TIIE SOPHISTS. 351 Thamyras the skilful bard, is called a sophist : l Sokrates is eo denominated, not merely by Aristophanes, but by ^Eschines : a Aristotle himself calls Aristippus, and Xenophon calls Antisthe- nes, both of them disciples of Sokrates, by that name : 3 Xenophon, 4 in describing a collection of instructive books, calls them "the writings of the old poets and sophists," meaning by the latter word prose-writers generally : Plato is alluded to as a sophist, even by Isokrates : 5 Isokrates himself was harshly criticized as a sophist, and defends both himself and his profession : lastly, Timon, the friend and admirer of Pyrrho, about 300-280 B.C., who bitterly satirized all the philosophers, designated them all, including Plato and Aristotle, by the general name of sophists. 6 1 Herodot. i, 29 ; ii, 49 ; iv, 95. Diogenes of Apollonia, contemporary of Herodotus, called the Ionic philosophers or physiologists by the name sophists : see Brandis, Geschich. der Gricch. Rom. Philosoph. c. Ivii, note 0. About Thamyras, see "Welcker, Griech. Tragod., Sophokles, p. 421 : Eir' oiiv ffo^tor^f KaAti irapaTtaiuv x&vv, etc. The comic poet Kratinus called all the poets, including Homer and He- iod, aotyiaTai : see the Fragments of his drama 'Ap^t'Ao^oc in Meineke, Fragm. Comicor. Grsecor. vol. ii, p. 16.
- ^Eschines cont. Timarch. c. 34. ^schines calls Demosthenes also a
sophist, c. 27. We see plainly from the terms in Plato's Politicns, c. 38, p. 299, B zereupokoyov, udoAeaxfjv nva (ro^terrr/v, that both Sokrates and Plato him- self were designated as sophists by the Athenian public. 3 Aristotel. Metaphysic. iii, 2, p. 996 ; Xenophon, Sympos. iv, 1. Aristippus is said to have been the first of the disciples of Sokrates who took money for instruction (Diogen. LaCrt. ii, 65). 4 Xenoph. Memor. iv, 2, 1. ypa///uara TroAAa avvtifayficvov ITOIIJTUV re ical The word oooiaruv is here used just in the same sense as ro TUV TraAat aofyuv uvdpuv, ot)f EKEIVOL KareTinrov kv /?<^3Xtotf ypaip etc. (Memor. i, 6, 14.) It is used in a different sense in another passage (i, 1, 11), to signify teachers who gave instruction on physical and astronomi- r;il subjects, which Sokrates and Xenophon both disapproved. 6 Isokrates, Orat. v, ad Philipp. sect. 14: see Heindorfs note on the F.nthydcmus of Plato, p. 305, C. sect. 79. Diogen. Lne'rt. ix, C5. ' EOTTCTE vvv jioi, foot TroAvirpuy/iovef kirtt co- Qiorai (Diogen. Laort. viii, 74). Demetrius of Trcczcn numbered Empedokles as a sophist. Isokrates ipeaks of Empedokles, Ion, Alkmaeon, Parmenides, Melissns, Gorgias, all as ol ira^aioi aotytarai ; all as having taught different irepirro^o^af al>ouf the elements of the physical world (Isok. de Permut. sect 288).
