Chapter II: Science and Religion (1)

[Sidenote: Migrations to the West.]

32. So far we have not met with any trace of direct antagonism between science and popular beliefs, though the views of the Milesian cosmologists were really as inconsistent with the religions of the people as with the mythology of the anthropomorphic poets.[169] Two things hastened the conflict—the shifting of the scene to the West, and the religious revival which swept over Hellas in the sixth century B.C.

Footnote 169:

For the theological views of Anaximander and Anaximenes, see § 22 and
30.

The chief figures in the philosophical history of the period were Pythagoras of Samos and Xenophanes of Kolophon. Both were Ionians by birth, and yet both spent the greater part of their lives in the West. We see from Herodotos how the Persian advance in Asia Minor occasioned a series of migrations to Sicily and Southern Italy;[170] and this, of course, made a great difference to philosophy as well as to religion. The new views had probably grown up so naturally and gradually in Ionia that the shock of conflict and reaction was avoided; but that could no longer be so, when they were transplanted to a region where men were wholly unprepared to receive them.

Footnote 170:

Cf. Herod. i. 170 (advice of Bias); vi. 22 sqq. (Kale Akte).

Another, though a somewhat later, effect of these migrations was to bring Science into contact with Rhetoric, one of the most characteristic products of Western Hellas. Already in Parmenides we may note the presence of that dialectical and controversial spirit which was destined to have so great an influence on Greek thought, and it was just this fusion of the art of arguing for victory with the search for truth that before long gave birth to Logic.

[Sidenote: The religious revival.]

33. Most important of all in its influence on philosophy was the religious revival which culminated about this time. The religion of continental Hellas had developed in a very different way from that of Ionia. In particular, the worship of Dionysos, which came from Thrace, and is barely mentioned in Homer, contained in germ a wholly new way of looking at man’s relation to the world. It would certainly be wrong to credit the Thracians themselves with any very exalted views; but there can be no doubt that, to the Greeks, the phenomenon of ecstasy suggested that the soul was something more than a feeble double of the self, and that it was only when “out of the body” it could show its true nature.[171] To a less extent, such ideas were also suggested by the worship of Demeter, whose mysteries were celebrated at Eleusis; though, in later days, these came to take the leading place in men’s minds. That was because they were incorporated in the public religion of Athens.

Footnote 171:

On all this, see Rohde, _Psyche_, pp. 327 sqq. It is probable that he
exaggerated the degree to which these ideas were already developed
among the Thracians, but the essential connexion of the new view of
the soul with Northern worships is confirmed by the tradition over and
over again.

Before the time with which we are dealing, tradition shows us dimly an age of inspired prophets—Bakides and Sibyls—followed by one of strange medicine-men like Abaris and Aristeas of Prokonnesos. With Epimenides of Crete, we touch the fringe of history, while Pherekydes of Syros is the contemporary of the early cosmologists, and we still have some fragments of his discourse. It looked as if Greek religion were about to enter upon the same stage as that already reached by the religions of the East; and, but for the rise of science, it is hard to see what could have checked this tendency. It is usual to say that the Greeks were saved from a religion of the Oriental type by their having no priesthood; but this is to mistake the effect for the cause. Priesthoods do not make dogmas, though they preserve them once they are made; and in the earlier stages of their development, the Oriental peoples had no priesthoods either in the sense intended.[172] It was not so much the absence of a priesthood as the existence of the scientific schools that saved Greece.

Footnote 172:

See Meyer, _Gesch. des Alterth._ ii. § 461. The exaggerated rôle often
attributed to priesthoods is a survival of French eighteenth century
thinking.

[Sidenote: The Orphic religion.]

34. The new religion—for in one sense it was new, though in another as old as mankind—reached its highest point of development with the foundation of the Orphic communities. So far as we can see, the original home of these was Attika; but they spread with extraordinary rapidity, especially in Southern Italy and Sicily.[173] They were first of all associations for the worship of Dionysos; but they were distinguished by two features which were new among the Hellenes. They looked to a revelation as the source of religious authority, and they were organised as artificial communities. The poems which contained their theology were ascribed to the Thracian Orpheus, who had himself descended into Hades, and was therefore a safe guide through the perils which beset the disembodied soul in the next world. We have considerable remains of this literature, but they are mostly of late date, and cannot safely be used as evidence for the beliefs of the sixth century. We do know, however, that the leading ideas of Orphicism were quite early. A number of thin gold plates with Orphic verses inscribed on them have been discovered in Southern Italy;[174] and though these are somewhat later in date than the period with which we are dealing, they belong to the time when Orphicism was a living creed and not a fantastic revival. What can be made out from them as to the doctrine has a startling resemblance to the beliefs which were prevalent in India about the same time, though it seems impossible that there should have been any actual contact between India and Greece at this date. The main purpose of the _Orgia_[175] was to “purify” the believer’s soul, and so enable it to escape from the “wheel of birth,” and it was for the better attainment of this end that the Orphics were organised in communities. Religious associations must have been known to the Greeks from a fairly early date;[176] but the oldest of these were based, at least in theory, on the tie of kindred blood. What was new was the institution of communities to which any one might be admitted by initiation.[177] This was, in fact, the establishment of churches, though there is no evidence that these were connected with each other in such a way that we could rightly speak of them as a single church. The Pythagoreans came nearer to realising that.

Footnote 173:

See E. Meyer, _Gesch. des Alterth._ ii. §§ 453-460, who rightly
emphasises the fact that the Orphic theogony is the continuation of
Hesiod’s work. As we have seen, some of it is even older than Hesiod.

Footnote 174:

For the gold plates of Thourioi and Petelia, see the Appendix to Miss
Harrison’s _Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion_, where the
text of them is discussed and a translation given by Professor Gilbert
Murray.

Footnote 175:

This was the oldest name for these “mysteries,” and it simply means
“sacraments” (cf. ἔοργα). _Orgia_ are not necessarily “orgiastic.”
That association of ideas merely comes from the fact that they
belonged to the worship of Dionysos.

Footnote 176:

Herodotos mentions that Isagoras and those of his γένος worshipped the
Karian Zeus (v. 66), and it is probable that the _Orgeones_ attached
by Kleisthenes to the Attic _phratriai_ were associations of this
kind. See Foucart, _Les associations religieuses chez les Grecs_.

Footnote 177:

A striking parallel is afforded to all this by what we are told in
Robertson Smith’s _Religion of the Semites_, p. 339. “The leading
feature that distinguished them” (the Semitic mysteries of the seventh
century B.C.) “from the old public cults with which they came into
competition, is that they were not based on the principle of
nationality, but sought recruits from men of every race who were
willing to accept initiation through the mystic sacraments.”

[Sidenote: Philosophy as a Way of Life.]

35. We have to take account of the religious revival here, chiefly because it suggested the view that philosophy was above all a “way of life.” Science too was a “purification,” a means of escape from the “wheel.” This is the view expressed so strongly in Plato’s _Phaedo_, which was written under the influence of Pythagorean ideas.[178] Sokrates became to his followers the ideal “wise man,” and it was to this side of his personality the Cynics mainly attached themselves. From them proceeded the Stoic sage and the Christian saint, and also the whole brood of impostors whom Lucian has pilloried for our edification.[179] Saints and sages are apt to appear in questionable shapes, and Apollonios of Tyana showed in the end where this view may lead. It was not wholly absent from any Greek philosophy after the days of Pythagoras. Aristotle is as much possessed by it as any one, as we may see from the Tenth Book of the _Ethics_, and as we should see still more distinctly if we possessed such works as the _Protreptikos_ in their entirety.[180] Plato, indeed, tried to make the ideal wise man of service to the state and mankind by his doctrine of the philosopher king. It was he alone, so far as we know, that insisted on philosophers descending by turns into the cave from which they had been released and coming to the help of their former fellow-prisoners.[181] That was not, however, the view that prevailed, and the “wise man” became more and more detached from the world. Apollonios of Tyana was quite entitled to regard himself as the spiritual heir of Pythagoras; for the theurgy and thaumaturgy of the late Greek schools was but the fruit of the seed sown in the generation before the Persian Wars.

Footnote 178:

The _Phaedo_ is dedicated, as it were, to Echekrates and the
Pythagorean society at Phleious, and it is evident that Plato in his
youth was impressed by the religious side of Pythagoreanism, though
the influence of Pythagorean science is not clearly marked till a
later period. Note specially the ἄτραπος of _Phd._ 66 b 4. In _Rep._
x. 600 b 1, Plato speaks of Pythagoras as the originator of a private
ὁδός τις βίου.

Footnote 179:

Cf. especially the point of view of the _Auction of Lives_ (Βίων
πρᾶσις).

Footnote 180:

For the Προτρεπτικός of Aristotle, see Bywater in _J. Phil._ ii. p.
55; Diels in _Arch._ i. p. 477; and the notes on _Ethics_, i. 5, in my
edition.

Footnote 181:

Plato, _Rep._ 520 c 1, καταβατέον οὖν ἐν μέρει. The allegory of the
Cave seems to be Orphic, and I believe Professor Stewart’s suggestion
(_Myths of Plato_, p. 252, n. 2), that Plato had the κατάβασις εἰς
Ἅιδου in mind, to be quite justified. The idea of rescuing the
“spirits in prison” is thoroughly Orphic.

[Sidenote: No doctrine in the “Mysteries.”]

36. On the other hand, it would be wrong to suppose that Orphicism or the Mysteries suggested any definite doctrines to philosophers, at least during the period which we are about to consider. We have admitted that they really implied a new view of the soul, and we might therefore have expected to find that they profoundly modified men’s theory of the world and their relation to it. The striking thing is that this did not happen. Even those philosophers who were most closely in touch with the religious movement, like Empedokles and the Pythagoreans, held views about the soul which really contradicted the theory implied by their religious practices.[182] There is no room for an immortal soul in any philosophy of this period. Up to Plato’s time immortality was never treated in a scientific way, but merely assumed in the Orphic rites, to which Plato half seriously turns for confirmation of his own teaching.[183]

Footnote 182:

For Empedokles, see § 119; for the Pythagoreans, see § 149.

Footnote 183:

Cf. _Phd._ 69 c 2, καὶ κινδυνεύουσι καὶ οἱ τὰς τελετὰς ἡμῖν οὗτοι
καταστήσαντες οὐ φαῦλοί τινες εἶναι, ἀλλὰ τῷ ὄντι πάλαι αἰνίττεσθαι
κ.τ.λ. The gentle irony of this and similar passages ought to be
unmistakable.

All this is easily accounted for. With us a religious revival generally means the vivid realisation of a new or forgotten doctrine, while ancient religion has properly no doctrine at all. “The initiated,” Aristotle said, “were not expected to learn anything, but merely to be affected in a certain way and put into a certain frame of mind.”[184] Nothing was required but that the ritual should be correctly performed, and the worshipper was free to give any explanation of it he pleased. It might be as exalted as that of Pindar and Sophokles, or as material as that of the itinerant mystery-mongers described by Plato in the _Republic_. The essential thing was that he should duly sacrifice his pig.

Footnote 184:

Arist. fr. 45, 1483 a 19, τοὺς τελουμένους οὐ μαθεῖν τι δεῖν, ἀλλὰ
παθεῖν καὶ διατεθῆναι.

I. PYTHAGORAS OF SAMOS

[Sidenote: Character of the tradition.]

37. It is no easy task to give an account of Pythagoras that can claim to be regarded as history. Our principal sources of information[185] are the Lives composed by Iamblichos, Porphyry, and Laertios Diogenes. That of Iamblichos is a wretched compilation, based chiefly on the work of the arithmetician Nikomachos of Gerasa in Judaea, and the romance of Apollonios of Tyana, who regarded himself as a second Pythagoras, and accordingly took great liberties with his materials.[186] Porphyry stands, as a writer, on a far higher level than Iamblichos; but his authorities do not inspire us with more confidence. He, too, made use of Nikomachos, and of a certain novelist called Antonius Diogenes, author of a work entitled _Marvels from beyond Thule_.[187] Diogenes quotes, as usual, a considerable number of authorities, and the statements he makes must be estimated according to the nature of the sources from which they were drawn.[188] So far, it must be confessed, our material does not seem promising. Further examination shows, however, that a good many fragments of two much older authorities, Aristoxenos and Dikaiarchos, are embedded in the mass. These writers were both disciples of Aristotle; they were natives of Southern Italy, and contemporary with the last generation of the Pythagorean school. Both wrote accounts of Pythagoras; and Aristoxenos, who was personally intimate with the last representatives of scientific Pythagoreanism, also made a collection of the sayings of his friends. Now the Neopythagorean story, as we have it in Iamblichos, is a tissue of incredible and fantastic myths; but, if we sift out the statements which go back to Aristoxenos and Dikaiarchos, we can easily construct a rational narrative, in which Pythagoras appears not as a miracle-monger and religious innovator, but simply as a moralist and statesman. We might then be tempted to suppose that this is the genuine tradition; but that would be altogether a mistake. There is, in fact, a third and still earlier stratum in the Lives, and this agrees with the latest accounts in representing Pythagoras as a wonder-worker and a religious reformer.

Footnote 185:

See E. Rohde’s admirable papers, “Die Quellen des Iamblichus in seiner
Biographie des Pythagoras” (_Rh. Mus._ xxvi., xxvii.).

Footnote 186:

Iamblichos was a disciple of Porphyry, and contemporary with
Constantine. The _Life of Pythagoras_ has been edited by Nauck (1884).
Nikomachos belongs to the beginning of the second century A.D. There
is no evidence that he added anything to the authorities he followed,
but these were already vitiated by Neopythagorean fables. Still, it is
to him we chiefly owe the preservation of the valuable evidence of
Aristoxenos.

Footnote 187:

Porphyry’s _Life of Pythagoras_ is the only considerable extract from
his _History of Philosophy_, in four books, that has survived. The
romance of Antonius is the original parodied by Lucian in his _Vera
Historia_.

Footnote 188:

The importance of the life in Laertios Diogenes lies in the fact that
it gives us the story current at Alexandria before the rise of
Neopythagoreanism and the promulgation of the gospel according to
Apollonios of Tyana.

Some of the most striking miracles of Pythagoras are related on the authority of Andron’s _Tripod_, and of Aristotle’s work on the Pythagoreans.[189] Both these treatises belong to the fourth century B.C., and are therefore untouched by Neopythagorean fancies. Further, it is only by assuming the still earlier existence of this view that we can explain the allusions of Herodotos. The Hellespontine Greeks told him that Salmoxis or Zamolxis had been a slave of Pythagoras,[190] and Salmoxis is a figure of the same class as Abaris and Aristeas.

Footnote 189:

Andron of Ephesos wrote a work on the Seven Wise Men, called _The
Tripod_, in allusion to the well-known story. The feats ascribed to
Pythagoras in the Aristotelian treatise remind us of an ecclesiastical
legend. For example, he kills a deadly snake by biting it; he was seen
at Kroton and Metapontion at the same time; he exhibited his golden
thigh at Olympia, and was addressed by a voice from heaven when
crossing the river Kasas. The same authority stated that he was
identified by the Krotoniates with Apollo Hyperboreios (Arist. fr.
186).

Footnote 190:

Herod. iv. 95.

It seems, then, that both the oldest and the latest accounts agree in representing Pythagoras as a man of the class to which Epimenides and Onomakritos belonged—in fact, as a sort of “medicine-man”; but, for some reason, there was an attempt to save his memory from this imputation, and that attempt belonged to the fourth century B.C. The significance of this will appear in the sequel.

[Sidenote: Life of Pythagoras.]

38. We may be said to know for certain that Pythagoras passed his early manhood at Samos, and was the son of Mnesarchos;[191] and he “flourished,” we are told, in the reign of Polykrates.[192] This date cannot be far wrong; for Herakleitos already speaks of him in the past tense.[193]

Footnote 191:

Cf. Herod. iv. 95, and Herakleitos, fr. 17 (R. P. 31 a). Herodotos
represents him as living at Samos. On the other hand, Aristoxenos said
that he came from one of the islands which the Athenians occupied
after expelling the Tyrrhenians (Diog. viii. 1). This suggests Lemnos,
from which the Tyrrhenian “Pelasgians” were expelled by Miltiades
(Herod. vi. 140), or possibly some other island which was occupied at
the same time. There were also Tyrrhenians at Imbros. This explains
the story that he was an Etrurian or a Tyrian. Other accounts bring
him into connexion with Phleious, but that is perhaps a pious
invention of the Pythagorean society which flourished there at the
beginning of the fourth century B.C. Pausanias (ii. 13, 1) gives it as
a Phleiasian tradition that Hippasos, the great-grandfather of
Pythagoras, had emigrated from Phleious to Samos.

Footnote 192:

Eratosthenes identified Pythagoras with the Olympic victor of Ol.
XLVIII. 1 (588/7 B.C.), but Apollodoros gave his _floruit_ as 532/1,
the era of Polykrates. He doubtless based this on the statement of
Aristoxenos quoted by Porphyry (_V. Pyth._ 9), that Pythagoras left
Samos from dislike to the tyranny of Polykrates (R. P. 53 a). For a
full discussion, see Jacoby, pp. 215 sqq.

Footnote 193:

Herakl. fr. 16, 17 (R. P. 31, 31 a).

The extensive travels attributed to Pythagoras by late writers are, of course, apocryphal. Even the statement that he visited Egypt, though far from improbable if we consider the close relations between Polykrates of Samos and Amasis, rests on no sufficient authority.[194] Herodotos, it is true, observes that the Egyptians agreed in certain practices with the rules called Orphic and Bacchic, which are really Egyptian, and with the Pythagoreans;[195] but this does not imply that the Pythagoreans derived these directly from Egypt. He says also in another place that the belief in transmigration came from Egypt, though certain Greeks, both at an earlier and a later date, had passed it off as their own. He refuses, however, to give their names, so he can hardly be referring to Pythagoras.[196] Nor does it matter; for the Egyptians did not believe in transmigration at all, and Herodotos was simply deceived by the priests or the symbolism of the monuments.

Footnote 194:

It occurs first in the _Bousiris_ of Isokrates, § 28 (R. P. 52).

Footnote 195:

Herod. ii. 81 (R. P. 52 a). The comma at Αἰγυπτίοισι is clearly right.
Herodotos believed that the worship of Dionysos was introduced from
Egypt by Melampous (ii. 49), and he means to suggest that the Orphics
got these practices from the worshippers of Bakchos, while the
Pythagoreans got them from the Orphics.

Footnote 196:

Herod. ii. 123 (R. P. _ib._). The words “whose names I know, but do
not write” cannot refer to Pythagoras; for it is only of
contemporaries that Herodotos speaks in this way (cf. i. 51; iv. 48).
Stein’s suggestion that he meant Empedokles seems to me convincing.
Herodotos may have met him at Thourioi. Nor is there any reason to
suppose that οἱ μὲν πρότερον refers specially to the Pythagoreans. If
Herodotos had ever heard of Pythagoras visiting Egypt, he would surely
have said so in one or other of these passages. There was no occasion
for reserve, as Pythagoras must have died before Herodotos was born.

Aristoxenos said that Pythagoras left Samos in order to escape from the tyranny of Polykrates.[197] It was at Kroton, a city already famous for its medical school,[198] that he founded his society. How long he remained there we do not know; he died at Metapontion, whither he had retired on the first signal of revolt against his influence.[199]

Footnote 197:

Porph. _V. Pyth._ 9 (R. P. 53 a).

Footnote 198:

From what Herodotos tells us of Demokedes (iii. 131) we can see that
the medical school of Kroton was founded before the time of
Pythagoras. Cf. Wachtler, _De Alcmaeone Crotoniata_, p. 91.

Footnote 199:

It may be taken as certain that Pythagoras spent his last days at
Metapontion; Aristoxenos said so (_ap._ Iambl. _V. Pyth._ 249), and
Cicero (_De Fin._ v. 4) speaks of the honours which continued to be
paid to his memory in that city (R. P. 57 c). Cf. also Andron, fr. 6
(_F.H.G._ ii. 347).

[Sidenote: The Order.]

39. There is no reason to believe that the detailed statements which have been handed down with regard to the organisation of the Pythagorean Order rest upon any historical basis, and in the case of many of them we can still see how they came to be made. The distinction of grades within the Order, variously called _Mathematicians_ and _Akousmatics_, _Esoterics_ and _Exoterics_, _Pythagoreans_ and _Pythagorists_,[200] is an invention designed to explain how there came to be two widely different sets of people, each calling themselves disciples of Pythagoras, in the fourth century B.C. So, too, the statement that the Pythagoreans were bound to inviolable secrecy, which goes back to Aristoxenos,[201] is intended to explain why there is no trace of the Pythagorean philosophy proper before Philolaos.

Footnote 200:

For these distinctions, see Porphyry (_V. Pyth._ 37) and Iamblichos
(_V. Pyth._ 80), quoted R. P. 56 and 56 b. The name ἀκουσματικοί is
clearly related to the ἀκούσματα, with which we shall have to deal
shortly (§ 44).

Footnote 201:

For the “mystic silence,” see Aristoxenos, _ap._ Diog. viii. 15 (R. P.
55 a). Tannery, “Sur le secret dans l’école de Pythagore” (_Arch._ i.
pp. 28 sqq.), thinks that the mathematical doctrines were the secrets
of the school, and that these were divulged by Hippasos; but the most
reasonable view is that there were no secrets at all except of a
ritual kind.

The Pythagorean Order was simply, in its origin, a religious fraternity of the type described above, and not, as has sometimes been maintained, a political league.[202] Nor had it anything to do with the “Dorian aristocratic ideal.” Pythagoras was an Ionian, and the Order was originally confined to Achaian states.[203] Nor is there the slightest evidence that the Pythagoreans favoured the aristocratic rather than the democratic party.[204] The main purpose of the Order was to secure for its own members a more adequate satisfaction of the religious instinct than that supplied by the State religion. It was, in fact, an institution for the cultivation of holiness. In this respect it resembled an Orphic society, though it seems that Apollo, rather than Dionysos, was the chief Pythagorean god. That is doubtless why the Krotoniates identified Pythagoras with Apollo Hyperboreios.[205] From the nature of the case, however, an independent society within a Greek state was apt to be brought into conflict with the larger body. The only way in which it could then assert its right to exist was by identifying the State with itself, that is, by securing the control of the sovereign power. The history of the Pythagorean Order, so far as it can be traced, is, accordingly, the history of an attempt to supersede the State; and its political action is to be explained as a mere incident of that attempt.

Footnote 202:

Plato, _Rep._ x. 600 a, implies that Pythagoras held no public office.
The view that the Pythagorean sect was a political league, maintained
in modern times by Krische (_De societatis a Pythagora conditae scopo
politico_, 1830), goes back, as Rohde has shown (_loc. cit._), to
Dikaiarchos, the champion of the “Practical Life,” just as the view
that it was primarily a scientific society goes back to the
mathematician and musician Aristoxenos. The former antedated Archytas,
just as the latter antedated Philolaos (see Chap. VII. § 138). Grote’s
good sense enabled him to see this quite clearly (vol. iv. pp. 329
sqq.).

Footnote 203:

Meyer, _Gesch. des Alterth._ ii. § 502, Anm. It is still necessary to
insist upon this, as the idea that the Pythagoreans represented the
“Dorian ideal” dies very hard. In his _Kulturhistorische Beiträge_
(Heft i. p. 59), Max C. P. Schmidt imagines that later writers call
the founder of the sect Pythagoras instead of Pythagores, as he is
called by Herakleitos and Demokritos, because he had become “a Dorian
of the Dorians.” The fact is simply that Πυθαγόρας is the Attic form
of Πυθαγόρης, and that the writers in question wrote Attic. Similarly,
Plato calls Archytas, who did belong to a Dorian state, Archytes,
though Aristoxenos and others retained the Dorian form of his name.

Footnote 204:

Kylon, the chief opponent of the Pythagoreans, is described by
Aristoxenos (Iambl. _V. Pyth._ 248) as γένει καὶ δόξῃ καὶ πλούτῳ
πρωτεύων τῶν πολιτῶν. Taras, later the chief seat of the Pythagoreans,
was a democracy. The truth is that, at this time, the new religion
appealed to the people rather than the aristocracies, which were apt
to be “free-thinking” (Meyer, _Gesch. des Alt._ iii. § 252).
Xenophanes, not Pythagoras, is their man.

Footnote 205:

We have the authority of Aristotle, fr. 186, 1510 b 20, for the
identification of Pythagoras with Apollo Hyperboreios. The names of
Abaris and Aristeas stand for a mystical movement parallel to the
Orphic, but based on the worship of Apollo. The later tradition makes
them predecessors of Pythagoras; and that this has some historical
basis, appears from Herod. iv. 13 sqq., and above all from the
statement that Aristeas had a statue at Metapontion, where Pythagoras
died. The connexion of Pythagoras with Zamolxis belongs to the same
order of ideas. As the legend of the Hyperboreans is Delian, we see
that the religion taught by Pythagoras was genuinely Ionian in its
origin.

[Sidenote: Downfall of the Order.]

40. For a time the new Order seems actually to have succeeded in securing the supreme power, but reaction came at last. Under the leadership of Kylon, a wealthy noble, Kroton was able to assert itself victoriously against the Pythagorean domination. This, we may well believe, had been galling enough. The “rule of the saints” would be nothing to it; and we can still imagine and sympathise with the irritation felt by the plain man of those days at having his legislation done for him by a set of incomprehensible pedants, who made a point of abstaining from beans, and would not let him beat his own dog because they recognised in its howls the voice of a departed friend (Xenophanes, fr. 7). This feeling would be aggravated by the private religious worship of the Society. Greek states could never pardon the introduction of new gods. Their objection to this was not, however, that the gods in question were false gods. If they had been, it would not have mattered so much. What they could not tolerate was that any one should establish a private means of communication between himself and the unseen powers. That introduced an unknown and incalculable element into the arrangements of the State, which might very likely be hostile to those citizens who had no means of propitiating the intruding divinity.

Aristoxenos’s version of the events which led to the downfall of the Pythagorean Order is given at length by Iamblichos. According to this, Pythagoras had refused to receive Kylon into his Society, and he therefore became a bitter foe of the Order. From this cause Pythagoras removed from Kroton to Metapontion, where he died. The Pythagoreans, however, still retained possession of the government of Kroton, till at last the partisans of Kylon set fire to Milo’s house, where they were assembled. Of those in the house only two, Archippos and Lysis, escaped. Archippos retired to Taras; Lysis, first to Achaia and then to Thebes, where he became later on the teacher of Epameinondas. The Pythagoreans who remained concentrated themselves at Rhegion; but, as things went from bad to worse, they all left Italy except Archippos.[206]

Footnote 206:

See Rohde, _Rh. Mus._ xxvi. p. 565, n. 1. The narrative in the text
(Iambl. _V. Pyth._ 250; R. P. 59 b) goes back to Aristoxenos and
Dikaiarchos (R. P. 59 a). There is no reason to suppose that their
view of Pythagoras has vitiated their account of what must have been a
perfectly well-known piece of history. According to the later story,
Pythagoras himself was burned to death in the house of Milo, along
with his disciples. This is merely a dramatic compression of the whole
series of events into a single scene; we have seen that Pythagoras
died at Metapontion before the final catastrophe. The valuable
reference in Polybios ii. 39 (R. P. 59) to the burning of Pythagorean
συνέδρια certainly implies that the disturbances went on for a very
considerable time.

This account has all the air of being historical. The mention of Lysis proves, however, that those events were spread over more than one generation. The _coup d’état_ of Kroton can hardly have occurred before 450 B.C., if the teacher of Epameinondas escaped from it, and it may well have been even later. But it must have been before 410 B.C. that the Pythagoreans left Rhegion for Hellas; Philolaos was certainly at Thebes about that time.[207]

Footnote 207:

Plato, _Phd._ 61 d 7, e 7.

The political power of the Pythagoreans as an Order was now gone for ever, though we shall see that some of them returned to Italy at a later date. In exile they seem to have dropped the merely magical and superstitious parts of their system, and this enabled them to take their place as one of the scientific schools of Hellas.

[Sidenote: Want of evidence as to the teaching of Pythagoras.]

41. Of the opinions of Pythagoras we know even less than of his life. Aristotle clearly knew nothing for certain of ethical or physical doctrines going back to the founder of the Society himself.[208] Aristoxenos only gave a string of moral precepts.[209] Dikaiarchos is quoted by Porphyry as asserting that hardly anything of what Pythagoras taught his disciples was known except the doctrine of transmigration, the periodic cycle, and the kinship of all living creatures.[210] The fact is, that, like all teachers who introduce a new way of living rather than a new view of the world, Pythagoras preferred oral instruction to the dissemination of his opinions by writing, and it was not till Alexandrian times that any one ventured to forge books in his name. The writings ascribed to the earliest Pythagoreans were also forgeries of the same period.[211] The early history of Pythagoreanism is, therefore, wholly conjectural; but we may still make an attempt to understand, in a very general way, what the position of Pythagoras in the history of Greek thought must have been.

Footnote 208:

When discussing the Pythagorean system, Aristotle always refers it to
“the Pythagoreans,” not to Pythagoras himself. That this was
intentional seems to be proved by the phrase οἱ καλούμενοι
Πυθαγόρειοι, which occurs more than once (_e.g._ _Met._ Α, 5. 985 b
23; _de Caelo_, Β, 13. 293 a 20). Pythagoras himself is only thrice
mentioned in the whole Aristotelian corpus, and in only one of these
places (_M. Mor._ 1182 a 11) is any philosophical doctrine ascribed to
him. We are told there that he was the first to discuss the subject of
goodness, and that he made the mistake of identifying its various
forms with numbers. But this is just one of the things which prove the
late date of the _Magna Moralia_. Aristotle himself is quite clear
that what he knew as the Pythagorean system belonged in the main to
the days of Empedokles, Anaxagoras, and Leukippos; for, after
mentioning these, he goes on to describe the Pythagoreans as
“contemporary with and earlier than them” (ἐν δὲ τούτοις καὶ πρὸ
τούτων, _Met._ Α, 5. 985 b 23).

Footnote 209:

The fragments of the Πυθαγορικαὶ ἀποφάσεις of Aristoxenos are given by
Diels, _Vors._ pp. 282 sqq.

Footnote 210:

_V. Pyth._ 19 (R. P. 55).

Footnote 211:

See Diels, _Dox._ p. 150; and “Ein gefälschtes Pythagorasbuch”
(_Arch._ iii. pp. 451 sqq.). Cf. also Bernays, _Die Heraklitischen
Briefe_, n. 1.

[Sidenote: Transmigration.]

42. In the first place, then, there can be no doubt that he really taught the doctrine of transmigration.[212] The story told by the Greeks of the Hellespont and Pontos as to his relations with Salmoxis could never have gained currency by the time of Herodotos if he had not been known as a man who taught strange views of the life after death.[213] Now the doctrine of transmigration is most easily to be explained as a development of the savage belief in the kinship of men and beasts, as all alike children of the Earth,[214] a view which Dikaiarchos said Pythagoras certainly held. Further, among savages, this belief is commonly associated with a system of taboos on certain kinds of food, and the Pythagorean rule is best known for its prescription of similar forms of abstinence. This in itself goes far to show that it originated in the same ideas, and we have seen that the revival of these would be quite natural in connexion with the foundation of a new religious society. There is a further consideration which tells strongly in the same direction. In India we have a precisely similar doctrine, and yet it is not possible to assume any actual borrowing of Indian ideas at this date. The only explanation which will account for the facts is that the two systems were independently evolved from the same primitive ideas. These are found in many parts of the world; but it seems to have been only in India and in Greece that they were developed into an elaborate doctrine.

Footnote 212:

The proper Greek term for this is παλιγγενεσία, and the inaccurate
μετεμψύχωσις only occurs in late writers. Hippolytos and Clement of
Alexandria say μετενσωμάτωσις, which is accurate but cumbrous. See
Rohde, _Psyche_, p. 428, n. 2.

Footnote 213:

On the significance of this, see above, p. 93.

Footnote 214:

Dieterich, “Mutter Erde” (_Archiv für Religionswissenschaft_, viii.
pp. 29 and 47).

[Sidenote: Abstinence.]

43. It has indeed been doubted whether we have a right to accept what we are told by such late writers as Porphyry on the subject of Pythagorean abstinence. Aristoxenos, whom we have admitted to be one of our earliest witnesses, may be cited to prove that the original Pythagoreans knew nothing of these restrictions on the use of animal flesh and beans. He undoubtedly said that Pythagoras did not abstain from animal flesh in general, but only from that of the ploughing ox and the ram.[215] He also said that Pythagoras preferred beans to every other vegetable, as being the most laxative, and that he was partial to sucking-pigs and tender kids.[216] Aristoxenos, however, is a witness who very often breaks down under cross-examination, and the palpable exaggeration of these statements shows that he is endeavouring to combat a belief which existed in his own day. We are therefore able to show, out of his own mouth, that the tradition which made the Pythagoreans abstain from animal flesh and beans goes back to a time long before there were any Neopythagoreans interested in upholding it. Still, it may be asked what motive Aristoxenos could have had for denying the common belief? The answer is simple and instructive. He had been the friend of the last of the Pythagoreans; and, in their time, the merely superstitious part of Pythagoreanism had been dropped, except by some zealots whom the heads of the Society refused to acknowledge. That is why he represents Pythagoras himself in so different a light from both the older and the later traditions; it is because he gives us the view of the more enlightened sect of the Order. Those who clung faithfully to the old practices were now regarded as heretics, and all manner of theories were set on foot to account for their existence. It was related, for instance, that they descended from one of the “Akousmatics,” who had never been initiated into the deeper mysteries of the “Mathematicians.”[217] All this, however, is pure invention. The satire of the poets of the Middle Comedy proves clearly enough that, even though the friends of Aristoxenos did not practise abstinence, there were plenty of people in the fourth century, calling themselves followers of Pythagoras, who did.[218] History has not been kind to the Akousmatics, but they never wholly died out. The names of Diodoros of Aspendos and Nigidius Figulus help to bridge the gulf between them and Apollonios of Tyana.

Footnote 215:

Aristoxenos _ap._ Diog. viii. 20, πάντα μὲν τὰ ἄλλα συγχωρεῖν αὐτὸν
ἐσθίειν ἔμψυχα, μόνον δ’ ἀπέχεσθαι βοὸς ἀροτῆρος καὶ κριοῦ.

Footnote 216:

Aristoxenos _ap._ Gell. iv. 11, 5, Πυθαγόρας δὲ τῶν ὀσπρίων μάλιστα
τὸν κύαμον ἐδοκίμασεν· λειαντικόν τε γὰρ εἶναι καὶ διαχωρητικόν· διὸ
καὶ μάλιστα κέχρηται αὐτῷ; _ib._ 6, “porculis quoque minusculis et
haedis tenerioribus victitasse, idem Aristoxenus refert.” It is, of
course, possible that Aristoxenos may be right about the taboo on
beans. We know that it was Orphic, and it may have been transferred to
the Pythagoreans by mistake. That, however, would not affect the
general conclusion that at least some Pythagoreans practised
abstinence from various kinds of food, which is all that is required.

Footnote 217:

The sect of the “Akousmatics” was said to descend from Hippasos
(Iambl. _V. Pyth._ 81; R. P. 56). Now Hippasos was the author of a
μυστικὸς λόγος (Diog. viii. 7; R. P. 56 c), that is to say, of a
superstitious ceremonial or ritual handbook, probably containing
Akousmata like those we are about to consider; for we are told that it
was written ἐπὶ διαβολῇ Πυθαγόρου.

Footnote 218:

Diels has collected these fragments in a convenient form (_Vors._ pp.
291 sqq.). For our purpose the most important passages are Antiphanes,
fr. 135, Kock, ὥσπερ Πυθαγορίζων ἐσθίει | ἔμψυχον οὐδέν; Alexis, fr.
220, οἱ Πυθαγορίζοντες γάρ, ὡς ἀκούομεν, | οὔτ’ ὄψον ἐσθίουσιν οὔτ’
ἄλλ’ οὐδὲ ἓν | ἔμψυχον; fr. 196 (from the Πυθαγορίζουσα), ἡ δ’
ἑστίασις ἰσχάδες καὶ στέμφυλα | καὶ τυρὸς ἔσται· ταῦτα γὰρ θύειν νόμος
| τοῖς Πυθαγορείοις; Aristophon, fr. 9 (from the Πυθαγοριστής), πρὸς
τῶν θεῶν οἰόμεθα τοὺς πάλαι ποτέ, | τοὺς Πυθαγοριστὰς γενομένους ὄντως
ῥυπᾶν | ἑκόντας ἢ φορεῖν τριβῶνας ἡδέως; Mnesimachos, fr. 1, ὡς
Πυθαγοριστὶ θύομεν τῷ Λοξίᾳ | ἔμψυχον οὐδὲν ἐσθίοντες παντελῶς. See
also Theokritos, xiv. 5, τοιοῦτος καὶ πρᾶν τις ἀφίκετο Πυθαγορικτάς, |
ὠχρὸς κἀνυποδητός· Ἀθηναῖος δ’ ἔφατ’ ἦμεν.

We know, then, that Pythagoras taught the kinship of beasts and men, and we infer that his rule of abstinence from flesh was based, not upon humanitarian or ascetic grounds, but on taboo. This is strikingly confirmed by a fact which we are told in Porphyry’s _Defence of Abstinence_. The statement in question does not indeed go back to Theophrastos, as so much of Porphyry’s tract certainly does;[219] but it is, in all probability, due to Herakleides of Pontos, and is to the effect that, though the Pythagoreans did as a rule abstain from flesh, they nevertheless ate it when they sacrificed to the gods.[220] Now, among savage peoples, we often find that the sacred animal is slain and eaten sacramentally by its kinsmen on certain solemn occasions, though in ordinary circumstances this would be the greatest of all impieties. Here, again, we have to do with a very primitive belief; and we need not therefore attach any weight to the denials of Aristoxenos.[221]

Footnote 219:

See Bernays, _Theophrastos’ Schrift über Frömmigkeit_. Porphyry’s
tract, Περὶ ἀποχῆς ἐμψύχων, was doubtless saved from the general
destruction of his writings by its conformity to the ascetic
tendencies of the age. Even St. Jerome made constant use of it in his
polemic against Iovianus, though he is careful not to mention
Porphyry’s name (_Theophr. Schr._ n. 2). The tract is addressed to
Castricius Firmus, the disciple and friend of Plotinos, who had fallen
away from the strict vegetarianism of the Pythagoreans.

Footnote 220:

The passage occurs _De Abst._ p. 58, 25 Nauck: ἱστοροῦσι δέ τινες καὶ
αὐτοὺς ἅπτεσθαι τῶν ἐμψύχων τοὺς Πυθαγορείους, ὅτε θύοιεν θεοῖς. The
part of the work from which this is taken comes from one Clodius, on
whom see Bernay, _Theophr. Schr._ p. 11. He was probably the
rhetorician Sextus Clodius, and a contemporary of Cicero. Bernays has
shown that he made use of the work of Herakleides of Pontos (_ib._ n.
19). On “mystic sacrifice” generally, see Robertson Smith, _Rel. Sem._
i. p. 276.

Footnote 221:

Porphyry (_V. Pyth._ c 15) has preserved a tradition to the effect
that Pythagoras recommended a flesh diet for athletes (Milo?). This
story must have originated at the same time as those related by
Aristoxenos, and in a similar way. In fact, Bernays has shown that it
comes from Herakleides of Pontos (_Theophr. Schr._ n. 8). Iamblichos
(_V. Pyth._ 5. 25) and others (Diog. viii. 13, 47) got out of this by
supposing it referred to a gymnast of the same name. We see here very
distinctly how the Neoplatonists for their own ends endeavoured to go
back to the original form of the Pythagorean legend, and to explain
away the fourth century reconstruction.

[Sidenote: _Akousmata._]

44. We shall now know what to think of the various Pythagorean rules and precepts which have come down to us. These are of two kinds, and have very different sources. Some of them, derived from the collection of Aristoxenos, and for the most part preserved by Iamblichos, are mere precepts of morality. They do not pretend to go back to Pythagoras himself; they are only the sayings which the last generation of “Mathematicians” heard from their predecessors.[222] The second class is of a very different nature, and the sayings which belong to it are called _Akousmata_,[223] which points to their being the property of that sect of Pythagoreans which had faithfully preserved the old customs. Later writers interpret them as “symbols” of moral truth; but their interpretations are extremely far-fetched, and it does not require a very practised eye to see that they are genuine taboos of a thoroughly primitive type. I give a few examples in order that the reader may judge what the famous Pythagorean rule of life was really like.

1. To abstain from beans. 2. Not to pick up what has fallen. 3. Not to touch a white cock. 4. Not to break bread. 5. Not to step over a crossbar. 6. Not to stir the fire with iron. 7. Not to eat from a whole loaf. 8. Not to pluck a garland. 9. Not to sit on a quart measure. 10. Not to eat the heart. 11. Not to walk on highways. 12. Not to let swallows share one’s roof. 13. When the pot is taken off the fire, not to leave the mark of it in the ashes, but to stir them together. 14. Do not look in a mirror beside a light. 15. When you rise from the bedclothes, roll them together and smooth out the impress of the body.

Footnote 222:

For these see Diels, _Vors._ pp. 282 sqq.

Footnote 223:

There is an excellent collection of Ἀκούσματα καὶ σύμβολα in Diels,
_Vors._ pp. 279 sqq., where the authorities will be found. It is
impossible to discuss these in detail here, but students of folklore
will see at once to what order of ideas they belong.

It would be easy to multiply proofs of the close connexion between Pythagoreanism and primitive modes of thought, but what has been said is really sufficient for our purpose. The kinship of men and beasts, the abstinence from flesh, and the doctrine of transmigration all hang together and form a perfectly intelligible whole from the point of view which has been indicated.

[Sidenote: Pythagoras as a man of science.]

45. Were this all, we should be tempted to delete the name of Pythagoras from the history of philosophy altogether, and relegate him to the class of “medicine-men” (γόητες) along with Epimenides and Onomakritos. This, however, would be quite wrong. As we shall see, the Pythagorean Society became one of the chief scientific schools of Hellas, and it is certain that Pythagorean science as well as Pythagorean religion originated with the master himself. Herakleitos, who is not partial to him, says that Pythagoras had pursued scientific investigation further than other men, though he also says that he turned his much learning into an art of mischief.[224] Herodotos called Pythagoras “by no means the weakest sophist of the Hellenes,” a title which at this date does not imply the slightest disparagement.[225] Aristotle even said that Pythagoras first busied himself with mathematics and numbers, and that it was later on he attached himself to the miracle-mongering of Pherekydes.[226] Is it possible for us to trace any connexion between these two sides of his activity?

Footnote 224:

Herakl. fr. 17 (R. P. 31 a). The word ἱστορίη is in itself quite
general. What it chiefly means here we see from a valuable notice
preserved by Iamblichos, _V. Pyth._ 89, ἐκαλεῖτο δὲ ἡ γεωμετρία πρὸς
Πυθαγόρου ἱστορία. Tannery’s interpretation of this statement is based
on a misunderstanding, and need not be discussed here.

Footnote 225:

Herod. iv. 95.

Footnote 226:

Arist. Περὶ τῶν Πυθαγορείων, fr. 186, 1510 a 39, Πυθαγόρας Μνησάρχου
υἱὸς τὸ μὲν πρῶτον διεπονεῖτο περὶ τὰ μαθήματα καὶ τοὺς ἀριθμούς,
ὕστερον δέ ποτε καὶ τῆς Φερεκύδου τερατοποιΐας οὐκ ἀπέστη.

We have seen that the aim of the Orphic and other _Orgia_ was to obtain release from the “wheel of birth” by means of “purifications,” which were generally of a very primitive type. The new thing in the Society founded by Pythagoras seems to have been that, while it admitted all these half-savage customs, it at the same time suggested a more exalted idea of what “purification” really was. Aristoxenos tells us that the Pythagoreans employed music to purge the soul as they used medicine to purge the body, and it is abundantly clear that Aristotle’s famous theory of κάθαρσις is derived from Pythagorean sources.[227] Such methods of purifying the soul were familiar in the _Orgia_ of the Korybantes, and will serve to explain the Pythagorean interest in Harmonics. But there is more than this. If we can trust Herakleides so far, it was Pythagoras who first distinguished the “three lives,” the Theoretic, the Practical, and the Apolaustic, which Aristotle made use of in the _Ethics_. The general theory of these lives is clear, and it is impossible to doubt that in substance it belongs to the very beginning of the school. It is to this effect. We are strangers in this world, and the body is the tomb of the soul, and yet we must not seek to escape by self-murder; for we are the chattels of God who is our herdsman, and without his command we have no right to make our escape.[228] In this life, there are three kinds of men, just as there are three sorts of people who come to the Olympic Games. The lowest class is made up of those who come to buy and sell, and next above them are those who come to compete. Best of all, however, are those who come simply to look on (θεωρεῖν). The greatest purification of all is, therefore, disinterested science, and it is the man who devotes himself to that, the true philosopher, who has most effectually released himself from the “wheel of birth.” It would be rash to say that Pythagoras expressed himself exactly in this manner; but all these ideas are genuinely Pythagorean, and it is only in some such way that we can bridge the gulf which separates Pythagoras the man of science from Pythagoras the religious teacher.[229] We must now endeavour to discover how much of the later Pythagorean science may reasonably be ascribed to Pythagoras himself.

Footnote 227:

Its immediate source is to be found in Plato, _Laws_, 790 d 2 sqq.,
where the Korybantic rites are adduced as an instance. For a full
account see Rohde, _Psyche_, p. 336, n. 2.

Footnote 228:

Plato gives this as the Pythagorean view in _Phd._ 62 b, for the
interpretation of which cf. Espinas in _Arch._ viii. pp. 449 sqq.
Plato distinctly implies that it was not merely the theory of
Philolaos, but something older.

Footnote 229:

See Döring in _Arch._ v. pp. 505 sqq. There seems to be a reference to
the theory of the “three lives” in Herakleitos, fr. 111. It was
apparently taught in the Pythagorean Society of Phleious; for
Herakleides made Pythagoras expound it in a conversation with the
tyrant of Phleious (Cic. _Tusc._ v. 3; Diog. pr. 12, viii. 8), and it
is developed by Plato in a dialogue which is, as it were, dedicated to
Echekrates. If it should be thought that this is interpreting
Pythagoras too much in the light of Schopenhauer, it may be answered
that even the Orphics came very near such a theory. The soul must not
drink of Lethe, but go past it and drink of the water of Memory,
before it can claim to become one of the heroes. This has obvious
points of contact with Plato’s ἀνάμνησις, and the only question is how
much of the _Phaedo_ we are to ascribe to Pythagorean sources. A great
deal, I suspect. See Prof. Stewart’s _Myths of Plato_, pp. 152 sqq.

[Sidenote: Arithmetic.]

46. In his treatise on Arithmetic, Aristoxenos said that Pythagoras was the first to carry that study beyond the needs of commerce,[230] and his statement is confirmed by everything we otherwise know. By the end of the fifth century B.C., we find that there is a widespread interest in such subjects and that these are studied for their own sake. Now this new interest cannot have been wholly the work of a school; it must have originated with some great man, and there is no one but Pythagoras to whom we can refer it. As, however, he wrote nothing, we have no sure means of distinguishing his own teaching from that of his followers in the next generation or two. All we can safely say is that, the more primitive any Pythagorean doctrine appears, the more likely it is to be that of Pythagoras himself, and all the more so if it can be shown to have points of contact with views which we know to have been held in his own time or shortly before it. In particular, when we find the later Pythagoreans teaching things that were already something of an anachronism in their own day, we may be reasonably sure that we are dealing with survivals which only the authority of the master’s name could have preserved. Some of these must be mentioned at once, though the developed system belongs to a later part of our story. It is only by separating its earliest form from its later that the true place of Pythagoreanism in Greek thought can be made clear, though we must always remember that no one can now pretend to draw the line between its successive stages with any certainty.

Footnote 230:

Stob. i. p. 20, 1, ἐκ τῶν Ἀριστοξένου περὶ ἀριθμητικῆς, Τὴν δὲ περὶ
τοὺς ἀριθμοὺς πραγματείαν μάλιστα πάντων τιμῆσαι δοκεῖ Πυθαγόρας καὶ
προαγαγεῖν ἐπὶ τὸ πρόσθεν ἀπαγαγὼν ἀπὸ τῆς τῶν ἐμπόρων χρείας.

[Sidenote: The figures.]