tions. He said that a Definition was nothing but a series of words (λóyov μaxpóv, "a long discourse"); for which Aristotle calls him an ignoramus.* To the Socratic notion of a Definition, as including the essence of a thing, he opposed the Sophistic notion of a Definition, as expressing a purely subjective relation. You can only express qualities, not essences; you can call a thing silver, but you cannot say in what it consists. Your definition is only verbal: hence the first step in education should be the study of words.t What was the consequence of this skepticism? The consequence was, that the Cynics answered arguments by facts. When some one was arguing in support of Zeno of Elea's notion respecting the impossibility of movement, Diogenes rose and walked. Definitions might prove that there was no motion; but definitions were only verbal, and could be answered by facts. This refuge found in common-sense against the assaults of logic, enabled the Cynics to shape a doctrine of morals which had some certain basis. As they answered arguments by facts, so they made actions take the place of precepts. Instead of speculating about virtue, they endeavored to be virtuous. Socrates had brought philosophy from the clouds; the Cynics endeavored to bring it into daily practice. Their personal dispositions gave the peculiar coloring to their doctrine, as that of Aristippus had done to the Cyrenaic. *'Araldouros.—Metaph. viii. 3. † Arrian, Epictet., Diss. i. 17, quoted in Ritter and Preller, Hist. Philos. Græco-Romanæ ex fontium locis contexta (Hamburg, 1888), p. 174. SIXTH EPOCH. COMPLETE ADOPTION AND APPLICATION OF THE SOCRATIC METHOD.-PLATO. § I. LIFE OF PLATO. PERHAPS of all ancient writers, Plato's name is the best known. Homer himself is unknown to many who have some dim notion of Plato as the originator of the so-called Platonic love. There is a great and wide-spread interest about the Grecian sage. The young and romantic have strange, romantic ideas of him. "The general reader," especially if a dabbler in fashionable philosophy, or rather in the philosophy current in fashionable novels, has a very exalted notion of him as the "great Idealist." The theological reader regards him with affection, as the stout and eloquent upholder of the doctrine of the immateriality and immortality of the soul. The literary critic often regards him as the type of metaphysical eloquence, and classes with him every vapory, mystical, metaphorical writer of "poetical philosophy." Now, except that of the theologian, these notions, derived at second-hand, are all false. It would be idle to inquire how such extravagant opinions came into circulation. Enough for us that they are false. Plato was any thing but "dreamy ;" any thing but "an Idealist," as that phrase is usually understood. He was an inveterate dialectician, a severe and abstract thinker, and a great quibbler. His metaphysics are of a nature to frighten away all but the most determined students, so abstract and so subtle are they. His morals and politics, so far from having any romantic tinge, are the ne plus ultra of logical severity; hard, uncompromising, and above humanity. In a word, Plato the man was almost completely absorbed in Plato the Dialectician he had learned to look upon human passion as a disease, and human pleasure as a frivolity. The only thing worth living for was truth. Dialectics was the noblest exercise of humanity. Even the notions respecting his style are erroneous. It is not the "poetical" metaphorical style usually asserted. It has unmistakable beauties, but not the beauties popularly attributed to it. Its immense power is dramatic power. The best dialogues are inimitable scenes of comedy. Character, banter, irony, and animation are there, but scarcely any imagery, and that seldom beautiful.* His object was to refute or to convince; his illustrations are therefore homely. When fit occasion arrives he can be eloquent and familiar. He clothes some myths in language of splendid beauty; and there are many felicitous passages scattered through the dreary waste of dialectical quibbling and obscurity. These passages have been quoted by various writers; hence readers have supposed that Plato always wrote in such strains. But very fine passages are also to be found in Aristotle, who is nevertheless a repulsive writer on the whole. In truth, Plato is a very difficult, and, as far as regards matter, somewhat tedious writer; this is the reason of his being so little read for we must not be deceived by the many editions. He is often mentioned and often quoted at second-hand; but he is rarely read, except by professed scholars and critics. Men of culture usually attack a dialogue or two out of curiosity. Their curiosity seldom inspirits them to further progress. The difficul * "Even upon abstract subjects, whether moral, metaphysical, or mathematical, the language of Plato is clear as the running stream; and in simplicity and sweetness vies with the humble violet which perfumes the vale." -Dr. Enfield, Hist. of Phil. ii. 221. Whenever you meet with such trash as this, be dubious that the writer of it ever read Plato. Aristotle capitally describes Plato's style as "a middle species of diction between verse and prose." It has rhythm rather than imagery. ty of mastering the ideas, and their unsatisfactory nature when mastered, are barriers to any general acquaintance with Plato. But those who persevere believe themselves repaid; the journey has been difficult, but it was worth performing. Aristocles, surnamed Plato (the broad-browed),* the son of Ariston and Perictione, was born at Athens or Egina, Ol. 87.3, on the 7th Thargelion (about the middle of May, B. c. 430). His childhood and youth consequently synchronize with the Peloponnesian war, the most active and brilliant period of Grecian thought and action. His lineage was illustrious: on the maternal side he was connected with Solon. So great a name could not escape becoming the nucleus of many fables, and we find the later historians gravely repeating various miraculous events connected with him. He was said to be the child of Apollo, his mother a virgin. Ariston, though betrothed to Perictione, delayed his marriage because Apollo had appeared to him in a dream, and told him that she was with child. Plato's education was excellent; and in gymnastics he was sufficiently skilled to contend at the Pythian and Isthmian games. Like a true Greek, he attached extreme importance to gymnastics, as doing for the body what dialectics did for the mind; and, like a true Greek, he did not suffer these corporeal exercises to absorb all his time and attention: poetry, music, and rhetoric were assiduously cultivated, and with some success. He wrote an epic poem, besides some tragedies, dithyrambics, lyrics, and epigrams. The epic he is said to have burned in a fit of despair on comparing it with Homer. The tragedies he burned on be * Some writers incline to the opinion that "Plato" was the epithet of broad-browed; others of broad-shouldered; others, again, that it was expressive of the breadth of his style. This last is absurd. The author of the article Plato in the Penny Cyclopædia pronounces all the above explanations to be "idle, as the name of Plato was of common occurrence among the Athenians of that time." But surely Aristocles was not endowed with this surname of Plato without cause? Unless he derived the name from a relation, he must have derived it from one of the above causes. coming acquainted with Socrates. The epigrams have been partially preserved. One of them is very beautiful: *Αστέρας εἰσαθρεῖς, ἀστὴρ ἐμός· εἴθε γενοίμην Οὐρανὸς, ὡς πολλοῖς ὄμμασιν εἷς σε βλέπω. "Thou gazest on the stars, my Life! Ah! gladly would I be Yon starry skies, with thousand eyes, that I might gaze on thee!" His studies of poetry were mingled with those of philosophy, which he must have cultivated early; for we know that he was only twenty when he first went to Socrates, and we also know that he had been taught by Cratylus before he knew Socrates. Early he must have felt "A presence that disturbed him with the joy All thinking things, all objects of all thought, A deep and meditative spirit led him to question Nature in her secret haunts. The sombre philosophy of Heraclitus suited well with his melancholy youth. Skepticism, which was the fever of that age, had seized on Plato as on all the rest. This skepticism, together with an imperious craving for belief which struggled with the skepticism, found breathing-room in the doctrines of Socrates; and the young scholar learned that without impugning the justice of his doubts, he could escape them by seeking Truth elsewhere. He remained with Socrates ten years, and was separated from him only by death. He attended his beloved master during the trial; undertook to plead his cause; indeed, began a speech which the violence of the judges would not allow him to continue; and pressed his master to accept a sum of money sufficient to purchase his life. On the death of Socrates he went to Megara to visit Euclid, as we mentioned before. From thence he proceeded to Cyrene, |