Part 6
Again, there are the legal and political principles of morals--freedom, equality, rights of persons; 'Every man to count for one and no man for more than one,' 'Every man equal in the eye of the law and of the legislator.' There is also the other sort of political morality, which if not beginning with 'Might is right,' at any rate seeks to deduce our ideas of justice from the necessities of the state and of society. According to this view the greatest good of men is obedience to law: the best human government is a rational despotism, and the best idea which we can form of a divine being is that of a despot acting not wholly without regard to law and order. To such a view the present mixed state of the world, not wholly evil or wholly good, is supposed to be a witness. More we might desire to have, but are not permitted. Though a human tyrant would be intolerable, a divine tyrant is a very tolerable governor of the universe. This is the doctrine of Thrasymachus adapted to the public opinion of modern times.
There is yet a third view which combines the two:--freedom is obedience to the law, and the greatest order is also the greatest freedom; 'Act so that thy action may be the law of every intelligent being.' This view is noble and elevating; but it seems to err, like other transcendental principles of ethics, in being too abstract. For there is the same difficulty in connecting the idea of duty with particular duties as in bridging the gulf between phainomena and onta; and when, as in the system of Kant, this universal idea or law is held to be independent of space and time, such a mataion eidos becomes almost unmeaning.
Once more there are the religious principles of morals:--the will of God revealed in Scripture and in nature. No philosophy has supplied a sanction equal in authority to this, or a motive equal in strength to the belief in another life. Yet about these too we must ask What will of God? how revealed to us, and by what proofs? Religion, like happiness, is a word which has great influence apart from any consideration of its content: it may be for great good or for great evil. But true religion is the synthesis of religion and morality, beginning with divine perfection in which all human perfection is embodied. It moves among ideas of holiness, justice, love, wisdom, truth; these are to God, in whom they are personified, what the Platonic ideas are to the idea of good. It is the consciousness of the will of God that all men should be as he is. It lives in this world and is known to us only through the phenomena of this world, but it extends to worlds beyond. Ordinary religion which is alloyed with motives of this world may easily be in excess, may be fanatical, may be interested, may be the mask of ambition, may be perverted in a thousand ways. But of that religion which combines the will of God with our highest ideas of truth and right there can never be too much. This impossibility of excess is the note of divine moderation.
So then, having briefly passed in review the various principles of moral philosophy, we may now arrange our goods in order, though, like the reader of the Philebus, we have a difficulty in distinguishing the different aspects of them from one another, or defining the point at which the human passes into the divine.
First, the eternal will of God in this world and in another,--justice, holiness, wisdom, love, without succession of acts (ouch e genesis prosestin), which is known to us in part only, and reverenced by us as divine perfection.
Secondly, human perfection, or the fulfilment of the will of God in this world, and co-operation with his laws revealed to us by reason and experience, in nature, history, and in our own minds.
Thirdly, the elements of human perfection,--virtue, knowledge, and right opinion.
Fourthly, the external conditions of perfection,--health and the goods of life.
Fifthly, beauty and happiness,--the inward enjoyment of that which is best and fairest in this world and in the human soul.
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The Philebus is probably the latest in time of the writings of Plato with the exception of the Laws. We have in it therefore the last development of his philosophy. The extreme and one-sided doctrines of the Cynics and Cyrenaics are included in a larger whole; the relations of pleasure and knowledge to each other and to the good are authoritatively determined; the Eleatic Being and the Heraclitean Flux no longer divide the empire of thought; the Mind of Anaxagoras has become the Mind of God and of the World. The great distinction between pure and applied science for the first time has a place in philosophy; the natural claim of dialectic to be the Queen of the Sciences is once more affirmed. This latter is the bond of union which pervades the whole or nearly the whole of the Platonic writings. And here as in several other dialogues (Phaedrus, Republic, etc.) it is presented to us in a manner playful yet also serious, and sometimes as if the thought of it were too great for human utterance and came down from heaven direct. It is the organization of knowledge wonderful to think of at a time when knowledge itself could hardly be said to exist. It is this more than any other element which distinguishes Plato, not only from the presocratic philosophers, but from Socrates himself.
We have not yet reached the confines of Aristotle, but we make a somewhat nearer approach to him in the Philebus than in the earlier Platonic writings. The germs of logic are beginning to appear, but they are not collected into a whole, or made a separate science or system. Many thinkers of many different schools have to be interposed between the Parmenides or Philebus of Plato, and the Physics or Metaphysics of Aristotle. It is this interval upon which we have to fix our minds if we would rightly understand the character of the transition from one to the other. Plato and Aristotle do not dovetail into one another; nor does the one begin where the other ends; there is a gulf between them not to be measured by time, which in the fragmentary state of our knowledge it is impossible to bridge over. It follows that the one cannot be interpreted by the other. At any rate, it is not Plato who is to be interpreted by Aristotle, but Aristotle by Plato. Of all philosophy and of all art the true understanding is to be sought not in the afterthoughts of posterity, but in the elements out of which they have arisen. For the previous stage is a tendency towards the ideal at which they are aiming; the later is a declination or deviation from them, or even a perversion of them. No man's thoughts were ever so well expressed by his disciples as by himself.
But although Plato in the Philebus does not come into any close connexion with Aristotle, he is now a long way from himself and from the beginnings of his own philosophy. At the time of his death he left his system still incomplete; or he may be more truly said to have had no system, but to have lived in the successive stages or moments of metaphysical thought which presented themselves from time to time. The earlier discussions about universal ideas and definitions seem to have died away; the correlation of ideas has taken their place. The flowers of rhetoric and poetry have lost their freshness and charm; and a technical language has begun to supersede and overgrow them. But the power of thinking tends to increase with age, and the experience of life to widen and deepen. The good is summed up under categories which are not summa genera, but heads or gradations of thought. The question of pleasure and the relation of bodily pleasures to mental, which is hardly treated of elsewhere in Plato, is here analysed with great subtlety. The mean or measure is now made the first principle of good. Some of these questions reappear in Aristotle, as does also the distinction between metaphysics and mathematics. But there are many things in Plato which have been lost in Aristotle; and many things in Aristotle not to be found in Plato. The most remarkable deficiency in Aristotle is the disappearance of the Platonic dialectic, which in the Aristotelian school is only used in a comparatively unimportant and trivial sense. The most remarkable additions are the invention of the Syllogism, the conception of happiness as the foundation of morals, the reference of human actions to the standard of the better mind of the world, or of the one 'sensible man' or 'superior person.' His conception of ousia, or essence, is not an advance upon Plato, but a return to the poor and meagre abstractions of the Eleatic philosophy. The dry attempt to reduce the presocratic philosophy by his own rather arbitrary standard of the four causes, contrasts unfavourably with Plato's general discussion of the same subject (Sophist). To attempt further to sum up the differences between the two great philosophers would be out of place here. Any real discussion of their relation to one another must be preceded by an examination into the nature and character of the Aristotelian writings and the form in which they have come down to us. This enquiry is not really separable from an investigation of Theophrastus as well as Aristotle and of the remains of other schools of philosophy as well as of the Peripatetics. But, without entering on this wide field, even a superficial consideration of the logical and metaphysical works which pass under the name of Aristotle, whether we suppose them to have come directly from his hand or to be the tradition of his school, is sufficient to show how great was the mental activity which prevailed in the latter half of the fourth century B.C.; what eddies and whirlpools of controversies were surging in the chaos of thought, what transformations of the old philosophies were taking place everywhere, what eclecticisms and syncretisms and realisms and nominalisms were affecting the mind of Hellas. The decline of philosophy during this period is no less remarkable than the loss of freedom; and the two are not unconnected with each other. But of the multitudinous sea of opinions which were current in the age of Aristotle we have no exact account. We know of them from allusions only. And we cannot with advantage fill up the void of our knowledge by conjecture: we can only make allowance for our ignorance.
There are several passages in the Philebus which are very characteristic of Plato, and which we shall do well to consider not only in their connexion, but apart from their connexion as inspired sayings or oracles which receive their full interpretation only from the history of philosophy in later ages. The more serious attacks on traditional beliefs which are often veiled under an unusual simplicity or irony are of this kind. Such, for example, is the excessive and more than human awe which Socrates expresses about the names of the gods, which may be not unaptly compared with the importance attached by mankind to theological terms in other ages; for this also may be comprehended under the satire of Socrates. Let us observe the religious and intellectual enthusiasm which shines forth in the following, 'The power and faculty of loving the truth, and of doing all things for the sake of the truth': or, again, the singular acknowledgment which may be regarded as the anticipation of a new logic, that 'In going to war for mind I must have weapons of a different make from those which I used before, although some of the old ones may do again.' Let us pause awhile to reflect on a sentence which is full of meaning to reformers of religion or to the original thinker of all ages: 'Shall we then agree with them of old time, and merely reassert the notions of others without risk to ourselves; or shall we venture also to share in the risk and bear the reproach which will await us': i.e. if we assert mind to be the author of nature. Let us note the remarkable words, 'That in the divine nature of Zeus there is the soul and mind of a King, because there is in him the power of the cause,' a saying in which theology and philosophy are blended and reconciled; not omitting to observe the deep insight into human nature which is shown by the repetition of the same thought 'All philosophers are agreed that mind is the king of heaven and earth' with the ironical addition, 'in this way truly they magnify themselves.' Nor let us pass unheeded the indignation felt by the generous youth at the 'blasphemy' of those who say that Chaos and Chance Medley created the world; or the significance of the words 'those who said of old time that mind rules the universe'; or the pregnant observation that 'we are not always conscious of what we are doing or of what happens to us,' a chance expression to which if philosophers had attended they would have escaped many errors in psychology. We may contrast the contempt which is poured upon the verbal difficulty of the one and many, and the seriousness with the unity of opposites is regarded from the higher point of view of abstract ideas: or compare the simple manner in which the question of cause and effect and their mutual dependence is regarded by Plato (to which modern science has returned in Mill and Bacon), and the cumbrous fourfold division of causes in the Physics and Metaphysics of Aristotle, for which it has puzzled the world to find a use in so many centuries. When we consider the backwardness of knowledge in the age of Plato, the boldness with which he looks forward into the distance, the many questions of modern philosophy which are anticipated in his writings, may we not truly describe him in his own words as a 'spectator of all time and of all existence'?
PHILEBUS
PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE: Socrates, Protarchus, Philebus.
SOCRATES: Observe, Protarchus, the nature of the position which you are now going to take from Philebus, and what the other position is which I maintain, and which, if you do not approve of it, is to be controverted by you. Shall you and I sum up the two sides?
PROTARCHUS: By all means.
SOCRATES: Philebus was saying that enjoyment and pleasure and delight, and the class of feelings akin to them, are a good to every living being, whereas I contend, that not these, but wisdom and intelligence and memory, and their kindred, right opinion and true reasoning, are better and more desirable than pleasure for all who are able to partake of them, and that to all such who are or ever will be they are the most advantageous of all things. Have I not given, Philebus, a fair statement of the two sides of the argument?
PHILEBUS: Nothing could be fairer, Socrates.
SOCRATES: And do you, Protarchus, accept the position which is assigned to you?
PROTARCHUS: I cannot do otherwise, since our excellent Philebus has left the field.
SOCRATES: Surely the truth about these matters ought, by all means, to be ascertained.
PROTARCHUS: Certainly.
SOCRATES: Shall we further agree--
PROTARCHUS: To what?
SOCRATES: That you and I must now try to indicate some state and disposition of the soul, which has the property of making all men happy.
PROTARCHUS: Yes, by all means.
SOCRATES: And you say that pleasure, and I say that wisdom, is such a state?
PROTARCHUS: True.
SOCRATES: And what if there be a third state, which is better than either? Then both of us are vanquished--are we not? But if this life, which really has the power of making men happy, turn out to be more akin to pleasure than to wisdom, the life of pleasure may still have the advantage over the life of wisdom.
PROTARCHUS: True.
SOCRATES: Or suppose that the better life is more nearly allied to wisdom, then wisdom conquers, and pleasure is defeated;--do you agree?
PROTARCHUS: Certainly.
SOCRATES: And what do you say, Philebus?
PHILEBUS: I say, and shall always say, that pleasure is easily the conqueror; but you must decide for yourself, Protarchus.
PROTARCHUS: You, Philebus, have handed over the argument to me, and have no longer a voice in the matter?
PHILEBUS: True enough. Nevertheless I would clear myself and deliver my soul of you; and I call the goddess herself to witness that I now do so.
PROTARCHUS: You may appeal to us; we too will be the witnesses of your words. And now, Socrates, whether Philebus is pleased or displeased, we will proceed with the argument.
SOCRATES: Then let us begin with the goddess herself, of whom Philebus says that she is called Aphrodite, but that her real name is Pleasure.
PROTARCHUS: Very good.
SOCRATES: The awe which I always feel, Protarchus, about the names of the gods is more than human--it exceeds all other fears. And now I would not sin against Aphrodite by naming her amiss; let her be called what she pleases. But Pleasure I know to be manifold, and with her, as I was just now saying, we must begin, and consider what her nature is. She has one name, and therefore you would imagine that she is one; and yet surely she takes the most varied and even unlike forms. For do we not say that the intemperate has pleasure, and that the temperate has pleasure in his very temperance,--that the fool is pleased when he is full of foolish fancies and hopes, and that the wise man has pleasure in his wisdom? and how foolish would any one be who affirmed that all these opposite pleasures are severally alike!
PROTARCHUS: Why, Socrates, they are opposed in so far as they spring from opposite sources, but they are not in themselves opposite. For must not pleasure be of all things most absolutely like pleasure,--that is, like itself?
SOCRATES: Yes, my good friend, just as colour is like colour;--in so far as colours are colours, there is no difference between them; and yet we all know that black is not only unlike, but even absolutely opposed to white: or again, as figure is like figure, for all figures are comprehended under one class; and yet particular figures may be absolutely opposed to one another, and there is an infinite diversity of them. And we might find similar examples in many other things; therefore do not rely upon this argument, which would go to prove the unity of the most extreme opposites. And I suspect that we shall find a similar opposition among pleasures.
PROTARCHUS: Very likely; but how will this invalidate the argument?
SOCRATES: Why, I shall reply, that dissimilar as they are, you apply to them a new predicate, for you say that all pleasant things are good; now although no one can argue that pleasure is not pleasure, he may argue, as we are doing, that pleasures are oftener bad than good; but you call them all good, and at the same time are compelled, if you are pressed, to acknowledge that they are unlike. And so you must tell us what is the identical quality existing alike in good and bad pleasures, which makes you designate all of them as good.
PROTARCHUS: What do you mean, Socrates? Do you think that any one who asserts pleasure to be the good, will tolerate the notion that some pleasures are good and others bad?
SOCRATES: And yet you will acknowledge that they are different from one another, and sometimes opposed?
PROTARCHUS: Not in so far as they are pleasures.
SOCRATES: That is a return to the old position, Protarchus, and so we are to say (are we?) that there is no difference in pleasures, but that they are all alike; and the examples which have just been cited do not pierce our dull minds, but we go on arguing all the same, like the weakest and most inexperienced reasoners? (Probably corrupt.)
PROTARCHUS: What do you mean?
SOCRATES: Why, I mean to say, that in self-defence I may, if I like, follow your example, and assert boldly that the two things most unlike are most absolutely alike; and the result will be that you and I will prove ourselves to be very tyros in the art of disputing; and the argument will be blown away and lost. Suppose that we put back, and return to the old position; then perhaps we may come to an understanding with one another.
PROTARCHUS: How do you mean?
SOCRATES: Shall I, Protarchus, have my own question asked of me by you?
PROTARCHUS: What question?
SOCRATES: Ask me whether wisdom and science and mind, and those other qualities which I, when asked by you at first what is the nature of the good, affirmed to be good, are not in the same case with the pleasures of which you spoke.
PROTARCHUS: What do you mean?
SOCRATES: The sciences are a numerous class, and will be found to present great differences. But even admitting that, like the pleasures, they are opposite as well as different, should I be worthy of the name of dialectician if, in order to avoid this difficulty, I were to say (as you are saying of pleasure) that there is no difference between one science and another;--would not the argument founder and disappear like an idle tale, although we might ourselves escape drowning by clinging to a fallacy?
PROTARCHUS: May none of this befal us, except the deliverance! Yet I like the even-handed justice which is applied to both our arguments. Let us assume, then, that there are many and diverse pleasures, and many and different sciences.
SOCRATES: And let us have no concealment, Protarchus, of the differences between my good and yours; but let us bring them to the light in the hope that, in the process of testing them, they may show whether pleasure is to be called the good, or wisdom, or some third quality; for surely we are not now simply contending in order that my view or that yours may prevail, but I presume that we ought both of us to be fighting for the truth.
PROTARCHUS: Certainly we ought.
SOCRATES: Then let us have a more definite understanding and establish the principle on which the argument rests.
PROTARCHUS: What principle?
SOCRATES: A principle about which all men are always in a difficulty, and some men sometimes against their will.
PROTARCHUS: Speak plainer.
SOCRATES: The principle which has just turned up, which is a marvel of nature; for that one should be many or many one, are wonderful propositions; and he who affirms either is very open to attack.
PROTARCHUS: Do you mean, when a person says that I, Protarchus, am by nature one and also many, dividing the single 'me' into many 'me's,' and even opposing them as great and small, light and heavy, and in ten thousand other ways?
SOCRATES: Those, Protarchus, are the common and acknowledged paradoxes about the one and many, which I may say that everybody has by this time agreed to dismiss as childish and obvious and detrimental to the true course of thought; and no more favour is shown to that other puzzle, in which a person proves the members and parts of anything to be divided, and then confessing that they are all one, says laughingly in disproof of his own words: Why, here is a miracle, the one is many and infinite, and the many are only one.