Introduction to the Philosophy and Writings of Plato Part 2

In the Phaedo he says that these are the causes to us of reminiscence; because disciplines are nothing else than reminiscences of middle dianoetic forms, from which the productive powers of nature being derived and inspired, give birth to all the mundane phenomena.

Plato however did not consider things definable, or in modern language abstract ideas, as the only universals, but prior to these he established those principles productive of science which essentially reside in the soul, as is evident from his Phaedrus and Phaedo. In the 10th book of the Republic too, he venerates those separate forms which subsist in a divine intellect. In the Phaedrus, he a.s.serts that souls elevated to the supercelestial place, behold Justice herself, temperance herself, and science herself; and lastly in the Phaedo he evinces the immortality of the soul from the hypothesis of separate forms.

Syria.n.u.s[11], in his commentary on the 13th book of Aristotle's Metaphysics, shows in defense of Socrates, Plato, the Parmenideans, and Pythagoreans, that ideas were not introduced by these divine men according to the usual meaning of names, as was the opinion of Chrysippus, Archedemus, and many of the junior Stoics; for ideas are distinguished by many differences from things which are denominated from custom. Nor do they subsist, says he, together with intellect, in the same manner as those slender conceptions which are denominated universals abstracted from sensibles, according to the hypothesis of Longinus:[12] for if that which subsists is unsubstantial, it cannot be consubsistent with intellect.

----------------- [11] See my translation of Aristotle's Metaphysics, p. 347. If the reader conjoins what is said concerning ideas in the notes on that work, with the introduction and notes to the Parmenides in this, he will be in possession of nearly all that is to be found in the writings of the ancients on this subject.

[12] It appears from this pa.s.sage of Syria.n.u.s that Longinus was the original inventor of the theory of abstract ideas; and that Mr. Locke was merely the restorer of it.

Nor are ideas according to these men notions, as Cleanthes afterwards a.s.serted them to be. Nor is idea definite reason, nor material form; for these subsist in composition and division, and verge to matter. But ideas are perfect, simple, immaterial, and impartible natures. And what wonder is there, says Syria.n.u.s, if we should separate things which are so much distant from each other? Since neither do we imitate in this particular Plutarch, Atticus, and Democritus, who, because universal reasons perpetually subsist in the essence of the soul, were of opinion that these reasons are ideas: for though they separate them from the universal in sensible natures, yet it is not proper to conjoin in one and the same the reason of soul, and an intellect such as ours, with paradigmatic and immaterial forms, and demiurgic intellections. But as the divine Plato says, it is the province of our soul to collect things into one by a reasoning process, and to possess a reminiscence of those transcendent spectacles, which we once beheld when governing the universe in conjunction with divinity. Boethus,[13] the peripatetic too, with whom it is proper to join Cornutus; thought that ideas are the same with universals in sensible natures. However, whether these universals are prior to particulars, they are not prior in such a manner as to be denudated from the habitude which they possess with respect to them, nor do they subsist as the causes of particulars; both which are the prerogatives of ideas; or whether they are posterior to particulars, as many are accustomed to call them, how can things of posterior origin, which have no essential subsistence, but are nothing more than slender conceptions, sustain the dignity of fabricative ideas?

------------------- [13] This was a Greek philosopher, who is often cited by Simplicius in his Commentary on the Predicaments, and must not therefore be confounded with Boetius, the roman senator and philosopher.

In what manner then, says Syria.n.u.s, do ideas subsist according to the contemplative lovers of truth? We reply, intelligibly and tetradically ([Greek: noeros kai tetradikos]), in animal itself ([Greek: en to antozoo]), or the extremity of the intelligible order; but intellectually and decadically ([Greek: noeros kai dekadikos]), in the intellect of the artificer of the universe; for, according to the Pythagoric Hymn, "Divine number proceeds from the retreats of the undecaying monad, till it arrives at the divine tetrad which produced the mother of all things, the universal recipient, venerable, circularly investing all things with bound, immovable and unwearied, and which is denominated the sacred decad, both by the immortal G.o.ds and earth-born men."

[Greek: Proeisi gar o Theios arithmos, os phesin o Pythagoreios eis auton umnos, Monados ek keuthmonos akeralou esti'an iketai Tetrada epi zatheen, he de teke metera panton, Pandechea, presbeiran, oron peri pasi t.i.theiran, Atropon, akamatou, dekada kleiousi min agnen, Athanatoi to theoi kai gegeneeis anthropoi.]

And such is the mode of their subsistence according to Orpheus, Pythagoras and Plato. Or if it be requisite to speak in more familiar language, an intellect sufficient to itself, and which is a most perfect cause, presides over the wholes of the universe, and through these governs all its parts; but at the same time that it fabricates all mundane natures, and benefits them by its providential energies, it preserves its own most divine and immaculate purity; and while it illuminates all things, is not mingled with the natures which it illuminates. This intellect, therefore, comprehending in the depths of its essence an ideal world, replete with all various forms, excludes privation of cause and casual subsistence, from its energy. But as it imparts every good and all possible beauty to its fabrications, it converts the universe to itself, and renders it similar to its own omniform nature. Its energy, too, is such as its intellection; but it understands all things, since it is most perfect. Hence there is not any thing which ranks among true beings, that is not comprehended in the essence of intellect; but it always establishes in itself ideas, which are not different from itself and its essence, but give completion to it, and introduce to the whole of things, a cause which is at the same time productive, paradigmatic, and final. For it energizes as intellect, and the ideas which it contains are paradigmatic, as being forms; and they energize from themselves, and according to their own exuberant goodness.

And such are the Platonic dogmas concerning ideas, which sophistry and ignorance may indeed oppose, but will never be able to confute.

From this intelligible world, replete with omniform ideas, this sensible world, according to Plato, perpetually flows, depending on its artificer intellect, in the same manner as shadow on its forming substance. For as a deity of an intellectual characteristic is its fabricator, and both the essence and energy of intellect are established in eternity the sensible universe, which is the effect or production of such an energy, must be consubsistent with its cause, or in other words, must be a perpetual emanation from it. This will be evident from considering that every thing which is generated, is either generated by art or by nature, or according to power. It is necessary, therefore, that every thing operating according to nature or art should be prior to the things produced; but that things operating according to power should have their productions coexistent with themselves; just as the sun produces light coexistent with itself; fire, heat; and snow, coldness. If therefore the artificer of the universe produced it by art, he would not cause it simply to be, but to be in some particular manner; for all art produces form. Whence therefore does the world derive its being? If he produced it from nature, since that which makes by nature imparts something of itself to its productions, and the maker of the world is incorporeal, it would be necessary that the world, the offspring of such an energy, should be incorporeal. It remains therefore, that the demiurgus produced the universe by power alone; but every thing generated by power subsists together with the cause containing this power: and hence production of this kind cannot be destroyed unless the producing cause is deprived of power. The divine intellect therefore that produced the sensible universe caused it to be coexistent with himself.

This world thus depending on its divine artificer, who is himself an intelligible world replete with the archetypal ideas of all things, considered according to its corporeal nature, is perpetually flowing, and perpetually advancing to being (en to gignesthai), and compared with its paradigm, has no stability or reality of being. However, considered as animated by a divine soul, and as receiving the illuminations of all the supermundane G.o.ds, and being itself the receptacle of divinities from whom bodies are suspended, it is said by Plato in the Timaeus to be a blessed G.o.d. The great body of this world too, which subsists in a perpetual dispersion of temporal extension, may be properly called a whole with a total subsistence, on account of the perpetuity of its duration, though this is nothing more than a flowing eternity. And hence Plato calls it a whole of wholes; by the other wholes which are comprehended in its meaning, the celestial spheres, the sphere of fire, the whole of air considered as one great orb; the whole earth, and the whole sea. These spheres, which are called by Platonic writers parts with a total subsistence, are considered by Plato as aggoregately perpetual.

For if the body of this world is perpetual, this also must be the case with its larger parts, on account of their exquisite alliance to it, and in order that wholes with a partial subsistence, such as all individuals, may rank in the last gradation of things.

As the world too, considered as one great comprehending whole, is called by Plato a divine animal, so likewise every whole which it contains is a world, possessing in the first place, a self-perfect unity; proceeding from the ineffable, by which it becomes a G.o.d; in the second place, a divine intellect; in the third place, a divine soul; and in the last place, a deified body. Hence each of these wholes is the producing cause of all the mult.i.tude which it contains, and on this account is said to be a whole prior to parts; because, considered as possessing an eternal form which holds all its parts together, and gives to the whole perpetuity of subsistence, it is not indigent of such parts to the perfection of its being. That these wholes which rank thus high in the universe are animated, must follow by a geometrical necessity. For, as Theophrastus well observes, wholes would possess less authority than parts, and things eternal than such as are corruptible, if deprived of the possession of soul.

And now having with venturous, yet unpresuming wing, ascended to the ineffable principle of things, and standing with every eye closed in the vestibules of the adytum, found that we could announce nothing concerning him, but only indicate our doubts and disappointment, and having thence descended to his occult and most venerable progeny, and pa.s.sing through the luminous world of ideas, holding fast by the golden chain of deity, terminated our downward flight in the material universe, and its undecaying wholes, let us stop awhile and contemplate the sublimity and magnificence of the scene which this journey presents to our view. Here then we see the vast empire of deity, an empire terminated upwards by a principle so ineffable that all language is subverted about it, and downwards, by the vast body of the world. Immediately subsisting after this immense unknown we in the next place behold a mighty all- comprehending one, which as being next to that which is in every respect incomprehensible, possesses much of the ineffable and unknown.

From this principle of principles, in which all things casually subsist absorbed in superessential light and involved in unfathomable depths, we view a beauteous progeny of principles, all largely partaking of the ineffable, all stamped with the occult characters of deity, all possessing an over-flowing fullness of good. From these dazzling summits, these ineffable blossoms, these divine propagations, we next see being, life, intellect, soul, nature and body depending; monads suspended from unities, deified natures proceeding from deities. Each of these monads too, is the leader of a series which extends from itself to the last of things, and which while it proceeds from, at the same time abides in, and returns to its leader. And all these principles and all their progeny are finally centred, and rooted by their summits in the first great all- comprehending one. Thus all beings proceed from, and are comprehended in the first being; all intellects emanate from one first intellect; all souls from one first soul; all natures blossom from one first nature; and all bodies proceed from the vital and luminous body of the world. And lastly, all these great monads are comprehended in the first one, from which both they and all their depending series are unfolded into light.

Hence this first one is truly the unity of unities, the monad of monads, the principle of principles, the G.o.d of G.o.ds, one and all things, and yet one prior to all.

Such, according to Plato, are the flights of the true philosopher, such the August and magnificent scene which presents itself to his view. By ascending these luminous heights, the spontaneous tendencies of the soul to deity alone find the adequate object of their desire; investigation here alone finally reposes, doubt expires in certainty, and knowledge loses itself in the ineffable.

And here perhaps some grave objector, whose little soul is indeed acute, but sees nothing with a vision healthy and sound, will say that all this is very magnificent, but that it is soaring too high for man; that it is merely the effect of spiritual pride; that no truths, either in morality or theology, are of any importance which are not adapted to the level of the meanest capacity; and that all that it is necessary for man to know concerning either G.o.d or himself is so plain, that he that runs may read.

In answer to such like cant, for it is nothing more,--a cant produced by the most profound ignorance, and frequently attended with the most deplorable envy, I ask, is then the Delphic precept, KNOW THYSELF, a trivial mandate? Can this be accomplished by every man? Or can any one properly know himself without knowing the rank he holds in the scale of being? And can this be effected without knowing what are the natures which he surpa.s.ses, and what those are by which he is surpa.s.sed? And can he know this without knowing as much of those natures as it is possible for him to know? And will the objector be hardy enough to say that every man is equal to this arduous task? That he who rushes from the forge, or the mines, with a soul distorted, crushed and bruised by base mechanical arts, and madly presumes to teach theology to a deluded audience, is master of this sublime, this most important science? For my own part I know of no truths which are thus obvious, thus accessible to every man, but axioms, those self-evident principles of science which are conspicuous by their own light, which are the spontaneous unperverted conceptions of the soul, and to which he who does not a.s.sent deserves, as Aristotle justly remarks, either pity or correction. In short, if this is to be the criterion of all moral and theological knowledge, that it must be immediately obvious to every man, that it is to be apprehended by the most careless inspection, what occasion is there for seminaries of learning? Education is ridiculous, the toil of investigation is idle. Let us at once confine Wisdom in the dungeons of Folly, recall Ignorance from her barbarous wilds, and close the gates of Science with everlasting bars.

Having thus taken a general survey of the great world, and descended from the intelligible to the sensible universe, let us still, adhering to that golden chain which is bound round the summit of Olympus, and from which all things are suspended, descend to the microcosm man. For man comprehends in himself partially everything which the world contains divinely and totally. Hence, according to Pluto, he is endued with an intellect subsisting in energy, and a rational soul proceeding from the same father and vivific G.o.ddess as were the causes of the intellect and soul of the universe. He has likewise an ethereal vehicle a.n.a.logous to the heavens, and a terrestrial body, composed from the four elements, and with which also it is coordinate.

With respect to his rational part, for in this the essence of man consists, we have already shown that it is of a self-motive nature, and that it subsists between intellect, which is immovable both in essence and energy, and nature, which both moves and is moved. In consequence of this middle subsistence, the mundane soul, from which all partial souls are derived, is said by Plato in the Timaeus, to be a medium between that which is indivisible and that which is divisible about bodies, i.e. the mundane soul is a medium between the mundane intellect, and the whole of that corporeal life which the world partic.i.p.ates. In like manner, the human soul is a medium between a daemoniacal intellect proximately, established above our essence, which it also elevates and perfects, and that corporeal life which is distributed about our body, and which is the cause of its generation, nutrition and increase. This daemoniacal intellect is called by Plato, in the Phaedrus, theoretic and, the governor of the soul. The highest part therefore of the human soul is the summit of the dianoetic power ([Greek: to akrotaton tes dianoias]), or that power which reasons scientifically; and this summit is our intellect.

As, however, our very essence is characterized by reason, this our summit is rational, and though it subsists in energy, yet it has a remitted union with things themselves. Though too it energizes from itself, and contains intelligibles in its essence, yet from its alliance to the discursive nature of soul, and its inclination to that which is divisible, it falls short of the perfection of an intellectual essence and energy profoundly indivisible and united, and the intelligibles which it contains degenerate from the transcendently fulged and self-luminous nature of first intelligibles. Hence, in obtaining a perfectly indivisible knowledge, it requires to be perfected by an intellect whose energy is ever vigilant and unremitted; and it's intelligibles, that they may become perfect, are indigent of the light which proceeds from separate intelligibles.

Aristotle, therefore, very properly compares the intelligibles of our intellect to colors, because these require the splendour of the sun, and denominates an intellect of this kind, intellect in capacity, both on account of its subordination to an essential intellect, and because it is from a separate intellect that it receives the full perfection of its nature. The middle part of the rational soul is called by Plato, dianoia, and is that power which, as we have already said, reasons scientifically, deriving the principles of its reasoning, which are axioms from intellect.

And the extremity of the rational soul is opinion, which in his Sophista he defines to be that power which knows the conclusion of dianoia. This power also knows the universal in sensible particulars, as that every man is a biped, but it knows only the oti, or that a thing is, but is ignorant of the dioti, or why it is: knowledge of the latter kind being the province of the dianoetic power.

And such is Plato's division of the rational part of our nature, which he very justly considers as the true man; the essence of every thing consisting in its most excellent part.

After this follows the irrational nature, the summit of which is the phantasy, or that power which perceives every thing accompanied with figure and interval; and on this account it may be called a figured intelligence ([Greek: morphotike noesis]). This power, as Jamblichus beautifully observes, groups upon, as it were, and fas.h.i.+ons all the powers of the soul; exciting in opinion the illuminations from the senses, and fixing in that life which is extended with body, the impressions which descend from intellect. Hence, slays Proclus, it folds itself about the indivisibility of true intellect, conforms itself to all formless species, and becomes perfectly every thing, from which the dianoetic power and our indivisible reason consists. Hence too, it is all things pa.s.sively which intellect is impa.s.sively, and on this account Aristotle calls it pa.s.sive intellect. Under this subsist anger and desire, the former resembling a raging lion, and the latter a many-headed beast; and the whole is bounded by sense, which is nothing more than a pa.s.sive perception of things, and on this account is justly said by Plato, to be rather pa.s.sion than knowledge; since the former of these is characterized by alertness, and the latter by energy.

Further still, in order that the union of the soul with this gross terrestrial body may be effected in a becoming manner, two vehicles, according to Plato, are necessary as media, one of which is ethereal, and the other aerial, and of these, the ethereal vehicle is simple and immaterial, but the aerial, simple and material; and this dense earthly body is composite and material.

The soul thus subsisting as a medium between natures impartible and such as are divided about bodies, it produces and const.i.tutes the latter of these; but establishes in itself the prior causes from which it proceeds. Hence it previously receives, after the manner of an exemplar, the natures to which it is prior as their cause; but it possesses through partic.i.p.ation, and as the blossoms of first natures, the causes of its subsistence. Hence it contains in its essence immaterial forms of things material, incorporeal of such as are corporeal, and extended of such as are distinguished by interval. But it contains intelligibles after the manner of an image, and receives partibly their impartible forms, such as are uniform variously, and such as are immovable, according to a self-motive condition. Soul therefore is all things, and is elegantly said by Olympiodorus to be an omniform statue ([Greek: pammorphon agalma]): for it contains such things as are first through partic.i.p.ation, but such as are posterior to its nature, after the manner of an exemplar.

As, too, it is always moved; and this always is not eternal, but temporal, for that which is properly eternal, and such is intellect, is perfectly stable, and has no transitive energies, hence it is necessary that its motions should be periodic. For motion is a certain mutation from some things into others. And beings are terminated by mult.i.tudes and magnitudes. These therefore being terminated, there can neither be an infinite mutation, according to a right line, nor can that which is always moved proceed according to a finished progression. Hence that which is always moved will proceed from the same to the same; and will thus form a periodic motion. Hence, too, the human, and this also is true of every mundane soul, uses periods and rest.i.tutions of its proper life.

For, in consequence of being measured by time, it energizes transitively, and possesses a proper motion. But every thing which is moved perpetually and partic.i.p.ates of time, revolves periodically and proceeds from the same to the same. And hence the soul, from possessing motion, and energizing according to time, will both possess periods of motion and rest.i.tutions to its pristine state.

Again, as the human soul, according to Plato, ranks among the number of those souls that sometimes follow the mundane divinities, in consequence of subsisting immediately after daemons and heroes, the perpetual attendants of the G.o.ds, hence it possesses a power of descending infinitely into generation, or the sublunary region, and of ascending from generation to real being. For since it does not reside with divinity through an infinite time, neither will it be conversant with bodies through the whole succeeding time. For that which has no temporal beginning, both according to Plato and Aristotle, cannot have an end; and that which has no end, is necessarily without a beginning. It remains, therefore, that every soul must perform periods, both of ascensions from generation, and of descensions into generation; and that this will never fail, through an infinite time.

From all this it follows that the soul, while an inhabitant of earth, is in a fallen condition, an apostate from deity, an exile from the orb of light. Hence Plato, in the 7th book of his Republic, considering our life with reference to erudition and the want of it, a.s.similates us to men in a subterranean cavern, who have been there confined from their childhood, and so fettered by chains as to be only able to look before them to the entrance of the cave which expands to the light, but incapable through the chain of turning themselves round. He supposes too, that they have the light of a fire burning far above and behind them; and that between the fire and the fettered men, there is a road above, along which a low wall is built. On this wall are seen men bearing utensils of every kind, and statues in wood and stone of men and other animals. And of these men some are speaking and others silent. With respect to the fettered men in this cave, they see nothing of themselves or another, or of what is carrying along, but the shadows formed by the fire falling on the opposite part of tho cave. He supposes too, that the opposite part of this prison has an echo; and that in consequence of this the fettered men, when they hear any one speak, will imagine that it is nothing else than the pa.s.sing shadow.

Here, in the first place, as we have observed in the notes on that book, the road above between the fire and the fettered men, indicates that there is a certain ascent in the cave itself from a more abject to a more elevated life. By this ascent, therefore Plato signifies the contemplation of dianoetic objects in the mathematical disciplines. For as the shadows in the cave correspond to the shadows of visible objects, and visible objects are the immediate images of dianoetic forms, or those ideas which the soul essentially partic.i.p.ates, it is evident that the objects from which these shadows are formed must correspond to such as are dianoetic.

It is requisite, therefore, that the dianoetic power exercising itself in these, should draw forth the principles of these from their latent retreats, and should contemplate them not in images, but as subsisting in herself in impartible involution.

In the next place he says, "that the man who is to be led from the cave will more easily see what the heavens contain, and the heavens themselves, by looking in the night to the light of the stars, and the moon, than by day looking on the sun, and the light of the sun." By this he signifies the contemplation of intelligibles: for the stars and their light are imitations of intelligibles, so far as all of them partake of the form of the sun, in the same manner as intelligibles are characterized by the nature of the good.

After the contemplation of these, and after the eye is accustomed through these to the light, as it is requisite in the visible region to see the sun himself in the last place, in like manner, according to Plato, the idea of the good must be seen the last in the intelligible region. He, likewise divinely adds, that it is scarcely to be seen; for we can only be conjoined with it through the intelligible, in the vestibule of which it is beheld by the ascending soul.

In short, the cold, according to Plato, can only be restored while on earth to the divine likeness, which she abandoned by her descent, and be able after death to reascend to the intelligible world, by the exercise of the cathartic and theoretic virtues; the former purifying her from the defilements of a mortal nature, and the latter elevating her to the vision of true being: for thus, as Plato says in the Timaeus, "the soul becoming sane and entire, will arrive at the form of her pristine habit."

The cathartic, however, must necessarily precede the theoretic virtues; since it is impossible to survey truth while subject to the perturbation and tumult of the pa.s.sions. For the rational soul subsisting as a medium between intellect and the irrational nature, can then only without revulsion a.s.sociate with the intellect prior to herself, when she becomes pure from copa.s.sivity with inferior natures. By the cathartic virtues, therefore, we become sane, in consequence of being liberated from the pa.s.sions as diseases; but we become entire by the rea.s.sumption of intellect and science as of our proper parts; and this is effected by contemplative truth. Plato also clearly teaches us that our apostacy from better natures is only to be healed by a flight from hence, when he defines in his Theaetetus philosophy to be a flight from terrestrial evils: for he evinces by this that pa.s.sions are connascent with mortals alone. He likewise says in the same dialogue, "that neither can evil be abolished, nor yet do they subsist with the G.o.ds, but that they necessarily revolve about this terrene abode, and a mortal nature." For those who are obnoxious to generation and corruption can also be affected in a manner contrary to nature, which is the beginning of evils. But in the same dialogue he subjoins the mode by which our flight from evil is to be accomplished. "It is necessary," says he "to fly from hence thither: but the flight is a similitude to divinity, as far as is possible to man; and this similitude consists in becoming just and holy in conjunction with intellectual prudence." For it is necessary that he who wishes to run from evils, should in the first place turn away from a mortal nature; since it is not possible for those who are mingled with it to avoid being filled with its attendant evils. As therefore, through our flight from divinity, and the defluction of those wings which elevate us on high, we fell into this mortal abode, and thus became connected with evils, so by abandoning pa.s.sivity with a mortal nature, and by the germination of the virtues, as of certain wings, we return to the abode of pure and true good, and to the possession of divine felicity. For the essence of many subsisting as a medium between daemoniacal natures, who always have an intellectual knowledge of divinity, and those beings who are never adapted by nature to understand him, it ascends to the former and descends to the latter, through the possession and desertion of intellect. For it becomes familiar both with the divine and brutal likeness, through the amphibious condition of its nature.

When the soul therefore has recovered her pristine perfection in as great a degree as is possible, while she is an inhabitant of earth by the exercise of the cathartic and theoretic virtues, she returns after death, as he says in the Timaeus, to her kindred star, from which she fell, and enjoys a blessed life. Then, too, as he says in the Phaedrus, being winged, she governs the world in conjunction with the G.o.ds. And this indeed is the most beautiful end of her labors. This is what he calls in the Phaedo, a great contest and a mighty hope. This is the most perfect fruit of philosophy to familiarize and lead her back to things truly beautiful, to liberate her from this terrene abode as from a certain subterranean cavern of material life, elevate her to ethereal splendors, and place her in the islands of the blessed.

From this account of the human soul, that most important Platonic dogma necessarily follows, that our soul essentially contains all knowledge, and that whatever knowledge she acquires in the present life, is in reality nothing more than a recovery of what a he once possessed. This recovery is very properly called by Plato reminiscence, not as being attended with actual recollection in the present life, but as being an actual repossession of what the soul had lost through her oblivious union with the body. Alluding to this essential knowledge of the soul, which discipline evocates from its dormant retreats, Plato says in the Sophista, "that we know all things as in a dream, and are again ignorant of them, according to vigilant perception." Hence too, as Proclus well observes, it is evident that the soul does not collect her knowledge from sensibles, nor from things partial and divisible discover the whole and the one. For it is not proper to think that things which have in no respect a real subsistence, should be the leading causes of knowledge to the soul; and that things which oppose each other and are ambiguous, should precede science which has a sameness of subsistence; nor that things which are variously mutable, should be generative of reasons which are established in unity; nor that things indefinite should be the causes of definite intelligence. It is not fit, therefore, that the truth of things eternal should be received from the many, nor the discrimination of universals from sensibles, nor a judgment respecting what is good from irrational natures; but it is requisite that the soul entering within herself, should investigate herself the true and the good, and the eternal reasons of things.

We have said that discipline awakens the dormant knowledge of the soul; and Plato considered this as particularly effected by the mathematical discipline. Hence, he a.s.serts of theoretic arithmetic that it imparts no small aid to our ascent to real being, and that it liberates us from the wandering and ignorance about a sensible nature.

Geometry too is considered by him as most instrumental to the knowledge of the good, when it is not pursued for the sake of practical purposes, but as the means of ascent to an intelligible essence. Astronomy also is useful for the purpose of investigating the fabricator of all things, and contemplating as in most splendid images the ideal world, and its ineffable cause. And lastly music, when properly studied, is subservient to our ascent, viz. when from sensible we betake ourselves to the contemplation of ideal and divine harmony. Unless, however, we thus employ the mathematical discipline, the study of them is justly considered by Plato as imperfect and useless, and of no worth. For as the true end of man according to his philosophy is an a.s.similation to divinity, in the greatest perfection of which human nature is capable, whatever contributes to this is to be ardently pursued; but whatever has a different tendency, however necessary it may be to the wants and conveniences of the mere animal life, is comparatively little and vile.

Hence it necessary to pa.s.s rapidly from things visible and audible, to those which are alone seen by the eye of intellect. For the mathematical sciences, when properly studied, move the inherent knowledge of the soul; awaken its intelligence; purify its dianoetic power; call forth its essential forms from their dormant retreats; remove that oblivion and ignorance which are congenial with our birth; and dissolve the bonds arising from our union with an irrational nature. It is therefore beautifully said by Plato in the 7th book of his Republic, "that the soul through these disciplines has an organ purified and enlightened, which is blinded and buried by studies of a different kind, an organ better worth saving than ten thousand eyes, since truth becomes visible through this alone."

Dialectic, however, or the vertex of the mathematical sciences, as it is called by Plato in his Republic, is that master discipline which particularly leads us up to an intelligible essence. Of this first of sciences, which is essentially different from vulgar logic, and is the same with what Aristotle calls the first philosophy and wisdom, I have largely spoken in the introduction and notes to the Parmenides. Suffice it therefore to observe in this place, that dialectic differs from mathematical science in this, that the latter flows from, and the former is void of hypothesis. That dialectic has a power of knowing universals; that it ascends to good and the supreme cause of all; and, that it considers good as the end of its elevation; but that the mathematical science, which previously fabricates for itself definite principles, from which it evinces things consequent to such principles, does not tend to the principle, but to the conclusion. Hence Plato does not expel mathematical knowledge from the number of the sciences, but a.s.serts it to be the next in rank to that one science which is the summit of all; nor does he accuse it as ignorant of its own principles, but considers it as receiving these from the master science dialectic, and that possessing them without any demonstration, it demonstrates from these its consequent propositions.

Hence Socrates, in the Republic, speaking of the power of dialectic, says that it surrounds all disciplines like a defensive enclosure, and elevates those that use it to the good itself, and the first unities; that it purifies the eye of the soul; establishes itself in true beings, and, the one principle of all things, and ends at last in that which is no longer hypothetical. The power of dialectic, therefore, being thus great, and the ends of this path so mighty, it must by no means be confounded with arguments which are alone conversant with opinion: for the former is the guardian of sciences, and the pa.s.sage to it is through these, but the latter is perfectly dest.i.tute of disciplinative science.

To which we may add, that the method of reasoning which is founded in opinion, regards only that which is apparent; but the dialectic method endeavors to arrive at the one itself, always employing for this purpose steps of ascent, and at last beautifully ends in the nature of the good.

Very different therefore is it from the merely logical method, which presides over the demonstrative phantasy, is of a secondary nature, and is alone pleased with contentious discussions. For the dialectic of Plato for the most part employs divisions and a.n.a.lyses as primary sciences, and as imitating the progression of beings from the one, and their conversion to it again. It likewise sometimes uses definitions and demonstrations, and prior to these the definitive method, and the divisive prior to this.

On the contrary, the merely logical method, which is solely conversant with opinion, is deprived of the incontrovertible reasonings of demonstration.

The following is a specimen of the a.n.a.lytical method of Plato's dialectic.

Of a.n.a.lysis there are three species. For one is an ascent from sensibles to the first intelligibles; a second is an ascent through things demonstrated and subdemonstrated, to undemonstrated and immediate propositions; and a third proceeds from hypothesis to unhypothetical principles. Of the first of these species, Plato has given a most admirable specimen in the speech of Diotima in the Banquet. For there he ascends from the beauty about bodies to the beauty in souls; from this to the beauty in right disciplines; from this again to the beauty in laws; from the beauty in laws to the ample sea of beauty (Greek: to polu pelagos tou kalou); and thus proceeding he at length arrives at the beautiful itself.

The second species of a.n.a.lysis is as follows: It is necessary to make the thing investigated the subject of hypothesis; to survey such things as are prior to it; and to demonstrate these from things posterior, ascending to such as are prior, till we arrive at the first thing and to which we give our a.s.sent. But beginning from this, we descend synthetically to the thing investigated. Of this species, the following is an example from the Phaedrus of Plato. It is inquired if the soul is immortal; and this being hypothetically admitted, it is inquired in the next place if it is always moved. This being demonstrated, the next inquiry is if that which is always moved, is self-moved; and this again being demonstrated, it is considered whether that which is self-moved is the principle of motion, and afterwards if the principle is unbegotten.

This then being admitted as a thing acknowledged, and likewise that what is begotten is incorruptible, the demonstration of the thing proposed is thus collected. If there is a principle, it is unbegotten and incorruptible. That which is self-moved is the principle of motion. Soul is self-moved. Soul therefore (i.e. the rational soul) is incorruptible, unbegotten, and immortal.

Of the third species of a.n.a.lysis, which proceeds from the hypothetical to that which is unhypothetical, Plato has given a most beautiful specimen in the first hypothesis of his Parmenides. For here, taking for his hypothesis that the one is, he proceeds through an orderly series of negations, which are not privative of their subjects, but generative of things which are as it were, their opposites, till he at length takes away the hypothesis that the one is. For he denies of it all discourse and every appellation. And thus evidently denies of it not only that it is, but even negation. For all things are posterior to the one; viz.

things known, knowledge, and the instruments of knowledge. And thus, beginning from the hypothetical, he ends in that which is unhypothetical, and truly ineffable.

Having taken a general survey, both of the great world and the microcosm man, I shall close this account of the princ.i.p.al dogmas of Plato, with the outlines of his doctrine concerning Providence and Fate, as it is a subject of the greatest importance, and the difficulties in which it is involved are happily removed by that prince of philosophers.

In the first place, therefore, Providence, according to common conceptions, is the cause of good to the subjects of its care; and Fate is the cause of a certain connection to generated natures. This being admitted, let us consider what the things are which are connected. Of beings, therefore, some have their essence in eternity, and others in time. But by beings whose essence is in eternity, I mean those whose energy as well as their essence is eternal; and by beings essentially temporal, those whose essence is always in generation, or becoming to be, though this should take place in an infinite time. The media between these two extremes are natures which, in a certain respect, have an essence permanent and better than generation, or a flowing subsistence, but whose energy is measured by time. For it is necessary that every procession from things first to last should be effected through media.

The medium, therefore, between these two extremes, must either be that which has an eternal essence, but any energy indigent of time, or, on the contrary, that which has a temporal essence, but an eternal energy. It is impossible, however, for the latter of these to have any subsistence; for if this were admitted, energy would be prior to essence. The medium, therefore, must be that whose essence is eternal, but energy temporal.

And the three orders which compose this first middle and last are, the intellectual, psychical (or that pertaining to soul), and corporeal. For from what has been already said by us concerning the gradation of beings, it is evident that the intellectual order is established in eternity, both in essence and energy; that the corporeal order is always in generation, or advancing to being, and this either in an infinite time, or in a part of time; and that the psychical is indeed eternal in essence, but temporal in energy. Where then shall we rank things which being distributed either in places or times, have a certain coordination and sympathy with each other through connection? It is evident that they must be ranked among altermotive and corporeal natures. For of things which subsist beyond the order of bodies, some are better both than place and time; and others, though they energize according to time, appear to be entirely pure from any connection with place.