PART I.

STATE OF CULTURE IN GREECE.

CHAPTER I.

THE INTELLECTUAL AND POLITICAL STATE OF GREECE

AT THE CLOSE OF THE FOURTH CENTURY.

GREEK PHILOSOPHY had reached its greatest perfection in Plato and Aristotle-the Socratic theory of conceptions having, in their hands, reached its most perfect development. The whole range of contemporary knowledge had been brought within its compass, and grouped around definite centres, thus affording a connected view of the world. The study of nature had been supplemented by stringent enquiries into morals; whilst, at the same time, natural science in all its branches had been sensibly altered and enlarged. The concentration of all existing speculations had strengthened the intellectual foundation for a science of metaphysics. A multitude of phenomena, which had escaped the notice of earlier thinkers-in particular the phenomena of mental life—had been impressed into the service of science; new questions had been raised; new answers given.

B

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I.

A. Merits and defects of the systems of Aristotle.

Plato and

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Into every branch of knowledge new ideas had pene-
trated. The clearest and most characteristic ex-
pression of the intellectual life of Greece-Idealism
--after being set forth by Plato with extraordinary
brilliancy, had been brought into harmony with
the most careful results of experience by Aristotle.
Thanks to this union of theory and practice, construc-
tive criticism had become an art. The machinery
of thought had been improved by an invaluable
addition in the scientific use of names, a
use of
which Aristotle was the real originator. In short,
within a few years the intellectual treasures of
Greece had been increased manifold, both in extent
and value. Who would have recognised in the
mighty system left by Aristotle to his successors, the
scanty store of philosophic ideas which Socrates
inherited from his predecessors?

Great, no doubt, had been the progress made by Greek philosophy in the fourth century before Christ. Not less great, however, were the hindrances with which that philosophy had perpetually to contend; not less difficult the questions which were ever presenting themselves to it for solution. Already Aristotle had pointed out weak points in the system of Plato, with which he had found it impossible to agree; nor had their number been diminished by the criticism of advancing science. Even in the system of Aristotle himself, inconsistencies on some of the most important points were discovered; concealed, it is true, under a certain indefiniteness of expression, but fatal, if once brought to light, to the soundness of his entire

system. With all his skill, Aristotle had not succeeded in blending into one harmonious whole all the elements out of which his system was composed; and therein lay the cause of the difference between Aristotle's own teaching and that of his immediate

successors.

Nor was the defect of a kind that could be easily removed. On the contrary, the more it was investigated, the stronger became the conviction that these weak points were embedded in the foundations of the systems both of Plato and Aristotle; in short, that they underlay the whole tendency of previous philosophic thought. Leaving details and minor points out of consideration, these weak points might be referred to two main sources. They either arose from an imperfect knowledge and experience of the world, or they were flaws caused by an over-hasty attempt to enthrone Idealism as the knowledge of conceptions. To the former cause may be attributed the mistakes in natural science into which Plato and Aristotle fell, and the limited character of their view of history; to the latter, the Platonic theory of ideas, with all that it involves-the antithesis of ideas and appearances, of the intellect and the senses, of knowledge and ignorance, of the present world and the world to come-and not less truly the corresponding points in the system of Aristotle, such as the difficulties in the relation of what is particular and what is general, of form and matter, of God and the world, of the theory of final causes and of natural explanations,

B 2

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of the reasoning and the irrational parts of the soul, of speculative theory and practice.

Both causes are, however, closely connected. The two great thinkers of Greece had been content with an uncertain and defective knowledge of facts. They had trusted to conceptions because the study of nature was yet in its infancy. Trusting implicitly to conceptions, they had failed to enquire how conceptions arose, and whether they would stand. The knowledge of history was as yet so limited that they were not aware of any difference between the results obtained by rigid observation and those obtained by ordinary unmethodical experience. They had failed to recognise how'arbitrary most of their traditional principles were, and how necessary a more stringent method of induction had become. The fault common to them both, which Plato and Aristotle had inherited from Socrates, lay in attaching undue prominence to mental criticism, in neglecting observation, and in supposing that out of ordinary beliefs and current language conceptions expressing the very essence of things could be obtained by pure logic. In Plato this fault appears more strongly than in Aristotle, and finds expression in a theory characteristically known as the theory of recollection. And certainly if all our conceptions are inherent from the moment of birth, needing only the agency of sensible things to make us conscious of their existence, it may be legitimately inferred that, to know the essence of things, we must look within, and not without, obtaining our ideas by development from

the mind rather than by abstraction from experience. It may be inferred, with equal reason, that the ideas drawn from the mind are the true standard by which experience must be judged. Whenever ideas and experience disagree, instead of regarding ideas as at fault, we ought to look upon the data of experience as imperfect, and as inadequately expressing the ideas which constitute the thing as it really exists. The whole theory of ideas, in short, and all that it implies, is a natural corollary from the Socratic theory of conceptions. Even those parts of this theory which seem most incongruous are best explained by being referred to the principles on which the constructive criticism of Socrates is primarily based, and the onesidedness of which Aristotle only very imperfectly overcame. Undoubtedly he attempted to supply the defects in the Socratic and Platonic theory of conceptions by deriving knowledge from observation, although Plato's knowledge of the external world cannot for one moment be compared with Aristotle's use of observation, either in accuracy or extent. Undoubtedly Aristotle's attempt changed the whole character of the Platonic theory of conceptions, ultimately securing for individual things a footing by the side of general conceptions, just as a footing had been already secured for experience by the side of intellectual speculation. But Aristotle did not go far enough. In his theory of knowledge he could not wholly repudiate the notion that the soul gains its knowledge by a process of development from within, being not only endowed by nature with

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