I. GREEK PHILOSOPHY. 1. THE IONIC SCHOOL (6th Cent. B.C.). The first effort of Greek speculation to find the cause of existences was purely naturalistic (ἐν ὕλης εἴδει μόνας ὠήθη σav åρxàs elvaι Távтwv).1 Matter was with the first philosophers the original principle (άpxý, σTOιXEîov), whether it were water, as taught by Thales, or air, as supposed by Anaximenes and Diogenes of Apollonia. Anaximander of Miletus considered the principle of all things to be a substance in infinite space, of undetermined form, in which the motive force indwelt, and out of which, by a process of separation of opposites, individualities were formed. This infinite substance was, he said, immortal and imperishable, and he designated it, hylozoistically, the Deity.2 2. HERACLITUS OF EPHESUS (500 B.C.). The experimental observation of the continual flux of nature (πάντα ῥεῖ καὶ οὐδὲν μένει) inspired the notion that the essence of all things lay in perpetual modification. The world, according to Heraclitus, is eternal (ourÉ TIS DEŵV OUTÈ ἀνθρώπων ἐποίησεν, ἀλλ ̓ ἦν καὶ ἔστιν καὶ ἔσται), but it is a whirl of ever-shifting phenomena, an eternal emergence and disappearance, and it was well said of this philosopher that he swept repose clean out of the world. The universe rose out of fire, and will dive back into fire to become renovated and renew its precipitate career. It had no beginning, and it will have no end. It is one, as a river is one, but without living unity of being. That which Heraclitus calls God is the life of the aggregate of substances, undergoing 1 Aristot. Met. i. 3. 2 Aristot. Phys. i. 4. 2 1 change, in obedience to a law of necessity, which is however logic (ô έuvos λóyos). Man, according to Heraclitus, is only a transitory phenomenon in the universal becoming; 3 and his negation of individuality obliges him to reduce conscience and personal independence to an illusion.* 3. THE ATOMISTS. LEUCIPPUS AND DEMOCRITUS (500 B.C.). The materialism of this school is of the most pronounced character. It is not pantheistic, for the idea of divinity is expelled from its hypothesis of the universe. In the eyes of Leucippus and Democritus, matter is inert and passive, and if bodies exist in combination, it is through a succession of shocks (λnyai) repeated through eternity.5 Consequently the world is not an unity, immutable or in process of development, but is an agglomeration of an infinite number of eternal atoms, invisible, and insecable (πρŵτα ἁπλᾶ σώματα, πρῶτα μεγέθη, στοιχεία, ἄτομα), and without original connexion or bond of union τὸ ὂν οὐκ εἶναι ἓν, ἀλλ' ἄπειρα τὸ πλῆθος, καὶ ἀόρατα διὰ σμικρότητα)." The universe being the result of chance combinations, there is no law either in physics or in morals. The object of life is happiness, and life is devoid of responsibilities. The soul is an aggregate of fiery atoms, and when these atoms have reached a proper temperature they evolve thought; right thought is the product of high temperature, but excess in heat or cold makes thought unintelligent. 1 Plut. Plat. Phil. i. 27. 3 Sext. Emp. Pyrrh. Hyp. iii. 320. : 6 2 Sext. Emp. adv. Math. vii. 133. 4 Heraclitus in Zeller's "Philosophy of the Greeks," i. 450-490 ; also see "Fragments of Heraclitus" in "Museum der Alterthumswissenschaft," 1808. 5 Cicero: De Nat. Deor. i. 12, 29. 6 Aristot. De Gen. An. v. 8. 7 Aristot. De Gen. et Corr. i. 8; Phys. iv. 6. Though the intervention of divine power was not postulated in the moulding of the universe, yet the existence of divinity was not wholly denied. The Atomists taught that the gods were systems of round igneous atoms, which had attached themselves to finer bodies than those of men. These deities became visible to men through the images ever flowing from them.1 4. EMPEDOCLES OF AGRIGENTUM (440 B.C.). The system of this remarkable poet-philosopher is thoroughly pantheistic. He taught that the world was composed of the combination and dissolution (uiĝis and διάλλαξις, σύγκρισις and διάκρισις) of four eternal elements, fire, air, earth, and water. To explain the double movement, he had recourse to two principles, that of combination (φιλία, ἁρμονία, Αφροδιτή) and that of dissolution (yeîkos, opis, 'Apá). These two powers form one. Nature is an unity of love and hate. The world has a life and soul, self-conscious, divine; a holy will flying in swift thought.2 Phenomena are produced by the reciprocal operations of the two forces. Hate detaches objects from the primal unity and objects them into being, and love resolves them back again into the original essence.3 5. ANAXAGORAS OF CLAZOMENÆ (530 B.C.) In opposition to the doctrine of Empedocles, this philosopher conceived that in the universe there was nothing conflicting and unintelligent. The animator and former of the world he held to be incorporeal (dσúμarov), an im1 Sext. Emp. adv. Math. ix. 34. 2 Ibid. i. v. 359-363. 3 Fragments of Empedocles in Karsten: Philos. Græc. vet. Reliquiæ, vol. i. material spirit (vous), whose action produced order and harmony in chaos.1 This spirit he did not regard as divine, and indeed he carefully avoided calling it God. He supposed that all matter was penetrated by this nous, which was the principle of life. It was diffused throughout the world, energizing nature, intelligent, individual, wise. By it the world was not created, but was moulded out of preexisting material (πάντα χρήματα ἦν ὁμοῦ· εἶτα ὁ Νοῦς ἐλθὼν αὐτὰ διεκόσμησε). The philosophy of Anaxagoras is important as being a first effort to rise above the materialism of the atomic and Ionic schools; and Aristotle well remarks of him that he appears, in comparison with those who had preceded him, as a man of reflection among those who had none.3 Although he preceded Empedocles chronologically, philosophically he succeeded him (πρότερος ὢν τούτου, τοῖς δ ̓ ἔργοις ὕστερος).4 6. SCHOOL OF PYTHAGORAS (525-300 B.C.). According to the cosmology of the Pythagoræans, the world is a closed ball, in the centre of which is a core of fire. Around it lie three regions with ten globes; the heaven extending from the earth to the moon, the cosmos from the moon to the fixed stars, and Olympus, the region of the gods, beyond. God (ô cós) is the supreme cause, the creator (yevrov vπô ОEοû TÒV Kоoμóv) 5 which He rules, and to which He communicates His eternal and imperishable nature. This God is supreme intelligence, the vous, with1 Plat. Phæd. 105. 2 Plat. Crat.; Aristot. Phys. viii. i. 5; Met. i. 3. 3 Plut. Pericl. iv. 4 Arist. Met. i. 3. See Fragments of Anaxagoras collected by Schaubach; Leipz. 1827. 5 Plutarch de Placit. Philos. i. 2; ii. 4. out passions, inaccessible to the senses, nor capable of change, conceivable only by the intellect.1 Pythagoræan philosophy is theistic, not pantheistic. 7. THE ELEATIC SCHOOL. ZENOPHANES, PARMENIDES, ZENO OF ELEA. (6th and 5th Cent. B.C.) The effort made by the Pythagoræans to distinguish the essence of being (rò ov) from phenomena (rà paivóμeva) was pursued by the Eleatic school. If the Ionic school had occupied itself with the empirical perception of phenomena and by the mouth of Heraclitus had stipulated that the Távτa peî, or the becoming, is the principle of philosophy, the Eleatic school started from the contrary assumption, that the Being (Tô őv) is the principle of all (távτα éσTávαI— Ev Kai Tâν).2 According to Zenophanes, the world is not only the continual development of one substance, as taught the Ionians, nor the eternal becoming, as said Heraclitus, nor the agglomeration of atoms, as Democritus pretended, nor is it fashioned out of pre-existing material, according to Anaxagoras; but it is one in all, an unity of multiplicity, whether spiritual or material is not clear, but held by Parmenides to be pure idea (rò yàp avtò voeîv te kaì eîvaı,3—xpý σε λέγειν τε νοεῖν τ' ἐὸν ἔμμεναι), Thinking and thought are identical, and the absolute unity does not permit the admission of the real existence of a plurality of things, and of a world in continual movement. Consequently, the visible world is illusion. Idea exists; the phenomenal world is an acosmism. But a distinction must be drawn between the tenets of Xenophanes and Parmenides. The former maintained that 1 Plut. Numa. 8. 3 Aristot. Met. i. 5, 21. 2 Plato, Soph. 4 Parm. ap. Procul. in Plat. Timæ. |
