Dissertations and Discussions/Volume 4/Plato

by John Stuart Mill

For works with similar titles, see Plato.

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PLATO.^[1]

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The readers of Mr. Grote’s “History of Greece” were not likely to forget the hope held out in its concluding volume, that he who had so well interpreted the political life of Hellas would delineate and judge that great outburst of speculative thought, by which, as much as by her freedom, Greece has been to the world what Athens according to Pericles was to Greece, a course of education. It might have been safely predicted, that the same conscientious research, the same skilful discrimination of authenticated fact from traditional misapprehension or uncertified conjecture, and the same rare power of realizing different intellectual and moral points of view, which were conspicuous in the History, and nowhere more than in the memorable chapters on the Sophists and on Sokrates, would find congenial occupation in tracing out the genuine lineaments of Plato, Aristotle, and their compeers. But the present work does more than merely keep the promise of Mr. Grote’s previous achievements—it reveals new powers: had it not been written, the world at large might never have known, except on trust, the whole range of his capacities and endowments. Though intellects exercised in the higher philosophy might well perceive that such a book as the "History of Greece” could not have been produced but by a mind similarly disciplined, the instruction which lay on the surface of that great work was chiefly civic and political; while the speculations of the Grecian philosophers, and emphatically of Plato, range over the whole domain of human thought and curiosity, from etymology up to cosmogony, and from the discipline of the music—school and the gymnasium to the most vast problems of metaphysics and ontology. Many even of Mr. Grote,s admirers may not have been prepared to find, that he would be as much at home in the most abstract metaphysical speculations as among the concrete realities of political institutions — would move through the one region with the same easy mastery as through the other — and would bring before us, along with the clearest and fullest explanation of ancient thought, mature and well-weighed opinions of his own, manifesting a command of the entire field of speculative philosophy which places him in the small number of the eminent psychologists and metaphysicians of the age.

The work of which we now give an account, though complete in itself, brings down the history of Greek philosophy only to Plato and his generation; but a continuation is promised, embracing at least the generation of Aristotle; which, by the analogy of the concluding chapters of the present work, may be construed as implying an estimate of the Stoics and Epicureans. If to this were added a summary of what is known to us concerning the Pythagorean revival and the later Academy, no portion of purely Greek thought would remain untreated of; for Neo—platonism, an after-growth of late date and little intrinsic value, was a hybrid product of Greek and Oriental speculation, and its place in history is by the side of Gnosticism. What contact it has with the Greek mind is with that mind in its decadence; as the little in Plate which is allied to it belongs chiefiy to the decadence of Plato's own mind. We are quite reconciled to the exclusion from Mr. Grote's plan, of this tedious and unsatisfactory chapter in the history of human intellect. But such an exposition as he is capable of giving of Aristotle, will be hardly inferior in value to that of Plato. The latter, however, was the most needed; for Plato presents greater ditiiculties than Aristotle to the modern mind; more of our knowledge of the master, than of the pupil, is only apparent, and requires to be unlearned; and much more use has been made of what the later philosopher can teach us, than of the earlier.

Though the writings of Plate supply the principal material of Mr. Grote's three volumes, the portion of them which does not relate directly to Plate is of great interest and value. The first two chapters contain as full an account as our information admits, of the forms of Greek philosophy which preceded Sokrates; and the two which conclude the work recount the little which is known (except in the case of Xenophon it is very little) of the other "Socratici viri” and their spcculations: the Megaric school, commencing with Euklcides, the Cynic, with Antisthenes, the Cyrenaic or Hedonistic, with Aristippus. All these were personal companions of Sokrates, and their various and conflicting streams of thought did not flow out of a primitive intellectual feuntain opened by him, but issued from Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/289 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/290 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/291 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/292 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/293 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/294 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/295 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/296 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/297 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/298 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/299 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/300 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/301 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/302 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/303 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/304 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/305 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/306 name in other dialogues, Hippias even having two to himself. Now, while there is an undisguised purpose on Plato's part to lower the reputation of these men, and convict them of notunderstanding what they professed to teach, not a thought or a sentiment is ascribed to them of any immoral tendency, while they often appear in the character of serious and impressive exhorters to virtue.

With regard to Protagoras in particular, the discourse which he is made to deliver on the moral virtues is justly considered by Mr. Grote^[2] as "one of the best parts of the Platonic writings.” It springs out of a doubt raised, seriously or ironically, by Sokrates, whether virtue is teachable, on the ground that there are no recegnized teachers of it, as there are of other things. Protagoras admits the fact, and says that the reason why there are no express teachers of virtue is, that all mankind teach it. Artistic or professional skill in any special department needs only be possessed by a few, for the benefit of the rest; but social and civic virtue, consisting in justice and self-restraint, is indispensable in every one; and as the welfare of each imperatively requires this virtue in others, every one inculcates it on all. A highly philosophieal as well as eloquent exposition follows,^[3] "of the growth and propagatien of common sense — the common, established, ethical and social sentiment among a community; sentiment neither dictated in the beginning by any scientific or artistic lawgiver; nor personified in any special guild of craftsmen apart from the remaining community; nor inculcated by any formal professional teachers; nor tested by analysis; nor verified by comparison with any objective standard; but self-sown and self-asserting, stamped, multiplied, and kept in circulation by the unpremeditated conspiracy of the general public — the omniprcsent agency of King Nomos^[4] and his numerous volunteers.” This common standard of virtue Protagoras fully accepts. He takes it^[5] "for granted that justice, virtue, good, evil, &c., are known, indisputable, determinate data, fully understood and unanmnously interpreted.” He pretends not to set right the general opinion, but^[6] "teaches in his eloquent expositions and interpretations the same morality, public and private, that every one else tcaches; while he can perform the work of teaching somewhat more effectively than they:” and^[7] "what he pretends to do, beyond the general public, 110 really can do.” Sokrates, (or Plato under his name) not accepting this common standard, and not considering justice, virtue, good, and evil, as things understood, but as things whose essence, and the proper meaning of the words, remain to be found out, of course contests the point with Protagoras; and bringing to bear on him the whole power of the Sokratic cross-examination, convicts him of being unable to give any definition or theory of these things; an incapacity which, in Platonic speech, goes by the name of not knowing what they are. The inability of Protagoras to discuss, and of his opinions to resist logical scrutiny, is driven home against the Sophist with great force. But it is remarkable that Protagoras, in answering the questions of Sokrates, whenever required to choose between two opinions, one of which is really or apparently the more mo ᾿1.11 or elevating, not only chooses the loftier doctrine, but declares that no other choice would be agreeablc to his past life, to which he repeatedly appeals as not permitting him to concede anything that would lower the claims 01 dignity of Virtue; thus proving (as far as anything put into his mouth by Plate can prove it) , not only that he had never taught other than virtuous doctrines, but that he had an established reputation both for virtuous teaching, and for an exemplary and dignified life. Finally, it is Sokrates who, in this dialogue, maintains the "degrading ” doctrine of Utilitarianism ——-at least the part most odious to its impugners, the doctrine of Hedonism, that Pleasure and the absence of Pain are the ends of morality; in opposition to Protagoras, to whom that opinion is repugnant; a revcrsal of the parts assigned to the two teachers by the German commentators, very embarrassing to some of them, who, rather than impute to Plato so "low ” a doctrine, resort to the absurd supposition that one of the finest specimens of analysis in all his writings is ironical, intended to ridicule a Sophist who is not even represented as agreeing with it. Let us add, that though at first sore under his confutation by Sokrates, Protagoras parts With him on excellent terms, and predicts for him, at the conclusion of the dialogue, great eminence in Wisdom.

Prodikus of Keios has no dialogue devoted to himself, nor is Sokrates ever introduced as confuting him. Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/310 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/311 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/312 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/313 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/314 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/315 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/316 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/317 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/318 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/319 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/320 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/321 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/322 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/323 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/324 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/325 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/326 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/327 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/328 wise; beginning with the politicians, all of whom he found to be in a state of gross ignorance, and in general more profoundly so in proportion to their reputation, but puffed up in the extreme by a false opinion of their own knowledge. He next tested the poets, but found that though they composed splendid things, doubtless by a divine afflatus, they were unable to give any rational account of the works which, or of the subjects on which, they composed. Last, he tried the artificers, and these, he found, did possess real knowledge, each concerning his special art; but fell into the error of imagining that they knew other things besides, which false opinion put them on the whole in a worse condition than his own conscious ignorance. It is noticeable that he does not here mention the Sophists among those whom he had cross-examined, and convicted of not knowing what they pretendcd to know. It is evident, however, that one who had this opinion concerning all the world, would come first and most into collision with the teachers. Those who not only fancied that they knew What they knew not, but professed to teach it, would be the very first persons whom it would fall in his way to conviet of ignorance ; and this is the exact position of Plato with regard to the Sophists. He attacks them not as the pervertcrs of society, but as marked representatives of society itself, and compelled, by the law of their existence as its paid instructors, to sum up in themselves all that is bad in its tendencies.

The enemy against whom Plato really fought, and the warfare against whom was the incessant occupation of the greater part of his life and writings, was not Sophistry, either in the ancient or the modern sense of the term, but Commonplace. It was the acceptance of traditional opinions and current sentiments as an ultimate fact; and bandying of the abstract terms which express approbation and disapprobation, desire and aversion, admiration and disgust, as if they had a meaning thoroughly understood and universally assented to. The men of his day (like those of ours) thought that they knew what Good and Evil, Just and Unjust, Honorable and Shameful, were, because they could use the words glibly, and affirm them of this and of that, in agreement with existing custom. But what the property was, which these several instances possessed in common, justifying the application of the term, nobody had considered; neither the Sophists, nor the rhetoricians, nor the statesmen, nor any of those who set themselves up or were set up by others as wise. Yet whoever could not answer this question was wandering in darkness; had no standard by which his judgments were regulated, and which kept them consistent with one another; no rule which he knew, and could stand by, for the guidance of his life. Not knowing what Justice and Virtue are, it was impossible to be just and virtuous; not knowing what Good is, we not only fail to reach it, but are certain to embrace Evil instead. Such a condition, to any one capable of thought, made life not worth having. The grand business of human intellect ought to consist in subjecting these general terms to the most rigorous scrutiny, and bringing to light the ideas that lie at the bottom of them. Even if this cannot be done, and real knowledge be attained, it is already no small benefit to expel the false opinion of knowledge; to make men conscious of their ignorance of the things most needful to be known, fill them with shame and uneasiness at their own state, and rouse a pungent internal stimulus, summoning up all their mental energies to attack these greatest of all problems, and never rest until, as far as possible, the true solutions are reachcd. This is Plato's notion of the condition of the human mind in his time, and of what philosophy could do to help it; and any one who does not think the description applicable, with slight modifications, to the majority even of educated minds in our own and 111 all times known to us, certainly has not brought either the teachers or the practical men of any time to the Platonic test.^[8]

the sole means by which, in Platois opinion, the minds of men can be delivered from this intolerable state, and put in the way of obtaining the real knowledge which has power to make them wise and virtuous, is what he terms Dialectics; and the philosopher, as conceived by him, is almost- synonymous with the Dialectician. that Plato understood by this name consisted of two parts. One is, the testing every opinion by a negative scrutiny, eliciting every objection or difficulty that could be raised against it, and demanding, before it was adopted, that they should be successfully met. This could only be done eithetually by way of oral discussion; pressing the respondent by questions, to which he was generally unable to make replies that were not in contradiction either to admitted fact, or to his own original hypothesis. This cross-examination is the Sokratic Elcnchus; which, wielded by a master such as Sokrates was, and as we can ourselves appreciate in Pluto, no mere appearance of knowledge without the reality was able to resist. Its pressure was certain, in an honest-mind, to dissipate the false opinion of knowledge, and make the confuted respondent sensible of his own ignorance, while it at once helped and stimulated him to the mental effort by which alone that ignorance could be exehanged for knowledge. Dialccties, thus understood, is one branch of an art Which is a main portion of the Art of Living—that of not believing except on sufiicient evidence; its function being that of compelling a man to put his belief into precise terms, and take a defensiblc position against all the objections that can be made to it. The other, or positive arm of Plato's dialectics, of which he and Sokrates may be regarded as the originators, is the direct search for the common feature of things that are classed together, or, in other words, for the meaning of the class—name. It comprehends the logical processes of Definition and Division or Classification ; the theory and systematic employment of which were a new thing in Plato”s day : indeed Aristotle says that the former of the Operations was first introduced by Sokrates. They are indissolubly connected, Division being, as Plato inculcates, the only road to Definition. To find what a thing is, it is necessary to set out from Being in general, or from some large and known Kind which includes the thing sought—to dismember the kind into its component parts, and these into others, each division being, if possible, only into the members (an anticipation of Ramus and Bentham) , marking at cach stage the distinctive feature which differentiates one member from the other. By the time we have divided down to the thing of Which we are in quest, we have remarked its points of agreement with all the things to which it is allied, and the points that constitute its differences from them; and are thus enabled to produce a definition of it, which is a compendium of its whole nature. This mode of arriving at a definition is elaborately exemplified, first on an insignilicant subject, then on a great and difficult one, in the Sophistes and Politikes; two of the most important of the Platonic dialogues, because in both of them the conception of this part of the process of philosophizing is purely Baconian, unencumbered by the ontologieal theory which Plate in other writings superinduces on his pure logic.^[9] Without this theory, however, a very insufiicient conception would be formed of the Platonic philosophy.. The bond of union among the particulars comprised in a class, as understood by Plato, is not a mental Concept, framed by abstraction, and having no existence outside the mind, but a Form or Idea, existing by itself, belonging to another world than ours — with which Form or Idea, concrete objects have a communion or participation of nature, and in the likeness of which (though a very imperfect likeness) they have been made. WVhen this mode of conceiving Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/334 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/335 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/336 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/337 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/338 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/339 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/340 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/341 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/342 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/343 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/344 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/345 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/346 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/347 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/348 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/349 And what he thus feels, πο one ever had a power superior to his of making felt by his readers. It is this element which coniplctes in him the character of a Great Teacher. Others can instruct, but Plato is of those who form great men, by the combination of moral enthusiasm and logical discipline. "Aristotle,” says Mr. Grotc,^[10] "in one of his lost dialogues, made honorable mention of a Corinthian cultivator, who in reading the Platonic Gergias, was smitten with such vehement admiration, that he abandoned his fields and his vincs, came to Athens ferthwith, and committed himself to the tuition of Plate.” It was not, we may be assured, by its arguments, that the Gorgias produced this striking manifestation of psychagogic efficacy; for they are nearly all of them fallacies, and could not have resisted the first touch of the eress-examining Elenchus, se unsparingly applied to their impugners. This great dialogue, full of just thoughts and fine observations on human nature, is, in mere argument, one of the weakest of Plate's works. It is not by its logic, but by its ἦθος, that it produces its effects; not by instructing the understanding, but by working on the feelings and imagination. Nor is this strange; for the disinterestcd love of virtuc is an affair of feeling. It is impossible to prove to any one Plate”s thesis, that justice is supreme happiness, unless he can be made to feel it as such. The external inducements which recommend it be may be taught to appreciate; the favorable regards and good offices of other people, and the 10wards of another life. These considerations, however, though Plato has recourse to them in other places, are not available in the Gorgias. The posthumous recompense he only ventures to introduce in the form of a mythe; and the earthly one is opposed to the whole scheme of the dialogue, which represents the virtuous and wise man as, in every existing society, a solitary being, misjudgcd, persecuted, and having no more chance with the Diany against their adulators, than (to use Platds comparison) a physician would have, if indicted before a jury of children by a confectioner for giving them nauseous drugs instead of delicious sweet-meats. It is precisely this picture of the moral hero, still ziewam proposz'ti against the hostility and contempt of the world, which makes the splendor and power of the Gorgias. The Sokrates of the dialogue makes us feel all other evils to be more tolerable than injustice in the soul, not by proving it, but by the sympathy he calls ferth with his own intense feeling of it. He inspires heroism, because he shows himself a hero. And his failures in logic do not prevent the step marked by the Gorgias from being one of the greatest ever made in moral culture—the cultivation of a disinterested preference of duty for its own sake, as a higher state than that of sacrifieing selńsh preferences to a more distant self—interest.

In the Republic, the excellence and inherent felicity of the just life are as impressively insisted on, and enforced by arguments of greater substance. But, as Mr. Grote justly remarks, those arguments, even if conclusive, are addressed to the wrong point; for the life they suppose is not that of the simply just man, but of the philosopher. They are not applicable to the typical just man— to such a person as Aristeides, who is no dialectician, sears to no speculative heights, and is no nearer than other people to a vision of the Self-Existent Ideas, but who, at every personal sacrifice, persistently acts up to the rules of Virtue acknowledged by the worthiest of his countrymen. It is not obvious what place there was for Aristeides in the Platonic theory of Virtue, nor how he was to be adjusted to the doctrine of Plate and of the historical Sokrates, that virtue is a branch of knowledge, and that no one is unjust willingly. Aristeides probably had the same notions of justice as his contemporarics, and could as little as any of them have answcred Sokratic interrogatories by a definition of it which would have been proof against all objections. The conformity of his will to it, the never being unjust willingly, was probably the chief moral difference between him and ordinary inen. Plato might indeed have said that Aristeides had the most indispensable point of knowledge—he knew that the just man must be the happiest. But Aristeidcs was not. the kind of man of whom Plate has, more or less successfully, proved this ; and the true Platonic doctrine is, that it is impossible to be just, without knowing (in the high Platonic meaning of _knowledge) What justice is.^[11] Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/353 of mankind. The system is thus a selfish one; though only theoretically so, since its propounder would have held fast to the doctrine that the just is the only happy life, i.e. (according to the theory of this dialogue) the one which affords tο the agent himself the greatest excess of pleasure over pain. The standard of the Protagoras agrees with that of the historical Sokrates, who throughout the Memorabilia inculcates the ordinary duties of life on hedonistic grounds, and recommends

them by the ordinary hedonistic inducements, the good opinion and praise of fellow-citizens, reciprocity of good treatment, and the favor of benevolent deities. Even in the Leges, Plato affirms that people will never be persuaded to prefer Virtue unless convinced of its being the path of greatest pleasure, and that whether it is so or not (though he fully believes that it is), they must not only be taught to believe this, but no approach to a doubt of it must be tolerated within the country. The Sokrates of the Gorgias, however, dissents both from the Sokrates of the Protagoras and from the real Sokrates.

Good is, with him, no longer synonymous with Pleasurable, nor Evil with Painful. To constitute any-

thing a Good, it must be either pleasurable or beneficial (ὠᾳέλιμον), and Justice belongs to the category of Beneńcial; but beneficial to what end, is not explained,

except that the end certainly is not Pleasure. Justice is assimilated to the health of the soul, injustice to a disease: and since the health of the body is the greatest good, and disease its greatest evil, the same estimate is

extended by analogy to the mind.

There is no attempt, in the Gorgias, to define Justice. In the Republic, which has this definition for its express purpose, and travels through the whole process of constructing an ideal commonwealth to arrive at it, the result is brought out, that Justice is synonymous with the complete supremacy of Reason in the soul. The human mind is analyzed into the celebrated three elements, Reason, Spirit or Passion (τὸ θυμοειδὲς, another troublesome Mixed Mode), and Appetite. The just mind is that in which each of the three keeps its proper place; in which Reason governs, Passion makes itself the aid and instrument of Reason, and the two combined keep Appetite in a state of willing subjection. In the Philebus, which is professedly De Bono (or rather De Summe Bono), the subject is more discriminatingly scrutinized. After a long discussion, in which those who uphold Pleasure, and those who contend for Wisdom or intelligence (φρόνησις), as the ultimate end, are both confuted; Good, or that which is worthy of being desired, is found to consist of five things, desirable in unequal degrees. We shall not quote the whole list, as, from the vagueness of some of the conceptions, and the extremely abstract nature of the phraseology, even Mr. Grote confesses how hard it is to be understood. The first four, however, have exclusive reference to the rational elements of the mind, while the fifth, placed far below the others, consists of the few pleasures which are gentle and unmixed with pain; all others, and especially the intenser pleasures, having been eliminated, as belonging to a distempered mental condition. All these theories lay themselves open to Mr. Grote's criticism, by defining virtue with reference to the good only οἷ the agent himself; even justice, pre-eminently the social virtue, being resolved into the supremacy of reason within our own minds; in disregard of the fact that the idea and sentiment of Virtue have their foundation not exclusively in the self-regarding, but also, and even more directly, in the social feelings : a truth first fully accepted by the Stoics, who have the glory of being the earliest thinkers who grounded the obligation of morals on the brotherhood, the συγγένεια, of the whole human race. The grand defect of Platds ethical conceptions (excellcntly discussed in Mr. Grote,s remarks on the Republic) was in overlooking, what was completely seizcd by Aristotle _— that the essential part of the virtue of justice is the recognition and obscrvance of the rights of other people.^[12]

It is noticeable that even in the Republic, the governing and controlling principle of the mind, which we have translated Reason, and whose unresisted authority constitutes the essence of Virtue, is τὸ λογισιιιιόν — literally the calculating principle (λογισπχή being used by Plate himself, in the Gorgias, to dcnote a portion of Arithmetic). This is the very doctrine of the Protagoras, except that the elements to be calculated are different. And, through the whole series of the dialogues, a Measuring Art, μετρητικὴ τέχνη, as a means of distinguishing the truth of things from their superlicial appea ~ance, is everywhere desiderated as the great requisite both of Wisdom and of virtue. When, however, the Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/357 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/358 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/359 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/360 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/361 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/362 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/363 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/364 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/365 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/366 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/367 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/368 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/369 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/370 could be possible; how we can think that which is not — a non-entity — any more than we can touch, or eat, or drink that which is not. It is surprising how often Plato returns to this perplexity. More than half the Sophistes is devoted to the discussion of it, merely in a parenthesis. As a specimen of the stumbling-blocks which the early metaphysical inquirers found in their path, as well as a striking example of the diversity of the points of view of different dialogues, we will quote a passage from Mr. Grote on this subject:^[13] —

“How is a false proposition possible? Many held that a false proposition and a false name were impossible, that you could not speak the thing that is not, or Non-Ens (τὸ μὴ ὄν): that such a proposition would be an empty sound, without meaning or signification; that speech may be significant or insignificant, but could not be false, except in the sense of being unmeaning. Now, this doctrine is dealt with in the Theætêtus, Sophistês, and Kratylus. In the Theætêtus, Sokratês examines it at great length, and proposes several different hypotheses to explain how a false proposition might be possible, but ends in pronouncing them all inadmissible. He declares himself incompetent, and passes onto something else. Again, in the Sophistês, the same point is taken up, and discussed there also very copiously. The Eleate in that dialogue ends by finding a solution which satisfies him — (viz., that τὸ μὴ ὄν = ιὸ ἕτερον τοῦ ὄντος). But what is remarkable is, that the solution does not meet any of the difficulties propounded in the Theætêtus; nor are these difficulties at all adverted to in the Sophistês. Finally, in the Kratylus, we have the very same doctrine, that false affirmations are impossible, — which both in the Theætêtus and in the Sophistès is enunciated, not as the decided opinion of the speaker, but as a problem which embarrasses him — we have this same doctrine averred unequivocally by Kratylus as his own full conviction. And Sokratês finds that a very short argument, and a very simple comparison, suffice to refute him. The supposed “aggressive cress-examiner,” who presses Sokratês so hard in the Theætêtus, is not allowed to put his puzzling questions in the Kratylus.

“How are we to explain these three ditferent modes of handling the same question by the same philosopher? If the question about Non-Ens can be disposed of in the summary way which we read in the Kratylus, what is gained by the string of unsolved puzzles in the Theætêtus, or by the long discursive argument in the Sophistês, ushering in a new solution no way satisfactory? If, on the contrary, the difficulties which are unsolved in the Theætêtus, and imperfectly solved in the Sophistês, are real and pertinent,——how are we to explain the proceeding of Plate in the Kratylus, when he puts into the mouth of Kratylus a distinct averment of the opinion about Non-Ens, yet without allowing him, when it is impugned by Sokratês, to urge any of these pertinent arguments in defence of it? If the peculiar solution given in the Sophistês be the really genuine and triumphant solution, why is it left unnoticed both in the Kratylus and the Theætêtus, and why is it contradicted in other dialogues? Which of the three dialogues represents Plato's real opinion on the question?

“To these questions, and to many others of like bearing, connected with the Platonic writings, I see no satisfactory reply, if we are to consider Plate as a positive philosopher, with a scheme and edifice of methodized opinions in his mind; and as composing all his dialogues with a set purpose, either of inculcating these opinions on the reader, or of refuting the opinions opposed to them. This supposition is what most Platonic critics have in their minds, even when professedly modifying it. Their admiration for Plato is not satisfied unless they conceive him in the professorial chair Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/373 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/374 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/375 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/376 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/377 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/378 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/379 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/380 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/381 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/382 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/383 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/384 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/385 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/386 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/387 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/388 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/389 Page:Dissertations and Discussions, Vol. 4 (1867).djvu/390

1. Edinburgh Review, April, 1866.
2. Grote, vol. ii. p. 45.
3. Ibid.
4. Νόμος ὃ πάντων βασιλεύς. an expression of Pindar, cited by Herodotus (as well as by Pluto himself in the Gorgias), and very happily applied, on many occasions, by Mr. Grote. ”The large sense of the Word Νόμος, as received by Pindar and Herodotus, must be kept in mind, comprising positive morality, religious ritual, cnnsecrated habits, and local turns of sympathy and antipathy,” &c. (Grote, vol. i. p. 262, note.) Νόμος, thus understood. includes all that is enjuinod by law, custom, or the general sentiment, and all that is voluntarily accepted in reliance on these.
5. Grote, vol. ii. p. 47.
6. Ibid. p. 44.
7. Ibid. p. 73.
8. “Such terms as Nature, Law, Freedom, Necessity, Body, Substance, Matter, Church, State, Revelation, Inspiration, Knowledge, Belief, are tossed about in the wars of words as if everybody knew what they meant, and as if everybody used them exactly in the same sense; whereas most people, and particularly those who represent public opinion, pick up these complicated terms as children, beginning with the vaguest conceptions, adding to them from time to time, perhaps correcting likewise at haphazard some of their involuntary errors, but never taking stock, never either inquiring into the history of the terms which they handle so freely, or realizing the fulness of their meaning according to the strict rules of logical definition.”—Max Mueller, Lectures on the Science of Language, Second Series, pp. 526, 527.
9. The transition in Plato's mind from the simple to the transcendental doctrine is represented in a tolerably intelligible manner in his Seventh Epistle, of which an abstract is given by Mr. Grote, vol. i. p. 223, et seq.
10. Grote, vol. ii. p. 90.
11. The historical Sokrates of the Memorabilia (iv. 4), being challenged by the Sophist Hippias to give over merely tennenting others, and commit himself to a positive opinion about justice, replies by a definition which would have included Aristcides, but not the Platonic ruler or philosopher: Justice, he says, is τὸ νόμιμον—conformity to the laws of the country. This definition, which exactly suited the unideal and practical Xenophon, does not satisfy the Sophist, who is here again represented asceontending for a higher law. He objects, that the laws cannot be the standard of virtue, since the communities which enact thom often change their mind, and abrogate the laws they have made. To which Sokrates
12. Grote, vol. iii. pp. 138-159. The only vestige we find in Plato of the conception of moralny which refers to the general happiness, is when, in answering the remark that the guardians of his ideal republic, being denied all the interents to which human life is generally devoted,would have a poor and undesirable existence, he says, “ Perlmps it may turn out that theirs would be the happiest of all; but even if what you say is true, our object is not that one portion of the community may be as happy as possible, but that the whole community may be so.”
13. Grote, vol. ii. pp. 548—551.