Christianity and Greek Philosophy Part 27

_Zeno of Elea_ (born B.C. 500) was the logician of the Eleatic school.

He was, says Diogenes Laertius, "the inventor of Dialectics."[455] Logic henceforth becomes the ???a???[456]--organon of the Eleatics.

[Footnote 452: "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 50.]

[Footnote 453: Encyclopaedia Britannica, article "Simplicius."]

[Footnote 454: Cudworth's "Intellectual System," vol. i. p. 511.]

[Footnote 455: "Lives," p. 387 (Bohn's edition).]

[Footnote 456: Plato in "Parmen."]

This organon, however, Zeno used very imperfectly. In his hands it was simply the "reductio ad absurdum" of opposing opinions as the means of sustaining the tenets of his own sect. Parmenides had a.s.serted, on _a priori_ grounds, the existence of "the One." Zeno would prove by his dialectic the non-existence of "the many." His grand position was that all phenomena, all that appears to sense, is but a _modification_ of the absolute One. And he displays a vast amount of dialectic subtilty in the effort to prove that all "appearances" are unreal, and that all movement and change is a mere "seeming"--not a reality. What men call motion is only a name given to a series of conditions, each of which, considered separately, is rest. "Rest is force resistant; motion is force triumphant."[457] The famous puzzle of "Achilles and the Tortoise," by which he endeavored to prove the unreality of motion, has been rendered familiar to the English reader.[458]

[Footnote 457: Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 60.]

[Footnote 458: Ritter's "History of Ancient Philosophy," vol. i. pp.

475, 476.]

Aristotle a.s.sures us that Zeno, "by his one Ens, which neither was moved nor movable, meaneth G.o.d." And he also informs us that "Zeno endeavored to demonstrate that there is but one G.o.d, from the idea which all men have of him, as that which is the best, supremest, most powerful of all, or an absolutely perfect being" ("De Xenophane, Zenone, et Gorgia").[459]

With Zeno we close our survey of the second grand line of independent inquiry by which philosophy sought to solve the problem of the universe.

The reader will be struck with the resemblance which subsists between the history of its development and that of the modern Idealist school.

Pythagoras was the Descartes, Parmenides the Spinoza, and Zeno the Hegel of the Italian school.

In this survey of the speculations of the pre-Socratic schools of philosophy, we have followed the course of two opposite streams of thought which had their common origin in one fundamental principle or law of the human mind--the _intuition of unity_--"or the desire to comprehend all the facts of the universe in a single formula, and consummate all conditional knowledge in the unity of unconditioned existence." The history of this tendency is, in fact, the history of all philosophy. "The end of all philosophy," says Plato, "is the intuition of unity." "All knowledge," said the Platonists, "is the gathering up into one."[460]

[Footnote 459: Cudworth's "Intellectual System," vol. i. p. 518.]

[Footnote 460: Hamilton's "Metaphysics," vol. i. pp. 67-70 (English edition).]

Starting from this fundamental idea, _that, beneath the endless flux and change of the visible universe, there must be a permanent principle of unity_, we have seen developed two opposite schools of speculative thought. As the traveller, standing on the ridges of the Andes, may see the head-waters of the great South American rivers mingling in one, so the student of philosophy, standing on the elevated plane of a.n.a.lytic thought, may discover, in this fundamental principle, the common source of the two great systems of speculative thought which divided the ancient world. Here are the head-waters of the sensational and the idealist schools. The Ionian school started its course of inquiry in the direction of _sense_; it occupied itself solely with the phenomena of the external world, and it sought this principle of unity in a _physical_ element. The Italian school started its course of inquiry in the direction of _reason_; it occupied itself chiefly with rational conceptions or _a priori_ ideas, and it sought this principle of unity in purely _metaphysical_ being. And just as the Amazon and La Plata sweep on, in opposite directions, until they reach the extremities of the continent, so these two opposite streams of thought rush onward, by the force of a logical necessity, until they terminate in the two Unitarian systems of _Absolute Materialism_ and _Absolute Idealism_, and, in their theological aspects, in a pantheism which, on the one hand, identifies G.o.d with matter, or, on the other hand, swallows up the universe in G.o.d.

The radical error of both these systems is at once apparent. The testimony of the primary faculties of the mind was not regarded as each, within its sphere, final and decisive. The duality of consciousness was not accepted in all its integrity; one school rejected the testimony of reason, the other denied the veracity of the senses, and both prepared the way for the _skepticism_ of the Sophists.

We must not, however, lose sight of the fact that there were some philosophers of the pre-Socratic school, as Anaxagoras and Empedocles, who recognized the partial and exclusive character of both these systems, and sought, by a method which Cousin would designate as Eclecticism, to combine the element of truth contained in each.

_Anaxagoras of Clazomenc_ (B.C. 500-428) added to the Ionian philosophy of a material element or elements the Italian idea of a _spirit_ distinct from, and independent of the world, which has within itself the principle of a spontaneous activity--???? a?t???at??, and which is the first cause of motion in the universe--???? t?? ????se??.[461]

[Footnote 461: Cousin, "History of Philosophy," vol. i. p. 411.]

In his physical theory, Anaxagoras was an Atomist. Instead of one element, he declared that the elements or first principles were numerous, or even infinite. No point in s.p.a.ce is unoccupied by these atoms, which are infinitely divisible. He imagined that, in nature, there are as many kinds of principles as there are species of compound bodies, and that the peculiar form of the primary particles of which any body is composed is the same with the qualities of the compound body itself. This was the celebrated doctrine of _h.o.m.omeria_, of which Lucretius furnishes a luminous account in his philosophic poem "De Natura Rerum"--

"That bone from bones Minute, and embryon; nerve from nerves arise; And blood from blood, by countless drops increased.

Gold, too, from golden atoms, earths concrete, From earths extreme; from fiery matters, fire; And lymph from limpen dews. And thus throughout From primal kinds that kinds perpetual spring."[462]

These primary particles were regarded by Anaxagoras as eternal; because he held the dogma, peculiar to all the Ionians, that nothing can be really created or annihilated (de nihilo nihil, in nihilum nil posse reverti). But he saw, nevertheless, that the simple existence of "_inert_" matter, even from eternity, could not explain the motion and the harmony of the material world. Hence he saw the necessity of another power--_the power of Intelligence_. "All things were in chaos; then came Intelligence and introduced Order."[463]

Anaxagoras, unlike the pantheistic speculators of the Ionian school, rigidly separated the Supreme Intelligence from the material universe.

The ???? of Anaxagoras is a principle, infinite, independent (a?t???at??), omnipresent (?? pa?t? pa?t?? ???a ????), the subtilest and purest of things (?ept?tat?? p??t?? ????t?? ?a? ?a?a??tat??); and incapable of mixture with aught besides; it is also omniscient (p??ta ????), and unchangeable (p?? ????? ?st?).--Simplicius, in "Arist.

Phys." i. 33.[464]

[Footnote 462: Good's translation, bk. i. p. 325.]

[Footnote 463: Diogenes Laertius, "Lives," p. 59.]

[Footnote 464: Butler's "Lectures on Philosophy," vol. i. p. 305, note.]

Thus did Anaxagoras bridge the chasm between the Ionian and the Italian schools. He accepted both doctrines with some modifications. He believed in the real existence of the phenomenal world, and he also believed in the real existence of "The Infinite Mind," whose Intelligence and Omnipotence were manifested in the laws and relations which pervade the world. He proclaimed the existence of the Infinite Intelligence ("the ONE"), who was the Architect and Governor of the Infinite Matter ("the MANY").

On the question as to the origin and certainty of human knowledge, Anaxagoras differed both from the Ionians and the Eleatics. Neither the sense alone, nor the reason alone, were for him a ground of cert.i.tude.

He held that reason (?????) was the regulative faculty of the mind, as the ????, or Supreme Intelligence, was the regulative power of the universe. And he admitted that the senses were veracious in their reports; but they reported only in regard to phenomena. The senses, then, perceive _phenomena_, but it is the reason alone which recognizes _noumena_, that is, the reason perceives being in and through phenomena, substance in and through qualities; an antic.i.p.ation of the fundamental principle of modern psychology--"_that every power or substance in existence is knowable to us, so far only, as we know its phenomena_."

Thus, again, does he bridge the chasm that separates between the Sensationalist and the Idealist. The Ionians relied solely on the intuitions of sense; the Eleatics accepted only the apperceptions of pure reason; he accepted the testimony of both, and in the synthesis of subject and object--the union of an element supplied by sensation, and an element supplied by reason, he found real, certain knowledge.

The harmony which the doctrine of Anaxagoras introduced into the philosophy of Athens, soon attracted attention and multiplied disciples.

He was teaching when Socrates arrived in Athens, and the latter attended his school. The influence which the doctrine of Anaxagoras exerted upon the mind of Socrates (leading him to recognize Intelligence as the cause of order and special adaptation in the universe),[465] and also upon the course of philosophy in the Socratic schools, is the most enduring memorial of his name.[466]

[Footnote 465: "Phaedo," -- 105.]

[Footnote 466: Aristotle's "Metaphysics," bk. i. ch. iii.]

We have devoted a much larger s.p.a.ce than we originally designed to the ante-Socratic schools--quite out of proportion, indeed, with that we shall be able to appropriate to their successors. But inasmuch as all the great primary problems of thought, which are subsequently discussed by Plato and Aristotle, were started, and received, at least, typical answers in those schools, we can not hope to understand Plato, or Aristotle, or even Epicurus, or Zeno of Cittium, unless we have first mastered the doctrines of Herac.l.i.tus, Pythagoras, Parmenides, and Anaxagoras.[467] The attention we have bestowed on these early thinkers will, therefore, have been a valuable preparatory discipline for the study of

II. THE SOCRATIC SCHOOL.

The first cycle of philosophy was now complete. That form of Grecian speculative thought which, during the first period of its development, was a philosophy of nature, had reached its maturity; it had sought "the first principles of all things" in the study of external nature, and had signally failed. In this pursuit of first principles as the basis of a true and certain knowledge of the system of the universe, the two leading schools had been carried to opposite poles of thought. One had a.s.serted that _experience_ alone, the other, that _reason_ alone was the sole criterion of truth. As the last consequence of this imperfect method, Leucippus had denied the existence of "the one," and Zeno had denied the existence of "the many." The Ionian school, in Democritus, had landed in Materialism; the Italian, in Parmenides, had ended in Pantheism; and, as the necessary result of this partial and defective method of inquiry, which ended in doubt and contradiction, a spirit of general skepticism was generated in the Athenian mind. If doubt be cast upon the veracity of the primary cognitive faculties of the mind, the flood-gates of universal skepticism are opened. If the senses are p.r.o.nounced to be mendacious and illusory in their reports regarding external phenomena, and if the intuitions of the reason, in regard to the ground and cause of phenomena, are delusive, then we have no ground of cert.i.tude. If one faculty is unveracious and unreliable, how can we determine that the other is not equally so? There is, then, no such thing as universal and necessary truth. Truth is variable and uncertain, as the variable opinion of each individual.

[Footnote 467: Maurice's "Ancient Philosophy," p. 114; Butler's "Lectures on Ancient Philosophy," vol. ii. pp. 87, 88.]

The Sophists, who belonged to no particular school, laid hold on the elements of skepticism contained in both the pre-Socratic schools of philosophy, and they declared that "the s?f?a" was not only unattainable, but that no relative degree of it was possible for the human faculties.[468] Protagoras of Abdera accepted the doctrine of Herac.l.i.tus, that thought is identical with sensation, and limited by it; he therefore declared that there is no criterion of truth, and _Man is the measure of all things_.[469] s.e.xtus Empiricus gives the psychological opinions of Protagoras with remarkable explicitness.

"Matter is in a perpetual flux, whilst it undergoes augmentations and losses; the senses also are modified according to the age and disposition of the body. He said, also, that the reason of all phenomena resides in matter as substrata, so that matter, in itself, might be whatever it appeared to each. But men have different perceptions at different periods, according to the changes in the things perceived....

Man is, therefore, the criterion of that which exists; all that is perceived by him exists; _that which is perceived by no man does not exist_."[470] These conclusions were rigidly and fearlessly applied to ethics and political science. If there is no Eternal Truth, there can be no Immutable Right. The distinction of right and wrong is solely a matter of human opinion and conventional usage.[471] "That which _appears_ just and honorable to each city, is so for _that city_, so long as the opinion prevails."[472]

[Footnote 468: Encyclopaedia Britannica, article "Sophist."]

[Footnote 469: Plato's "Theaetetus" (?????p??--"the individual is the measure of all things"), vol. i. p. 381 (Bohn's edition).]

[Footnote 470: Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 117.]

[Footnote 471: "Gorgias," -- 85-89.]

[Footnote 472: Plato's "Theaetetus," -- 65-75.]

There were others who laid hold on the weapons which Zeno had prepared to their hands. He had a.s.serted that all the objects of sense were mere phantoms--delusive and transitory. By the subtilties of dialectic quibbling, he had attempted to prove that "change" meant "permanence,"

and "motion" meant "rest."[473] Words may, therefore, have the most opposite and contradictory meanings; and all language and all opinion may, by such a process, be rendered uncertain. One opinion is, consequently, for the individual, just as good as another; and all opinions are equally true and untrue. It was nevertheless desirable, for the good of society, that there should be some agreement, and that, for a time at least, certain opinions should prevail; and if philosophy had failed to secure this agreement, rhetoric, at least, was effectual; and, with the Sophist, rhetoric was "the art of making the worst appear the better reason." All wisdom was now confined to a species of "word jugglery," which in Athens was dignified as "the art of disputation."

[Footnote 473: "And do we not know that the Eleatic Palamedes (Zeno) spoke by art in such a manner that the same things appeared to be similar and dissimilar, one and many, at rest and in motion?"--"Phaedrus," -- 97.]