We are accustomed to think of the Greeks as the least superstitious and most tolerant of ancient peoples; we are sometimes told that we stretch hands across the gulf of the Dark Ages to them. But men like Anaxagoras (whose philosophy somewhat resembled that of modern idealism) were not hailed as harbingers of light, and probably escaped being condemned to death only because their speculations were never really understood except by a small circle of philosophers.[1]
Again, it must be remembered that one of the greatest mistakes made by Athens in the Peloponnesian War was that of driving Alcibiades into the Lacedaemonian camp, because he and his friends were, though without much reason, suspected of having mutilated the Hermae, which would bring down the wrath of the gods on the whole city. The gods of the Greek City State were to a certain extent Pan-Hellenic, but they were also taken to represent the city alone. The State-gods and State-ideals were the gods and ideals of the individual. Even Socrates assented to this, if the " Crito" have any foundation in fact.
The most cursory perusal of Aristotle's politics
- ↑ Anaxagoras was persecuted as a religious innovator in Athens, but subsequently had an altar put up to him in Ionia: " The religious views of the Demos (of Athens) were of the narrowest kind, and hardly any the liberty of science (Burnet's "Early Greek Philosophy," London, 1892, pp. 276-280).
