83 Pindar, Pyth. iii. 21.

84

Compare Valckenaer, Diatrib. Eurip. pp. 38, 39, cap. 5.

About the accusations against Sokrates, of leading the youth to contract doubts and to slight the authority of their fathers, see Xenoph. Memor. i. 2, 52; Plato, Gorgias, 522 B, p. 79, Menon, p. 70. A touching anecdote, illustrating this displeasure of the fathers against Sokrates, may be found in Xenophon, Cyropæd. iii. 1, 89, where the father of Tigranes puts to death the σοφιστὴς who had taught his son, because that son had contracted a greater attachment to the σοφιστὴς than to his own father.

Xenophon, Memor. i. 2, 9; i. 2, 49. Apolog. So. s. 20; compare the speech of Kleon in Thucyd. iii. 37. Plato, Politikus, p. 299 E.

Timon in the Silli bestows on Sokrates and his successors the title of ἀκριβόλογοι. Diog. Laert. ii. 19. Sext. Emp. adv. Mathem. vii. 8. Aristophan. Nubes, 130, where Strepsiades says —

Compare 320-359 of the same comedy — σύ τε λεπτοτάτων λήρων ἱερεῦ — also Ranæ, 149, b.

When Euripides (ὁ σκηνικὸς φιλόσοφος) went down to Hades, he is described by Aristophanes as giving clever exhibitions among the malefactors there, with great success and applause. Ranæ, 771 —

These astute cavils and quibbles of Euripides are attributed by Aristophanes, and the other comic writers, to his frequent conversations with Sokrates. Ranæ, 1490-1500. Dionys. Hal. Ars Rhet. p. 301-355. Valckenaer, Diatribe in Euripid. c. 4. Aristophanes describes Sokrates as having stolen a garment from the palæstra (Nubes, 180); and Eupolis also introduces him as having stolen a wine-ladle (Schol. ad loc. Eupolis, Fragm. Incert. ix. ed. Meineke). The fragment of Eupolis (xi. p. 553, Ἀδολεσχεῖν αὐτὸν ἐκδίδαξον, ὦ σοφιστά) seems to apply to Sokrates. About the sympathy of the people with the attacks of the comic writers on Sokrates, see Lucian, Piscat. c. 25.

The rhetor Aristeides (Orat. xlvi. Ὑπὲρ τῶν Τεττάρων, pp. 406-407-408, Dindorf), after remarking on the very vague and general manner in which the title Σοφιστὴς was applied among the Greeks (Herodotus having so designated both Solon and Pythagoras), mentions that Androtion not only spoke of the seven wise men as τοὺς ἕπτα σοφιστάς, but also called Sokrates σοφιστὴν τοῦτον τὸν πάνυ: that Lysias called Plato σοφιστὴν, and called Æschines (the Sokratic) by the same title; that Isokrates represented himself, and rhetors and politicians like himself, as φιλοσόφους, while he termed the dialecticians and critics σοφιστάς. Nothing could be more indeterminate than these names, σοφιστὴς and φιλόσοφος. It was Plato who applied himself chiefly to discredit the name σοφιστὴς (ὁ μάλιστα ἐπαναστὰς τῷ ὀνόματι) but others had tried to discredit φιλόσοφος and τὸ φιλοσοφεῖν in like manner. It deserves notice that in the restrictive or censorial law (proposed by Sophokles, and enacted by the Athenians in B.C. 307, but repealed in the following year) against the philosophers and their schools, the philosophers generally are designated as σοφισταί. Pollux, Onomast. ix. 42 ἔστι δὲ καὶ νόμος Ἀττικὸς κατὰ τῶν φιλοσοφούντων γραφείς, ὃν Σοφοκλῆς Ἀμφικλείδου Σουνιεὺς εἶπεν, ἐν ᾧ τινα κατὰ αὐτῶν προειπὼν, ἐπήγαγε, μὴ ἐξεῖναι μηδενὶ τῶν σοφιστῶν διατριβὴν κατασκευάσασθαι.

85 Plato, Euthyphron, p. 3 C-D. Ἀθηναίοις γὰρ οὐ σφόδρα μέλει, ἂν τινα δεινὸν οἴωνται εἶναι, μὴ μέντοι διδασκαλικὸν τῆς αὑτοῦ σοφίας· ὃν δ’ ἂν καὶ ἄλλους οἴωνται ποιεῖν τοιούτους, θυμοῦνται, εἶτ’ οὖν φθόνῳ, ὡς συ λέγεις, εἴτε δι’ ἄλλο τι.

86 Plato, Menon, pp. 90-92. The antipathy manifested here by Anytus against the Sophists, is the same feeling which led him to indict Sokrates, and which induced also Cato the Censor to hate the character of Sokrates, and Greek letters generally. Plutarch, Cato, 23: ὅλως φιλοσοφίᾳ προσκεκρουκὼς, καὶ πᾶσαν Ἑλληνικὴν μοῦσαν καὶ παιδείαν ὑπὸ φιλοτιμίας προπηλακίζων· ὃς γε καὶ Σωκράτη φησὶ λάλον καὶ βίαιον γενόμενον ἐπιχειρεῖν, ᾧ τρόπῳ δυνατὸν ἦν, τυραννεῖν τῆς πατρίδος, καταλύοντα τὰ ἔθη, καὶ πρὸς ἐναντίας τοῖς νόμοις δόξας ἕλκοντα καὶ μεθίσταντα τοὺς πολίτας. Comp. Cato, Epist. ap. Plin. H. N. xxix. 7.

87 Plato, Legg. viii. p. 835 C. νῦν δε ἀνθρώπου τολμηροῦ κινδυνεύει δεῖσθαί τινος, ὃς παῤῥησίαν διαφερόντως τιμῶν ἐρεῖ τὰ δοκοῦντα ἄριστ’ εἶναι πόλει καὶ πολίταις, ἐν ψυχαῖς διεφθαρμέναις τὸ πρέπον καὶ ἑπόμενον πάσῃ τῇ πολιτείᾳ τάττων, ἐναντία λέγων ταῖς μεγίσταισιν ἐπιθυμίαις καὶ οὐκ ἔχων βοηθὸν ἀνθρώπων οὐδένα, λόγῳ ἑπόμενος μόνῳ μόνος.

Here the dissenter who proclaims his sincere convictions is spoken of with respect: compare the contrary feeling, Leges, ix. 881 A, and in the tenth book generally. In the striking passage of the Republic, referred to in a previous note (vi. 492) Plato declares the lessons taught by the multitude — the contagion of established custom and tradition, communicated by the crowd of earnest assembled believers — to be of overwhelming and almost omnipotent force. The individual philosopher (he says), who examines for himself and tries to stand against it, can hardly maintain himself without special divine aid.

88 In the dialogue called Politikus, Plato announces formally and explicitly (what the historical Sokrates had asserted before him, Xen. Mem. iii. 9, 10) the exclusive pretensions of the Βασιλεὺς Τεχνικὸς (representing political science, art, or theory) to rule mankind — the illusory nature of all other titles to rule and the mischievous working of all existing governments. The same view is developed in the Republic and the Leges. Compare also Aristotel. Ethic. Nikom. x. p. 1180, b. 27 ad fin.

In a remarkable passage of the Leges (i. 637 D, 638 C), Plato observes, in touching upon the discrepancy between different local institutions at Sparta, Krete, Keos. Tarentum, &c.:—“If natives of different cities argue with each other about their respective institutions, each of them has a good and sufficient reason. This is the custom with us; with you perhaps it is different. But we, who are now conversing, do not apply our criticisms to the private citizen; we criticise the lawgiver himself, and try to determine whether his laws are good or bad.” ἡμῖν δ’ ἐστι οὐ περὶ τῶν ἀνθρώπων τῶν ἄλλων ὁ λόγος, ἀλλὰ περὶ τῶν νομοθετῶν αὐτῶν κακίας τε καὶ ἀρετῆς. King Nomos was not at all pleased to be thus put upon his trial.

89 Cicero, Tusc. Disp. ii. 3. “Est enim philosophia paucis contenta judicibus, multitudinem consulto ipsa fugiens, eique ipsi et suspecta et invisa,” &c.

The extreme publicity, and indiscriminate, aggressive conversation of Sokrates, is strongly insisted on by Themistius (Orat. xxvi. p. 384, Ὑπὲρ τοῦ λέγειν) as aggravating the displeasure of the public against him.

90 Xenophon, Memor. iv. 2, 3-5-40.

91 Aristotel. Topica, i. p. 101, a. 29, with the Scholion of Alexander of Aphrodisias, who remarks that the habit of colloquial debate had been very frequent in the days of Aristotle, and afterwards; but had comparatively ceased in his own time, haying been exchanged for written treatises. P. 254, b. Schol. Brandis, also Plato, Parmenid. pp. 135, 136, and the Commentary of Proklus thereupon, p. 776 seqq., and p. 917, ed. Stallbaum.

92 A passage in one of the speeches composed by Lysias, addressed by a plaintiff in court to the Dikasts, shows how debate and free antithesis of opposite opinions were accounted as essential to the process τοῦ φιλοσοφεῖν — καὶ ἐγὼ μὲν ᾤμην φιλοσοφοῦντας αὐτοὺς περὶ τοῦ πράγματος ἀντιλέγειν τὸν ἐναντίον λόγον· οἱ δ’ ἄρα οὐκ ἀντέλεγον, ἀλλ’ ἀντέπραττον. (Lysias, Or. viii. Κακολογιῶν s. 11, p. 273; compare Plat. Apolog. p. 28 E.)

Bacon describes his own intellectual cast of mind, in terms which illustrate the Platonic διάλογοι ζητητικοί, — the character of the searcher, doubter, and tester, as contrasted with that of the confident affirmer and expositor:—“Me ipsum autem ad veritatis contemplationes quam ad alia magis fabrefactum deprehendi, ut qui mentem et ad rerum similitudinem (quod maximum est) agnoscendum satis mobilem, et ad differentiarum subtilitates observandas satis fixam et intentam haberem — qui et quærendi desiderium, et dubitandi patientiam, et meditandi voluptatem, et asserendi cunctationem, et resipiscendi facilitatem, et disponendi sollicitudinem tenerem — quique nec novitatem affectarem, nec antiquitatem admirarer, et omnem imposturam odissem. Quare naturam meam cum veritate quandam familiaritatem et cognationem habere judicavi.” (Impetus Philosophici, De Interpretatione Naturæ Proœmium.)

Σωκρατικῶς εἰς ἑκάτερον is the phrase of Cicero, ad Atticum ii. 3.

93 Xenoph. Mem. iv. 2, 40.

Mr. John Stuart Mill, in his Essay on Liberty, has the following remarks, illustrating Plato’s Dialogues of Search. I should have been glad if I could have transcribed here many other pages of that admirable Essay: which stands almost alone as an unreserved vindication of the rights of the searching individual intelligence, against the compression and repression of King Nomos (pp. 79-80-81):—

“The loss of so important an aid to the intelligent and living apprehension of a truth, as is afforded by the necessity of explaining it to or defending it against opponents, though not sufficient to outweigh, is no trifling drawback from, the benefits of its universal recognition. Where this advantage cannot be had, I confess I should like to see the teachers of mankind endeavouring to provide a substitute for it: some contrivance for making the difficulties of the question as present to the learner’s consciousness, as if they were pressed upon him by a dissentient champion eager for his conversion.

“But instead of seeking contrivances for this purpose, they have lost those they formerly had. The Sokratic dialectics, so magnificently exemplified in the dialogues of Plato, were a contrivance of this description. They were essentially a discussion of the great questions of life and philosophy, directed with consummate skill to the purpose of convincing any one, who had merely adopted the common-places of received opinion, that he did not understand the subject — that he as yet attached no definite meaning to the doctrines he professed: in order that, becoming aware of his ignorance, he might be put in the way to attain a stable belief, resting on a clear apprehension both of the meaning of doctrines and of their evidence. The school-disputations of the middle ages had a similar object. They were intended to make sure that the pupil understood his own opinion, and (by necessary correlation) the opinion opposed to it — and could enforce the grounds of the one and confute those of the other. These last-mentioned contests had indeed the incurable defect, that the premisses appealed to were taken from authority, not from reason; and as a discipline to the mind they were in every respect inferior to the powerful dialectics which formed the intellects of the ‘Socratici viri’. But the modern mind owes far more to both than it is generally willing to admit; and the present modes of instruction contain nothing which in the smallest degree supplies the place either of the one or of the other.… It is the fashion of the present time to disparage negative logic — that which points out weaknesses in theory or errors in practice, without establishing positive truths. Such negative criticism would indeed be poor enough as an ultimate result, but as a means to attaining any positive knowledge or conviction worthy the name, it cannot be valued too highly; and until people are again systematically trained to it, there will be few great thinkers, and a low general average of intellect, in any but the mathematical and physical departments of speculation. On any other subject no one’s opinions deserve the name of knowledge, except so far as he has either had forced upon him by others, or gone through of himself, the same mental process which would have been required of him in carrying on an active controversy with opponents.”

94 See Plato, Republic, vii. 518, B, C, about παιδεία, as developing τὴν ἐνοῦσαν ἑκάστου δύναμιν ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ: and 534, about ἐπιστήμη, with its test, τὸ δοῦναι καὶ δέξασθαι λόγον. Compare also Republic, v. 477, 478, with Theætêt. 175, C, D; Phædon, 76, B, Phædrus, 276; and Sympos. 202 A. τὸ ὀρθὰ δοξάζειν καὶ ἄνευ τοῦ ἔχειν λόγον δοῦναι, οὐκ οἶσθ’ ὅτι οὔτε ἐπίστασθαι ἐστιν; ἄλογον γὰρ πρᾶγμα πῶς ἂν εἴη ἐπιστήμη;

95 On this point the scholastic manner of handling in the Middle Ages furnishes a good illustration for the Platonic dialectic. I borrow a passage from the treatise of M Hauréau, De la Phil. Scolastique, vol. ii. p. 190.

“Saint Thomas pouvait s’en tenir là: nous le comprenons, nous avons tout son système sur l’origine des idées, et nous pouvons croire qu’il n’a plus rien à nous apprendre à ce sujet: mais en scolastique, il ne suffit pas de démontrer, par deux ou trois arguments, réputés invincibles, ce que l’on suppose être la vérité, il faut, en outre, répondre aux objections première, seconde, troisième, &c., &c., de divers interlocuteurs, souvent imaginaires; il faut établir la parfaite concordance de la conclusion enoncée et des conclusions precédents ou subséquentes; il faut réproduire, à l’occasion de tout problème controversé, l’ensemble de la doctrine pour laquelle on s’est déclaré.”

96 Longinus De Sublim. s. 6. καίτοι τὸ πρᾶγμα δύσληπτον· ἡ γὰρ τῶν λόγων κρίσις πολλῆς ἐστι πείρας τελευταῖον ἐπιγέννημα. Compare what is said in a succeeding chapter about the Hippias Minor. And see also Sir W. Hamilton’s Lectures on Logic, Lect. 35, p. 224.

97 Xenoph. Memor. i. 1, 12-15. I transcribe the following passage from an article in the Edinburgh Review (April, 1866, pp. 325-326), on the first edition of the present work: an article not merely profound and striking as to thought, but indicating the most comprehensive study and appreciation of the Platonic writings:—

“The enemy against whom Plato really fought, and the warfare against whom was the incessant occupation of his life and writings, was — not Sophistry, either in the ancient or modern sense of the term, but — Commonplace. It was the acceptance of traditional opinions and current sentiments as an ultimate fact; and bandying of the abstract terms which express approbation and disapprobation, desire and aversion, admiration and disgust, as if they had a meaning thoroughly understood and universally assented to. The men of his day (like those of ours) thought that they knew what Good and Evil, Just and Unjust, Honourable and Shameful, were — because they could use the words glibly, and affirm them of this or that, in agreement with existing custom. But what the property was, which these several instances possessed in common, justifying the application of the term, nobody had considered; neither the Sophists, nor the rhetoricians, nor the statesmen, nor any of those who set themselves up, or were set up by others, as wise. Yet whoever could not answer this question was wandering in darkness — had no standard by which his judgments were regulated, and which kept them consistent with one another — no rule which he knew and could stand by for the guidance of his life. Not knowing what Justice and Virtue are, it was impossible to be just and virtuous: not knowing what Good is, we not only fail to reach it, but are certain to embrace evil instead. Such a condition, to any one capable of thought, made life not worth having. The grand business of human intellect ought to consist in subjecting these terms to the most rigorous scrutiny, and bringing to light the ideas that lie at the bottom of them. Even if this cannot be done and real knowledge attained, it is already no small benefit to expel the false opinion of knowledge: to make men conscious of the things most needful to be known, fill them with shame and uneasiness at their own state, and rouse a pungent internal stimulus, summoning up all their energies to attack those greatest of all problems, and never rest until, as far as possible, the true solutions are reached. This is Plato’s notion of the condition of the human mind in his time, and of what philosophy could do to help it: and any one who does not think the description applicable, with slight modifications, to the majority of educated minds in our own time and in all times known to us, certainly has not brought either the teachers or the practical men of any time to the Platonic test.”

The Reviewer farther illustrates this impressive description by a valuable citation from Max Müller to the same purpose (Lectures on the Science of Language, Second Series, pp. 520-527). “Such terms as Nature, Law, Freedom, Necessity, Body, Substance, Matter, Church, State, Revelation, Inspiration, Knowledge, Belief, &c., are tossed about in the war of words as if every body knew what they meant, and as if every body used them exactly in the same sense; whereas most people, and particularly those who represent public opinion, pick up these complicated terms as children, beginning with the vaguest conceptions, adding to them from time to time — perhaps correcting likewise at haphazard some of their involuntary errors — but never taking stock, never either enquiring into the history of the terms which they handle so freely, or realising the fulness of their meaning according to the strict rules of logical definition.”

98 See the conversation between Menippus and Sokrates. (Lucian, Dialog. Mortuor. xx.)

99 Dionysius of Halikarnassus remarks that the topics upon which Plato renounces the character of a searcher, and passes into that of a vehement affirmative dogmatist, are those which are above human investigation and evidence — the transcendental: καὶ γὰρ ἐκεῖνος (Plato) τὰ δόγματα οὐκ αὐτὸς ἀποφαίνεται, εἶτα περὶ αὐτῶν διαγωνίζεται· ἀλλ’ ἐν μεσῳ τὴν ζήτησιν ποιούμενος πρὸς τοὺς διαλεγομένους, εὑρίσκων μᾶλλον τὸ δέον δόγμα, ἢ φιλονεικῶν ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ φαίνεται· πλὴν ὅσα περὶ τῶν κρειττόνων, ἢ καθ’ ἡμᾶς, λέγεται (Dion. Hal. Ars Rhet. c. 10, p. 376, Reiske.)

M. Arago, in the following passage, points to a style of theorising in the physical sciences, very analogous to that of Plato, generally:—

Arago, Biographies, vol. i. p. 149, Vie de Fresnel. “De ces deux explications des phénomènes de la lumière, l’une s’appelle la théorie de l’émission; l’autre est connue sous le nom de système des ondes. On trouve déjà des traces de la première dans les écrits d’Empédocle. Chez les modernes, je pourrais citer parmi ses adhérents Képler, Newton, Laplace. Le système des ondes ne compte pas des partisans moins illustres: Aristote, Descartes, Hooke, Huygens, Euler, l’avaient adopté.…

“Au reste, si l’on s’étonnait de voir d’aussi grands génies ainsi divisés, je dirais que de leurs temps la question on litige ne pouvait être résolue; que les expériences nécessaires manquaient; qu’alors les divers systèmes sur la lumière étaient, non des déductions logiques des faits, mais, si je puis m’exprimer ainsi, de simples vérités de sentiment, qu’enfin, le don de l’infaillibilité n’est pas accordé même aux plus habiles, des qu’en sortant du domaine des observations, et se jetant dans celui des conjectures, ils abandonnent la marche sévère et assurée dont les sciences se prévalent de nos jours avec raison, et qui leur a fait faire de si incontestables progrès.”

100 Several of the Platonic critics speak as if they thought that Plato would never suggest any difficulty which he had not, beforehand and ready-made, the means of solving; and Munk treats the idea which I have stated in the text as ridiculous. “Plato (he observes) must have held preposterous doctrines on the subject of pædagogy. He undertakes to instruct others by his writings, before he has yet cleared up his own ideas on the question, he proposes, in propædeutic writings, enigmas for his scholars to solve, while he has not yet solved them himself; and all this for the praiseworthy (ironically said) purpose of correcting in their minds the false persuasion of knowledge.” (Die natürliche Ordnung der Platon Schrift. p. 515.)

That which Munk here derides, appears stated, again and again, by the Platonic Sokrates, as his real purpose. Munk is at liberty to treat it as ridiculous, but the ridicule falls upon Plato himself. The Platonic Sokrates disclaims the pædagogic function, describing himself as nothing more than a fellow searcher with the rest.

So too Munk declares (p. 79-80, and Zeller also, Philos. der Griech. vol. ii. p. 472, ed. 2nd) that Plato could not have composed the Parmenidês, including, as it does, such an assemblage of difficulties and objections against the theory of Ideas, until he possessed the means of solving all of them himself. This is a bold assertion, altogether conjectural; for there is no solution of them given in any of Plato’s writings, and the solutions to which Munk alludes as given by Zeller and Steinhart (even assuming them to be satisfactory, which I do not admit) travel much beyond the limits of Plato.

Ueberweg maintains the same opinion (Ueber die Aechtheit der Platon. Schriften, p. 103-104); that Sokrates, in the Platonic Dialogues, though he appears as a Searcher, must nevertheless be looked upon as a matured thinker, who has already gone through the investigation for himself, and solved all the difficulties, but who goes back upon the work of search over again, for the instruction of the interlocutors. “The special talent and dexterity (Virtuosität) which Sokrates displays in conducting the dialogue, can only be explained by supposing that he has already acquired for himself a firm and certain conviction on the question discussed.”

This opinion of Ueberweg appears to me quite untenable, as well as inconsistent with a previous opinion which he had given elsewhere (Platonische Welt-seele, p. 69-70) — That the Platonic Ideenlehre was altogether insufficient for explanation. The impression which the Dialogues of Search make upon me is directly the reverse. My difficulty is, to understand how the constructor of all these puzzles, if he has the answer ready drawn up in his pocket, can avoid letting it slip out. At any rate, I stand upon the literal declarations, often repeated, of Sokrates; while Munk and Ueberweg contradict them.

For the doubt and hesitation which Plato puts into the mouth of Sokrates (even in the Republic, one of his most expository compositions) see a remarkable passage, Rep. v. p. 450 E. ἀπιστοῦντα δὲ καὶ ζητοῦντα ἄμα τοὺς λόγους ποιεῖσθαι, ὃ δὴ ἐγὼ δρῶ, &c.