Chapter 1 of 37 · 3297 words · ~16 min read

Part 1

# A History of Philosophy in Epitome ### By Schwegler, Albert

---

───────────────────────────────────────────────── Transcriber’s note:

The letters A and B with the plus sign at the top are shown as A⁺ and B⁺. ─────────────────────────────────────────────────

HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY

IN EPITOME,

DR. ALBERT SCHWEGLER.

_TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL GERMAN_,

JULIUS H. SEELYE.

THIRD EDITION.

NEW YORK: D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 443 & 445 BROADWAY. LONDON: 16 LITTLE BRITAIN. 1864.

ENTERED, according to act of Congress, in the year 1856,

BY JULIUS H. SEELYE,

In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States for the Northern District of New York.

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

BY HENRY B. SMITH, D. D.

The History of Philosophy, by Dr. Albert Schwegler, is considered in Germany as the best concise manual upon the subject from the school of Hegel. Its account of the Greek and of the German systems, is of especial value and importance. It presents the whole history of speculation in its consecutive order. Though following the method of Hegel’s more extended lectures upon the progress of philosophy, and though it makes the system of Hegel to be the ripest product of philosophy, yet it also rests upon independent investigations. It will well reward diligent study, and is one of the best works for a text-book in our colleges, upon this neglected branch of scientific investigation. The translation is made by a competent person, and gives, I doubt not, a faithful rendering of the original.

HENRY B. SMITH.

UNION THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY, NEW YORK, _Nov. 6, 1855_.

TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE.

Schwegler’s History of Philosophy originally appeared in the “_Neue Encyklopädie für Wissenschaften und Künste_.” Its great value soon awakened a call for its separate issue, in which form it has attained a very wide circulation in Germany. It is found in the hands of almost every student in the philosophical department of a German university, and is highly esteemed for its clearness, conciseness, and comprehensiveness.

The present translation was commenced in Germany three years ago, and has been carefully finished. It was undertaken with the conviction that the work would not lose its interest or its value in an English dress, and with the hope that it might be of wider service in such a form to students of philosophy here. It was thought especially, that a proper translation of this manual would supply a want for a suitable text-book on this branch of study, long felt by both teachers and students in our American colleges.

The effort has been made to translate, and not to paraphrase the author’s meaning. Many of his statements might have been amplified without diffuseness, and made more perceptible to the superficial reader without losing their interest to the more profound student, but he has so happily seized upon the germs of the different systems, that they neither need, nor would be improved by any farther development, and has, moreover, presented them so clearly, that no student need have any difficulty in apprehending them as they are. The translator has therefore endeavored to represent faithfully and clearly the original history. As such, he offers his work to the American public, indulging no hope, and making no efforts for its success beyond that which its own merits shall ensure.

J. H. S.

SCHENECTADY, N. Y., _January, 1856_.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

INTRODUCTORY NOTE, by HENRY B. SMITH, D. D. iii

TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE v

TABLE OF CONTENTS vii

SECTION I.—WHAT IS MEANT BY THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 11

II.—CLASSIFICATION 16

III.—GENERAL VIEW OF THE PRE-SOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 17 1. The Ionics 17 2. The Pythagoreans 18 3. The Eleatics 18 4. Heraclitus 18 5. The Atomists 19 6. Anaxagoras 19 7. The Sophists 20

IV.—THE IONIC PHILOSOPHERS 21 1. Thales 21 2. Anaximander 22 3. Anaximenes 23 4. Retrospect 23

V.—PYTHAGOREANISM 23 1. Its Relative Position 23 2. Historical and Chronological 23 3. The Pythagorean Principle 24 4. Carrying out of this Principle 25

VI.—THE ELEATICS 27 1. The Relation of the Eleatic Principle to the Pythagorean 27 2. Xenophanes 28 3. Parmenides 28 4. Zeno 30

VII.—HERACLITUS 31 1. Relation of the Heraclitic Principle to the Eleatic 31 2. Historical and Chronological 32 3. The Principle of the Becoming 32 4. The Principle of Fire 33 5. Transition to the Atomists 33

VIII.—EMPEDOCLES 35 1. General View 35 2. The Four Elements 35 3. The Two Powers 36 4. Relation of the Empedoclean to the Eleatic and Heraclitic Philosophy 36

IX.—THE ATOMISTIC PHILOSOPHY 37 1. Its Propounders 37 2. The Atoms 37 3. The Fulness and the Void 38 4. The Atomistic Necessity 38 5. Relative Position of the Atomistic Philosophy 39

X.—ANAXAGORAS 40 1. His Personal History 40 2. His Relation to his Predecessors 41 3. The Principle of the νοῦς 41 4. Anaxagoras as the close of the Pre-Socratic Realism 42

XI.—THE SOPHISTIC PHILOSOPHY 43 1. The Relation of the Sophistic Philosophy to the Anaxagorean Principle 43 2. Relation of the Sophistic Philosophy to the Universal Life of that Age 44 3. Tendencies of the Sophistic Philosophy 46 4. Significance of the Sophistic Philosophy from its relation to the Culture of the Age 47 5. Individual Sophists 48 6. Transition to Socrates, and characteristic of the following Period 51

XII.—SOCRATES 52 1. His Personal Character 52 2. Socrates and Aristophanes 55 3. The Condemnation of Socrates 57 4. The Genius of Socrates 60 5. Sources of the Philosophy of Socrates 61 6. Universal Character of the Philosophizing of Socrates 62 7. The Socratic Method 64 8. The Socratic Doctrine concerning Virtue 66

XIII.—THE PARTIAL DISCIPLES OF SOCRATES 67 1. Their Relation to the Socratic Philosophy 67 2. Antisthenes and the Cynics 68 3. Aristippus and the Cyrenians 69 4. Euclid and the Megarians 70 5. Plato as the complete Socraticist 71

XIV.—PLATO 72 I. PLATO’S LIFE 72 1. His Youth 72 2. His Years of Discipline 73 3. His Years of Travel 73 4. His Years of Instruction 74

II. THE INNER DEVELOPMENT OF THE PLATONIC PHILOSOPHY AND WRITINGS 75

III. CLASSIFICATION OF THE PLATONIC SYSTEM 82

IV. THE PLATONIC DIALECTICS 83 1. Conception of Dialectics 83 2. What is Science? 84 (1.) As opposed to Sensation 84 (2.) The Relation of Knowing to Opinion 86 (3.) The Relation of Science to Thinking 86 3. The Doctrine of Ideas in its Genesis 87 4. Positive Exposition of the Doctrine of Ideas 91 5. The Relation of Ideas to the Phenomenal World 93 6. The Idea of the Good and the Deity 95

V. THE PLATONIC PHYSICS 96 1. Nature 96 2. The Soul 98

VI. THE PLATONIC ETHICS 100 1. Good and Pleasure 100 2. Virtue 102 3. The State 102

XV.—THE OLD ACADEMY 107

XVI.—ARISTOTLE 108 I. LIFE AND WRITINGS OF ARISTOTLE 108 II. UNIVERSAL CHARACTER AND DIVISION OF THE ARISTOTELIAN PHILOSOPHY 109 III. LOGIC AND METAPHYSICS 112 1. Conception and Relation of the Two 112 2. Logic 113 3. Metaphysics 115 (1.) The Aristotelian Criticism of the Platonic Doctrine of Ideas 116 (2.) The Four Aristotelian Principles, or Causes, and the Relation of Form and Matter 120 (3.) Potentiality and Actuality 123 (4.) The Absolute Divine Spirit 124 IV. THE ARISTOTELIAN PHYSICS 127 1. Motion, Matter, Space, and Time 127 2. The Collective Universe 128 3. Nature 129 4. Man 129 V. THE ARISTOTELIAN ETHICS 131 1. Relation of Ethics to Physics 131 2. The Highest Good 132 3. Conception of Virtue 134 4. The State 135 VI. THE PERIPATETIC SCHOOL 136 VII. TRANSITION TO THE POST-ARISTOTELIAN PHILOSOPHY 137

XVII.—STOICISM 138 1. Logic 139 2. Physics 140 3. Ethics 142 (1.) Respecting the Relation of Virtue to Pleasure 142 (2.) The View of the Stoics concerning External Good 142 (3.) Farther Verification of this View 143 (4.) Impossibility of furnishing a System of Concrete Moral Duties from this Standpoint 143

XVIII.-EPICUREANISM 145

XIX.—SCEPTICISM AND THE NEW ACADEMY 148 1. The Old Scepticism 149 2. The New Academy 150 3. The Later Scepticism 151

XX.—THE ROMANS 152

XXI.—NEW PLATONISM 154 1. Ecstasy as a Subjective State 154 2. The Cosmical Principles 154 3. The Emanation Theory of the New Platonists 155

XXII.—CHRISTIANITY AND SCHOLASTICISM 157 1. The Christian Idea 157 2. Scholasticism 159 3. Nominalism and Realism 160

XXIII.—TRANSITION TO THE MODERN PHILOSOPHY 161 1. Fall of Scholasticism 161 2. The Results of Scholasticism 162 3. The Revival of Letters 163 4. The German Reformation 164 5. The Advancement of the Natural Sciences 165 6. Bacon of Verulam 166 7. The Italian Philosophers of the Transition Epoch 167 8. Jacob Boehme 169

XXIV.—DESCARTES 172 1. The Beginning of Philosophy with Doubt 173 2. Cogito ergo sum 173 3. The Nature of Mind deduced from this Principle 173 4. The Universal Rule of all Certainty follows from the same 174 5. The Existence of God 174 6. Results of this Fact in Philosophy 176 7. The Two Substances 177 8. The Anthropology of Descartes 177 9. Results of the Cartesian System 178

XXV.—GEULINCX AND MALEBRANCHE 180 1. Geulincx 180 2. Malebranche 182 3. The Defects of the Philosophy of Descartes 183

XXVI.—SPINOZA 184 1. The One Infinite Substance 185 2. The Two Attributes 186 3. The Modes 188 4. His Practical Philosophy 189

XXVII.—IDEALISM AND REALISM 192

XXVIII.—LOCKE 193

XXIX.—HUME 198

XXX.—CONDILLAC 201

XXXI.—HELVETIUS 203

XXXII.-THE FRENCH CLEARING UP AND MATERIALISM 205 1. The Common Character of the French Philosophers of this Age 205 2. Voltaire 206 3. Diderot 206 4. La Mettrie’s Materialism 207 5. Système de la Nature 208 (1.) The Materiality of Man 208 (2.) The Atheism of this System 209 (3.) Its Denial of Freedom and Immortality 210 (4.) The Practical Consequences of these Principles 210

XXXIII.—LEIBNITZ 211 1. The Doctrine of Monads 213 2. The Monads more accurately determined 214 3. The Pre-established Harmony 215 4. The Relation of the Deity to the Monads 216 5. The Relation of Soul and Body 217 6. The Theory of Knowledge 218 7. Leibnitz’s Théodicée 219

XXXIV.—BERKELEY 220

XXXV.—WOLFF 222 1. Ontology 224 2. Cosmology 225 3. Rational Psychology 225 4. Natural Theology 226

XXXVI.—THE GERMAN CLEARING UP 227

XXXVII.—TRANSITION TO KANT 229 1. Examination of the Faculty of Knowledge 230 2. Three Chief Principles of the Kantian Theory of Knowledge 232

XXXVIII.—KANT 235 I. CRITICK OF PURE REASON 238 1. The Transcendental Æsthetics 238 (1.) The Metaphysical Discussion 239 (2.) The Transcendental Discussion 239 2. The Transcendental Analytic 241 3. The Transcendental Dialectics 246 (1.) The Psychological Ideas 247 (2.) The Antinomies of Cosmology 248 (3.) The Ideal of the Pure Reason 249 (_a._) The Ontological Proof 249 (_b._) The Cosmological Proof 250 (_c._) The Physico-Theological Proof 250 II. CRITICK OF THE PRACTICAL REASON 252 (1.) The Analytic 254 (2.) The Dialectic: What is this Highest Good? 256 (_a._) Perfect Virtue or Holiness 257 (_b._) Perfect Happiness 258 (_c._) Kant’s Views of Religion 259 III. CRITICK OF THE FACULTY OF JUDGMENT 262 1. Critick of the Æsthetic Faculty of Judgment 263 (1.) Analytic 263 (2.) Dialectic 265 2. Critick of the Teleological Faculty of Judgment 266 (1.) Analytic of the Teleological Faculty of Judgment 267 (2.) Dialectic 267

XXXIX.—TRANSITION TO THE POST-KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY 268

XL.—JACOBI 271

XLI.—FICHTE 279 I. THE FICHTIAN PHILOSOPHY IN ITS ORIGINAL FORM 282 1. The Theoretical Philosophy of Fichte, his Wissenschaftslehre, or Theory of Science 282 2. Fichte’s Practical Philosophy 295 II. THE LATER FORM OF FICHTE’S PHILOSOPHY 301

XLII.—HERBART 303 1. The Basis and Starting Point of Philosophy 304 2. The First Act of Philosophy 304 3. Remodelling the Conceptions of Experience 305 4. Herbart’s Reals 306 5. Psychology connected with Metaphysics 310 6. The Importance of Herbart’s Philosophy 311

XLIII.—SCHELLING 312 I. FIRST PERIOD: SCHELLING’S PROCESSION FROM FICHTE 314 II. SECOND PERIOD: STANDPOINT OF THE DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN THE PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE AND OF MIND 318 1. Natural Philosophy 318 (1.) Organic Nature 319 (2.) Inorganic Nature 321 (3.) The Reciprocal Determination of the Organic and Inorganic World 321 2. Transcendental Philosophy 322 (1.) The Theoretical Philosophy 323 (2.) The Practical Philosophy 324 (3.) Philosophy of Art 324 III. THIRD PERIOD: PERIOD OF SPINOZISM, OR THE INDIFFERENCE OF THE IDEAL AND THE REAL 326 IV. FOURTH PERIOD: THE DIRECTION OF SCHELLING’S PHILOSOPHY AS MYSTICAL, AND ALLIED TO NEW PLATONISM 333 V. FIFTH PERIOD: ATTEMPT AT A THEOGONY AND COSMOGONY, AFTER THE MANNER OF JACOB BOEHME 335 (1.) The Progressive Development of Nature to Man 337 (2.) The Development of Mind in History 337 VI. SIXTH PERIOD 338

XLIV.—TRANSITION TO HEGEL 339

XLV.—HEGEL 343 I. SCIENCE OF LOGIC 346 1. The Doctrine of Being 347 (1.) Quality 347 (2.) Quantity 348 (3.) Measure 348 2. The Doctrine of Essence 349 (1.) The Essence as such 349 (2.) Essence and Phenomenon 350 (3.) Actuality 351 3. The Doctrine of the Conception 352 (1.) The Subjective Conception 352 (2.) Objectivity 353 (3.) The Idea 353 II. THE SCIENCE OF NATURE 353 1. Mechanics 354 2. Physics 355 3. Organics 355 (1.) Geological Organism 355 (2.) Vegetable Organism 355 (3.) Animal Organism 356 III. PHILOSOPHY OF MIND 356 1. The Subjective Mind 356 2. The Objective Mind 358 3. The Absolute Mind 362 (1.) Æsthetics 363 (_a._) Architecture 363 (_b._) Sculpture 363 (_c._) Painting 364 (_d._) Music 364 (_e._) Poetry 364 (2.) Philosophy of Religion 364 (_a._) The Natural Religion of the Oriental World 364 (_b._) The Religion of Mental Individuality 364 (_c._) Revealed, or the Christian Religion 365 (3.) Absolute Philosophy 365

HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

SECTION I.

WHAT IS MEANT BY THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.

To philosophize is to reflect; to examine things, in thought.

Yet in this is the conception of philosophy not sufficiently defined. Man, as thinking, also employs those practical activities concerned in the adaptation of means to an end; the whole body of sciences also, even those which do not in strict sense belong to philosophy, still lie in the realm of thought. In what, then, is philosophy distinguished from these sciences, _e. g._ from the science of astronomy, of medicine, or of rights? Certainly not in that it has a different material to work upon. Its material is precisely the same as that of the different empirical sciences. The construction and disposition of the universe, the arrangement and functions of the human body, the doctrines of property, of rights and of the state—all these materials belong as truly to philosophy as to their appropriate sciences. That which is given in the world of experience, that which is real, is the content likewise of philosophy. It is not, therefore, in its material but in its form, in its method, in its mode of knowledge, that philosophy is to be distinguished from the empirical sciences. These latter derive their material directly from experience; they find it at hand and take it up just as they find it. Philosophy, on the other hand, is never satisfied with receiving that which is given simply as it is given, but rather follows it out to its ultimate grounds; it examines every individual thing in reference to a final principle, and considers it as one link in the whole chain of knowledge. In this way philosophy removes from the individual thing given in experience, its immediate, individual, and accidental character; from the sea of empirical individualities, it brings out that which is common to all; from the infinite and orderless mass of contingencies it finds that which is necessary, and throws over all a universal law. In short, philosophy examines the _totality_ of experience in the form of an _organic system_ in harmony with the laws of thought. From the above it is seen, that philosophy (in the sense we have given it) and the empirical sciences have a reciprocal influence; the latter conditioning the former, while they at the same time are conditioned by it. We shall, therefore, in the history of the world, no more find an absolute and complete philosophy, than a complete empirical science (_Empirik_). Rather is philosophy found only in the form of the different philosophical systems, which have successively appeared in the course of history, advancing hand in hand with the progress of the empirical sciences and the universal, social, and civil culture, and showing in their advance the different steps in the development and improvement of human science. The history of philosophy has, for its object, to represent the content, the succession, and the inner connection of these philosophical systems.

The relation of these different systems to each other is thus already intimated. The historical and collective life of the race is bound together by the idea of a spiritual and intellectual progress, and manifests a regular order of advancing, though not always continuous, stages of development. In this, the fact harmonizes with what we should expect from antecedent probabilities. Since, therefore, every philosophical system is only the philosophical expression of the collective life of its time, it follows that these different systems which have appeared in history will disclose one organic movement and form together one rational and internally connected (_gegliedertes_) system. In all their developments, we shall find one constant order, grounded in the striving of the spirit ever to raise itself to a higher point of consciousness and knowledge, and to recognize the whole spiritual and natural universe, more and more, as its outward being, as its reality, as the mirror of itself.

_Hegel_ was the first to utter these thoughts and to consider the history of philosophy as a united process, but this view, which is, in its principle, true, he has applied in a way which would destroy the freedom of human actions, and remove the very conception of contingency, _i. e._ that any thing should be contrary to reason. Hegel’s view is, that the succession of the systems of philosophy which have appeared in history, corresponds to the succession of logical categories in a system of logic. According to him, if, from the fundamental conceptions of these different philosophical systems, we remove that which pertains to their outward form or particular application, &c., so do we find the different steps of the logical conceptions (_e. g._ being, becoming, existence, being _per se_ (_fürsichseyn_) quantity, &c.). And on the other hand, if we take up the logical process by itself, we find also in it the actual historical process.

This opinion, however, can be sustained neither in its principle nor in its historical application. It is defective in its principle, because in history freedom and necessity interpenetrate, and, therefore, while we find, if we consider it in its general aspects, a rational connection running through the whole, we also see, if we look solely at its individual parts, only a play of numberless contingencies, just as the kingdom of nature, taken as a whole, reveals a rational plan in its successions, but viewed only in its parts, mocks at every attempt to reduce them to a preconceived plan. In history we have to do with free subjectivities, with individuals capable of originating actions, and have, therefore, a factor which does not admit of a previous calculation. For however accurately we may estimate the controlling conditions which may attach to an individual, from the general circumstances in which he may be placed, his age, his associations, his nationality, &c., a free will can never be calculated like a mathematical problem. History is no example for a strict arithmetical calculation. The history of philosophy, therefore, cannot admit of an apriori construction; the actual occurrences should not be joined together as illustrative of a preconceived plan; but the facts, so far as they can be admitted, after a critical sifting, should be received as such, and their rational connection be analytically determined. The speculative idea can only supply the law for the arrangement and scientific connection of that which may be historically furnished.