105 Plato, Phædrus, p. 230 A.
If we are to find any common purpose pervading and binding together all the dialogues, it must not be a didactic purpose, in the sense above defined. The value of them consists, not in the result, but in the discussion — not in the conclusion, but in the premisses for and against it. In this sense all the dialogues have value, and all the same sort of value — though not all equal in amount. In different dialogues, the same subject is set before you in different ways: with remarks and illustrations sometimes tending towards one theory, sometimes towards another. It is for you to compare and balance them, and to elicit such result as your reason approves. The Platonic dialogues require, in order to produce their effect, a supplementary responsive force, and a strong effective reaction, from the individual reason of the reader: they require moreover that he shall have a genuine interest in the process of dialectic scrutiny (τὸ φιλομαθές, φιλόλογον)106 which will enable him to perceive beauties in what would appear tiresome to others.
106 Plato, Republic, v. p. 475; compare Phædon, pp. 89-90. Phædrus, p. 230 E.
Such manner of proceeding may be judicious or not, according to the sentiment of the critic. But it is at any rate Platonic. And we have to recall this point of view when dismissing the Kratylus, which presents much interest in the premisses and conflicting theories, with little or no result. It embodies the oldest speculations known to us respecting the origin, the mode of signification, and the functions of words as an instrument: and not the least interesting part of it, in my judgment, consists in its etymological conjectures, affording evidence of a rude etymological sense which has now passed away.
The Philêbus, which we are now about to examine, is not merely a Dialogue of Search, but a Dialogue of Exposition, accompanied with more or less of search made subservient to the exposition. It represents Sokrates from the first as advancing an affirmative opinion — maintaining it against Philêbus and Protarchus — and closing with a result assumed to be positively established.1
1 Schleiermacher says, about the Philêbus (Einleit. p. 136) — “Das Ganze liegt fertig in dem Haupte des Sokrates, und tritt mit der ganzen Persönlichkeit und Willkühr einer zusammenhängenden Rede heraus,” &c.
Character, Personages, and Subject of the Philêbus.
The question is, Wherein consists the Good — The Supreme Good — Summum Bonum. Three persons stand before us: the youthful Philêbus: Protarchus, somewhat older, yet still a young man: and Sokrates. Philêbus declares that The Good consists in pleasure or enjoyment; and Protarchus his friend advocates the same thesis, though in a less peremptory manner. On the contrary, Sokrates begins by proclaiming that it consists in wisdom or intelligence. He presently however recedes from this doctrine, so far as to admit that wisdom, alone and per se, is not sufficient to constitute the Supreme Good: and that a certain combination of pleasure along with it is required. Though the compound total thus formed is superior both to wisdom and to pleasure taken separately, yet comparing the two elements of which it is compounded, wisdom (Sokrates contends) is the most important of the two, and pleasure the least important. Neither wisdom nor pleasure can pretend to claim the first prize; but wisdom is fully entitled to the second, as being far more cognate than pleasure is, with the nature of Good.
Protest against the Sokratic Elenchus, and the purely negative procedure.
Such is the general purpose of the dialogue. As to the method of enquiry, Plato not only assigns to Sokrates a distinct affirmative opinion from the beginning, instead of that profession of ignorance which is his more usual characteristic — but he also places in the mouth of Protarchus an explicit protest against the negative cross-examination and Elenchus. “We shall not let you off” (says Protarchus to Sokrates) “until the two sides of this question shall have been so discriminated as to elicit a sufficient conclusion. In meeting us on the present question, pray desist from that ordinary manner of yours — desist from throwing us into embarrassment, and putting interrogations to which we cannot at the moment give suitable answers. We must not be content to close the discussion by finding ourselves in one common puzzle and confusion. If we cannot solve the difficulty, you must solve it for us.”2
2 Plato, Philêbus, pp. 19 E — 20 A. παῦσαι δὴ τὸν τρόπον ἡμῖν ἀπαντῶν τοῦτον ἐπὶ τὰ νῦν λεγόμενα … εἰς ἀπορίαν ἐμβάλλων καὶ ἀνερωτῶν ὧν μὴ δυναίμεθ’ ἂν ἱκανὴν ἀπόκρισιν ἐν τῷ παρόντι διδόναι σοι. μὴ γὰρ οἰώμεθα τέλος ἡμῖν εἶναι τῶν νῦν τὴν πάντων ἡμῶν ἀπορίαν, ἀλλ’ εἰ δρᾷν τοῦθ’ ἡμεῖς ἀδυνατοῦμεν, σοὶ δραστέον.
There is a remarkable contrast between the method here proclaimed and that followed in the Theætêtus, though some eminent commentators have represented the Philêbus as a sequel of the Theætêtus.
Enquiry — What mental condition will ensure to all men a happy life? Good and Happiness — correlative and co-extensive. Philêbus declares for Pleasure, Sokrates for Intelligence.
Conformably to this requisition, Sokrates, while applying his cross-examining negative test to the doctrine of Philêbus, sets against it a counter-doctrine of his own, and prescribes, farther, a positive method of enquiry. “You and I” (he says) “will each try to assign what permanent habit of mind, and what particular mental condition, is calculated to ensure to all men a happy life.”3 Good and Happiness are used in this dialogue as correlative and co-extensive terms. Happiness is that which a man feels when he possesses Good: Good is that which a man must possess in order to feel Happiness. The same fact or condition, looked at objectively, is denominated Good: looked at subjectively, is denominated Happiness.
3 Plato, Philêbus, p. 11 D.
Good — object of universal choice and attachment by men, animals, and plants — all-sufficient — satisfies all desires.
Is Good identical with pleasure, or with intelligence, or is it a Tertium Quid, distinct from both? Good, or The Good must be perfect and all-sufficient in itself: the object of desire, aspiration, choice, and attachment, by all men, and even by all animals and plants, who are capable of attaining it. Every man who has it, is satisfied, desiring nothing else. If he neglects it, and chooses any thing else, this is contrary to nature: he does so involuntarily, either from ignorance or some other untoward constraint.4 Thus, the characteristic mark of Good or Happiness is, That it is desired, loved, and sought by all, and that, if attained, it satisfies all the wishes and aspirations of human nature.
4 Plato, Philêbus, p. 11 C. 20 C-D: Τὴν τἀγαθοῦ μοῖραν πότερον ἀνάγκη τέλεον ἢ μὴ τέλεον εἶναι; Πάντων δήπου τελεώτατον. Τί δέ· ἱκανὸν τἀγαθόν; Πῶς γὰρ οὔ; καὶ πάντων γε εἰς τοῦτο διαφέρειν τῶν ὄντῶν. Τόδε γε μὴν, ὡς οἶμαι, περὶ αὐτοῦ ἀναγκαιότατον εἶναι λέγειν, ὡς πᾶν τὸ γιγνῶσκον αὐτὸ θηρεύει καὶ ἐφίεται βουλόμενον ἑλεῖν καὶ περὶ αὑτὸ κτήσασθαι, καὶ τῶν ἄλλων οὐδὲν φροντίζει πλὴν τῶν ἀποτελουμένων ἄμα ἀγαθοῖς.
22 B: ἱκανὸς καὶ τέλεος καὶ πᾶσι φυτοῖς καὶ ζώοις αἱρετός, οἷσπερ δυνατὸν ἦν οὕτως ἀεὶ διὰ βίου ζῆν· εἰ δέ τις ἄλλα ᾑρεῖθ’ ἡμῶν, παρὰ φύσιν ἂν τὴν τοῦ ἀληθοῦς αἱρετοῦ ἐλάμβανεν ἄκων ἐξ ἀγνοίας ἤ τινος ἀνάγκης οὐκ εὐδαίμονος.
60 C, 61 A. 61 E: τὸν ἀγαπητότατον βίον. 64 C: τοῦ πᾶσι γεγονέναι προσφιλῆ τὴν τοιαύτην διάθεσιν. 67 A.
“Omnibus naturæ humanæ desideriis prorsus satisfacere” (Stallbaum ad Philêb. p. 18 D-E, page 139).
Pleasures are unlike to each other, and even opposite cognitions are so likewise.
Sokrates then remarks that pleasure is very multifarious and diverse: and that under that same word, different forms and varieties are signified, very unlike to each other, and sometimes even opposite to each other. Thus the intemperate man has his pleasures, while the temperate man enjoys his pleasures also, attached to his own mode of life: so too the simpleton has pleasure in his foolish dreams and hopes, the intelligent man in the exercise of intellectual force. These and many others are varieties of pleasure not resembling, but highly dissimilar, even opposite. — Protarchus replies — That they proceed from dissimilar and opposite circumstances, but that in themselves they are not dissimilar or opposite. Pleasure must be completely similar to pleasure — itself to itself. — So too (rejoins Sokrates) colour is like to colour: in that respect there is no difference between them. But black colour is different from, and even opposite to, white colour.5 You will go wrong if you make things altogether opposite, into one. You may call all pleasures by the name pleasures: but you must not affirm between them any other point of resemblance, nor call them all good. I maintain that some are bad, others good. What common property in all of them, is it, that you signify by the name good? As different pleasures are unlike to each other, so also different cognitions (or modes of intelligence) are unlike to each other; though all of them agree in being cognitions. To this Protarchus accedes.6 — We must enter upon our enquiry after The Good with this mutual concession: That Pleasure, which you affirm to be The Good — and Intelligence, which I declare to be so — is at once both Unum, and Multa et Diversa.7
5 Plat. Philêb. p. 12 D-E.
6 Plat. Philêb. pp. 13 D-E, 14 A.
7 Plat. Philêb. p. 14 B.
Whether Pleasure, or Wisdom, corresponds to this description? Appeal to individual choice.
In determining between the two competing doctrines — pleasure on one side and intelligence on the other — Sokrates makes appeal to individual choice. “Would you be satisfied (he asks Protarchus) to live your life through in the enjoyment of the greatest pleasures? Would any one of us be satisfied to live, possessing the fullest measure and variety of intelligence, reason, knowledge, and memory — but having no sense, great or small, either of pleasure or pain?” And Protarchus replies, in reference to the joint life of intelligence and pleasure combined, “Every man will choose this joint life in preference to either of them separately. It is not one man who will choose it, and another who will reject it: but every man will choose it alike.”8
8 Plato, Philêbus, p. 21 A. δέξαι’ ἂν σύ, Πρώταρχε, ζῆν τὸν βίον ἅπαντα ἡδόμενος ἡδονὰς τὰς μεγίστας; 21 D-E: εἴ τις δέξαιτ’ ἂν αὖ ζῆν ἡμῶν, &c. 22 A: Πᾶς δήπου τοῦτόν γε αἱρήσεται πρότερον ἢ ἐκείνων ὁποτερονοῦν, καὶ πρὸς τούτοις γε οὐχ ὁ μέν, ὁ δ’ οὔ. 60 D: εἴ τις ἄνευ τούτων δέξαιτ’ ἄν, &c.
Here again in appealing to the individual choice and judgment, the Platonic Sokrates indirectly recognises what, in the Theætêtus and other dialogues, we have seen him formally rejecting and endeavouring to confute — the Protagorean canon or measure. Protarchus is the measure of truth or falsehood, of belief or disbelief, to Protarchus himself: every other man is so to himself. Sokrates may be a wiser man, in the estimation of the public, than Protarchus; and if Protarchus believes him to be such, that very belief may amount to an authority, determining Protarchus to accept or reject various opinions propounded by Sokrates: but the ultimate verdict must emanate from the bosom of the acceptor or rejector. I have already observed elsewhere, that a large part of the conversation which the Platonic dialogues put into the mouth of Sokrates, is addressed to individualities and specialties of the other interlocutors: that this very power of discriminating between one mind and another, forms the great superiority of dialectic colloquy as compared with written treatise or rhetorical discourse — both of which address the same terms to a multitude of hearers or readers differing among themselves, without possibility of separate adaptation to each. (See above, ch. xxvi. pp. 50-54, on Phædrus.)
First Question submitted to Protarchus — Intense Pleasure, without any intelligence — He declines to accept it.
The point, which Sokrates submits to the individual judgment of Protarchus, is — “Would you be satisfied to pass your life in the enjoyment of the most intense pleasures, and would you desire nothing farther?” The reply is in the affirmative. “But recollect (adds Sokrates) that you are to have nothing else. The question assumes that you are to be without thought, intelligence, reason, sight, and memory: you are neither to have opinion of present enjoyment, nor remembrance of past, nor anticipation of future: you are to live the life of an oyster, with great present pleasure?” The question being put with these additions, Protarchus alters his view, and replies in the negative: at the same time expressing his surprise at the strangeness of the hypothesis.9
9 Plato, Philêbus, p. 21.
Such an hypothesis does indeed depart so totally from the conditions of human life, that it cannot be considered as a fair test of any doctrine. A perpetuity of delicious sensations cannot be enjoyed, consistent with the conditions of animal organization. A man cannot realise to himself that which the hypothesis promises; much less can he realise it without those accompaniments which it assumes him to renounce. The loss stands out far more palpably than the gain. It is no refutation of the theory of Philêbus; who, announcing pleasure as the Summum Bonum, is entitled to call for pleasure in all its varieties, and for exemption from all pains. Sokrates himself had previously insisted on the great variety as well as on the great dissimilarity of the modes of pleasure and pain. To each variety of pleasure there corresponds a desire: to each variety of pain, an aversion.
If the Summum Bonum is to fulfil the conditions postulated — that is, if it be such as to satisfy all human desires, it ought to comprise all these varieties of pleasure. It ought, e.g., to comprise the pleasures of self-esteem, and conscious self-protecting power, affording security for the future; it ought to comprise exemption from the pains of self-reproach, self-contempt, and conscious helplessness. These are among the greatest pleasures and pains of the mature man, though they are aggregates formed by association. Now the alternative tendered by Sokrates neither includes these pleasures nor eliminates these pains. It includes only the pleasures of sense; and it is tendered to one who has rooted in his mind desires for other pleasures, and aversions for other pains, besides those of sense. It does not therefore come up to the requirements fairly implied in the theory of Philêbus.
Second Question — Whether he will accept a life of Intelligence purely without any pleasure or pain? Answer — No.
Sokrates now proceeds to ask Protarchus, whether he will accept a life of full and all-comprehensive intelligence purely and simply, without any taste either of pleasure or pain. To which Protarchus answers, that neither he nor any one else would accept such a life.10 Both of them agree that the Summum Bonum ought to be sought neither in pleasure singly, nor in intelligence singly, but in both combined.
10 Plato, Philêbus, pp. 21-22.
It is to be remarked, however, that there was more than one Grecian philosopher who described the Summum Bonum as consisting in absence of pain (ἀλυπία); even without the large measure of intelligence which Sokrates here promises, and without any positive pleasure. These men would of course have accepted the second alternative put by Sokrates, which Protarchus here refuses. They took their standard of comparison from the actualities of human life around them, which exhibited pain and suffering universal, frequent, and unavoidable. They conceived that if painlessness could be obtained, it was as much as could reasonably be demanded, and that pleasure might be dispensed with. In laying down any theory about the Summum Bonum, the preliminary question ought always to be settled — What are the conditions of human life which are to be assumed as peremptory and unalterable? What circumstances are we at liberty to suppose to be suppressed, modified, or reversed? According as these fundamental postulates are given in a larger or narrower sense, the ideal Summum Bonum will be shaped differently. This preliminary requisite to the investigation was little considered by the ancient philosophers.
It is agreed on both sides, That the Good must be a Tertium Quid. But Sokrates undertakes to show, That Intelligence is more cognate with it than Pleasure.
Difficulties about Unum et Multa. How can the One be Many? How can the Many be One? The difficulties are greatest about Generic Unity — how it is distributed among species and individuals.
Sokrates then undertakes to show, that of these two elements, intelligence is the most efficacious and the most contributory to the Summum Bonum — pleasure the least so. But as a preparation for this enquiry, he adverts to that which has just been agreed between them respecting both Pleasure and Intelligence — That each of them is Unum, and each of them at the same time Multa et Diversa. Here (argues Sokrates) we find opened before us the embarrassing question respecting the One and the Many. Enquirers often ask — “How can the One be Many? How can the Many be One? How can the same thing be both One and Many?” They find it difficult to understand how you, Protarchus, being One person, are called by different names — tall, heavy, white, just, &c.: or how you are affirmed to consist of many different parts and members. To this difficulty, however (says Sokrates), the reply is easy. You, and other particular men, belong to the generated and the perishable. You partake of many different Ideas or Essences, and your partaking of one among them does not exclude you from partaking also of another distinct and even opposite. You partake of the Idea or Essence of Unity — also of Multitude — of tallness, heaviness, whiteness, humanity, greatness, littleness, &c. You are both great and little, heavy and light, &c. In regard to generated and perishable things, we may understand this. But in regard to the ungenerated, imperishable, absolute Essences, the difficulty is more serious. The Self-existent or Universal Man, Bull, Animal — the Self-existent Beautiful, Good — in regard to these Unities or Monads there is room for great controversy. First, Do such unities or monads really and truly exist? Next, assuming that they do exist, how do they come into communion with generated and perishable particulars, infinite in number? Is each of them dispersed and parcelled out among countless individuals? or is it found, whole and entire, in each individual, maintaining itself as one and the same, and yet being parted from itself? Is the Universal Man distributed among all individual men, or is he one and entire in each of them? How is the Universal Beautiful (The Self-Beautiful — Beauty) in all and each beautiful thing? How does this one monad, unchangeable and imperishable, become embodied in a multitude of transitory individuals, each successively generated and perishing? How does this One become Many, or how do these Many become One?11
11 Plato, Philêbus, p. 15 B.
Active disputes upon this question at the time.
These (says Sokrates) are the really grave difficulties respecting the identity of the One and the Many: difficulties which have occasioned numerous controversies, and are likely to occasion many more. Youthful speculators, especially, are fond of trying their first efforts of dialectical ingenuity in arguing upon this paradox — How the One can be Many, and the Many One.12
12 Plato, Philêbus, pp. 15-16.
In reading the difficulties thus started by Sokrates, we perceive them to be the same as those which we have seen set forth in the dialogue called Parmenidês, where they are put into the mouth of the philosopher so-called; as objections requiring to be removed by Sokrates, before the Platonic theory of self-existent Ideas, universal, eternal and unchangeable, can be admitted. We might expect that Plato having so emphatically and repeatedly announced his own sense of the difficulty, would proceed to suggest some mode of replying to it. But this he never does. In the Parmenidês, he does not even promise any explanation; in the Philêbus, he seems to promise one, but all the explanation which he gives ignores or jumps over the difficulty, enjoining us to proceed as if no such difficulty existed.
Order of Nature — Coalescence of the Finite with the Infinite. The One — The Finite Many — The Infinite Many.
It is a primæval inspiration (he says) granted by the Gods to man along with the fire of Prometheus, and handed down to us as a tradition from that heroic race who were in nearer kindred with the Gods — That all things said to exist are composed of Unity and Multitude, and include in them a natural coalescence of Finiteness and Infinity.13 This is the fundamental order of Nature, which we must assume and proceed upon in our investigations. We shall find everywhere the Form of Unity conjoined with the Form of Infinity. But we must not be satisfied simply to find these two forms. We must look farther for those intermediate Forms which lie between the two. Having found the Form of One, we must next search for the Form of Two, Three, Four, or some definite number: and we must not permit ourselves to acquiesce in the Form of Infinite, until no farther definite number can be detected. In other words, we must not be satisfied with knowing only one comprehensive Genus, and individuals comprised under it. We must distribute the Genus into two, three, or more Species: and each of those Species again into two or more sub-species, each characterised by some specific mark: until no more characteristic marks can be discovered upon which to found the establishment of a distinct species. When we reach this limit, and when we have determined the number of subordinate species which the case presents, nothing remains except the indefinite mass and variety of individuals.14 The whole scheme will thus comprise — The One, the Summum Genus, or Highest Form: The Many, a definite number of Species or sub-Species or subordinate Forms: The Infinite, a countless heap of Individuals.
13 Plato, Philêbus, p. 16 C. ὡς ἐξ ἑνὸς μὲν καὶ ἐκ πολλῶν ὄντων τῶν ἀεὶ λεγομένων εἶναι, πέρας δὲ καὶ ἀπειρίαν ἑν αὑτοῖς ξύμφυτον ἐχόντων.
14 Plato, Philêbus, p. 16 D. δεῖν οὖν ἡμᾶς τούτων οὕτω διακεροσμημένων, ἀεὶ μίαν ἰδέαν περὶ παντὸς ἑκάστοτε θεμένους ζητεῖν· εὑρήσειν γὰρ ἐνοῦσαν· ἐὰν οὖν μεταλάβωμεν, μετὰ μίαν δύο, εἴ πως εἰσί, σκοπεῖν, εἰ δὲ μή, τρεῖς ἤ τινα ἄλλον ἀριθμόν, καὶ τὸ ἓν ἐκείνων ἕκαστον πάλιν ὡσαύτως, μέχρι περ ἂν τὸ κατ’ ἀρχὰς ἓν μὴ ὅτι ἓν καὶ πολλὰ καὶ ἄπειρά ἐστι μόνον ἴδῃ τις ἀλλὰ καὶ ὅποσα· τὴν δὲ τοῦ ἀπείρου ἰδέαν πρὸς τὸ πλῆθος μὴ προσφέρειν, πρὶν ἄν τις τὸν ἀριθμὸν αὐτοῦ πάντα κατίδῃ τὸν μεταξὺ τοῦ ἀπείρου τε καὶ τοῦ ἑνός· τότε δ’ ἤδη τὸ ἓν ἕκαστον τῶν πάντων εἰς τὸ ἄπειρον μεθέντα χαίρειν ἐᾷν.
Plato here recognises a Form of the Infinite, ἀπείρου ἰδέαν; again, p. 18 A, ἀπείρου φύσιν.
Mistake commonly made — To look only for the One, and the Infinite Many, without looking for the intermediate subdivisions.
The mistake commonly made (continues Sokrates) by clever men of the present day, is, that they look for nothing beyond the One and the Infinite Many: one comprehensive class, and countless individuals included in it. They take up carelessly any class which strikes them,15 and are satisfied to have got an indefinite number of individuals under one name. But they never seek for intermediate sub-divisions between the two, so as to be able to discriminate one portion of the class from other by some definite mark, and thus to constitute a sub-class. They do not feel the want of such intermediate sub-divisions, nor the necessity of distinguishing one portion of this immense group of individuals from another. Yet it is exactly upon these discriminating marks that the difference turns, between genuine dialectical argument and controversy without result.16
15 Plato, Philêbus, p. 17 A. οἱ δὲ νῦν τῶν ἀνθρώπων σοφοὶ ἓν μέν, ὅπως ἂν τύχωσι, καὶ πολλὰ θᾶττον καὶ βραδύτερον ποιοῦσι τοῦ δέοντος, μετὰ δὲ τὸ ἓν ἄπειρα εὐθύς, τὰ δὲ μέσα αὐτοὺς ἐκφεύγει, &c.
Stallbaum conjectures that the words καὶ πολλὰ after τύχωσι ought not to be in the text. He proposes to expunge them. The meaning of the passage certainly seems clearer without them.
16 Plato, Philêbus, p. 17 A. οἷς διακεχώρισται τό τε διαλεκτικῶς πάλιν καὶ τὸ ἐριστικῶς ἡμᾶς ποιεῖσθαι πρὸς ἀλλήλους τοὺς λόγους.
Illustration from Speech and Music.
This general doctrine is illustrated by two particular cases — Speech and Music. The voice (or Vocal Utterance) is One — the voice is also Infinite: to know only thus much is to know very little. Even when you know, in addition to this, the general distinction of sounds into acute and grave, you are still far short of the knowledge of music. You must learn farthermore to distinguish all the intermediate gradations, and specific varieties of sound, into which the infinity of separate sounds admits of being distributed: what and how many these gradations are? what are the numerical ratios upon which they depend — the rhythmical and harmonic systems? When you have learnt to know the One Genus, the infinite diversity of individual sounds, and the number of subordinate specific varieties by which these two extremes are connected with each other — then you know the science of music. So too, in speech: when you can distinguish the infinite diversity of articulate utterance into vowels, semi-vowels, and consonants, each in definite number and with known properties — you are master of grammatical science. You must neither descend at once from the One to the Infinite Multitude, nor ascend at once from the Infinite Multitude to the One: you must pass through the intermediate stages of subordinate Forms, in determinate number. All three together make up scientific knowledge. You cannot know one portion separately, without knowing the remainder: all of them being connected into one by the common bond of the highest Genus.17
17 Plato, Philêbus, p. 18 C-D. καθορῶν δὲ ὡς οὐδεὶς ἡμῶν οὐδ’ ἂν ἓν αὐτὸ καθ’ αὑτὸ ἄνευ πάντων αὐτῶν μάθοι, τοῦτον τὸν δεσμὸν αὖ λογισάμενος ὡς ὄντα ἕνα καὶ πάντα ταῦτα ἓν πως ποιοῦντα, μίαν ἐπ’ αὐτοῖς ὡς οὖσαν γραμματικὴν τέχνην ἐπεφθέγξατο προσειπών.
Plato’s explanation does not touch the difficulties which he had himself recognised as existing.
Such is the explanation which Plato gives as to the identity of One and Many. Considered as a reply to his own previous doubts and difficulties, it is altogether insufficient. It leaves all those doubts unsolved. The first point of enquiry which he had started, was, Whether any Universal or Generic Monads really existed: the second point was, assuming that they did exist, how each of them, being essentially eternal and unchangeable, could so multiply itself or divide itself as to be at the same time in an infinite variety of particulars.18 Both points are left untouched by the explanation. No proof is furnished that Universal Monads exist — still less that they multiply or divide their one and unchangeable essence among infinite particulars — least of all is it shown, how such multiplication or division can take place, consistently with the fundamental and eternal sameness of the Universal Monad. The explanation assumes these difficulties to be eliminated, but does not suggest the means of eliminating them. The Philêbus, like the Parmenidês, recognises the difficulties as existing, but leaves them unsolved, though the dogmas to which they attach are the cardinal and peculiar tenets of Platonic speculation. Plato shows that he is aware of the embarrassments: yet he is content to theorize as if they did not exist. In a remarkable passage of this very dialogue, he intimates pretty clearly that he considered the difficulty of these questions to be insuperable, and never likely to be set at rest. This identification of the One with the Many, in verbal propositions (he says) has begun with the beginning of dialectic debate, and will continue to the end of it, as a stimulating puzzle which especially captivates the imagination of youth.19
18 Plato, Philêbus, p. 15 B-C.
19 Plato, Philêbus, p. 15 D. φαμέν που ταὐτὸν ἓν καὶ πολλὰ ὑπὸ λόγων γιγνόμενα περιτρέχειν πάντῃ καθ’ ἕκαστον τῶν λεγομένων ἀεὶ καὶ πάλαι καὶ νῦν. καὶ τοῦτο οὔτε μὴ παύσηταί ποτε οὔτε ἤρξατο νῦν, ἀλλ’ ἔστι τὸ τοιοῦτον, ὡς ἐμοὶ φαίνεται, τῶν λόγων αὐτῶν ἀθάνατόν τι καὶ ἀγήρων πάθος ἐν ἡμῖν.
The sequel (too long to transcribe) of this passage (setting forth the manner in which this apparent paradox worked upon the imagination of youthful students) is very interesting to read, and shows (in my opinion) that Stallbaum’s interpretation of it in his note is not the right one. Plato is here talking (in my judgment) about the puzzle and paradox itself: Stallbaum represents Plato as talking about his pretended solution of it, which has not as yet been at all alluded to.
Plato seems to give his own explanation without full certainty or confidence: see p. 16 B. And when we turn to pp. 18-19, we shall see that he forgets the original difficulty which had been proposed (compare p. 15 B), introducing in place of it another totally distinct difficulty, as if that had been in contemplation.
It is nevertheless instructive, in regard to logical division and classification.
But though the difficulties started by Plato remain unexplained, still his manner of stating them is in itself valuable and instructive. It proclaims — 1. The necessity of a systematic classification, or subordinate scale of species and sub-species, between the highest Genus and the group of individuals beneath. 2. That each of these subordinate grades in the scale must be founded upon some characteristic mark. 3. That the number of sub-divisions is definite and assignable, there being a limit beyond which it cannot be carried. 4. That full knowledge is not attainable until we know all three — The highest Genus — The intermediate species and sub-species; both what they are, how many there are, and how each is characterised — The infinite group of individuals. These three elements must all be known in conjunction: we are not to pass either from the first to the third, or from the third to the first, except through the second.
At that time little thought had been bestowed upon classification as a logical process.
The general necessity of systematic classification — of generalisation and specification, or subordination of species and sub-species, as a condition of knowing any extensive group of individuals — requires no advocate at the present day. But it was otherwise in the time of Plato. There existed then no body of knowledge, distributed and classified, to which he could appeal as an example. The illustrations to which he himself refers here, of language and music as systematic arrangements of vocal sounds, were both of them the product of empirical analogy and unconscious growth, involving little of predetermined principle or theory. All the classification then employed was merely that which is included in the structure of language: in the framing of general names, each designating a multitude of individuals. All that men knew of classification was, that which is involved in calling many individuals by the same common name. This is the defect pointed out by Plato, when he remarks that the clever men of his time took no heed except of the One and the Infinite (Genus and Individuals): neglecting all the intermediate distinctions. Upon the knowledge of these media (he says) rests the difference between true dialectic debate, and mere polemic.20 That is — when you have only an infinite multitude of individuals, called by the same generic name, it is not even certain that they have a single property in common: and even if they have, it is not safe to reason from one to another as to the possession of any other property beyond the one generic property — so that the debate ends in mere perplexity. All pleasures agree in being pleasures (Sokrates had before observed to Protarchus), and all cognitions agree in being cognitions. But you cannot from hence infer that there is any other property belonging in common to all.21 That is a point which you cannot determine without farther observation of individuals, and discrimination of the great multitude into appropriate subdivisions. You will thus bring the whole under that triple point of view which Plato requires:— the highest Genus, — the definite number of species and sub-species, — the undefined number of individuals.