96 Diog. L. vi. 54: Σωκράτης μαινό μενος. vi. 26: Οἱ δὲ φασι τὸν Διογένην εἰπεῖν, Πατῶ τὸν Πλάτωνος τῦφον· τὸν δὲ φάναι, Ἑτέρῳ γε τύφῳ, Διόγενες. The term τῦφος (“vanity, self-conceit, assumption of knowing better than others, being puffed up by the praise of vulgar minds”) seems to have been mach interchanged among the ancient philosophers, each of them charging it upon his opponents; while the opponents of philosophy generally imputed it to all philosophers alike. Pyrrho the Sceptic took credit for being the only ἄτυφος: and he is complimented as such by his panegyrist Timon in the Silli. Aristokles affirmed that Pyrrho had just as much τῦφον as the rest. Eusebius, Præp. Evang. xiv. 18.
97 Diog. L. vi. 2, 75-76.
98 Diog. L. vi. 2, 74. Xeniades was mentioned by Democritus: he is said to have been a sceptic (Sext. Emp. adv. Mathem. vii. 48-53), at least he did not recognise any κριτήριον.
99 Diog. L. vi. 2, 77-78.
Diogenes seems to have been known by his contemporaries under the title of ὁ Κύων. Aristotle cites from him a witty comparison under that designation, Rhetoric. iii. 10, 1410, a. 24. καὶ ὁ Κύων (ἐκάλει) τὰ καπηλεῖα, τὰ Ἀττικὰ φιδίτια.
Doctrines and smart sayings of Diogenes — Contempt of pleasure — training and labour required — indifference to literature and geometry.
In politics, ethics, and rules for human conduct, Diogenes adopted views of his own, and spoke them out freely. He was a freethinker (like Antisthenes) as to the popular religion: and he disapproved of marriage laws, considering that the intercourse of the sexes ought to be left to individual taste and preference.100 Though he respected the city and conformed to its laws, yet he had no reverence for existing superstitions, or for the received usages as to person, sex, or family. He declared himself to be a citizen of the Kosmos and of Nature.101 His sole exigency was, independence of life, and freedom of speech: having these, he was satisfied, fully sufficient to himself for happiness, and proud of his own superiority to human weakness. The main benefit which he derived from philosophy (he said) was, that he was prepared for any fortune that might befall him. To be ready to accept death easily, was the sure guarantee of a free and independent life.102 He insisted emphatically upon the necessity of exercise or training (ἄσκησις) both as to the body and as to the mind. Without this, nothing could be done: by means of it everything might be achieved. But he required that the labours imposed should be directed to the acquisition of habits really useful; instead of being wasted, as they commonly were, upon objects frivolous and showy. The truly wise man ought to set before him as a model the laborious life of Hêraklês: and he would find, after proper practice and training, that the contempt of pleasures would afford him more enjoyment than the pleasures themselves.103
100 Diog. L. vi. 2, 72. Cicero, De Nat. Deor. i. 13.
101 Diog. L. vi. 2, 63-71. The like declaration is ascribed to Sokrates. Epiktêtus, i. 9, 1.
102 Diog. L. vi. 2, 63, 72. μηδὲν ἐλευθερίας προκρίνων. Epiktêtus, iv. 1, 30. Οὕτω καὶ Διογένης λέγει, μίαν εἶναι μηχανὴν πρὸς ἐλευθερίαν — τὸ εὐκόλως ἀποθνήσκειν. Compare iv. 7-28, i. 24, 6.
103 Diog. L. vi. 2, 70-71. καὶ γὰρ αὐτὴ τῆς ἡδονῆς ἡ καταφρόνησις ἡδυτάτη προμελετηθεῖσα, καὶ ὥσπερ οἱ συνεθισθέντες ἡδέως ζῇν, ἀηδῶς ἐπὶ τοὐναντίον μετίασιν, οὕτω οἱ τοὐναντίον ἀσκηθέντες ἥδιον αὐτῶν τῶν ἡδονῶν καταφρονοῦσι. See Lucian, Vitar. Auct. c. 9, about the hard life and the happiness of Diogenes. Compare s. 26 about the τῦφος of Diogenes treading down the different τῦφος of Plato, and Epiktêtus iii. 22, 57. Antisthenes, in his dialogue or discourse called Ἡρακλῆς, appears to have enforced the like appeal to that hero as an example to others. See Winckelmann, Fragm. Antisthen. pp. 15-18.
Admiration of Epiktêtus for Diogenes, especially for his consistency in acting out his own ethical creed.
Diogenes declared that education was sobriety to the young, consolation to the old, wealth to the poor, ornament to the rich. But he despised much of what was commonly imparted as education — music, geometry, astronomy, &c.: and he treated with equal scorn Plato and Eukleides.104 He is said however to have conducted the education of the sons of his master Xeniades105 without material departure from the received usage. He caused them to undergo moderate exercise (not with a view to athletic success) in the palæstra, and afterwards to practise riding, shooting with the bow, hurling the javelin, slinging and hunting: he cultivated their memories assiduously, by recitations from poets and prose authors, and even from his own compositions: he kept them on bread and water, without tunic or shoes, with clothing only such as was strictly necessary, with hair closely cut, habitually silent, and fixing their eyes on the ground when they walked abroad. These latter features approximate to the training at Sparta (as described by Xenophon) which Diogenes declared to contrast with Athens as the apartments of the men with those of the women. Diogenes is said to have composed several dialogues and even some tragedies.106 But his most impressive display (like that of Sokrates) was by way of colloquy — prompt and incisive interchange of remarks. He was one of the few philosophers who copied Sokrates in living constantly before the public — in talking with every one indiscriminately and fearlessly, in putting home questions like a physician to his patient.107 Epiktêtus, — speaking of Diogenes as equal, if not superior, to Sokrates — draws a distinction pertinent and accurate. “To Sokrates” (says he) “Zeus assigned the elenchtic or cross-examining function: to Diogenes, the magisterial and chastising function: to Zeno (the Stoic) the didactic and dogmatical.” While thus describing Diogenes justly enough, Epiktetus nevertheless insists upon his agreeable person and his extreme gentleness and good-nature:108 qualities for which probably Diogenes neither took credit himself, nor received credit from his contemporaries. Diogenes seems to have really possessed — that which his teacher Antisthenes postulated as indispensable — the Sokratic physical strength and vigour. His ethical creed, obtained from Antisthenes, was adopted by many successors, and (in the main) by Zeno and the Stoics in the ensuing century. But the remarkable feature in Diogenes which attracts to him the admiration of Epiktêtus, is — that he set the example of acting out his creed, consistently and resolutely, in his manner of life:109 an example followed by some of his immediate successors, but not by the Stoics, who confined themselves to writing and preaching. Contemporary both with Plato and Aristotle, Diogenes stands to both of them in much the same relation as Phokion to Demosthenes in politics and oratory: he exhibits strength of will, insensibility to applause as well as to reproach, and self-acting independence — in antithesis to their higher gifts and cultivation of intellect. He was undoubtedly, next to Sokrates, the most original and unparalleled manifestation of Hellenic philosophy.
104 Diog. L. vi. 2, 68-73-24-27.
105 Diog. L. vi. 2, 30-31.
106 Diog. L. vi. 2, 80. Diogenes Laertius himself cites a fact from one of the dialogues — Pordalus (vi. 2, 20): and Epiktêtus alludes to the treatise on Ethics by Diogenes — ἐν τῇ Ἠθικῇ — ii. 20, 14. It appears however that the works ascribed to Diogenes were not admitted by all authors as genuine (Diog. L. c.).
107 Dion Chrysost. Or. x.; De Servis, p. 295 E. Or. ix.; Isthmicus, p. 289 R. ὥσπερ ἰατροὶ ἀνακρίνουσι τοὺς ἀσθενοῦντας, οὕτως Διογένης ἀνέκρινε τὸν ἄνθρωπον, &c.
108 Epiktêtus, iii. 21, 19. ὡς Σωκράτει συνεβούλευε τὴν ἐλεγκτικὴν χώραν ἔχειν, ὡς Διογένει τὴν βασιλικὴν καὶ ἐπιπληκτικήν, ὡς Ζήνωνι τὴν διδασκαλικὴν καὶ δογματικήν.
About τὸ ἥμερον καὶ φιλάνθρωπον of Diogenes, see Epiktêtus, iii. 24, 64; who also tells us (iv. 11, 19), professing to follow the statements of contemporaries, that the bodies both of Sokrates and Diogenes were by nature so sweet and agreeable (ἐπίχαρι καὶ ἡδύ) as to dispense with the necessity of washing.
“Ego certé” (says Seneca, Epist. 108, 13-14, about the lectures of the eloquent Stoic Attalus) “cum Attalum audirem, in vitia, in errores, in mala vitæ perorantem, sæpé misertus sum generis humani, et illum sublimem altioremque humano fastigio credidi. Ipse regem se esse dicebat: sed plus quam regnare mihi videbatur, cui liceret censuram agere regnantium.” See also his treatises De Beneficiis, v. 4-6, and De Tranquillitate Animi (c. 8), where, after lofty encomium on Diogenes, he exclaims — “Si quis de felicitate Diogenis dubitat, potest idem dubitare et de Deorum immortalium statu, an parum beaté degant,” &c.
109 Cicero, in his Oration in defence of Murena (30-61-62) compliments Cato (the accuser) as one of the few persons who adopted the Stoic tenets with a view of acting them out, and who did really act them out — “Hæc homo ingeniosissimus M. Cato, autoribus eruditissimis inductus, arripuit: neque disputandi causa, ut magna pars, sed ita vivendi”. Tacitus (Histor. iv. 5) pays the like compliment to Helvidius Priscus.
M. Gaston Boissier (Étude sur la Vie et les Ouvrages de Varron, pp. 113-114, Paris, 1861) expresses an amount of surprise which I should not have expected, on the fact that persons adopted a philosophical creed for the purpose only of debating it and defending it, and not of acting it out. But he recognises the fact, in regard to Varro and his contemporaries, in terms not less applicable to the Athenian world: amidst such general practice, Antisthenes, Diogenes, Krates, &c., stood out as memorable exceptions. “Il ne faut pas non plus oublier de quelle manière, et dans quel esprit, les Romains lettrés étudiaient la philosophie Grecque. Ils venaient écouter les plus habiles maîtres, connaître les sectes les plus célèbres: mais ils les étudiaient plutôt en curieux, qu’ils ne s’y attachaient en adeptes. On ne les voit guères approfondir un système et s’y tenir, adopter un ensemble de croyances, et y conformer leur conduite. On étudiait le plus souvent la philosophie pour discuter. C’était seulement une matière à des conversations savantes, un exercice et un aliment pour les esprits curieux. Voilà pourquoi la secte Académique étoit alors mieux accueillie que les autres,” &c.
Admiration excited by the asceticism of the Cynics — Asceticism extreme in the East — Comparison of the Indian Gymnosophists with Diogenes.
Respecting Diogenes and the Cynic philosophers generally, we have to regard not merely their doctrines, but the effect produced by their severity of life. In this point Diogenes surpassed his master Antisthenes, whose life he criticised as not fully realising the lofty spirit of his doctrine. The spectacle of man not merely abstaining from enjoyment, but enduring with indifference hunger, thirst, heat, cold, poverty, privation, bodily torture, death, &c., exercises a powerful influence on the imagination of mankind. It calls forth strong feelings of reverence and admiration in the beholders: while in the sufferer himself also, self-reverence and self-admiration, the sense of power and exaltation above the measure of humanity, is largely developed. The extent to which self-inflicted hardships and pains have prevailed in various regions of the earth, the long-protracted and invincible resolution with which they have been endured, and the veneration which such practices have procured for the ascetics who submitted to them are among the most remarkable chapters in history.110 The East, especially India, has always been, and still is, the country in which these voluntary endurances have reached their extreme pitch of severity; even surpassing those of the Christian monks in Egypt and Syria, during the fourth and fifth centuries of the Christian era.111 When Alexander the Great first opened India to the observation of Greeks, one of the novelties which most surprised him and his followers was, the sight of the Gymnosophists or naked philosophers. These men were found lying on the ground, either totally uncovered or with nothing but a cloth round the loins; abstaining from all enjoyment, nourishing themselves upon a minimum of coarse vegetables or fruits, careless of the extreme heat of the plain, and the extreme cold of the mountain; and often superadding pain, fatigue, or prolonged and distressing uniformity of posture. They passed their time either in silent meditation or in discourse on religion and philosophy: they were venerated as well as consulted by every one, censuring even the most powerful persons in the land. Their fixed idea was to stand as examples to all, of endurance, insensibility, submission only to the indispensable necessities of nature, and freedom from all other fear or authority. They acted out the doctrine, which Plato so eloquently preaches under the name of Sokrates in the Phædon — That the whole life of the philosopher is a preparation for death: that life is worthless, and death an escape from it into a better state.112 It is an interesting fact to learn that when Onesikritus (one of Alexander’s officers, who had known and frequented the society of Diogenes in Greece), being despatched during the Macedonian march through India for the purpose of communicating with these Gymnosophists, saw their manner of life and conversed with them he immediately compared them with Diogenes, whom he had himself visited — as well as with Sokrates and Pythagoras, whom he knew by reputation. Onesikritus described to the Gymnosophists the manner of life of Diogenes: but Diogenes wore a threadbare mantle, and this appeared to them a mark of infirmity and imperfection. They remarked that Diogenes was right to a considerable extent; but wrong for obeying convention in preference to nature, and for being ashamed of going naked, as they did.113
110 Dion Chrysostom, viii. p. 275, Reiske.
111 See the striking description in Gibbon, Decl. and Fall, ch. xxxvii. pp. 253-265.
112 Strabo, xv. 713 A (probably from Onesikritus, see Geier, Fragment. Alexandr. Magn. Histor. p. 379). Πλείστους δ’ αὐτοῖς εἶναι λόγους περὶ τοῦ θανάτου· νομίζειν γὰρ δὴ τὸν μὲν ἐνθάδε βίον ὡς ἂν ἀκμὴν κυομένων εἶναι, τὸν δὲ θάνατον γένεσιν εἰς τὸν ὄντως βίον καὶ τὸν εὐδαίμονα τοῖς φιλοσοφήσασι· διὸ τῇ ἀσκήσει πλείστῃ χρῆσθαι πρὸς τὸ ἐτοιμοθάνατον· ἀγαθὸν δὲ ἢ κακὸν μηδὲν εἶναι τῶν συμβαινόντων ἀνθρώποις, &c.
This is an application of the doctrines laid down by the Platonic Sokrates in the Phædon, p. 64 A: Κινδυνεύουσι γὰρ ὅσοι τυγχάνουσιν ὀρθῶς ἀπτόμενοι φιλοσοφίας λεληθέναι τοὺς ἄλλους, ὅτι οὐδὲν ἄλλο αὐτοὶ ἐπιτηδεύουσιν ἢ ἀποθνήσκειν τε καὶ τεθνάναι. Compare p. 67 D.; Cicero. Tusc. D. i. 30. Compare Epiktêtus, iv. i. 30 (cited in a former note) about Diogenes the Cynic. Also Cicero, Tusc. Disp. v. 27; Valerius Maximus, iii. 3, 6; Diogen. L. Proœm. s. 6; Pliny, H. N. vii. 2.
Bohlen observes (Das Alte Indien, ch. ii. pp. 279-289), “It is a remarkable fact that Indian writings of the highest antiquity depict as already existing the same ascetic exercises as we see existing at present: they were even then known to the ancients, who were especially astonished at such fanaticism”.
113 Strabo gives a condensed summary of this report, made by Onesikritus respecting his conversation with the Indian Gymnosophist Mandanis, or Dandamis (Strabo, xv. p. 716 B):— Ταῦτ’ εἰπόντα ἐξερέσθαι (Dandamis asked Onesikritus), εἰ καὶ ἐν τοῖς Ἕλλησι λόγοι τοιοῦτοι λέγοιντο. Εἰπόντος δ’ (Ὀνησικρίτου), ὅτι καὶ Πυθαγόρας τοιαῦτα λέγοι, κελεύοι τε ἐμψύχων ἀπέχεσθαι, καὶ Σωκράτης, καὶ Διογένης, οὗ καὶ αὐτὸς (Onesikritus) ἀκροάσαιτο, ἀποκρίνασθαι (Dandamis), ὅτι τἄλλα μὲν νομίζοι φρονίμως αὐτοῖς δοκεῖν, ἓν δ’ ἁμαρτάνειν — νόμον πρὸ τῆς φύσεως τιθεμένους· οὐ γὰρ ἂν αἰσχύνεσθαι γυμνούς, ὥσπερ αὐτόν, διάγειν, ἀπὸ λιτῶν ζῶντας· καὶ γὰρ οἰκίαν ἀρίστην εἶναι, ἤτις ἂν ἐπισκευῆς ἐλαχίστης δέηται.
About Onesikritus, Diog. Laert. vi. 75-84; Plutarch, Alexand. c. 65; Plutarch, De Fortuna Alexandri, p. 331.
The work of August Gladitsch (Einleitung in das Verständniss der Weltgeschichte, Posen, 1841) contains an instructive comparison between the Gymnosophists and the Cynics, as well as between the Pythagoreans and the Chinese philosophers — between the Eleatic sect and the Hindoo philosophers. The points of analogy, both in doctrine and practice, are very numerous and strikingly brought out, pp. 356-377. I cannot, however, agree in his conclusion, that the doctrines and practice of Antisthenes were borrowed, not from Sokrates with exaggeration, but from the Parmenidean theory, and the Vedanta theory of the Ens Unum, leading to negation and contempt of the phenomenal world.
The precepts and principles laid down by Sokrates were carried into fullest execution by the Cynics.
These observations of the Indian Gymnosophist are a reproduction and an application in practice114 of the memorable declaration of principle enunciated by Sokrates — “That the Gods had no wants: and that the man who had fewest wants, approximated most nearly to the Gods”. This principle is first introduced into Grecian ethics by Sokrates: ascribed to him both by Xenophon and Plato, and seemingly approved by both. In his life, too, Sokrates carried the principle into effect, up to a certain point. Both admirers and opponents attest his poverty, hard fare, coarse clothing, endurance of cold and privation:115 but he was a family man, with a wife and children to maintain, and he partook occasionally, of indulgences which made him fall short of his own ascetic principle. Plato and Xenophon — both of them well-born Athenians, in circumstances affluent, or at least easy, the latter being a knight, and even highly skilled in horses and horsemanship — contented themselves with preaching on the text, whenever they had to deal with an opponent more self-indulgent than themselves; but made no attempt to carry it into practice.116 Zeno the Stoic laid down broad principles of self-denial and apathy: but in practice he was unable to conquer the sense of shame, as the Cynics did, and still more the Gymnosophists. Antisthenes, on the other hand, took to heart, both in word and act, the principle of Sokrates: yet even he, as we know from the Xenophontic Symposion, was not altogether constant in rigorous austerity. His successors Diogenes and Krates attained the maximum of perfection ever displayed by the Cynics of free Greece. They stood forth as examples of endurance, abnegation — insensibility to shame and fear — free-spoken censure of others. Even they however were not so recognised by the Indian Gymnosophists; who, having reduced their wants, their fears, and their sensibilities, yet lower, had thus come nearer to that which they called the perfection of Nature, and which Sokrates called the close approach to divinity.117 When Alexander the Great (in the first year of his reign and prior to any of his Asiatic conquests) visited Diogenes at Corinth, found him lying in the sun, and asked if there was anything which he wanted — Diogenes made the memorable reply — “Only that you and your guards should stand out of my sunshine”. This reply doubtless manifests the self-satisfied independence of the philosopher. Yet it is far less impressive than the fearless reproof which the Indian Gymnosophists administered to Alexander, when they saw him in the Punjab at the head of his victorious army, after exploits, dangers, and fatigues almost superhuman, as conqueror of Persia and acknowledged son of Zeus.118
114 Onesikritus observes, respecting the Indian Gymnosophists, that “they were more striking in act than in discourse” (ἐν ἔργοις γὰρ αὐτοὺς κρείττους ἢ λόγοις εἶναι, Strabo, xv. 713 B); and this is true about the Cynic succession of philosophers, in Greece as well as in Rome. Diogenes Laertius (compare his prooem, s. 19, 20, and vi. 103) ranks the Cynic philosophy as a distinct αἵρεσις: but he tells us that other writers (especially Hippobotus) would not reckon it as an αἵρεσις, but only as an ἔνστασις βίου — practice without theory.
115 Xenophon, Memor. i. 6, 2-5; Plato, Sympos. 219, 220.
The language of contemporary comic writers, Ameipsias, Eupolis, Aristophanes, &c., about Sokrates — is very much the same as that of Menander a century afterwards about Kratês. Sokrates is depicted as a Cynic in mode of life (Diogen. L. ii. 28; Aristophan. Nubes, 104-362-415).
116 Zeno, though he received instructions from Kratês, was ἄλλως μὲν εὔτονος πρὸς τὴν φιλοσοφίαν, αἰδήμων δὲ ὡς πρὸς τὴν κυνικὴν ἀναισχυντίαν (Diog. L. vii. 3).
“Disputare cum Socrate licet, dubitare cum Carneade, cum Epicure quiescere, hominis naturam cum Stoicis vincere, cum Cynicis excedere,” &c. This is the distinction which Seneca draws between Stoic and Cynic (De Brevitat. Vitæ, 14, 5). His admiration for the “seminudus” Cynic Demetrius, his contemporary and companion, was extreme (Epist. 62, 2, and Epist. 20, 18).
117 Xenoph. Memor. i. 6, 10 (the passage is cited in a previous note). The Emperor Julian (Orat. vi. p. 192 Spanh.) says about the Cynics — ἀπάθειαν γὰρ ποιοῦνται τὸ τέλος, τοῦτο δὲ ἴσον ἐστὶ τῷ θεὸν γενέσθαι. Dion Chrysostom (Or. vi. p. 208) says also about Diogenes the Cynic — καὶ μάλιστα ἐμιμεῖτο τῶν θεῶν τὸν βίον.
118 Cicero, Tusc. Disp. v. 32, 92, and the Anabasis of Arrian, vii. 1-2-3, where both the reply of Diogenes and that of the Indian Gymnosophists are reported. Dion Chrysostom (Orat. iv. p. 145 seq. Reiske) gives a prolix dialogue between Alexander and Diogenes. His picture of the effect produced by Diogenes upon the different spectators at the Isthmian festival, is striking and probable.
Kalanus, one of the Indian Gymnosophists, was persuaded, by the instances of Alexander, to abandon his Indian mode of life and to come away with the Macedonian army — very much to the disgust of his brethren, who scornfully denounced him as infirm and even as the slave of appetite (ἀκόλαστον, Strabo, xv. 718). He was treated with the greatest consideration and respect by Alexander and his officers; yet when the army came into Persis, he became sick of body and tired of life. He obtained the reluctant consent of Alexander to allow him to die. A funeral pile was erected, upon which he voluntarily burnt himself in presence of the whole army; who witnessed the scene with every demonstration of military honour. See the remarkable description in Arrian, Anab. vii. 3. Cicero calls him “Indus indoctus ac barbarus” (Tusc. Disp. ii. 22, 52); but the impression which he made on Alexander himself, Onesikritus, Lysimachus, and generally upon all who saw him, was that of respectful admiration (Strabo, xv. 715; Arrian, l. c.). One of these Indian sages, who had come into Syria along with the Indian envoys sent by an Indian king to the Roman Emperor Augustus, burnt himself publicly at Athens, with an exulting laugh when he leaped upon the funeral pile (Strabo, xv. 720 A) — κατὰ τὰ πάτρια τῶν Ἰνδῶν ἔθη.
The like act of self-immolation was performed by the Grecian Cynic Peregrinus Proteus, at the Olympic festival in the reign of Marcus Antoninus, 165 A.D. (See Clinton, Fasti Romani.) Lucian, who was present and saw the proceeding, has left an animated description of it, but ridicules it as a piece of silly vanity. Theagenes, the admiring disciple of Peregrinus, and other Cynics, who were present in considerable numbers — and also Lucian himself compare this act to that of the Indian Gymnosophists — οὗτος δὲ τίνος αἰτίας ἕνεκεν ἐμβάλλει φέρων ἑαυτὸν εἰς τὸ πῦρ; νὴ Δί’, ὅπως τὴν καρτερίαν ἐπιδείξηται, καθάπερ οἱ Βραχμᾶνες (Lucian, De Morte Peregrini, 25-39, &c.).
Antithesis between Nature — and Law or Convention — insisted on by the Indian Gymnosophists.
Another point, in the reply made by the Indian Gymnosophist to Onesikritus, deserves notice: I mean the antithesis between law (or convention) and nature (νόμος — φύσις) — the supremacy which he asserts for Nature over law — and the way in which he understands Nature and her supposed ordinances. This antithesis was often put forward and argued in the ancient Ethics: and it is commonly said, without any sufficient proof, that the Sophists (speaking of them collectively) recognised only the authority of law — while Sokrates and Plato had the merit of vindicating against them the superior authority of Nature. The Indian Gymnosophist agrees with the Athenian speaker in the Platonic treatise De Legibus, and with the Platonic Kallikles in the Gorgias, thus far — that he upholds the paramount authority of Nature. But of these three interpreters, each hears and reports the oracles of Nature differently from the other two: and there are many other dissenting interpreters besides.119 Which of them are we to follow? And if, adopting any one of them, we reject the others, upon what grounds are we to justify our preference? When the Gymnosophist points out, that nakedness is the natural condition of man; when he farther infers, that because natural it is therefore right and that the wearing of clothes, being a departure from nature, is also a departure from right — how are we to prove to him that his interpretation of nature is the wrong one? These questions have received no answer in any of the Platonic dialogues: though we have seen that Plato is very bitter against those who dwell upon the antithesis between Law and Nature, and who undertake to decide between the two.
119 Though Seneca (De Brevitate Vit. 14) talks of the Stoics as “conquering Nature, and the Cynics as exceeding Nature,” yet the Stoic Epiktêtus considers his morality as the only scheme conformable to Nature (Epiktêt. Diss. iv. 1, 121-128); while the Epikurean Lucretius claims the same conformity for the precepts of Epikurus.
The Greek Cynics — an order of ascetic or mendicant friars.
Reverting to the Cynics, we must declare them to be in one respect the most peculiar outgrowth of Grecian philosophy: because they are not merely a doctrinal sect, with phrases, theories, reasonings, and teachings, of their own — but still more prominently a body of practical ascetics, a mendicant order120 in philosophy, working up the bystanders by exhibiting themselves as models of endurance and apathy. These peculiarities seem to have originated partly with Pythagoras, partly with Sokrates — for there is no known prior example of it in Grecian history, except that of the anomalous priests of Zeus at Dodona, called Selli, who lay on the ground with unwashed feet. The discipline of Lykurgus at Sparta included severe endurance; but then it was intended to form, and actually did form, good soldiers. The Cynics had no view to military action. They exaggerated the peculiarities of Sokrates, and we should call their mode of life the Sokratic life, if we followed the example of those who gave names to the Pythagorean or Orphic life, as a set of observances derived from the type of Pythagoras or Orpheus.121
120 Respecting the historical connexion between the Grecian Cynics and the ascetic Christian monks, see Zeller, Philos. der Griech. ii. p. 241, ed. 2nd.
Homer, Iliad xvi. 233-5:—
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Ζεῦ ἄνα, Δωδωναῖε, Πελασγικέ, τηλόθι
ναίων,
Δωδώνης μεδέων δυσχειμέρου, ἀμφὶ δὲ Σέλλοι Σοὶ ναίουσ’ ὑποφῆται ἀνιπτόποδες, χαμαιεῦναι. |
There is no analogy in Grecian history to illustrate this very curious passage: the Excursus of Heyne furnishes no information (see his edition of the Iliad, vol. vii. p. 289) except the general remark:—“Selli — vitæ genus et institutum affectarunt abhorrens à communi usu, vitæ monachorum mendicantium haud absimile, cum sine vitæ cultu viverent, nec corpus abluerent, et humi cubarent. Ita inter barbaros non modo, sed inter ipsas feras gentes intellectum est, eos qui auctoritatem apud multitudinem consequi vellent, externâ specie, vitæ cultu austeriore, abstinentiâ et continentiâ, oculos hominum in se convertere et mirationem facere debere.”
121 Plato, Republic, x. 600 B; Legib. vi. 782 C; Eurip. Hippol. 955; Fragm. Κρῆτες.
See also the citations in Athenæus (iv. pp. 161-163) from the writers of the Attic middle comedy, respecting the asceticism of the Pythagoreans, analogous to that of the Cynics.
Logical views of Antisthenes and Diogenes — they opposed the Platonic Ideas.
Though Antisthenes and Diogenes laid chief stress upon ethical topics, yet they also delivered opinions on logic and evidence.122 Antisthenes especially was engaged in controversy, and seemingly in acrimonious controversy, with Plato; whose opinions he impugned in an express dialogue entitled Sathon. Plato on his side attacked the opinions of Antisthenes, and spoke contemptuously of his intelligence, yet without formally naming him. At least there are some criticisms in the Platonic dialogues (especially in the Sophistês, p. 251) which the commentators pronounce, on strong grounds, to be aimed at Antisthenes: who is also unfavourably criticised by Aristotle. We know but little of the points which Antisthenes took up against Plato and still less of the reasons which he urged in support of them. Both he and Diogenes, however, are said to have declared express war against the Platonic theory of self-existent Ideas. The functions of general Concepts and general propositions, together with the importance of defining general terms, had been forcibly insisted on in the colloquies of Sokrates; and his disciple Plato built upon this foundation the memorable hypothesis of an aggregate of eternal, substantive realities, called Ideas or Forms, existing separate from the objects of sense, yet affording a certain participation in themselves to those objects: not discernible by sense, but only by the Reason or understanding. These bold creations of the Platonic fancy were repudiated by Antisthenes and Diogenes: who are both said to have declared “We see Man, and we see Horse; but Manness and Horseness we do not see”. Whereunto Plato replied “You possess that eye by which Horse is seen: but you have not yet acquired that eye by which Horseness is seen”.123
122 Among the titles of the works of Antisthenes, preserved by Diogenes Laertius (vi. 15), several relate to dialectic or logic. Ἀλήθεια. Περὶ τοῦ διαλέγεσθαι, ἀντιλογικός. Σάθων, περὶ τοῦ ἀντιλέγειν, α, β, γ. Περὶ Διαλέκτον. Περὶ Παιδείας ἢ ὀνομάτων, α, β, γ, δ, ε. Περὶ ὀνομάτων χρησεως, ἢ ἐριστικός. Περὶ ἐρωτήσεως καὶ ἀποκρίσεως, &c., &c.
Diogenes Laertius refers to ten τόμοι of these treatises.
123 Simplikius, ad Aristot. Categ. p. 66, b. 47, 67, b. 18, 68, b. 25, Schol. Brand.; Tzetzes, Chiliad. vii. 606.
τῶν δὲ παλαιῶν οἱ μὲν ἀνῄρουν τὰς ποιότητας τελέως, τὸ ποιὸν συγχωροῦντος εἶναι· ὥσπερ Ἀντισθένης, ὅς ποτε Πλάτωνι διαμφισβητῶν — ὧ Πλάτων, ἔφη, ἵππον μὲν ὁρῶ, ἱππότητα δ’ οὐχ ὁρῶ· καὶ ὃς εἶπεν, ἔχεις μὲν ᾧ ἵππος ὁρᾶται τόδε τὸ ὄμμα, ᾧ δὲ ἱππότης θεωρεῖται, οὐδέπω κέκτησαι. καὶ ἄλλοι δέ τινες ἦσαν ταύτης τῆς δόξης. οἱ δὲ τινὰς μεν ἀνῄρουν ποιότητας, τινὰς δὲ κατελίμπανον.
Ἀνθρωπότης occurs p. 58, a. 31. Compare p. 20, a. 2.
The same conversation is reported as having taken place between Diogenes and Plato, except that instead of ἱππότης and ἀνθρωπότης, we have τραπεζότης and κυαθότης (Diog. L. vi. 53).
We have ζωότης — Ἀθηναιότης — in Galen’s argument against the Stoics (vol. xix. p. 481, Kühn).
First protest of Nominalism against Realism.
This debate between Antisthenes and Plato marks an interesting point in the history of philosophy. It is the first protest of Nominalism against the doctrine of an extreme Realism. The Ideas or Forms of Plato (according to many of his phrases, for he is not always consistent with himself) are not only real existences distinct from particulars, but absorb to themselves all the reality of particulars. The real universe in the Platonic theory was composed of Ideas or Forms such as Manness or Horseness124 (called by Plato the Αὐτὸ-Ἄνθρωπος and Αὐτὸ-Ἵππος), of which particular men and horses were only disfigured, transitory, and ever-varying photographs. Antisthenes denied what Plato affirmed, and as Plato affirmed it. Aristotle denied it also; maintaining that genera, species, and attributes, though distinguishable as separate predicates of, or inherencies in, individuals — yet had no existence apart from individuals. Aristotle was no less wanting than Antisthenes, in the intellectual eye required for discerning the Platonic Ideas. Antisthenes is said to have declared these Ideas to be mere thoughts or conceptions (ψιλὰς ἐννοίας): i.e., merely subjective or within the mind, without any object corresponding to them. This is one of the various modes of presenting the theory of Ideas, resorted to even in the Platonic Parmenidês, not by one who opposes that theory, but by one seeking to defend it — viz., by Sokrates, when he is hard pressed by the objections of the Eleate against the more extreme and literal version of the theory.125 It is remarkable, that the objections ascribed to Parmenides against that version which exhibits the Ideas as mere Concepts of and in the mind, are decidedly less forcible than those which he urges against the other versions.