period he resided in his native city,' honoured by his fellow-citizens,2 but in poor circumstances,3 which he bore with his characteristic repose of mind. He died, it would appear, at an advanced age, between 275 and 270 B.C., leaving no writings behind. Even the ancients therefore only knew his teaching by that of his pupils, among whom Timon of Philius was the most important. Besides Timon the whole by adroit flattery. Plut. Alex. 52; Ad Prin. Iner. 4; Qu. Conv. ix. 1, 2, 5; Æl. V. H. ix. 37; Athen. vi. 250. His indifference was, at any rate, very much lacking in nobility. Diog. ix. 64; 109. 2 According to Diog. 64, they made him head priest, and allowed to philosophers immunity from taxation on his account. According to Diocles (Diog. 65), the Athenians presented him with citizenship for his services in putting a Thracian prince Cotys to death. Diog. 66; 62. Examples in Diog. 67. It sounds, however, highly improbable; and doubts were expressed by Enesidemus whether his indifference ever went to the extent described by Antigonus, Ibid. 62, so that he had to be preserved from danger by his friends. He must have enjoyed a special good fortune to attain the age of 90, notwithstanding such senseless conduct. All the dates here are very uncertain. If, however, as Diog. 62, says, he attained the age of 90, and if he joined Anaxarchus at Alexander's first invasion of Asia, the statements above given follows. 6 Diog. Pro. 16; 102; Aristocl. in Eus. Pr. Ev. xiv. 18, 1; better authorities than Sext. Math. i. 282. Timon (see Wachsmuth, De Timone Phliasio: Leipzig, 1859) was a native of Phiius (Diog. ix. 109). At first a public dancer (Diog. 109; Aristocl. in Eus. Pr. Ev. xiv. 18, 12), when tired of this mode of life he repaired to Megara, to hear Stilpo (Diog. 109). Stilpo being alive in the third century, and Timon's birth being approximately 325-315 B.C., the connection is not an impossible one, as Wachsmuth and Preller assert. Subsequently Timon became acquainted with Pyrrho, and removed with his wife to Elis. He then appeared as a teacher in Chalcis, and, having amassed a fortune, concluded his life in Athens (Diog. 110; 115). It appears from Diog. 112 and 115, that he survived Arcesilaus (who died 241 B.C.), having attained the age of 90. His death may therefore be approximately fixed in 230, his birth in 320 B.C. For his life and character, see Diog. 110; 112-115; Athen. x. 438, a; Æl. V. H. ii. 41. Of his numerous CHAP. XXII. CHAP. XXII. B. Teaching of Pyrrho. (1) Impossibility of knowledge. several other of his pupils are known by name.1 His School, however, was short-lived. Soon after Timon it seems to have become extinct.3 Those who were disposed to be sceptical now joined the New Academy, for whose founder Timon had not been able to conceal his jealousy. The little which is known of Pyrrho's teaching may be summed up in the three following statements: We can know nothing about the nature of things: Hence the right attitude towards them is to withhold judgment: The necessary result of suspending judgment is imperturbability. He who will live happily -for happiness is the starting-point with the Scep writings, the best known is a 1 Diog. 67-69, mentions, be- same time, and both of these appear to have belonged to a later period of Scepticism. According to Diog. 115, Menodotus asserted that Timon left no successor, the School being in abeyance from Timon to Ptolemæus, i.e. until the second half of the first century B.C. Sotion and Hippobotus, however, asserted that his pupils were Dioscurides, Nicolochus, Euphranor, and Praylus. His son too, the physician Xanthus, likewise followed his father. Diog. 109. On the other hand, according to Suid. Пupswv, the second Pyrrho was a changeling. If Aratus of Soli was a pupil of his, he was certainly not an adherent of his views. In Diog. 116, Eubulus is called a pupil of Euphranor. If Ptolemæus is named as the next one after him, no philosopher of Pyrrho's aywyn can have been known for 150 years. Diog. 114. 1 tics-must, according to Timon, take three things into consideration: What is the nature of things? What ought our attitude to things to be? What is the gain resulting from this relation? To the first of these three questions Pyrrho can only reply by saying that things are altogether inaccessible to knowledge, and that whatever property may be attributed to a thing, we may with equal justice predicate the opposite.2 In support of this statement Pyrrho appears to have argued that neither the senses nor reason furnish certain knowledge.3 The senses do not show things as they are, but only as they appear to be. Rational knowledge, even where it seems to be most certain, in the sphere of morals, does not depend upon real knowledge, but only upon tradition and habit.5 Against every statement the opposite may be advanced with equal justice. 1 Aristocl. in Fus. Pr. Ev. xiv. 18,2 : δ δε γε μαθητὴς αὐτοῦ Τίμων φησὶ δεῖν τὸν μέλλοντα εὐδαιμονήσειν εἰς τρία ταῦτα βλέπειν· πρῶς τον μὲν ὁποῖα πέφυκε τὰ πράγματα· δεύτερον δὲ, τίνα χρὴ τρόπον ἡμὰς πρὸς αὐτὰ διακεῖσθαι· τελευταῖον δὲ τί περιέσται τοις οὕτως ἔχουσιν. 2 Aristocl. 1. c: τὰ μὲν οὖν πράγματά φησιν αὐτὸν (Pyrrho) ἀποφαίνειν ἐπίσης ἀδιάφορα καὶ ἀστάθμητα καὶ ἀνεπίκριτα, διὰ τοῦτο [το] μήτε τὰς αἰσθήσεις ἡμῶν μήτε τὰς δόξας ἀληθεύειν ἢ ψεύδεσθαι. Diog. ix. 61: οὐ γὰρ μᾶλλον τόδε ἢ τόδε εἶναι ἕκαστον. Gell. xi. 5, 4: Pyrrho is said to have stated οὐ μᾶλλον οὕτως ἔχει τόδε ἢ ἐκείνως ἢ οὐθετέρως. 3 Conf. Arist. 1. c. and Diog. ix. 114. If, how • Timon, in Diog. ix. 105: τὸ μέλι ὅτι ἐστὶ γλυκὺ οὐ τίθημι· τὸ δ ̓ ὅτι φαίνεται ὁμολογῶ. * Diog. ix. 61 : οὐδὲν γὰρ ἔφασκεν οὔτε καλὸν οὔτε αἰσχρὸν οὔτε δίκαιον οὔτε ἄδικον, καὶ ὁμοίω ἐπὶ πάντων, μηδὲν εἶναι τῇ ἀληθείᾳ, νόμῳ δὲ καὶ ἔθει πάντα τοὺς ἀνθρώπους πράττειν, οὐ γὰρ μᾶλλον τύδε ἢ τόδε εἶναι ἕκαστον. Sext. Math. xi. 140; οὔτε ἀγαθόν τί ἐστι φύσει ούτε κακὸν, ἀλλὰ πρὸς ἀνθρώπων ταῦτα νόῳ κέκριται κατὰ τὸν Τίμωνα. In this sense the words of Euesidemus, in Diog. ix. 106, must be understood: οὐδέν φησιν δρίζειν τὸν Πύρρωνα δογματικῶς διὰ τὴν ἀντιλογίαν. CHAP. XXII. СНАР. XXII. (2) Withholding of judgment. ever, neither the senses nor reason alone can furnish trustworthy testimony, no more can the two combined, and thus the third way is barred, by which we might possibly have advanced to knowledge.1 How many more of the arguments quoted by the later Sceptics belong to Pyrrho it is impossible to say. The short duration and narrow extension of Pyrrho's School renders it probable, that with him Scepticism was not far advanced. The same result appears to follow from its small hold in the Academy. The ten poo or aspects under which sceptical objections were summarised, cannot with certainty be attributed to any one before Enesidemus.2 Portions of the arguments used at a later day may be borrowed from Pyrrho and his pupils,3 but it is impossible to discriminate these portions with certainty. Thus, if knowledge of things proves to be a failure, there only remains as possible an attitude of pure Diog. ix. 114, on Timon: συνεχές τε ἐπιλέγειν εἰώθει προς τοὺς τὰς αἰσθήσεις μετ' ἐπιμαρτυροῦντος τοῦ νοῦ ἐγκρίνοντας· συνἦλθεν Ατταγάς τε καὶ Νουμήνιος. Diog. ix. 79 refers these Tрónо to Pyrrho, without any good reason however. Sext. Pyrrh. i. 36 generally attributes them to the ancient Sceptics, under whom, according to Math. vii. 345, he understood nesidemus and his followers. Aristocles, 1. c. 18, 11, refers them to nesidemus, and they may easily have been referred to Pyrrho by mistake, since nesidemus himself (Diog. ix. 106) and subsequent writers (Favorin. in Gall. xi. 5, 5; Philostr. Vit. Soph. i. 491) call every kind of sceptical statement λόγοι οι τρόποι Πυῤῥώνειοι. 3 Sext. Math. vi. 66; x. 197 quotes an argument of Timon against the reality of time, and further states (Math. iv. 2) that Timon in his conflict with the philosophers of nature, maintained that no assertion should be made without proof: in other words, he denied dogmatism, every proof supposing something established, i.e. another proof, and so on for ever. Scepticism; and therein is contained the answer to the second question. We know nothing whatever of the real nature of things, and hence can neither believe nor assert anything as to their nature. We cannot say of anything that it is or is not; but we must abstain from every opinion, allowing that of all which appears to us to be true, the opposite may with equal justice be true. Accordingly, all our statements (as the Cyrenaics taught) only express individual opinions, and not absolute realities. We cannot deny that things appear to be of this or the other kind; but we can never say that they are so.2 Even the assertion that things are of this or the other kind, is not an assertion, but a confession by the individual of his state of mind.3 Hence, too, the universal maxim of being undecided cannot be taken as an established principle, but only as an avowal of what is probable. It must, however, remain a 1 Arist. 1. e. 18, 3: διὰ τοῦτο οὖν μηδὲ πιστεύειν αὐταῖς δεῖν, ἀλλ ̓ ἀδοξάστους καὶ ἀκλινεῖς καὶ ἀκραδάντους εἶναι περὶ ἑνὸς ἑκάστου λέγοντας ὅτι οὐ μᾶλλον ἔστιν ἢ οὐκ ἔστιν, ἢ καὶ ἔστι καὶ οὐκ ἔστιν, ἢ οὔτε ἔστιν οὔτ ̓ οὐκ ἔστιν. Diog. ix. 61. Ibid. 76: οὐ μᾶλλον means, according to Timon, τὸ μηδὲν ὁρίζειν ἀλλὰ ἀπροσθετεῖν. 2 Anesidem. in Diog. ix. 106: οὐδὲν ὁρίζειν τὸν Πύῤῥωνα δογματικῶς διὰ τὴν ἀντιλογίαν, τοῖς δὲ φαινομένοις ἀκολουθεῖν. Timon, lbid. 105. 3 Diog. ix. 103: περὶ μὲν ὧν ὡς ἄνθρωποι πάσχομεν ὁμολογοῦμεν περὶ δὲ ὧν οἱ δογματικοὶ διαβεβαιοῦνται τῷ λόγῳ φάμενοι κατειλῆφθαι ἐπίχομεν περὶ τούτων ὡς ἀδήλων· μόνα δὲ τὰ πάθη γινώσκο μεν. τὸ μὲν γὰρ ὅτι δρα μεν όμολογοῦμεν καὶ τὸ ὅτι τόδε νοοῦμεν γινώσκομεν, πῶς δ ̓ ὁρῶμεν ἢ πῶς νοοῦμεν ἀγνοοῦμεν· καὶ ὅτι τόδε λευκὸν φαίνεται διηγηματικῶς λέξ γομεν οὐ διαβεβαιούμενοι εἰ καὶ ὄντως ἐστί . . . καὶ γὰρ τὸ φαινόμενον τιθέμεθα οὐχ ὡς καὶ τοιοῦτον ἄν· καὶ ὅτι πῦρ καίει αἰσθανόμεθα εἰ δὲ φύσιν ἔχει καυστικήν, ἐπέχομεν. • Diog. 1. c.: περὶ δὲ τῆς Οὐδὲν ὁρίζω φωνῆς καὶ τῶν ὁμοίων λεγομεν ὡς οὐ δογμάτων· οὐ γάρ εἰσιν ὅμοια τῷ λέγειν ὅτι σφαιροειδής ἐστιν ὁ κόσμος· ἀλλὰ γὰρ τὸ μὲν ἄδηλον, αἱ δὲ ἐξ ὁμολογήσεις εἰσίν. ἐν ᾧ οὖν λέγομεν μηδὲν ὁρίζειν οὐδ ̓ αὐτὸ τοῦτο οριζόμεθα. Diog. CHAP. ΧΑΠ. |