory of Education in P. '» Pep. , in Hellenic a ; J. S. Mill in Essays and Discussions. ]
The writings which are considered genuinely Platonic are (a) youthful works, wtuch scarcely go beyond the Socratic standpoint : Apology, Crito, Euthyphro, Lftis, Laches (perhaps also Charmides, Hippias Minor, and Alcibiudes, I. ) ;
*) writings to establish his position with regard to the Sophistic doctrines: Prvtaooras, Gorgias, Euthydemus, Cratylus, Meno, Theattetus ; (c) main works . aieaded to present his own doctrine : Pha-drus, Symposium, Phado, Philebus, ud the Republic, whose working out, begun early and completed in successive strata, as it were, extended into the last years of the Philosopher's life ; (</) the vritinxs of his old age : Timaeus, the Laws, and the fragment of Critias. Among ih« doubtful writings the most important are the Sophist, Politicus, and Par- m*mides. These probably did not originate with Plato, but with men of his « ti"~>l who were closely related with the Eleatic dialectic and eristic. The first two are by the same author.
Cf. H. v. Stein, Siehen Biicher zur Geschiehte des Platonismus (Gottingen, 1961 fl. 1; G. Grote, Plato and the Other Companions of Socrates (Lond. 1866); A. E. Chaignet. La vie et lesecrits de Platon (Paris, 1873); E. Heitz, <0. Midler's Htsek. der griech. Lit. , 2. Aufl. , II. 2, 148-236).
Plato's school is called the Academy, and the time of its development, which -rarhr* to the end of ancient thought, and which was aided by the continued ;>«w»ion of the academic grove and the gymnasium existing there, is usually 'itrxied into three or five periods : (1) the Older Academy, Plato's most inime- datle circle of scholars and the succeeding generations, extending to about 260 u. r ; (2) the Middle Academy, which took a sceptical direction, and in which aa older school of Arcesilaus and a younger school of Carneades (about 160) are 4i»ururaished ; (3) the New Academy, which with Philo of Larissa (about 100) mrned back to the old dogmatUui, and with Antiochus of Ascalon (about twenty- bt? rears later) turned into the paths of Eclecticism. Concerning the two (or fcwxr i later forms cf. Part II. ch. 1. Later the Neo- Platonic school took posses-
u<ti of the Academy. Cf. Part II. ch. 2.
To the Older Academy belonged men of great erudition and honourable per-
•naatity. The heart* of the school were Speualppna, the nephew of Plato, Tawx utile of Chalcedon, Polemo and Crate* of Athens ; beside these, Philip of i >pus and Heracleldes from Pontic Heraclea are to be mentioned fnns; the older, and Crantor among the younger members. Less closely frhued with the school were the astronomers Eudoxus of Cnidos and the Pythagorean Archytaa of Tarentum. R. Heinze, Xenoerates (Leips. 1892).
Ar1e*,"H» of Stagira towers far above all his associates in the Academy "Wl TTfj Aa son of a Macedonian physician, he brought with him an inclina
tion toward medical and natural science, when, at eighteen years of age, he enured the Academy, in which as literary supporter and also as teacher, at first A rhetoric, he early played a comparatively independent part, without acting
rnotrarv to a feeling of reverent subordination to the master, by so doing. It was not until after Plato's death that he separated himself externally from the Academy, visiting, with Xenoerates, his friend Hermias, the ruler of Atarneus and aana in Mysia, whose relative Pythias he afterwards married. After an appar- •aiiy transient stay at Athens and Mitylene, he undertook, at the wish of Philip
Maeedon, the education of the latter's son Alexander, and conducted for item three years with the greatest results. After this, he lived for some years a his native city, pursuing scientific studies with his friend Theophrastus, and v^Mber with him, in the year 336, founded in Athens his own school, which ad ija seat in the Lyceum, and (probably on account of its shady walks) was caOed the Peripatetic School.
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it
104 The Greeks : Systematic Period. [Part I.
After twelve years of the greatest activity, he left Athens on account of political disturbances and went to Chalcis, where he died in the following year, of a disease of the stomach. Cf. A. Stahr, Aristotelia, I. (Halle, 1830).
Of the results of the extraordinarily comprehensive literary activity of Aris totle only the smallest part, but the most important part from the point of view of science, is extant. The dialogues published by himself, which in the eyes of the ancients placed him on a level with Plato as an author also, are lost with the
'exception of a few fragments, and so also are the great compilations which with the aid of his scholars he prepared for the different branches of scientific knowl edge. Only his scientific didactic writings, which were designed as text-books to be made the foundation of lectures in the Lyceum, are extant. The plan of execution in his works varies greatly ; in many places there are only sketchy notes, in others complete elaborations ; there are also different revisions of the same sketch, and it is probable that supplementary matter by different scholars has been inserted in the gaps of the manuscripts.
Since the first complete edi tion prepared in ancient times (as it appears, on the occasion of a new discovery of original manuscripts) by Andronicus of Rhodes (60-50 b. c. ) did not separate these parts, many critical questions are still afloat concerning it.
Cf. A. Stahr, Aristotelia, II. (Leips. 1832); V. Rose (Berlin, 1854); H. Bonitz (Vienna, 1862 ff. ); J. Bernays (Berlin, 1863); E. Heitz (Leips. 1866 and in the second ed. of 0. Muller's Gesch. der griech. Lit. , II. 2, 236-321); E. Vahlen
(Vienna, 1870 ff. ).
This text-book collection,1 as it were, is arranged in the following manner :
(a) Logical treatises: the Categories, on the Proposition, on Interpretation, the Analytics, the Topics including the book on the Fallacies — brought together by the school as "Organon" ; (6) Theoretical Philosophy : Fundamental Science {Metaphysics), the Physics, the History of Animals, and the Psychology ; to the three last are attached a number of separate treatises ; (c) Practical Philosophy: the Ethics in the Nicomachean and Eudemian editions and the Politics (which likewise is not complete) ; (<J) Poietical or Poetical Philosophy : the Rhetoric and the Poetic.
Ft. Biese, Die Philosophic des Arintoteles (2 vols. , Berlin, 1836-42); A. Rosmini-Serbati, Aristotele Exposto ed Esaminato (Torino, 1868); G. H. Lewes, Aristotle, a Chapter from the History of Science (Lond. 1864) ; G. Grote, Aristotle (published from his literary remains, Lond. 1872).
[Trans, of the Psychology by E. Wallace (Camb. 1882) ; of the Ethics, by Peters (Lond. 1881), Welldon (Lond. and N. Y. ), Williams (Lond. 1876), Chase (Lond. 1877), Hatch (Lond. 1879); of the Poetics, by Wharton (Camb. 1883) ; of the Politics, by Welldon (Camb. 1888), Jowett (2 vols. , Oxford, 1886-88) ; of the Rhetoric, by Welldon (Lond. and N. Y. 1886) ; also tr. of all of the above and of the Metaphysics, Organon, and History of Animals in the Bohn Library. Editions of the Politics with valuable introduction by Newman (Oxford, 1887, 2 vols. ); of the Ethics, by A. Grant. Cf. also Art. in Enc. Brit. , Aristotle bv A. Giant; T. H. Green in Works; A. C. Bradley, A'* Theory of the State, in Hellenica. E. Wallace, Outlines of A. 's Phil, is convenient for the student. ]
§ 9. Metaphysics grounded anew in Epistemology and Ethics.
The great systematisers of Greek science exercised a swift but just criticism upon the Sophistic doctrine. They saw at once that among the doctrines of the Sophists but a single one possessed the worth of lasting validity and scientific fruitfulness — the perception theory of Protagoras.
1 Of the newer editions, that of the Berlin Academy (J. Bekker, Brandis, Rose, Usener, Bonitz), 6 vols. , Berlin, 1831-70, is made the basis of citations. The Parisian edition (Didot) is also to be noticed (DUbner, Bussemaker, Helta) 5 vols. , Paris, 1848-74.
Chat. 3, § ! >. ] The New Metaphysics. 105
1. This, therefore, became the starting-point for Democritus and for Plato ; and both adopted it in order to transcend it and attack the consequences which the Sophist had drawn from it. Both admit that perception, as being itself only a product of a natural process, can be the knowledge of something only which likewise arises and passes away as transitory product of the same natural process. Perception then gives only opinion (&6£a) ; it teaches what appears in and for human view (called vd^w in Democritus with a genuine Sophistic mode of expression), not what truly or really {ireg with Democritus, eVr«K with Piato) is.
For Protagoras, who regarded perception as the only source of knowledge, there was consequently no knowledge of what is. That he took the farther step of denying Being altogether and declaring the objects of perception to be the sole reality, behind which there is no Being to be sought for, — this " positivist" conclusion is not to be demonstrated in his case : the doctrine of " nihilism " there
no Being expressly ascribed by tradition only to Gorgias.
If, nevertheless, from any grounds whatever, universally valid knowledge (ympru; yvwiit) with Democritus, imar-finn with Plato) was
to be again set over against opinions, the sensualism of Protagoras must be abandoned and the position of the old metaphysicians, who distinguished thought (oWou), as higher and better knowledge, from perception, must l>e taken again (cf. 6). Thus Democritus and Plato both in like manner transcend Protagoras by acknowledg ing the relativity of perception, and looking to "thought" agaiu for knowledge of what truly is. Both are outspoken rationalists. 1
This new metaphysical rationalism yet distinguished from the older rationalism of the cosraological period, not only by its broader psychological basis, which owed to the Protagorean analysis of perception, but also in consequence of this, by another valuation of perception 'tself from the standpoint of the theory of knowledge. The earlier metaphysicians, where they could not fit the contents of perception into their conceptional idea of the world, had simply rejected them as deceit and illusion. Now this illusion had been explained (by Protagoras), but in such way that while sarrendering its universal validity the content of perception might yet claim at least the value of transient atid relative reality.
This, in connection with the fact that scientific knowledge was
Cf- Seat. Kmp. Adv. Math. VIII. 66. The doctrine of Democritus with nm^ri to " genuine " knowledge most ihaiply formulated in Sext . Kmp. Adv.
JMata. VII. 139. Plato'* attack upon the Protagorean sensualism found prin cipally in the Thtatetus, his positive rationalistic attitude in the Phtzdriu, Sym-
BrjmUic, and Phado.
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106 Tlie Greeks: Systematic Period. [Part I.
directed toward the abiding " true " Being, led to a division in the conception of reality, and with this the fundamental need of explana tory thought came to clear, explicit consciousness, — a need which unconsciously lay at the basis of the beginnings of science. To the two kinds of knowledge — so Democritus and Plato taught — cor respond/two different kinds of reality: to perception a changing, relative, transient reality or actuality ; to thought a reality homo geneous, absolute and abiding. For the former Democritus seems to have introduced the expression phenomena; Plato designates it as the world of generation, ytWes : the other kind of reality Democ ritus calls ra tTttf ovra ; Plato, to ovtux; ov or obo-la [that which really
or essence].
In this way perception and opinion gain correctness which is
analogous to that of scientific thought. Perception cognises chang ing reality as thought cognises abiding reality. To the two modes of cognition correspond two domains of reality. 1
But between these two domains there exists for this reason the same relation, as regards their respective values, as obtains between the two kinds of cognition. By as much as thought, the universally valid act of consciousness, above perception, the knowledge valid only for individuals and for the particular, by so much the true Being higher, purer, more primitive, raised above the lower actuality of phenomena and the changing processes and events among them. This relation was especially emphasised and carried out by Plato for reasons hereafter to be unfolded. But appears also with Democ ritus, not only in his theory of knowledge, but also in his ethics.
In this way the two metaphysicians agree with the result which the Pythagoreans (cf. and had likewise won from their premises, viz. the distinction of higher and lower kind of reality. Nevertheless, in the presence of this similarity we are not to think of dependence in nowise in the case of Democritus, who was complete stranger to the astronomical view of the Pythag oreans, and scarcely in the case of Plato, who indeed later adopted the astronomical theory, but whose idea of the higher reality (the doctrine of Ideas) has an entirely different content. The case rather that the common, fundamental motive which came from the conception of Being propounded by Parmenides, led in these three quite different forms to the division of the world into sphere of higher and one of lower reality.
The pragmatic parallelism in the motives of the two opposed systems of Democritus and Plato reaches step farther, although
Best formulated in Plat. , Tim. 27 D ff. , eapeoially 29 <X
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3, § 9. ] The New Metaphysics : Democritus, Plato. 107
bat a short step. To the world of perception belong, without doubt, the specific qualities of the senses, for these disclose their relativity in the fact that the same thing appears differently to different senses. But after we have abstracted these qualities, that which remains as in object for the knowledge of the truly actual, is primarily the form which things have, and both thinkers designated as the true essential nature of things the pure forms (l&au).
But it almost seems as though here they had nothing in common but the name, striking as this fact is ; for if Democritus understood by the l&iu, which he also called uxn^ra, his atom-forms, while Plato understood by his ! 8«u'or ub\j the conceptions corresponding to logical species (Oattungsbegriffe), then the apparently like state ment that the truly existent consists in " forms " has a completely different meaning in the two authors. For this reason we must here, too, remain in doubt as to whether we should see a parallel dependence upon Pythagoreanism, which, to be sure, had previously found the essence of things in mathematical forms, and whose influ ence upon the two thinkers may be assumed without encountering any difficulties in the assumption itself. At all events, however, if a common suggestion was present, it led to quite different results in the two systems before us, and though in both of them knowledge of mathematical relations stands in very close relation to knowledge of true reality, these relations are yet completely different with the respective thinkers.
4. The relationship thus far unfolded between the two rational istic systems changes now suddenly to a sharp opposition as soon as we consider the motives from which the two thinkers transcended the Protagorean sensualism and relativism, and observe also the consequences which result therefrom. Here the circumstance be comes of decisive importance, that Plato teas the disciple of Socrates, while Democritus experienced not even the slightest influence from the great Athenian sage.
With Democritus the demand which drives him to transcend the position of Protagoras grows solely out of his theoretical need and develops according to his personal nature, — the demand, namely, that there is a knowledge, and that this, if it is not to he found in perception, must be sought for in thought; the investigator of Nat ure believes, as against all the Sophistic teaching, in the possibility ef a theory that shall explain phenomena. Plato, on the contrary, sets out with his postulate of the Socratic conception of virtue. Virtue is to be gained only through Tight knowledge ; knowledge, however, is cognition of the true Being : if, then, this is not to be found in perception, it must be sought for through thought. For
108 The Greeks : Systematic Period. [Part L
Plato philosophy grows, according to the Socratic principle,1 out of the ethical need. But while the Sophistic friends of Socrates were endeavouring to give to the knowledge that constituted virtue some object in the form of a general life-purpose, the good, pleasure, etc. , Plato wins his metaphysical position with one stroke, by drawing the inference that this knowledge in which virtue is to consist must be the cognition of what is truly real, the oiWu, — as opposed to opinions which relate to the relative. In his case the knowledge in which virtue is to consist demands a metaphysics.
Here, then, the ways are already parting. Knowledge of the truly real was for Democritus, as for the old metaphysicians, essentially an idea of the unchangeably abiding Being, but an idea by means of which it should be possible to understand the derivative form of reality which is cognised in perception. His rationalism amounted to an explanation of phenomena, to be gained through thought; it was essentially theoretical rationalism. For Plato, on the contrary, knowledge of the truly real had its ethical purpose within itself; this knowledge was to constitute virtue, and hence it had no other relation to the world given through ception than that of sharply defining its limits. True Being has
for Democritus the theoretical value of explaining phenomena ; for Plato, the practical value of being the object of that knowledge which constitutes virtue. His doctrine as regards its original principle, essentially ethical rationalism.
Democritus, therefore, persevered in the work undertaken in the school of Abdera, — the construction of metaphysics of Nature. With the help of the Sophistic psychology he developed Atomism to comprehensive system. Like Leucippus, he regarded empty space and the atoms moving in as the true reality. He then attempted not only to explain from the motion of these atoms all qualitative phenomena of the corporeal world as quantitative phenomena, but also to explain from these motions all mental activities, including that knowing activity which directed toward true Being. Thus he created the system of materialism.
Plato, however, was led to the entirely opposite result by his attachment to the Socratic doctrine, which proved to be of decisive importance for his conception of the essential nature of science.
Socrates had taught that knowledge consists in general concep tions. If, however, this knowledge, in contrast with opinions, was to be knowledge of what truly, actually is, there must belong to the content of these conceptions that higher Being, that true essential
Set forth most clearly in the Meno, 96 fl.
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Caar. 5, f 10. ] Syttem of Materialism : Demoeritus. 109
reality which, it was held, could be grasped only by thought, in contrast with perception. The " forms " of true reality, knowledge of which constitutes virtue, are the species or class-concepts ( Gattungs- begriffe), tl&yj. With this consideration, the Platonic conception of the - Idea" first gains its complete determination.
So understood, Plato's doctrine of Ideas presents itself as the summit of Greek philosophy. In it are combined all the different lines of thought which had been directed toward the physical, the ethical, the logical first principle (ip\yi or <f>vois). The Platonic
Idea, the species or class-concept, is firstly the abiding Being in the change of phenomena; secondly, the object of knowledge in the change of opinions ; thirdly, the true end in the change of desires.
But this oioui, from the nature of its definition, is not to be found within the sphere of what may be perceived, and everything cor poreal is capable of being perceived. The Ideas are then something essentially different from the corporeal world. True reality is
The division in the conception of reality takes on accordingly a fixed form ; the lower reality of natural processes or generation (yiytott), which forms the object of perception, is the corporeal world ; the higher reality of Being, which thought knows, is the incorporeal, the immaterial world, rorot votjtos. Thus the
PUtonic system becomes immaterialism, or, as we rail it after the meaning given by him to the word "Idea," Idealism.
it. In the Platonic system, accordingly, we find perhaps the most extensive interweaving and complication of problems which history has seen. The doctrine of Demoeritus, on the contrary, is ruled throughout by the one interest of explaining Nature. However
rich the results which this latter doctrine might achieve for this its proper end, — results which could be taken up again in a later, similarly disposed condition of thought, and then first unfold their whole fruitfulness, — at first the other doctrine must surpass this, all the more in proportion as it satisfied all needs of the time and united within itself the entire product of earlier thought. More points of attack for immanent criticism are perhaps offered by the Platonic system than by that of Demoeritus ; but for Greek thought the latter was a relapse into the cosmology of the first period, and it was Plato's doctrine that must become the system of the future.
S 10. The System of Materialism.
The systematic character of the doctrine of Demoeritus consists in the way in which he carried through in all departments of his work the fundamental thought, that scientific theory must so far
incorporeal.
110 The Greeks : Systematic Period. [Part L
gain knowledge of the true reality, i. e. of the atoms and their motions in space, as to be able to explain from them the reality which appears in phenomena, as this presents itself in perception. There is every indication (even the titles of his books would show this) that Democritus took up this task by means of investigations covering the entire compass of the objects of experience, and in this connection devoted himself with as great an interest to the psy chological as to the physical problems. So much the more must we regret that the greater part of his teachings has been lost, and that what is preserved, in connection with accounts of others, permits only a hypothetical reconstruction of the main conceptions of his great work, a reconstruction which must always remain defective and uncertain.
1. It must be assumed in the first place that Democritus was fully conscious of this task of science, viz. that of explaining the world of experience through conceptions of the true reality. That which the Atomists regard as the Existent, viz. space and the par ticles whirring in has no value except for theoretical purposes. It only thought in order to make intelligible what perceived; but for this reason the problem so to think the truly real that
may explain the real which appears in phenomena, that at the same time this latter reality may " remain preserved " as some thing that " " in derived sense, and that the truth which inheres in may remain recognised. Hence Democritus knew very well that thought also must seek the truth in perception, and win out of perception. ' His rationalism far removed from being in con tradiction with experience, or even from being strange to experience. Thought has to infer from perception that by means of which the latter explained. The motive which lay at the foundation of the mediating attempts following the Eleatic paradox of acosmism became with Democritus the clearly recognised principle of meta physics and natural science. Yet unfortunately nothing now known as to how he carried out in detail the methodical relation between the two modes of cognition, and how the process by which knowledge grows out of perception in the particular instance was thought by him.
More particularly, the theoretical explanation which Democritus
The very happv expression for this juur<if«r tA <pair6iumi. Cf.