Chapter I (2)

In this subject Ens, with its few predicates, chiefly negative, consisted all that Parmenides called Truth. Everything else belonged to the region of Opinion, which embraced all that was phenomenal, relative, and transient: all that involved a reference to man's senses, apprehension, and appreciation, all the indefinite diversity of observed facts and inferences. Plurality, succession, change, motion, generation, destruction, division of parts, &c., belonged to this category. Parmenides did not deny that he and other men had perceptions and beliefs corresponding to these terms, but he denied their application to the Ens or the self-existent. We are conscious of succession, but the self-existent has no succession: we perceive change of colour and other sensible qualities, and change of place or motion, but Ens neither changes nor moves. We talk of things generated or destroyed--things coming into being or going out of being--but this phrase can have no application to the self-existent Ens, which _is_ always and cannot properly be called either past or future.[63] Nothing is really generated or destroyed, but only in appearance to us, or relatively to our apprehension.[64] In like manner we perceive plurality of objects, and divide objects into parts. But Ens is essentially One, and cannot be divided.[65] Though you may divide a piece of matter you cannot divide the extension of which that matter forms part: you cannot (to use the expression of Hobbes[66]) pull asunder the first mile from the second, or the first hour from the second. The milestone, or the striking of the clock, serve as marks to assist you in making a mental division, and in considering or describing one hour and one mile apart from the next. This, however, is your own act, relative to yourself: there is no real division of extension into miles, or of duration into hours. You may consider the same space or time as one or as many, according to your convenience: as one hour or as sixty minutes, as one mile or eight furlongs. But all this is a process of your own mind and thoughts; another man may divide the same total in a way different from you. Your division noway modifies the reality without you, whatever that may be--the Extended and Enduring Ens--which remains still a continuous one, undivided and unchanged.

[Footnote 63: Parm. Frag. v. 96.

[Greek: ----e)pei\ to/ ge moi=r' e)pe/dêsen Oi)=on a)ki/nêton tele/thein tô=| pa/nt' o)/nom' _ei)=nai_, O)/ssa brotoi\ kate/thento, pepoitho/tes ei)=nai a)lêthê=, gi/gnesthai/ te kai\ o)/llusthai, ei)=nai/ te kai\ ou)ki\, kai\ to/pon a)lla/ssein, dia/ te chro/a phano\n a)mei/bein;

v. 75:--

ei)/ ge ge/noit', ou)k e)/st'; ou)d' ei)/ po/te me/llei e)/sesthai; tô=s ge/nesis me\n a)pe/sbestai, kai\ a)/pistos o)/lethros.]]

[Footnote 64: Aristotel. De Coelo, iii. 1. [Greek: Oi( me\n ga\r au)tô=n o(/lôs a)nei=lon ge/nesin kai\ phthora/n; ou)the\n ga\r ou)/te gi/gnesthai/ phasin ou)/te phthei/resthai tô=n o)/ntôn, _a)lla\ mo/non dokei=n ê(mi=n_; oi)=on oi( peri\ Me/lisson kai\ Parmeni/dên], &c.]

[Footnote 65: Parm. Frag. v. 77.

[Greek: Ou)de\ diai/reto/n e)stin, e)pei\ pa=n e)sti\n o(/moion, ou)de/ ti tê=| ma=llon to/ ken ei)/rgoi min xune/chesthai, ou)de/ ti cheiro/teron; pa=n de\ ple/on e)sti\n e)o/ntos; tô=| xuneche\s pa=n e)sti/n; e)o\n ga\r e)o/nti pela/zei].

Aristotel. Metaphys. A. 5, p. 986, b. 29, with the Scholia, and Physic. i. 2, 3. Simplikius Comm. in Physic. Aristot. (apud Tennemann Geschichte der Philos. b. i. s. 4, vol. i. p. 170) [Greek: pa/nta ga/r phêsi (Parmeni/dês) ta\ o)/nta, katho\ o)/nta, e(n e)sti/n]. This chapter, in which Tennemann gives an account of the Eleatic philosophy, appears to me one of the best and most instructive in his work.]

[Footnote 66: "To make parts,--or to part or divide, Space or Time,--is nothing else but to consider one and another within the same: so that if any man divide space or time, the diverse conceptions he has are more, by one, than the parts which he makes. For his first conception is of that which is to be divided--then, of some part of it--and again of some other part of it: and so forwards, as long as he goes in dividing. But it is to be noted, that here, by _division_, I do not mean the severing or pulling asunder of one space or time from another (for does any man think that one hemisphere may be separated from the other hemisphere, or the first hour from the second?), but _diversity of consideration_: so that division is not made by the operation of the hands, but of the mind."--Hobbes, First Grounds of Philosophy, chap. vii. 5, vol. i. p. 96, ed. Molesworth.

"Expansion and duration have this farther agreement, that though they are both considered by us as having parts, yet their parts are not separable one from another, not even in thought; though the parts of bodies from which we take our measure of the one--and the parts of motion, from which we may take the measure of the other--may be interrupted or separated."--Locke, Essay on the Human Understanding, book ii. ch. 15. s. 11.

In the Platonic Parmenides, p. 156 D., we find the remarkable conception of what he calls [Greek: to\ e)xai/phnês, a)/topo/s tis phu/sis]--a break in the continuity of duration, an extra-temporal moment.]

[Side-note: Parmenidean ontology stands completely apart from phenomenology.]

The Ens of Parmenides thus coincided mainly with that which (since Kant) has been called the Noumenon--the Thing in itself--the Absolute; or rather with that which, by a frequent illusion, passes for the absolute--no notice being taken of the cogitant and believing apart from mind, as if cogitation and belief, _cogitata_ and _credita_, would be had without it. By Ens was understood the remnant in his mind, after leaving out all that abstraction, as far as it had then been carried, could leave out. It was the minimum indispensable to the continuance of thought; you cannot think (Parmenides says) without thinking of Something, and that Something Extended and Enduring. Though he and others talk of this Something as an Absolute (_i.e._ apart from or independent of his own thinking mind), yet he also uses some juster language ([Greek: to\ ga\r au)to\ noei=n e)/stin te kai\ ei)=nai]), showing that it is really relative: that if the Cogitans implies a Cogitatum, the Cogitatum also implies no less its correlative Cogitans: and that though we may divide the two in words, we cannot divide them in fact. It is to be remarked that Parmenides distinguishes the Enduring or Continuous from the Transient or Successive, Duration from Succession (both of which are included in the meaning of the word Time), and that he considers Duration alone as belonging to Ens or the Absolute--to the region of Truth--setting it in opposition or antithesis to Succession, which he treats as relative and phenomenal. We have thus (with the Eleates) the first appearance of Ontology, the science of Being or Ens, in Grecian philosophy. Ens is everything, and everything is Ens. In the view of Parmenides, Ontology is not merely narrow, but incapable of enlargement or application; we shall find Plato and others trying to expand it into numerous imposing generalities.[67]

[Footnote 67: Leibnitz says, Réponse à M. Foucher, p. 117, ed. Erdmann, "Comment seroit il possible qu'aucune chose existât, si l'être même, ipsum Esse, n'avoit l'existence? Mais bien au contraire ne pourrait on pas dire avec beaucoup plus de raison, qu'il n'y a que lui qui existe véritablement, les êtres particuliers n'ayant rien de permanent? Semper generantur, et nunquam sunt."]

[Side-note: Parmenidean phenomenology--relative and variable.]

Apart from Ontology, Parmenides reckons all as belonging to human opinions. These were derived from the observations of sense (which he especially excludes from Ontology) with the comparisons, inferences, hypothesis, &c., founded thereupon: the phenomena of Nature generally.[68] He does not attempt (as Plato and Aristotle do after him) to make Ontology serve as a principle or beginning for anything beyond itself,[69] or as a premiss from which the knowledge of nature is to be deduced. He treats the two--Ontology and Phenomenology, to employ an Hegelian word--as radically disparate, and incapable of any legitimate union. Ens was essentially one and enduring: Nature was essentially multiform, successive, ever changing and moving relative to the observer, and different to observers at different times and places. Parmenides approached the study of Nature from its own starting point, the same as had been adopted by the Ionic philosophers--the data of sense, or certain agencies selected among them, and vaguely applied to explain the rest. Here he felt that he relinquished the full conviction, inseparable from his intellectual consciousness, with which he announced his few absolute truths respecting Ens and Non-Ens, and that he entered upon a process of mingled observation and conjecture, where there was great room for diversity of views between man and man.

[Footnote 68: Karsten observes that the Parmenidean region of opinion comprised not merely the data of sense, but also the comparisons, generalisations, and notions, derived from sense.

"[Greek: Doxasto\n] et [Greek: noêto\n] vocantur duo genera inter se diversa, quorum alterum complectitur res externas et fluxas, _notionesque quæ ex his ducuntur_--alterum res æternas et à conspectu remotas," &c. (Parm. Fragm. p. 148-149).]

[Footnote 69: Marbach (Lehrbuch der Gesch. der Philos., s. 71, not. 3) after pointing out the rude philosophical expression of the Parmenidean verses, has some just remarks upon the double aspect of philosophy as there proclaimed, and upon the recognition by Parmenides of that which he calls the "illegitimate" vein of enquiry along with the "legitimate."

"Learn from me (says Parmenides) the opinions of mortals, brought to your ears in the deceitful arrangement of my words. This is not philosophy (Marbach says): it is Physics. We recognise in modern times two perfectly distinct ways of contemplating Nature: the philosophical and the physical. Of these two, the second dwells in plurality, the first in unity: the first teaches everything as infallible truth, the second as multiplicity of different opinions. We ought not to ask why Parmenides, while recognising the fallibility of this second road of enquiry, nevertheless undertook to march in it,--any more than we can ask, Why does not modern philosophy render physics superfluous?"

The observation of Marbach is just and important, that the line of research which Parmenides treated as illegitimate and deceitful, but which he nevertheless entered upon, is the analogon of modern Physics. Parmenides (he says) indicated most truly the contrast and divergence between Ontology and Physics; but he ought to have gone farther, and shown how they could be reconciled and brought into harmony. This (Marbach affirms) was not even attempted, much less achieved, by Parmenides: but it was afterwards attempted by Plato, and achieved by Aristotle.

Marbach is right in saying that the reconciliation was attempted by Plato; but he is not right (I think) in saying that it was achieved by Aristotle--nor by any one since Aristotle. It is the merit of Parmenides to have brought out the two points of view as radically distinct, and to have seen that the phenomenal world, if explained at all, must be explained upon general principles of its own, raised out of its own data of facts--not by means of an illusory Absolute and Real. The subsequent philosophers, in so far as they hid and slurred over this distinction, appear to me to have receded rather than advanced.]

[Side-note: Parmenides recognises no truth, but more or less probability, in phenomenal explanations.--His physical and astronomical conjectures.]

Yet though thus passing from Truth to Opinions, from full certainty to comparative and irremediable uncertainty,[70] Parmenides does not consider all opinions as equally true or equally untrue. He announces an opinion of his own--what he thinks most probable or least improbable--respecting the structure and constitution of the Kosmos, and he announces it without the least reference to his own doctrines about Ens. He promises information respecting Earth, Water, Air, and the heavenly bodies, and how they work, and how they came to be what they are.[71] He recognises two elementary principles or beginnings, one contrary to the other, but both of them positive--Light, comprehending the Hot, the Light, and the Rare--Darkness, comprehending the Cold, the Heavy, and the Dense.[72] These two elements, each endued with active and vital properties, were brought into junction and commixture by the influence of a Dea Genitalis analogous to Aphroditê,[73] with her first-born son Eros, a personage borrowed from the Hesiodic Theogony. From hence sprang the other active forces of nature, personified under various names, and the various concentric circles or spheres of the Kosmos. Of those spheres, the outer-most was a solid wall of fire--"flammantia moenia mundi"--next under this the Æther, distributed into several circles of fire unequally bright and pure--then the circle called the Milky Way, which he regarded as composed of light or fire combined with denser materials--then the Sun and Moon, which were condensations of fire from the Milky Way--lastly, the Earth, which he placed in the centre of the Kosmos.[74] He is said to have been the first who pronounced the earth to be spherical, and even distributed it into two or five zones.[75] He regarded it as immovable, in consequence of its exact position in the centre. He considered the stars to be fed by exhalation from the Earth. Midway between the Earth and the outer flaming circle, he supposed that there dwelt a Goddess--Justice or Necessity--who regulated all the movements of the Kosmos, and maintained harmony between its different parts. He represented the human race as having been brought into existence by the power of the sun,[76] and he seems to have gone into some detail respecting animal procreation, especially in reference to the birth of male and female offspring. He supposed that the human mind, as well as the human body, was compounded of a mixture of the two elemental influences, diffused throughout all Nature: that like was perceived and known by like: that thought and sensation were alike dependent upon the body, and upon the proportions of its elemental composition: that a certain limited knowledge was possessed by every object in Nature, animate or inanimate.[77]

[Footnote 70: Parmen. Fr. v. 109.

[Greek: e)n tô=| soi\ pau/ô pisto\n lo/gon ê)de\ no/êma a)mphi\s a)lêthei/ês; do/xas d' a)po\ tou=de brotei/as ma/nthane, ko/smon e)mô=n e)pe/ôn a)patêlo\n a)kou/ôn.]]

[Footnote 71: Parm. Frag. v. 132-142.]

[Footnote 72: Aristotle (Metaphys. A. 5, p. 987, a. 1) represents Parmenides as assimilating one of his phenomenal principles (Heat) to Ens, and the other (Cold) to Non-Ens. There is nothing in the fragments of Parmenides to justify this supposed analogy. Heat as well as Cold belongs to Non-Ens, not to Ens, in the Parmenidean doctrine. Moreover Cold or Dense is just as much a positive principle as Hot or Rare, in the view of Parmenides; it is the female to the male (Parm. Fragm. v. 129; comp. Karsten, p. 270). Aristotle conceives Ontology as a substratum for Phenomenology; and his criticisms on Parmenides imply (erroneously in my judgment) that Parmenides did the same. The remarks which Brucker makes both on Aristotle's criticism and on the Eleatic doctrine are in the main just, though the language is not very suitable.

Brucker, Hist. Philosoph., part ii. lib. ii. ch. xi. tom. 1, p. 1152-3, about Xenophanes:--"Ex iis enim quæ apud Aristotelem ex ejus mente contra motum disputantur, patet Xenophanem motûs notionem aliam quam quæ in physicis obtinet, sibi concepisse; et ad verum motum progressum a nonente ad ens ejusque existentiam requisivisse. Quo sensu notionis hujus semel admisso, sequebatur (cum illud impossibile sit, ut ex nihilo fiat aliquid) universum esse immobile, adeoque et partes ejus non ita moveri, ut ex statu nihili procederent ad statum existentiæ. Quibus admissis, de rerum tamen mutationibus disserere poterat, quas non alterationes, generationes, et extinctiones, rerum naturalium, sed modificationes, esse putabat: hoc nomine indignas, eo quod rerum universi natura semper maneret immutabilis, soliusque materiæ æternum fluentis particulæ varie inter se modificarentur. Hâc ratione si Eleaticos priores explicemus de motu disserentes, rationem facile dabimus, quî de rebus physicis disserere et phenomena naturalia explicare, salvâ istâ hypothesi, potuerint. Quod tamen de iis negat Aristoteles, _conceptum motûs metaphysicum ad physicum transferens_: ut, more suo, Eleatico systemate corrupto, eò vehementius illud premeret."]

[Footnote 73: Parmenides, ap. Simplik. ad Aristot. Physic. fol. 9 a.

[Greek: e)n de\ me/sô| tou/tôn Daimôn, ê(\ pa/nta kuberna=|], &c.

Plutarch, Amator, 13.]

[Footnote 74: See especially the remarkable passage from Stobæus, Eclog. Phys. i. 23, p. 482, cited in Karsten, Frag. Parm. p. 241, and Cicero, De Natur. Deor, i. 11, s. 28, with the Commentary of Krische, Forschungen auf dem Gebiete der alten Philosophie, viii. p. 98, seqq.

It is impossible to make out with any clearness the Kosmos and its generation as conceived by Parmenides. We cannot attain more than a general approximation to it.]

[Footnote 75: Diogen. Laert. ix. 21, viii. 48; Strabo, ii. p. 93 (on the authority of Poseidonius). Plutarch (Placit. Philos. iii. 11) and others ascribe to Parmenides the recognition not of five zones, but only of two. If it be true that Parmenides held this opinion about the figure of the earth, the fact is honourable to his acuteness; for Leukippus, Anaxagoras, Archelaus, Diogenes the Apolloniate, and Demokritus, all thought the earth to be a flat, round surface, like a dish or a drum: Plato speaks about it in so confused a manner that his opinion cannot be made out: and Aristotle was the first who both affirmed and proved it to be spherical. The opinion had been propounded by some philosophers earlier than Anaxagoras, who controverted it. See the dissertation of L. Oettinger. Die Vorstellungen der Griechen über die Erde als Himmelskörper, Freiburg, 1850, p. 42-46.]

[Footnote 76: Diogen. Laert. ix. 22.]

[Footnote 77: Parmen. Frag. v. 145; Theophrastus, De Sensu, Karsten. pp. 268, 270.

Parmenides (according to Theophrastus) thought that the dead body, having lost its fiery element, had no perception of light, or heat, or sound; but that it had perception of darkness, cold, and silence--[Greek: kai\ o(/lôs de\ pa=n to\ o)\n e)/chein tina gnô=sin].]

Before we pass from Parmenides to his pupil and successor Zeno, who developed the negative and dialectic side of the Eleatic doctrine, it will be convenient to notice various other theories of the same century: first among them that of Herakleitus, who forms as it were the contrast and antithesis to Xenophanes and Parmenides.

[Side-note: Herakleitus--his obscure style, impressive metaphors, confident and contemptuous dogmatism.]

Herakleitus of Ephesus, known throughout antiquity by the denomination of the Obscure, comes certainly after Pythagoras and Xenophanes and apparently before Parmenides. Of the two first he made special mention, in one of the sentences, alike brief and contemptuous which have been preserved from his lost treatise:--"Much learning does not teach reason: otherwise it would have taught Hesiod and Pythagoras, Xenophanes and Hekatæus." In another passage Herakleitus spoke of the "extensive knowledge, cleverness, and wicked arts" of Pythagoras. He declared that Homer as well as Archilochus deserved to be scourged and expelled from the public festivals.[78] His thoughts were all embodied in one single treatise, which he is said to have deposited in the temple of the Ephesian Artemis. It was composed in a style most perplexing and difficult to understand, full of metaphor, symbolical illustration, and antithesis: but this very circumstance imparted to it an air of poetical impressiveness and oracular profundity.[79] It exercised a powerful influence on the speculative minds of Greece, both in the Platonic age, and subsequently: the Stoics especially both commented on it largely (though with many dissentient opinions among the commentators), and borrowed with partial modifications much of its doctrine.[80]

[Footnote 78: Diogen. L. ix. 1. [Greek: Polumathi/ê no/on ou) dida/skei; Ê(si/odon ga\r a)\n e)di/daxe kai\ Puthago/rên, au)=tis te Xenopha/nea kai\ E(katai=on], &c. Ib. viii. 1, 6. [Greek: Puthago/rês Mnêsa/rchou i(stori/ên ê)/skêsen a)nthrô/pôn ma/lista pa/ntôn, kai\ e)klexa/menos tau/tas ta\s suggrapha\s e)poi/êsen e(ôu+tou= sophi/ên, polumathi/ên, kakotechni/ên.]]

[Footnote 79: Diogen. Laert. ix. 1-6. Theophrastus conceived that Herakleitus had left the work unfinished, from eccentricity of temperament ([Greek: u(po\ melagcholi/as]). Of him, as of various others, it was imagined by some that his obscurity was intentional (Cicero, Nat. Deor. i. 26, 74, De Finib. 2, 5). The words of Lucretius about Herakleitus are remarkable (i. 641):--

Clarus ob obscuram linguam magis inter inanes Quamde graves inter Græcos qui vera requirunt: Omnia enim stolidi magis admirantur amantque Inversis quæ sub verbis latitantia cernunt.

Even Aristotle complains of the difficulty of understanding Herakleitus, and even of determining the proper punctuation (Rhetoric. iii. 5).]

[Footnote 80: Cicero, Nat. Deor., iii. 14, 35.]

[Side-note: Doctrine of Herakleitus--perpetual process of generation and destruction--everything flows, nothing stands--transition of the elements into each other, backwards and forwards.]

The expositors followed by Lucretius and Cicero conceived Herakleitus as having proclaimed Fire to be the universal and all-pervading element of nature;[81] as Thales had recognised water, and Anaximenes air. This interpretation was countenanced by some striking passages of Herakleitus: but when we put together all that remains from him, it appears that his main doctrine was not physical, but metaphysical or ontological: that the want of adequate general terms induced him to clothe it in a multitude of symbolical illustrations, among which fire was only one, though the most prominent and most significant.[82] Xenophanes and the Eleates had recognised, as the only objective reality, One extended Substance or absolute Ens, perpetual, infinite, indeterminate, incapable of change or modification. They denied the objective reality of motion, change, generation, and destruction--considering all these to be purely relative and phenomenal. Herakleitus on the contrary denied everything in the nature of a permanent and perpetual substratum: he laid down nothing as permanent and perpetual except the process of change--the alternate sequence of generation and destruction, without beginning or end--generation and destruction being in fact coincident or identical, two sides of the same process, since the generation of one particular state was the destruction of its antecedent contrary. All reality consisted in the succession and transition, the coming and going, of these finite and particular states: what he conceived as the infinite and universal, was the continuous process of transition from one finite state to the next--the perpetual work of destruction and generation combined, which terminated one finite state in order to make room for a new and contrary state.

[Footnote 81: To some it appeared that Herakleitus hardly distinguished Fire from Air. Aristotel. De Animâ, i. 2; Sext. Empiric. adv. Mathemat. vii. 127-129, ix. 360.]

[Footnote 82: Zeller's account of the philosophy of Herakleitus in the second edition of his Philosophie der Griechen, vol. i. p. 450-496, is instructive. Marbach also is useful (Gesch. der Phil. s. 46-49); and his (Hegelian) exposition of Herakleitus is further developed by Ferdinand Lassalle (Die Philosophie Herakleitos des Dunklen, published 1858). This last work is very copious and elaborate, throwing great light upon a subject essentially obscure and difficult.]

[Side-note: Variety of metaphors employed by Herakleitus, signifying the same general doctrine.]

This endless process of transition, or ever-repeated act of generation and destruction in one, was represented by Herakleitus under a variety of metaphors and symbols--fire consuming its own fuel--a stream of water always flowing--opposite currents meeting and combating each other--the way from above downwards, and the way from below upwards, one and the same--war, contest, penal destiny or retributive justice, the law or decree of Zeus realising each finite condition of things and then destroying its own reality to make place for its contrary and successor. Particulars are successively generated and destroyed, none of them ever arriving at permanent existence:[83] the universal process of generation and destruction alone continues. There is no Esse, but a perpetual Fieri: a transition from Esse to Non-Esse, from Non-Esse to Esse, with an intermediate temporary halt between them: a ceaseless meeting and confluence of the stream of generation with the opposite stream of destruction: a rapid and instant succession, or rather coincidence and coalescence, of contraries. Living and dead, waking and sleeping, light and dark, come into one or come round into each other: everything twists round into its contrary: everything both is and is not.[84]

[Footnote 83: Plato, Kratylus, p. 402, and Theætet. p. 152, 153.

Plutarch, De [Greek: Ei] apud Delphos, c. 18, p. 392. [Greek: Potamô=| ga\r ou)/k e)stin e)mbê=nai di\s tô=| au)tô=| kath' Ê(ra/kleiton, ou)de\ thnêtê=s ou)si/as di\s a(/psasthai kata\ e(/xin; a)ll' o)xu/têti kai\ tachei metabolês skidnêsi kai\ pa/lin suna/gei, _ma=llon de\ ou)de\ pa/lin ou)de\ u(/steron, a)ll' a(/ma suni/statai kai\ a)polei/pei, pro/seisi kai\ a)/peisi. O(/then ou)d' ei)s to\ ei)=nai perai/nei to\ gigno/menon au)tê=s_, tô=| mêde/pote lê/gein mêd' i(/stasthai tê\n ge/nesin, a)ll' a)po\ spe/rmatos a)ei\ metaba/llousan--ta\s prô/tas phthei/rousan gene/seis kai\ ê(liki/as tai=s e)pigignome/nais].

Clemens Alex. Strom. v. 14, p. 711. [Greek: Ko/smon to\n au)to\n a(pa/ntôn ou)/te tis theô=n ou)/t' a)nthrô/pôn e)poi/êsen; a)ll' ê=n a)ei\ kai\ e)/stai pu=r a)ei/zôon, a(pto/menon me/tra kai\ a)posbennu/menon me/tra]. Compare also Eusebius, Præpar. Evang. xiv. 3, 8; Diogen. L. ix. 8.]

[Footnote 84: Plato, Sophist. p. 242 E. [Greek: Diaphero/menon ga\r a)ei\ xumphe/retai].

Plutarch, Consolat. ad Apollonium c. 10, p. 106. [Greek: Po/te ga\r e)n ê(mi=n au)toi=s ou)k e)/stin o( tha/natos? kai\ ê(=| phêsin Ê(ra/kleitos, tau)to/ t' e)/ni zô=n kai\ tethnêko/s, kai\ to\ e)grêgoro\s kai\ to\ katheu=don, kai\ ne/on kai\ gêraio/n; ta/de ga\r metapeso/nta e)kei=na e)sti, ka)kei=na pa/lin metapeso/nta tau=ta].

Pseudo-Origenes, Refut. Hær. ix. 10, [Greek: O( theo\s ê(me/rê, eu)phro/nê--chei/môn, the/ros--po/lemos, ei)rê/nê--ko/ros, li/mos], &c.]

[Side-note: Nothing permanent except the law of process and implication of contraries--the transmutative force. Fixity of particulars is an illusion for most part, so far as it exists, it is a sin against the order of Nature.]

The universal law, destiny, or divine working (according to Herakleitus), consists in this incessant process of generation and destruction, this alternation of contraries. To carry out such law fully, each of the particular manifestations ought to appear and pass away instantaneously--to have no duration of its own, but to be supplanted by its contrary at once. And this happens to a great degree, even in cases where it does not appear to happen: the river appears unchanged, though the water which we touched a short time ago has flowed away:[85] we and all around us are in rapid movement, though we appear stationary: the apparent sameness and fixity is thus a delusion. But Herakleitus does not seem to have thought that his absolute universal force was omnipotent, or accurately carried out in respect to all particulars. Some positive and particular manifestations, when once brought to pass, had a certain measure of fixity, maintaining themselves for more or less time before they were destroyed. There was a difference between one particular and another, in this respect of comparative durability: one was more durable, another less.[86] But according to the universal law or destiny, each particular ought simply to make its appearance, then to be supplanted and re-absorbed; so that the time during which it continued on the scene was, as it were, an unjust usurpation, obtained by encroaching on the equal right of the next comer, and by suspending the negative agency of the universal. Hence arises an antithesis or hostility between the universal law or process on one side, and the persistence of particular states on the other. The universal law or process is generative and destructive, positive and negative, both in one: but the particular realities in which it manifests itself are all positive, each succeeding to its antecedent, and each striving to maintain itself against the negativity or destructive interference of the universal process. Each particular reality represented rest and fixity: each held ground as long as it could against the pressure of the cosmical force, essentially moving, destroying, and renovating. Herakleitus condemns such pretensions of particular states to separate stability, inasmuch as it keeps back the legitimate action of the universal force, in the work of destruction and renovation.

[Footnote 85: Aristot. De Coelo, iii. 1, p. 298, b. 30; Physic. viii. 3, p. 253, b. 9. [Greek: Phasi/ tines kinei=sthai tô=n o)/ntôn ou) ta\ me\n ta\ d' ou)/, a)lla\ pa/nta kai\ a)ei\, a)lla\ lantha/nein tou=to tê\n ê(mete/ran ai)/sthêsin]--which words doubtless refer to Herakleitus. See Preller, Hist. Phil. Græc. Rom. s. 47.]

[Footnote 86: Lassalle, Philosophie des Herakleitos, vol. i. pp. 54, 55. "Andrerseits bieten die sinnlichen Existenzen _graduelle_ oder _Mass-Unterschiede_ dar, je nachdem in ihnen das Moment des festen Seins über die Unruhe des Werdens vorwiegt oder nicht; und diese Graduation wird also zugleich den Leitfaden zur Classification der verschiedenen Existenz-formen bilden."]

[Side-note: Illustrations by which Herakleitus symbolized his perpetual force, destroying and generating.]

The theory of Herakleitus thus recognised no permanent substratum, or Ens, either material or immaterial--no category either of substance or quality--but only a ceaseless principle of movement or change, generation and destruction, position and negation, immediately succeeding, or coinciding with each other.[87] It is this principle or everlasting force which he denotes under so many illustrative phrases--"the common ([Greek: to\ xuno\n]), the universal, the all-comprehensive ([Greek: to\ perie/chon]), the governing, the divine, the name or reason of Zeus, fire, the current of opposites, strife or war, destiny, justice, equitable measure, Time or the Succeeding," &c. The most emphatic way in which this theory could be presented was, as embodied, in the coincidence or co-affirmation of contraries. Many of the dicta cited and preserved out of Herakleitus are of this paradoxical tenor.[88] Other dicta simply affirm perpetual flow, change, or transition, without express allusion to contraries: which latter, however, though not expressed, must be understood, since change was conceived as a change from one contrary to the other.[89] In the Herakleitean idea, contrary forces come simultaneously into action: destruction and generation always take effect together: there is no negative without a positive, nor positive without a negative.[90]

[Footnote 87: Aristot. De Coelo, iii. 1, p. 298, b. 30. [Greek: Oi( de\ ta\ me\n a)/lla pa/nta gi/nesthai/ te/ phasi kai\ rhei=n, ei)=nai de\ pagi/ôs ou)de/n, e(\n de/ ti mo/non u(pome/nein, e)x ou(= tau=ta pa/nta metaschêmati/zesthai pe/phuken; o(/per e)oi/kasin bou/lesthai le/gein a)/lloi te polloi\ kai\ Ê(ra/kleitos o( E)phe/sios]. See the explanation given of this passage by Lassalle, vol. ii. p. 21, 39, 40, founded on the comment of Simplikius. He explains it as an universal law or ideal force--die reine Idee des Werdens selbst (p. 24), and "eine unsinnliche Potenz" (p. 25). Yet, in i. p. 55 of his elaborate exposition, he does indeed say, about the theory of Herakleitus, "Hier sind zum erstenmale die sinnlichen Bestimmtheiten zu bloss verschiedenen und absolut in einander übergehenden Formen eines identischen, ihnen zu Grunde liegenden, _Substrats_ herabgesetzt". But this last expression appears to me to contradict the whole tenor and peculiarity of Lassalle's own explanation of the Herakleitean theory. He insists almost in every page (compare ii. p. 156) that "das Allgemeine" of Herakleitus is "reines Werden; reiner, steter, erzeugender, Prozess". This process cannot with any propriety be called a _substratum_, and Herakleitus admitted no other. In thus rejecting any substratum he stood alone. Lassalle has been careful in showing that Fire was not understood by Herakleitus as a substratum (as water by Thales), but as a symbol for the universal force or law. In the theory of Herakleitus no substratum was recognised--no [Greek: to/de ti] or [Greek: ou)si/a]--in the same way as Aristotle observes about [Greek: to\ a)/peiron] (Physic. iii. 6, a. 22-31) [Greek: ô(/ste to\ a)/peiron ou) dei= lamba/nein ô(s to/de ti, oi(=on a)/nthrôpon ê)\ oi)ki/an, a)ll' ô(s ê( ê(me/ra le/getai kai\ o( a)gô\n, oi(=s to\ ei)=nai _ou)ch' ô(s ou)si/a tis ge/gonen, a)ll' a)ei\ e)n gene/sei ê(\ phthora=|_, ei) kai\ peperasme/non, _a)ll' a)ei/ ge e(/teron kai\ e(/teron_.]]

[Footnote 88: Aristotle or Pseudo-Aristotle, De Mundo, c. 5, p. 396, b. 20. [Greek: Tau)to\ de\ tou=to ê)=n kai\ to\ para\ tô=| skoteinô=| lego/menon Ê(rakleitô=|: "suna/pseias ou)=la kai\ ou)chi\ ou)=la, sumphero/menon kai\ diaphero/menon, suna=|don kai\ dia=|don, kai\ e)k pa/ntôn e(\n kai\ e)x e(no\s pa/nta."] Heraclid. Allegor. ap. Schleiermacher (Herakleitos, p. 529), [Greek: potamoi=s toi=s au)toi=s e)mbai/nome/n te kai\ ou)k e)mbai/nomen, ei)me/n te kai\ ou)k ei)me/n]: Plato, Sophist, p. 242, E., [Greek: diaphero/menon a)ei\ xumphe/retai]: Aristotle, Metaphys. iii. 7, p. 1012, b. 24, [Greek: e)/oike d' o( me\n Ê(raklei/tou lo/gos, le/gôn pa/nta ei)=nai kai\ mê\ ei)=nai, a(/panta a)lêthê= poei=n]: Aristot. Topic. viii. 5, p. 155, b., [Greek: oi(=on a)gatho\n kai\ kako\n ei)=nai tau)to\n, katha/per Ê(ra/kleito/s phêsin]: also Aristot. Physic. i. 2, p. 185, b. Compare the various Herakleitean phrases cited in Pseudo-Origen. Refut. Hæres. Fragm. ix. 10; also Krische, Forschungen auf dem Gebiete der alten Philosophie, vol. i. p. 370-468.

Bernays and Lassalle (vol. i. p. 81) contend, on reasonable grounds (though in opposition to Zeller, p. 495), that the following verses in the Fragments of Parmenides refer to Herakleitus:

[Greek: oi(=s to\ pe/lein te kai\ ou)k ei)=nai tau)to\n neno/mistai kou) tau)to\n, pa/ntôn de\ pali/ntropo/s e)sti ke/leuthos].

The commentary of Alexander Aphrodis. on the Metaphysica says, "Heraclitus ergo cum diceret omnem rem esse et non esse et opposita simul consistere, contradictionem veram simul esse statuebat, et omnia dicebat esse vera" (Lassalle, p. 83).

One of the metaphors by which Herakleitus illustrated his theory of opposite and co-existent forces, was the pulling and pushing of two sawyers with the same saw. See Bernays, Heraclitea, part i. p. 16; Bonn, 1848.]

[Footnote 89: Aristot. Physic. viii. 3, p. 253, b. 30, [Greek: ei)s tou)nanti/on ga\r ê( a)lloi/ôsis]: also iii. 5, p. 205, a. 6, [Greek: pa/nta ga\r metaba/llei e)x e)nanti/ou ei)s e)nanti/on, oi(=on e)k thermou= ei)s psuchro/n.]]

[Footnote 90: Lassalle, Herakleitos, vol. i. p. 323.]

[Side-note: Water--intermediate between Fire (Air) and Earth.]

Such was the metaphysical or logical foundation of the philosophy of Herakleitus: the idea of an eternal process of change, manifesting itself in the perpetual destruction and renovation of particular realities, but having itself no reality apart from these particulars, and existing only in them as an immanent principle or condition. This principle, from the want of appropriate abstract terms, he expressed in a variety of symbolical and metaphorical phrases, among which Fire stood prominent.[91] But though Fire was thus often used to denote the principle or ideal process itself, the same word was also employed to denote that one of the elements which formed the most immediate manifestation of the principle. In this latter sense, Fire was the first stage of incipient reality: the second stage was water, the third earth. This progression, fire, water, earth, was in Herakleitean language "the road downwards," which was the same as "the road upwards," from earth to water and again to fire. The death of fire was its transition into water: that of water was its transition partly into earth, partly into flame. As fire was the type of extreme mobility, perpetual generation and destruction--so earth was the type of fixed and stationary existence, resisting movement or change as much as possible.[92] Water was intermediate between the two.

[Footnote 91: See a striking passage cited from Gregory of Nyssa by Lassalle (vol. i. p. 287), illustrating this characteristic of fire; the flame of a lamp appears to continue the same, but it is only a succession of flaming particles, each of which takes fire and is extinguished in the same instant: [Greek: ô(/sper to\ e)pi\ tê=s thrualli/dos pu=r tô=| me\n dokei=n a)ei\ to\ au)to\ phai/netai--to\ ga\r suneche\s a)ei\ tê=s kinê/seôs a)dia/spaston au)to\ kai\ ê(nôme/non pro\s e(auto\ dei/knusi--tê=| de\ a)lêthei/a| pa/ntote au)to\ e(auto\ diadecho/menon, ou)de/pote to\ au)to\ me/nei--ê( ga\r e)xelkusthei=sa dia\ tê=s thermo/têtos i)kma\s _o(mou= te e)xephlogô/thê kai\ ei)s lignu\n e)kkauthei=sa metapoiê/thê_], &c.]

[Footnote 92: Diogen. Laert. ix. 9; Clemens Alexand. Strom. v. 14, p. 599, vi. 2, p. 624. [Greek: Puro\s tropai\ prô=ton tha/lassa, thala/ttês de\ to\ me\n ê(/misu gê=, to\ d' ê(/misu prêstê/r]. A full explanation of the curious expression [Greek: prêstê/r] is given by Lassalle (Herakl. vol. ii. p. 87-90). See Brandis (Handbuch der Gr. Philos. sect, xliii. p. 164), and Plutarch (De Primo Frigido, c. 17, p. 952, F.).

The distinction made by Herakleitus, but not clearly marked out or preserved, between the _ideal fire_ or universal process, and the _elementary fire_ or first stage towards realisation, is brought out by Lassalle (Herakleitos, vol. ii. p. 25-29).]

[Side-note: Sun and stars--not solid bodies but meteoric aggregations dissipated and renewed--Eclipses--[Greek: e)kpu/rôsis], or destructions of the Kosmos by fire.]

Herakleitus conceived the sun and stars, not as solid bodies, but as meteoric aggregations perpetually dissipated and perpetually renewed or fed, by exhalation upward from the water and earth. The sun became extinguished and rekindled in suitable measure and proportion, under the watch of the Erinnyes, the satellites of Justice. These celestial lights were contained in troughs, the open side of which was turned towards our vision. In case of eclipses the trough was for the time reversed, so that the dark side was turned towards us; and the different phases of the moon were occasioned by the gradual turning round of the trough in which her light was contained. Of the phenomena of thunder and lightning also, Herakleitus offered some explanation, referring them to aggregations and conflagrations of the clouds, and violent currents of winds.[93] Another hypothesis was often ascribed to Herakleitus, and was really embraced by several of the Stoics in later times--that there would come a time when all existing things would be destroyed by fire ([Greek: e)kpu/rôsis]), and afterwards again brought into reality in a fresh series of changes. But this hypothesis appears to have been conceived by him metaphysically rather than physically. Fire was not intended to designate the physical process of combustion, but was a symbolical phrase for the universal process; the perpetual agency of conjoint destruction and renovation, manifesting itself in the putting forth and re-absorption of particulars, and having no other reality except as immanent in these particulars.[94] The determinate Kosmos of the present moment is perpetually destroyed, passing into fire or the indeterminate: it is perpetually renovated or passes out of fire into water, earth--out of the indeterminate, into the various determinate modifications. At the same time, though Herakleitus seems to have mainly employed these symbols for the purpose of signifying or typifying a metaphysical conception, yet there was no clear apprehension, even in his own mind, of this generality, apart from all symbols: so that the illustration came to count as a physical fact by itself, and has been so understood by many.[95] The line between what he meant as the ideal or metaphysical process, and the elementary or physical process, is not easy to draw, in the fragments which now remain.

[Footnote 93: Aristot. Meteorol. ii. e. p. 355, a. Plato, Republ. vi. p. 498, c. 11; Plutarch, De Exilio, c. 11, p. 604 A.; Plutarch. De Isid. et Osirid. c. 48, p. 370, E.; Diogen. L. ix. 10; Plutarch, Placit. Philos. ii. 17-22-24-28, p. 889-891; Stobæus, Eclog. Phys. i. p. 594.

About the doctrine of the Stoics, built in part upon this of Herakleitus, see Cicero, Natur. Deor. ii. 46; Seneca, Quæst. Natur. ii. 5, vi. 16.]

[Footnote 94: Aristot. or Pseudo-Aristot., De Mundo, [Greek: e)k pa/ntôn e(\n kai\ e)x e(no\s pa/nta].]

[Footnote 95: See Lassalle, Herakleitos, vol. ii. s. 26-27, p. 182-258.

Compare about the obscure and debated meaning of the Herakleitean [Greek: e)kpu/rôsis], Schleiermacher, Herakleitos, p. 103; Zeller, Philos. der Griech. vol. i. p. 477-479.

The word [Greek: diako/smêsis] stands as the antithesis (in the language of Herakleitus) to [Greek: e)kpu/rôsis]. A passage from Philo Judæus is cited by Lassalle illustrating the Herakleitean movement from ideal unity into totality of sensible particulars, forwards and backwards--[Greek: o( de\ gonorrhuê\s (lo/gos) e)k ko/smou pa/nta kai\ ei)s ko/smon a)na/gôn, u(po\ theou= de\ mêde\n oi)o/menos, Ê(rakleitei/ou do/xês e(tai=ros, ko/ron kai\ chrêsmosu/nên, kai\ e(\n to\ pa=n kai\ pa/nta a)moibê=| ei)sa/gôn]--where [Greek: ko/ros] and [Greek: chrêsmosu/nê] are used to illustrate the same ideal antithesis as [Greek: diako/smêsis] and [Greek: e)kpu/rôsis] (Lassalle, vol. i. p. 232).]

[Side-note: His doctrines respecting the human soul and human knowledge. All wisdom resided in the Universal Wisdom--individual Reason is worthless.]

The like blending of metaphysics and physics--of the abstract and the concrete and sensible--is to be found in the statements remaining from Herakleitus respecting the human soul and human knowledge. The human soul, according to him, was an effluence or outlying portion of the Universal[96]--the fire--the perpetual movement or life of things. As such, its nature was to be ever in movement: but it was imprisoned and obstructed by the body, which represented the stationary, the fixed, the particular--that which resisted the universal force of change. So long as a man lived, his soul or mind, though thus confined, participated more or less in the universal movement: but when he died, his body ceased to participate in it, and became therefore vile, "fit only to be cast out like dung". Every man, individually considered, was irrational;[97] reason belonged only to the universal or the whole, with which the mind of each living man was in conjunction, renewing itself by perpetual absorption, inspiration or inhalation, vaporous transition, impressions through the senses and the pores, &c. During sleep, since all the media of communication, except only those through respiration, were suspended, the mind became stupefied and destitute of memory. Like coals when the fire is withdrawn, it lost its heat and tended towards extinction.[98] On waking, it recovered its full communication with the great source of intelligence without--the universal all-comprehensive process of life and movement. Still, though this was the one and only source of intelligence open to all waking men, the greater number of men could neither discern it for themselves, nor understand it without difficulty even when pointed out to them. Though awake, they were not less unconscious or forgetful of the process going on around them, than if they had been asleep.[99] The eyes and ears of men with barbarous or stupid souls, gave them false information.[100] They went wrong by following their own individual impression or judgment: they lived as if reason or intelligence belonged to each man individually. But the only way to attain truth was, to abjure all separate reason, and to follow the common or universal reason. Each man's mind must become identified and familiar with that common process which directed and transformed the whole: in so far as he did this, he attained truth: whenever he followed any private or separate judgment of his own, he fell into error.[101] The highest pitch of this severance of the individual judgment was seen during sleep, at which time each man left the common world to retire into a world of his own.[102]

[Footnote 96: Sext. Empiric. adv. Mathem. vii. 130. [Greek: ê( e)pixenôthei=sa toi=s ê(mete/rois sô/masin a)po\ tou= perie/chontos moi=ra].

Plutarch, Sympos., p. 644. [Greek: neku/es kopri/ôn e)kblêto/teroi].

Plutarch, Placit. Philos. i. 23, p. 884. [Greek: Ê(ra/kleitos ê)remi/an kai\ sta/sin e)k tô=n o(/lôn a)nê/|rei; e)sti\ ga\r tou=to tô=n nekrô=n.]]

[Footnote 97: See Schleiermacher, Herakleitos, p. 522; Sext. Empir. adv. Mathem. viii. 286.]

[Footnote 98: The passage of Sextus Empiricus (adv. Mathem. vii. 127-134) is curious and instructive about Herakleitus.

[Greek: A)re/skei ga\r tô=| phusikô=|] (Herakleitus) [Greek: to perie/chon ê(ma=s logiko/n te o)\n kai\ phrenê=res--tou=ton dê\ to\n thei=on lo/gon, kath' Ê(ra/kleiton, di' a)napnoê=s spa/santes noeroi\ gino/metha, kai\ e)n me\n u(/pnois lêthai=oi, kata\ de\ e)/gersin pa/lin e)/mphrones. e)n ga\r toi=s u(/pnois musa/ntôn tô=n ai)sthêtikô=n po/rôn chôri/zetai tê=s pro\s to\ perie/chon sumphui+/as o( e)n ê(mi=n nou=s, monê=s tê=s kata\ a)napnoê\n prosphu/seôs sôzome/nês oi(onei/ tinos rhi/zês, chôristhei/s te a)poba/llei ê)\n pro/teron ei)=che mnêmonikê\n du/namin. e)n de\ e)grêgoro/si pa/lin dia\ tô=n ai)sthêtikô=n po/rôn ô(/sper dia\ tinô=n thuri/dôn proku/psas kai\ tô=| perie/chonti sumba/llôn logikê\n e)ndu/etai du/namin.] Then follows the simile about coals brought near to, or removed away from, the fire.

The Stoic version of this Herakleitean doctrine, is to be seen in Marcus Antoninus, viii. 54. [Greek: Mêke/ti mo/non _sumpnei=n tô=| perie/chonti a)e/ri, a)ll' ê)/dê kai\ sumphronei=n tô=| perie/chonti pa/nta noerô=|_. Ou) ga\r ê(=tton ê( noera\ du/namis pa/ntê ke/chutai kai\ diapephoi/têke tô=| spa=sai boulome/nô|, ê(/per ê( a)erô/dês tô=| a)napneu=sai duname/nô|].

The Stoics, who took up the doctrine of Herakleitus with farther abstraction and analysis, distinguished and named separately matters which he conceived in one and named together--the physical inhalation of air--the metaphysical supposed influx of intelligence--_inspiration_ in its literal and metaphorical senses. The word [Greek: to\ perie/chon], as he conceives it, seems to denote, not any distinct or fixed local region, but the rotatory movement or circulation of the elements, fire, water, earth, reverting back into each other. Lassalle, vol. ii. p. 119-120; which transition also is denoted by the word [Greek: a)nathumi/asis] in the Herakleitean sense--cited from Herakleitus by Aristotle. De Animâ, i. 2, 16.]

[Footnote 99: Sextus Empiricus (adv. Math. vii. 132) here cites the first words of the treatise of Herakleitus (compare also Aristotle, Rhet. iii. 5). [Greek: lo/gou tou=de e)o/ntos a)xu/netoi gi/gnontai a)/nthrôpoi kai\ pro/sthen ê)\ a)kou=sai kai\ a)kou/santes to\ prô=ton;--tou\s de\ a)/llous a)nthrô/pous lantha/nei o(ko/sa e)gerthe/ntes poiou=sin o(/kôsper o(ko/sa eu(/dontes e)pilantha/nontai.]]

[Footnote 100: Sext. Empiric. ib. vii. 126, a citation from Herakleitus.]

[Footnote 101: Sext. Emp. ib. vii. 133 (the words of Herakleitus) [Greek: dio\ dei= _e(/pesthai tô=| xunô=|_;--tou= lo/gou de\ e)o/ntos xunou=, zô/ousin oi( polloi\ ô(s i)di/an e)/chontes phro/nêsin; ê( d' e)/stin ou)k a)/llo ti _a)ll' e)xê/gêsis tou= tro/pou tê=s tou= pa/ntos dioikê/seôs_; dio\ kath' o(/ ti a)\n au)tou= tê=s mnê/mês koinônê/sômen, a)lêtheu/omen, a(\ de\ a)\n i)dia/sômen, pseudo/metha.]]

[Footnote 102: Plutarch, De Superstit. c. 3, p. 166, C. See also the passage in Clemens Alexandr. Strom. iv. 22, about the comparison of sleep to death by Herakleitus.]

[Side-note: By Universal Reason he did not mean the Reason of most men as it is, but as it ought to be.]

By this denunciation of the mischief of private judgment, Herakleitus did not mean to say that a man ought to think like his neighbours or like the public. In his view the public were wrong, collectively as well as individually. The universal reason to which he made appeal, was not the reason of most men as it actually is but that which, in his theory, ought to be their reason:[103] that which formed the perpetual and governing process throughout all nature, though most men neither recognised nor attended to it, but turned away from it in different directions equally wrong. No man was truly possessed of reason, unless his individual mind understood the general scheme of the universe, and moved in full sympathy with its perpetual movement and alternation or unity of contraries.[104] The universal process contained in itself a sum-total of particular contraries which were successively produced and destroyed: to know the universal was to know these contraries in one, and to recognise them as transient, but correlative and inseparable, manifestations, each implying the other--not as having each a separate reality and each excluding its contrary.[105] In so far as a man's mind maintained its kindred nature and perpetual conjoint movement with the universal, he acquired true knowledge; but the individualising influences arising from the body usually overpowered this kindred with the universal, and obstructed the continuity of this movement, so that most persons became plunged in error and illusion.

[Footnote 103: Sextus Empiricus misinterprets the Herakleitean theory when he represents it (vii. 134) as laying down--[Greek: ta\ koinê=| phaino/mena, pista\, ô(s a)\n tô=| koinô=| krino/mena lo/gô|, ta\ de\ kat' i)di/an e(ka/stô|, pseudê=]. Herakleitus denounces mankind generally as in error. Origen. Philosophum. i. 4; Diog. Laert. ix. 1.]

[Footnote 104: The analogy and sympathy between the individual mind and the Kosmical process--between the knowing and the known--was reproduced in many forms among the ancient philosophers. It appears in the Platonic Timæus, c. 20, p. 47 C.

[Greek: To\ kinou/menon tô=| kinoume/nô| gignô/skesthai] was the doctrine of several philosophers. Aristot. De Animâ, i. 2. Plato, Kratylus, p. 412 A: [Greek: kai\ mê\n ê)/ ge e)pistê/mê mênu/ei ô(s pherome/nois toi=s pra/gmasin e)pome/nês tê=s psuchê=s tê=s a)xi/as lo/gou, kai\ ou)/te a)poleipome/nês ou)/te protheou/sês]. A remarkable passage from the comment of Philoponus (on the treatise of Aristotle De Animâ) is cited by Lassalle, ii. p. 339, describing the Herakleitean doctrine, [Greek: dia\ tou=to e)k tê=s a)nathumia/seôs au)tê\n e)/legen] (Herakleitus); [Greek: tô=n ga\r pragma/tôn e)n kinê/sei o)/ntôn dei=n kai\ to\ gi/nôskon ta\ pra/gmata e)n kinê/sei ei)=nai, i(/na _sumpara/theon au)toi=s e)pha/ptêtai kai\ e)pharmo/zê|_ au)toi=s]. Also Simplikius ap. Lassalle, p. 341: [Greek: e)n metabolê=| ga\r sunechei= ta\ o)/nta u(potithe/menos o( Ê(ra/kleitos, kai\ to\ gnôso/menon au)ta\ tê=| e)paphê=| gi/nôskon, sune/pesthai e)bou/leto ô(s a)ei\ ei)=nai kata\ to\ gnôstiko\n e)n kinê/sei.]]

[Footnote 105: Stobæus, Eclog. Phys. p. 58; and the passage of Philo Judæus, cited by Schleiermacher, p. 437; as well as more fully by Lassalle, vol. ii. p. 265-267 (Quis rerum divinar. hæres, p. 503, Mangey): [Greek: e(\n ga\r to\ e)x a)mphoi=n tô=n e)nanti/ôn, ou(= tmêthe/ntos gnô/rima ta\ e)nanti/a. Ou) tou=t' e)sti\n o(/ phasin E(/llênes to\n me/gan kai\ a)oi/dimon par' au)toi=s Ê(ra/kleiton, kephalai=on tê=s au)tou= prostêsa/menon philosophi/as, au)chei=n ô(s eu(re/sei kainê=|? palaio\n ga\r eu(/rêma Môu/seô/s e)stin.]]

[Side-note: Herakleitus at the opposite pole from Parmenides]

The absolute of Herakleitus stands thus at the opposite pole as compared with that of Parmenides: it is absolute movement, change, generation and destruction--negation of all substance and stability,[106] temporary and unbecoming resistance of each successive particular to the destroying and renewing current of the universal. The Real, on this theory, was a generalisation, not of substances, but of facts, events, changes, revolutions, destructions, generations, &c., determined by a law of justice or necessity which endured, and which alone endured, for ever. Herakleitus had many followers, who adopted his doctrine wholly or partially, and who gave to it developments which he had not adverted to, perhaps might not have acknowledged.[107] It was found an apt theme by those who, taking a religious or poetical view of the universe, dwelt upon the transitory and contemptible value of particular existences, and extolled the grandeur or power of the universal. It suggested many doubts and debates respecting the foundations of logical evidence, and the distinction of truth from falsehood; which debates will come to be noticed hereafter, when we deal with the dialectical age of Plato and Aristotle.

[Footnote 106: The great principle of Herakleitus, which Aristotle states in order to reject (Physic. viii. 3, p. 253, b. 10, [Greek: phasi/ tines kinei=sthai tô=n o)/ntôn ou) ta\ me\n ta\ d' ou), a)lla\ pa/nta kai\ a)ei\; a)lla\ lantha/nein tou=to tê\n ê(mete/ran ai)/sthêsin]) now stands averred in modern physical philosophy. Mr. Grove observes, in his instructive Treatise on the Correlation of Physical Forces, p. 22:

"Of absolute rest, Nature gives us no evidence. All matter, as far as we can discern, is ever in movement: not merely in masses, as in the planetary spheres, but also molecularly, or throughout its intimate structure. Thus every alteration of temperature produces a molecular change throughout the whole substance heated or cooled: slow chemical or electrical forces, actions of light or invisible radiant forces, are always at play; so that, as a fact, we cannot predicate of any portion of matter, that it is absolutely at rest."]

[Footnote 107: Many references to Herakleitus are found in the recently published books of the Refutatio Hæresium by Pseudo-Origen or Hippolytus--especially Book ix. p. 279-283, ed. Miller. To judge by various specimens there given, it would appear that his juxta-positions of contradictory predicates, with the same subject, would be recognised as paradoxes merely in appearance, and not in reality, if we had his own explanation. Thus he says (p. 282) "the pure and the corrupt, the drinkable and the undrinkable, are one and the same." Which is explained as follows: "The sea is most pure and most corrupt: to fish, it is drinkable and nutritive; to men, it is undrinkable and destructive." This explanation appears to have been given by Herakleitus himself, [Greek: tha/lassa, _phêsi\n_], &c.

These are only paradoxes in appearance--the relative predicate being affirmed without mention of its correlate. When you supply the correlate to each predicate, there remains no contradiction at all.]

[Side-note: Empedokles--his doctrine of the four elements, and two moving or restraining forces.]

After Herakleitus, and seemingly at the same time with Parmenides, we arrive at Empedokles (about 500-430 B. C.) and his memorable doctrine of the Four Elements. This philosopher, a Sicilian of Agrigentum, and a distinguished as well as popular-minded citizen, expounded his views in poems, of which Lucretius[108] speaks with high admiration, but of which few fragments are preserved. He agreed with Parmenides, and dissented from Herakleitus and the Ionic philosophers, in rejecting all real generation and destruction.[109] That which existed had not been generated and could not be destroyed. Empedokles explained what that was, which men mistook for generation and destruction. There existed four distinct elements--Earth, Water, Air, and Fire--eternal, inexhaustible, simple, homogeneous, equal, and co-ordinate with each other. Besides these four substances, there also existed two moving forces, one contrary to the other--Love or Friendship, which brought the elements into conjunction--Enmity or Contest, which separated them. Here were alternate and conflicting agencies, either bringing together different portions of the elements to form a new product, or breaking up the product thus formed and separating the constituent elements. Sometimes the Many were combined into One; sometimes the One was decomposed into Many. Generation was simply this combination of elements already existing separately--not the calling into existence of anything new: destruction was in like manner the dissolution of some compound, not the termination of any existent simple substance. The four simple substances or elements (which Empedokles sometimes calls by names of the popular Deities--Zeus, Hêrê, Aidoneus, &c.), were the roots or foundations of everything.[110]

[Footnote 108: Lucretius, i. 731.

Carmina quin etiam divini pectoris ejus Vociferantur, et exponunt præclara reperta: Ut vix humanâ videatur stirpe creatus.]

[Footnote 109: Empedokles, Frag. v. 77-83, ed. Karsten, p. 96:

[Greek: phu/sis ou)deno/s e)stin a(pa/ntôn thnêtô=n, ou)de/ tis ou)lome/nou thanatoi=o teleutê\, a)lla\ mo/non mi/xis te dia/llaxi/s te mige/ntôn e)sti, phu/sis d' e)pi\ toi=s o)noma/zetai a)nthrô/poisin. . . . ]

[Greek: Phu/sis] here is remarkable, in its primary sense, as derivative from [Greek: phu/omai], equivalent to [Greek: ge/nesis]. Compare Plutarch adv. Koloten, p. 1111, 1112.]

[Footnote 110: Emp. Fr. v. 55. [Greek: Te/ssara tô=n pa/ntôn rhizô/mata].]

[Side-note: Construction of the Kosmos from these elements and forces--action and counter action of love and enmity. The Kosmos alternately made and unmade.]