No More Learning

Yet the Cynics were not so bad as they made themselves. Diogenes even preserved a remnant of respect for mental training, as the only thing which could free man from the prejudices of con ventional institutions and lead to freedom from wants by insight into the nothingness of the pretended goods of civilisation. He also conducted the education of the sons of Xeniades, a Corinthian Sophist, according to the principles of the Cynic naturalism, and not without success.
On the whole, this philosophy is a characteristic sign of the time, the mark of a disposition which, if not hostile, was yet indifferent
pleasure
C«Ai. 2, § 7. ] Problem of Morality : Aristippus. 85
to society and had lost all comprehension of its ideal goods ; it ena bles us to see from within how at that time Greek society was dis integrating into individuals. When Diogenes called himself a
there was in this no trace of the ideal thought of a community of all men, but only the denial of his adherence to any civilised community ; and if Crates taught that the plurality of gods 'lists only in the opinion of men, and that, " according to Nature," there is but one God, there is in the Cynic doctrine no trace to war- rut the conclusion that this monotheism was for them an especially dear idea or even an especially deep feeling.
9. In complete contrast with this system stands Hedonism, the philosophy of regardless enjoyment. Starting as did the Cynics from the incompleteness of the Socratic doctrine, Aristippus struck out in the opposite direction. He was quick to give to the concept of the good, a clear and simple content, — that of pleasure (^Sonj). This latter conception at first does duty under the general psycholo gical meaning of the feeling of contentment which grows out of the fulfilment of every striving and wish. 1 Happiness is then the
•tate of pleasure which springs from the satisfied will. If this is the only thing to be considered, it is a matter of indifference what the object of will and of gratification is; all depends on the degree of pleasure, on the strength of the feeling of satisfaction. ' This, however, in the opinion of Aristippus, is present in the highest degree in the case of sensuous, bodily enjoyment which relates to the immediate present, to the satisfaction of the moment. If, then, virtue is knowledge directed toward happiness, it must enable man to enjoy as much and as vigorously as possible. Virtue is ability far enjoyment.
Erery one, to be sure, may and can enjoy ; but only the man of education, of intelligence, of insight — the wise man — understands how to enjoy rightly. In this we must consider not only the nselligent appraisal (^poVipnc), which knows how to select, among the various enjoyments that present themselves in the course of
'. i(e. those which will afford the pleasure that is highest, purest, least mixed with pain; we must consider also the inner self-posses- »»on of the man who is not blindly to follow every rising appetite, sad who, when he enjoys, is never to give himself entirely up to the enjoyment, but is to stand above it and control it. The enjoy- meat which makes man the slave of things is, indeed, as the Cynics
i this, also, Xenopbon not infrequently pats the 1)i6 into the mouth ■ASnctstes.
1 This, too, is s completely correct consequence from the eudsemonistic prior
cosmopolitan,
gg The Greek* : Anthropological Period. [Part L
but to delight in pleasure and yet not give one's self up to it is harder than to renounce as they do. Of this,
however, man becomes capable through right insight only. 1
On this ground the Cyrenaics, in particular the younger Aristippus
(called iirjTfx&SaKTos, " mother-taught," because his grandfather's
wisdom was transmitted to him through his mother Arete), set on
foot systematic investigations as to the origin of the raBrj, the feelings and impulses. In a physiological psychology which was connected with that of Protagoras (cf. below, 8), they traced the varieties in feeling back to states of motion in the body: to rest corresponded indifference, to violent motion pain, to gentle motion pleasure. Besides such explanatory theories, however, this philos ophy of bonvivants extended to an unprejudiced general theory of things. For them, too, as Theodorus taught, all ethical and legal
were ultimately merely institutions that were valid for the mass of men; the educated man of enjoyment gives himself no trouble about them, and enjoys things when they come into his possession. Theodorus, who bears the surname " the Atheist," put aside also all religious scruples which are opposed to devotion to sensuous enjoyment, and the school also exerted itself in this interest to strip the halo from religious faith, so far as possible, as
proved by the well-known theory of Euemerus, who in his Upa avaypatfrri undertook to trace belief in the gods back to the worship of ancestors and veneration of heroes.
Thus the Cyrenaics ultimately agreed with the Cynics in this, that they, too, regarded all that fixed vofua, i. e. by the social convention of morals and law, as a limitation of that right to enjoy ment which man has by nature (<£iW), and which the wise man exercises without troubling himself about historical institutions. The Hedonists gladly shared the refinement of enjoyment which civilisation brought with they found convenient and per missible that the intelligent man should enjoy the honey which others prepared; but no feeling of duty or thankfulness bound them to the civilisation whose fruits they enjoyed. This same con dition of recognising no native land, this same turning aside from the feeling of political responsibility, which among the Cynics grew out of despising the enjoyments of civilisation, resulted for the Cyrenaics from the egoism of their enjoyment. Sacrifice for others, patriotism, and devotion to general object, Theodorus
declared to be form of foolishness which did not become the wise man to share, and even Aristippus rejoiced in the freedom from
say, to be rejected;
prescriptions
Cf. Diog. Laert. II. 65 ff.
a 1
it
§
a
it ;
it
it,
is
is
C ur. 2, f 8. ] Problem of Science : the Sophists. 87
connection with any state, which his wandering life afforded him. ' The philosophy of the parasites, who feasted at the full table of Grecian beauty, was as far removed from the ideal meaning of that beauty as was the philosophy of the beggars who lay at the threshold.
In the meantime, the principle of the expert weighing of enjoy ments contains an element which necessarily leads beyond that doctrine of enjoyment for the moment which Aristippus preached, and this advance was made in two directions. Aristippus himself had already admitted that in the act of weighing, the pleasure
sad pain which would in future result from the
most be taken into account ; Theodorus found that the highest good *u to be sought rather in the cheerful frame of mind (\apo) than m the enjoyment of the moment, and Anniceris came to see that this could be attained in a higher degree through the spiritual joys of human intercourse, of friendship, of the family, and of civil society than through bodily enjoyments. This knowledge that the enjoy ments afforded by the intellectual and spiritual aspects of civilisa- Uoo are ultimately finer, richer, and more gratifying than those of bodily existence, leads directly over into the doctrine of the
Epicureans. But, on the other hand, the Hedonistic school could not fail ultimately to see that the painless enjoyment to which it umed to educate the man of culture is but a rare lot. In general, found Hegesicu, he is to be accounted as already happy who attains the painless state, is free from actual discomfort. With the great dim of men discomfort, the pain of unsatisfied desires, pre ponderates : for them it would be better, therefore, not to live. The impressiveness with which he presented this brought him the surname rtun&uaro? , —he persuaded to death. He is the first representative of eudvemonistic pessimimn ; with this doctrine, how ever, eudaemonism refutes itself. He shows that if happiness, satisfaction of wishes, and enjoyment are to be the meaning and end of human life, it misses this end, and is to be rejected as worthless. Pessimism is the last but also the annihilating con- tcqueoce of eudsemonism, — its immanent criticism.
§ 8. The Problem of Science. '
P. Xatorp, Forirhungen zur Oenrhichte de* Erkenutnittprobltmt bei den Atu». Berlin, 1884.
The Sophists were teachers of political eloquence. They were oUsg^d in the first instance to give instruction on the nature and
' Xen. Mem. II. 1. 8 ff.
* [ Wimtrnxkaft. Science, as used in this section, is nearly equivalent to "•tkaufle knowledge. " Sometimes the subjective aspect of the term is promi-
enjoyment
aod sometimes the objective. ]
88 The Greeks: Anthropological Period. [Part L
right use of language. And while they were transforming rhetoric from a traditional art to a science, they applied themselves in the first place to linguistic researches, and became creators of grammar and syntax. They instituted investigations as to the parts of the sentence, the use of words, synonyms, and etymology. Prodicus, Hippias, and Protagoras distinguished themselves in this respect ; as to the fruit of their investigations, we are only imperfectly informed.
1. Our knowledge of their logical acquisitions, which with the exception of a few allusions are lost, is in a still more unfortunate condition. For, as a matter of course, the teachers of rhetoric treated also the train of thought in discourse. This train of thought, however, consists in proof and refutation. It was then inevitable that the Sophists should project a theory of proof and refutation, and there is explicit testimony to this in the case of Protagoras. 1 Unfortunately, there is no more precise information as to how far the Sophists proceeded with this, and as to whether they attempted to separate out the logical Forms from those elements which belong to the content of thought. It is characteristic that the little information which we have concerning the logic of the Sophists relates almost without exception to their emphasising of the principle of contradiction. To the essential nature of the advo cate's task, refutation was more closely related than proof. Protag oras left a special treatise * concerning Grounds of Refutation, perhaps his most important writing, and formulated the law of the contradictory opposite, so far, at least, as to say that there are with reference to every object two mutually opposing propositions, and to draw consequences from this. He thus formulated, in fact, the procedure which Zeno had practically employed, and which also played a great part in the disciplinary exercises of the Sophists, indeed the greatest part. " "
For it was one of the main arts of these Enlighteners to per plex men as to the ideas previously regarded as valid, to involve them in contradictions, and when the victims were thus confused, to force them if possible, by logical consequences, real or manufac tured, to such absurd answers as to make them become ridiculous to themselves and others. From the examples which Plato 'and Aristotle s have preserved, it is evident that this procedure was not
1 Diog. Laert. IX. 61 ff.
* It is probable that Kara/SdXXorrcT («■. X6701) and 'Arri\o7(ai are only two different titles of this work, the first chapter of which treated truth.
' Plato in the Evthydemut and in the Cratylus, Aristotle in the book '• Un (h- SopMstic Fallacies. "
Caar. 2, § 8. ] Problem of Science : the Megariant. 89
always any too purely logical, but was thoroughly sophistical in the present sense of the word. The examples show that these people let slip no ambiguity in speech, no awkwardness in popular expres- lion, if out of it they might weave a snare of absurdity. The witticisms which result are often based merely upon language, grammar, and etymology ; more rarely they are properly logical ; quite often, however, coarse and dull. Characteristic here, too, are the catch-questions, where either an affirmative or negative answer, according to the customs and presuppositions of the ordinary mean, mgs of the words, gives rise to nonsensical consequences, unforeseen by the one answering. 1
Plato has portrayed two brothers, Euthydemus and Dionysidorus, who practised this art of logomachy or eristic, which had great success among the Athenians who were great talkers and accus tomed to word-quibbling. Aside from them, it was prosecuted principally by the Megarians, among whom the head of the school, EvduL, busied himself with the theory of refutation. ' His adhe rents, Evbulides and Alexinus, were famous for a series of such catches, which made a great seusation and called forth a whole lit erature. 1 Among these there are two, the " Heap " and the " Bald-
bead. "' the fundamental thought in which is to be traced back to Zrao, and was introduced by him into the arguments by which he wished to show that the composition of magnitudes out of small parts is impossible. In like manner, Zeno's arguments against notion were amplified, even if not deepened or strengthened,* by another Megarian, Diodorus Cronos. Unwearied in finding out such mporiee, difficulties, and contradictions, this same Diodorus invented also the famous argument (xvpMiW) which was designed to destroy the conception of possibility: only the actual is possible; for a possible which does not become actual evinces itself thereby to be
impossible. * *
In another manner, also, the Sophists who were affiliated with the
Eteaties, show an extreme application of the principle of contradic tion, and a corresponding exaggeration of the principle of identity. Even Gorgias seems to have supported his opinion that all state-
are false, upon the assumption that it is incorrect to predicate
* As a typical example, " Have yon left off beating your father ? " or " Have joa ihed your horn* ? "
> Dioc- Laert. II. 107.
* Cf. PraoU, Ouch, der Log, I. 33 ff.
* WkJefa kernel of grain by being added make* the heap r Which hair falling
•at make* the bald head ?
* 8m. Emp. Adv. Math. X. 86 ff. ' CV. De Fato, 7, 13.
90 The Greeks : Anthropological Period. [Part I.
of any subject anything else than just this subject itself; and the Cynics, as well as Stilpo the Megarian, made this thought their own There remain, accordingly, only such purely identical judgments as, good is good, man is man, etc' As a logical consequence of this, judging and talking are made as impossible as were plurality and motion according to the Eleatic principle. As in the metaphysics of Parmenides, the ghost of which appears occasionally both among the Megarians and the Cynics (cf. below, No. 5), the lack of concep tions of relation permitted no combination of unity with plurality and led to a denial of plurality, so here the lack of conceptions of logical relation made it appear impossible to assert of the subject a variety of predicates.
2. In all these devious windings taken by the researches of the Sophists concerning the knowing activity, the sceptical direction is manifesting itself. If on such grounds the logical impossibility of all formation of synthetic propositions was maintained, this showed that knowledge itself was irreconcilable with the abstract principle of identity, as it had been formulated in the Eleatics' doctrine of Being. The doctrine of Parmenides had itself become ensnared past help in the dichotomies of Zeno. This came to most open expression in the treatise of Oorgias,* which declared Being, Knowl edge, and Communication of Knowledge to be impossible. There is nothing; for both Being, which can be thought neither as eternal nor as transitory, neither as one nor as manifold, and Non-being are conceptions that are in themselves contradictory. If, however, there were anything, it would not be knowable ; for that which is thougM is always something else than that which actually is, other wise they could not be distinguished. Finally, if there were knowl edge, it could not be taught ; for every one has only his own ideas, and in view of the difference between the thoughts and the signs which must be employed in their communication, there is no guar anty of mutual understanding.
This nihilism, to be sure, scarcely claimed to be taken in earnest ; even the title of the book, ircpl <t>\xrt<o<; i} mpl tov fir/ oWos {Concern ing Nature, or concerning that which is not), appears like a grotesque farce. The Rhetorician, trained to formal dexterity, who despised all earnest science and pursued only his art of speaking,1 indulged in the jest of satirising as empty the entire labour of philos-
1 Plat. Theat. 201 E. Cf. Soph. 251 B.
* Extracts are found partly in the third chapter of the pseudo-Aristotelian treatise De Xenophane, Zenone, Gorgia (cf. p. 30), in part in Sext. Emp. VII. 66-88.
• Plat. Meno. 95 C.
Caar. 2, $ 8. ] Problem of Science : Protagoras. 91
ophy, and doing this ironically in the style of Zeno's pinching-mill of contradictions. But just the facts that he did this, and that his work found applause, show how among the men who occupied them selves in instructing the people, and in the circles of scientific culture itself, faith in science was becoming lost at just the time when the mass of the people was seeking its welfare in it. This despair of truth is the more comprehensible, as we see how the serious scientific investigation of Protagoras attained the same result.
E. Laas, Idealitmut und Potitivismus. I. Berlin, 1880.
W. Halbfass. Die Beriehte des Platon und Aristotelet fiber Protagoras, itztmb. 1882.
S»Uig. Dtr Protagoreische Sensualismus (Zeitachrift flir Pbilosopbie, vols. 96-e«).
3. The germ of the doctrine of Protagoras is found in his effort to explain the ideas of the human mind psyclio-genetically. Insight into the origin and development of ideas was absolutely necessary for the practical aspect of a system of ethics, and particularly for the cultivation of rhetoric. The statements, however, which the metaphysicians had occasionally uttered, were in nowise sufficient for the purpose, constructed as they were from general presupposi tions and permeated by them ; on the contrary, the observations in physiological psychology which had been made in the more recent circles of investigators who were more given to natural science, offered themselves as fit for the purpose. Thinking and perceiving bad been set over against each other from the point of view of their relative worth ; this determining element now disappeared for
Protagoras, and so there remained for him only the view of the iMvcbological identity of thinking and perceiving, — a view to which *reo those metaphysicians had committed themselves as soon as they attempted to explain ideation from the world-process (cf. § 8).
Is consequence of this he declared that the entire psychical life con- nMj only in perceptions} This sensualism was then illustrated by the great mass of facts which physiological psychology had assembled in connection with the teaching of the physicians that were scien tific investigators, and by the numerous theories which had been brought forward with special reference to the process of the action of the senses.
All these, however, had in common the idea that i>erception rests :a the last instance upon motion, as does every process by which come to be or occur in the world. In this even Anaxagoras
Diog. Laert. IX. 61.
92 The Greeks : Anthropological Period. [Pakt i.
and Empedocles were at one with the Atomists, from whose school Protagoras, as a native of Abdera, had probably gone out. This agreement extended still farther to the assumption, made on all sides, that in perception there was not only a condition of motion in the thing to be perceived, but also a like condition in the percip ient organ. Whatever view might be taken as to the metaphysical essence of that which was there in motion, it seemed to be acknowl edged as undoubted that every perception presupposed this double motion. Empedocles had already anticipated the doctrine that the inner organic motion advances to meet the outer. 1
On this foundation * the Protagorean theory of knowledge is built up. If, that is to say, perception is the product of these two motions directed toward one another, it is obviously something else than the perceiving subject, but just as obviously it is something else than the object which calls forth the perception. Conditioned by both, it is yet different from both. This pregnant discovery is designated as the doctrine of the subjectivity of sense-perception.
Nevertheless, in the case of Protagoras this appears with a peculiar restriction. Since, like all earlier thinkers, he evidently could not assume a consciousness without a corresponding existent content of consciousness, he taught that from this double motion there was a two fold result : viz. perception (<uo-<fyo-is) in the man, and content ofper ception (to oio-6Srrdv) in the thing. Perception is therefore indeed the completely adequate knowledge of what is perceived, but no knowl edge of the thing.
Every perception is then in so far true as, at the instant when it arises, there arises also in connection with the thing the represented content, as aladTjrw, but no perception knows the thing itself. Consequently every one knows things not as they are, but as they are in the moment of perception for him, and for him only ; and they are in this moment with reference to him such as he represents them to himself. This is the meaning of the Protagorean relativism, according to which things are for every individual such as they appear to him ; and this he expressed in the famous prof>osition that man is the measure of all thitigs.
According to this, therefore, every opinion which grows out of per ception is true, and yet in a certain sense, just for this reason, it is
1 Whether these two motions were already designated by Protagoras as active and passive (rotoir and rdc-gor), as is the case in Plato's presentation (Thecet. 156 A), may remain undecided. At all events, such anthropological categories in the mouth of the Sophist are not surprising.
1 With regard to such preparatory ideas, there is no ground to trace this theory of the motions which advance to meet one another, to direct connection with Heraclitu*. Its Heraclitean element, which Plato very correctly saw, was sufficiently maintained by those direct predecessors who reduced all Becoming and change to relations of motion.
Cbat. 2, § 8. ] Problem of Science : Protagoras. 93
also false. It is valid only for the one perceiving, and for him even only at the moment when it arises. All universal validity forsakes :x. And since, according to the view of Protagoras, there is no other kind of ideas, and therefore no other knowledge than percep tion, there is for human knowledge nothing whatever that is univer- ally vaiid. This view is phenomenalism in so far as it teaches in this entirely definite sense a knowledge of the phenomenon, limited to the individual and to the moment ; it however, scepticism in so far as it rejects all knowledge which transcends that.
How far Protagoras himself drew practical consequences from this principle that every one's opinion true for himself, we do not know. Later Sophists concluded that, according to this, error would
everything, and again nothing, belongs to everything In particular they concluded that no actual contradic
aot be possible
as attribute.
tion is possible
perception, different assertions can never have the same object. At all events, Protagoras refused to make any positive statement con cerning what is; he spoke not of the actual reality that moves, bat only of motion, and of the phenomena which it produces for
perception.
Moreover, the attempt was now made, whether by Protagoras him-
•elf, or by the Sophistic activity dependent upon him, to trace dif ferences in perception, and so also in the phenomenon, back to differences in this motion. It was principally the velocity of the motion which was considered in this connection, though the form also was probably regarded. 1 It interesting to note further that under the concept of perception not only sensations and perceptions, but also the sensuous feelings and desires, were subsumed note worthy especially because to these states also an cuV^toV, a momen tary qualification of the thing which produced the perception, was held to correspond. The predicates of agreeableness and desir ability receive in this way the same valuation epistemologically a« do the predicates of sensuous qualification. What appears agreeable, useful, and desirable to any one agreeable, useful, and desirable for him. The individual state of consciousness here, too, the measure of things, and no other universally valid determination of the worth of things exists. In this direction the Hedonism of Aristippus was developed out of the Protagorean doctrine we know, teaches Aristippus, not things, but only their
Doabtleas we have here asserting itself the development of the Pythagorean tarnrr nt knowledge oat of the Atomistic school, to which this reduction of the 7ia^-iatJTi> to the quantitative was essential (cf. above, 51, even though the 8o- paut declined from principle to enter into such metaphysical theories as Atomism.
for since every one talks about the content of his
§
is
1
;
is
; it is
is
;
;
is
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94 The Greek* : Anthropological Period. [Part I.
worth for us, and the states (n&rf) into which they put us. These, however, are rest and indifference, violent motion and pain, or gentle motion and pleasure. Of these only the last is worth striving for
(cL above, 5 7,9).
4. Thus all courses of Sophistic thought issued in giving up truth
as unattainable. Socrates, however, needed truth, and on this account he believed that it was to be attained if it were honestly sought for. Virtue is knowledge ; and since there must be virtue, there must be knowledge also. Here for the first time in history the moral con sciousness appears with complete clearness as an epistemological postulate. Because morality is not possible without knowledge, there must be knowledge ; and if knowledge is not here and now existent, it must be striven for as the lover seeks for the possession of the loved object Science is the yearning, struggling love for
knowledge, — ^mAoo-o^ko, philosophy (cf. Plat. Symp. 203 £). ' Out of this conviction grow all the peculiarities of the Socratic
doctrine of science. 1 and in the first place the bounds within which he held knowledge to be necessary and therefore possible. It is only a knowledge of the relations of human life that is necessary for the ethical life ; only for these is a knowing necessary, and only for these is man's knowing faculty adequate. Hypotheses as to metaphysics and the philosophy of Nature have nothing to do with man's ethical task, and they are left unconsidered by Socrates, so much the rather as he shared the view of the Sophists that it was impossible to gain a sure knowledge concerning them. Science is possible only as practical insight, as knowledge of the ethical life.
This view was formulated still more sharply by the Sophistic successors of Socrates under the influence of his eudaemonistic principle. For both Cynics and Cyrenaics science had worth only so far as it affords to man the right insight which serves to make him happy. With Antdsthenes and Diogenes science was prized not in itself, but as a means for controlling the desires and for knowing man's natural needs; the Cyrenaics said the causes of perception (to irartujjKora to raBr/) are for us as much matters of indifference as they are unknowable; knowledge which leads to happiness has to do only with our states, which we know with certainty. Indifference toward metaphysics and natural science
1 Cf. Ft. Schleiennacher, Veber den Werth des Sokrates als Philosophen (Gea. W. III. , Bd. 2, pp. 287 ft. ).
2 [ IVisse nschaftslehn: tt'issenschaft, " scientia," "science," has here both its subjective and objective sense ; knowledge as mental act, and knowledge as a body of truth. Hence Wissenschqftslehre means both'" doctrine of science," i. e. science of knowledge, and ■'scientific doctrine" i. e. philosophy. — Tr. ]
Chat. 2, § 8. ] Problem of Science : Socrates. 95
is with Socrates, as with the Sophists, the result of employment with the inner nature of man.
5. It will remain a noteworthy fact for all time that a man who so narrowed for himself the intellectual horizon of scientific research as did Socrates, should yet determine within this the essential aatere of science itself, in a manner so clear and so authoritative for all the future. This achievement was due essentially to his opposition to the relativism of the Sophists, — an opposition that was a matter both of instinct and of positive conviction. They taught that there are only opinions (&&u) which hold good for individuals
vith psycho-genetic necessity ; he, however, sought a knowledge that should be authoritative for all in like manner. In contrast with :he change and multiplicity of individual ideas he demanded the one and abiding " which all
should acknowledge. He sought the logical " Nature (^mtic ) as others had sought the cosmological
or ethical "Nature" (cf. § 7, 1), and found it in the concept or general notion. Here, too, the view propounded was rooted in the demand, the theory in the postulate.
The ancient thinkers, also, had had a feeling that the rational 'Junking to which they owed their knowledge was something essen tially other than the sensuous mode of apprehending the world in Togue in everyday life, or than traditional opinion ; but they had not been able to carry out this distinction in relative worth either psychologically or logically. Socrates succeeded in this because here, too, he defined the thing in question by the work which he expected it to perform. The idea that is to be more than opinion, that is to serve as knowledge for all, must be what is common in all the particular ideas which have forced themselves upon individuals in individual relations : subjective universal validity is to be expected only for the objectively universal. Hence, if there is to be knowledge, it is to be found only in that in which all par ticular ideas agree. This universal in the object-matter which
aakes possible the subjective community of ideas is the concept (Xrft). said science [scientific knowledge] is accordingly conceptional ■iimkiiuj. — abstract thought. The universal validity which is -L^med for knowledge is only possible on condition that the scientific concept brings out into relief the common element which n contained in all individual perceptions and opinions.
Hence the goal of all scientific work is the determination of the
tmtmtial mature of conceptions, — definition.
of an abiding nature as over against changing opinions.
The aim of investiga tion u to establish r« tmurrov urj, what each thing is, ami to come to
96 The Greeks : Anthropological Period. [Pabt i.
This doctrine was in some measure prepared for by the investigations of the Sophists concerning the meaning of words, synonyms, and etymological rela tions. In the latter respect, the hypotheses of the Sophists in the beginnings of the philosophy of language (cf. Plato's Cratylus) extended to the auestion whether a natural or only a conventional relation obtains between woraa and their meanings (0v<r«t rj eicti). l'rodicus, whom Socrates mentions with com mendation, seems to have been specially successful in fixing the meanings of words.
Among the later Sophists the Socratic demand for fixed conceptions became forthwith fused with the Kleatic metaphysics, and with its postulate of the iden tity of Being with itself. Euclid called virtue, or the good, the only Being : it remains the same, changeless in itself, and only the names by which men call it differ. Antisthenes, indeed, explained the concept by the definition that it is this which determines the timeless Being of the thing ; ' but he conceived this identity of the existent with Itself, raised above all relations, in so bold a manner that he thought of every truly existing entity as capable of being defined only through itself. Predication is impossible. There are none but analytic
judgments (cf. above, No. 1). Accordingly only the composite can have its essential elements determined in conceptions ; the simple is not to be defined. 2 There then, no possibility of understanding the simple by conceptions can only be exhibited in sensuous presentation. The Cynics came thus from the Socratic doctrine of the conception to sensualism which recognised as simple and original only that which can be grasped with the hands and seen with the eyes, and this is the ground of their opposition to Plato.
The searching out of conceptions (for his purpose, indeed, only ethical conceptions) was accordingly for Socrates the essence of science, and this determined in the first place the outer form of his philosophising. The conception was to be that which valid for all must then be found in common thinking. Socrates neither
solitary hypercritic nor an instructor who teaches ex cathedra, but a man thirsting for the truth, as anxious to instruct himself as to teach others. His philosophy philosophy of the dialogue; develops itself in conversation which he was ready to begin with every one who would talk with him. 3 To the ethical conceptions which he alone was seeking for, was indeed easy to find access from any object whatever of everyday business. The common element must be found in the mutual exchange of thoughts; the StoAoyw/tos was the way to the Ao'yos. But this " conversation " encountered many difficulties the inertia of the customary mode of thinking, the idle desire for innovation, and the paradoxical state ments which were characteristic of the Sophists, the pride belong ing to seeming knowledge and thoughtless imitation. Into such condition of things Socrates made his entrance by introducing him self as one eager to learn. By skilful questions he drew out the views of others, disclosed the defects in these views with remorse
less consistency, and finally led the Athenian, proud of his culture, into the state of mind where he recognised that insight into one's
\iyot iorlv t4 W t>¥ fort 37)Xw»: Oiog. Laert. VI.
Plat. ThecU. 202 B.
This factor united with the influence of Zeno's dialectic to stamp upon the
succeeding philosophical literature the form of the dialogue.
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Qmat. 2, f 8. ] Problem of Science : Socrates. 9?
Mtm ignorance, w the beginning of all knowledge. Whoever stood this test and still remained with him was taken into partnership is a serious effort to determine, in common thinking, the essential meaning of conceptions. Undertaking the direction of the conver sation, Socrates brought his companion step by step to unfold his «wn thoughts in clearer, less contradictory statements, and so caused
bun to bring to definite expression what was slumbering in him as u imperfect presentiment. He called this his art of mental mid- n/ery, and that preparation for it his irony.
7. The maieutic method has, however, still
meaning. In the process of conversation the common rational quality comes to light, to which all parts are subject in spite of their diverging opinions. The conception is not to be made, it is to be found ; it is already there, it requires only to be delivered from the envelopes of individual experiences and opinions in which it Lies hidden. The procedure of the Socratic formation of conceptions
epagogic or inductive : it leads to the generic concep
a, therefore,
tion by the comparison of particular views and individual sensuous
presentations; it decides every individual question by seeking to press forward to determine a general conception. This is accom plished by bringing together analogous cases, and by searching oat allied relations. The general conception thus gained is then employed to decide the special problem proposed, and this subordi nation of the particular under the general is thus worked out as the fundamental relation of scientific knowledge.
The inductive method of procedure as employed by Socrates, according to Xenophon and Plato, is, to be sure, still marked by a childlike simplicity and imperfection. It lacks as yet caution in generalisation and methodical circumspection in the formation of conceptions. The need for the general is so lively that it satisfies itself at once with hastily gathered material, and the conviction of the determining validity of the conception is so strong that the individual questions proposed are decided forthwith in accordance
*ith it. But however great the gaps may be in the arguments of Socrates, the significance of these arguments is by no means lessened Hii doctrine of induction has its value not for methodology, but for 1*7*. and for the theory of knmoledge. It fixes in a way that is deriiive for all the future that it is the task of science to strive to **aW*h general conceptions from comparison of facts.
8. While Socrates thus defined the essential nature of science as wneeptional thought, — thinking in conceptions, — he also fixed the l**»d» within which science can be employed: this task is, in his opinion, to be fulfilled only within the domain of practical life.
another essential
98 The Greeks: Anthropological Period. [Part 1.
Science is, as regards its form, the formation of conceptions, and as regards its content ethics.
Meanwhile the whole mass of ideas concerning Nature and all the connected questions and problems still persist, and though for the most part they are a matter of indifference for the moral life, neverthe less they cannot be entirely put aside. But after Socrates renounced the task of attaining insight into such questions through conceptions, it was all the more possible for him to form an idea of the universe that should satisfy his scientifically grounded ethical needs.
So it comes that Socrates puts aside, indeed, all natural science, but at the same time professes a teleological view of Nature, which admires the wisdom in the arrangement of the world, the adaptation in things,1 and which, where understanding ceases, trusts Providence in faith. With this faith Socrates kept himself as near as possible to the religious ideas of his people, and even spoke of a plurality of gods, although he indeed inclined to the ethical monotheism which
was preparing in his time. But he did not come forward in such matters as a reformer : he taught morality, and if he expounded his own faith, he left that of others untouched.
Out of this faith, however, grew the conviction with which he limited the rationalism of his ethics, — his confidence in the S<u/x6Viov. The more he pressed toward clearness of conceptions and complete knowledge of ethical relations, and the more true to himself he was in this, the less could he hide from himself that man in his limita tion does not completely succeed in this task, that there are condi tions in which knowledge is not sufficient for certain decision, and where feeling enters upon its rights. Under such conditions Soc rates believed that he heard within himself the daimonion, a coun selling and for the most part warning voice. He thought that in this way the gods warned from evil in difficult cases, where his knowledge ceased, the man who otherwise served them.
So the wise man of Athens set faith and feeling beside ethical science.
1 It is not probable that Socrates experienced any strong influence from Anaxagoraa in this respect, for the latter's teleology relates to the harmony of the stellar universe, not to human life, while the considerations which are ascribed to Socrates, especially by Xenophon, make utility for man the standard for admiration of the world. Much more closely related to Socratic faith are the religious views of the great poets of Athens, especially the tragedians.
CHAPTER III. THE SYSTEMATIC PERIOD.
The third, completing period of Greek science harvested the fruit of the two preceding developments. It appears essentially as a rrriprocal inter -penetration ofcosmological and anthropological bodies of bought. This union appears in but a very slight degree as a neces sity found in the nature of the case, still less as a demand of the tute ; rather, it is in its essentials the work of great personalities tad of the peculiar direction taken by their knowledge.
The tendency of the time was rather toward a practical utilisa tion of science : it was in accord with this tendency when research wjcrated into special investigations on mechanical, physiological, rhetorical, and political problems, and when scientific instruction accommodated itself to the ideas of the ordinary man. Not only for the mass of the people, but for scholars as well, general questions of ^jamology had lost the interest which in the beginning was directed toward them, and the fact that they were sceptically abandoned
because of the Sophistic theory of knowledge is nowhere presented in the form of renunciation or lamentation.
If. therefore, Greek philosophy turned with renewed force from ii*» investigation of human thinking and willing — researches with which it had busied itself during the time of the Enlightenment — back to the great problems of metaphysics, and reached its greatest height along this path, it owes this achievement to the personal thirst for knowledge on the part of the three great men who
Yooght in this most valuable development of ancient thought, and ttaad as its representatives, — Democritus, Plato, and Aristotle.
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.