Chapter XXXVIII: Timæus and Kritias (2)

It was thus that the Demiurgus confided to the recently-generated Gods the task of fabricating both mortal bodies, and mortal souls, to be joined with these immortal souls in their new stage of existence--and of guiding and governing the new mortal animal in the best manner, unless in so far as the latter should be the cause of mischief to himself. The Demiurgus decreed and proclaimed this beforehand, in order (says Plato) that he might not himself be the cause of any of the evil which might ensue[54] to individual men.

[Footnote 54: Plato, Timæus, p. 42 D-E. [Greek: Diathesmothetê/sas de\ pa/nta au)toi=s tau=ta, i(/na tê=s e)/peita ei)/ê kaki/as e(ka/stôn a)nai/tios . . . pare/dôke theoi=s sô/mata pla/ttein thnêta/, to/ te e)pi/loipon o(/son e)/t' ê)=n psuchê=s a)nthrôpi/nês de/on prosgene/sthai, tou=to kai\ pa/nth' o(/sa a)ko/loutha e)kei/nois a)pergasame/nous a)/rchein, kai\ kata\ du/namin o(/, ti ka/llista kai\ a)/rista to\ thnêto\n diakuberna=|n zô=on, o(/, ti mê\ kakô=n au)to\ e(autô=| gi/gnoito ai)/tion.]

We have here the theory, intimated but not expanded by Plato, that man is, by misconduct or folly, the cause of all the evil suffered on earth. That the Gods are not the cause of any evil, he tells us in Republ. ii. p. 379. It seems, however, that he did not remain satisfied with the theory of the Timæus, because we find a different theory in the treatise De Legibus (x. p. 896 E)--two kosmical souls, one good, the other evil.

Moreover, the recital of the Timæus itself (besides another express passage in it, pp. 86 D-87 A) plainly contradicts the theory, that man is the cause of his own sufferings and evil. The Demiurgus himself is described as the cause, by directing immortal souls to be joined with mortal bodies. The Demiurgus had constructed a beautiful Kosmos, with perfect and regular rotations--with the Gods, sidereal, planetary, and invisible--and with immortal souls distributed throughout the stars and earth, understanding and appreciating the cosmical rotations. So far all is admirable and faultless. But he is not satisfied with this. He determines to join each of these immortal souls with two mortal souls and with a mortal body. According to Plato's own showing, the immortal soul incurs nothing but corruption, disturbance, and stupidity, by such junction: as Empedokles and Herakleitus had said before (Plut. Solert. Animal. 7, p. 964 E). It is at first deprived of all intelligence ([Greek: a)/nous]); from this stupefaction it gradually but partially recovers; yet nothing short of the best possible education and discipline will enable it to contend, and even then imperfectly, against the corruption and incumbrance arising out of its companion the body; lastly, if it should contend with every success, the only recompense which awaits it is to be re-transferred to the star from whence it came down. What reason was there for removing the immortal soul from its happy and privileged position, to be degraded by forced companionship with an unworthy body and two inferior souls? The reason assigned is, that the Demiurgus required the Kosmos to be enlarged into a full and exact copy of the [Greek: Au)to/zôon] or Generic Animal, which comprehended four subordinate varieties of animals; one of them good (the Gods)--the other three inferior and corrupt, Men, Birds, Fishes. But here, according to Plato's own exposition, it was the Demiurgus himself and his plan that was at fault. What necessity was there to copy the worst parts of the Generic Animal as well as the best? The Kosmos would have been decidedly better, though it might have been less complete, without such unenviable accompaniments. When Plato constructs his own community (Republic and Legg.) he does not knowingly train up defective persons, or prepare the foundation for such, in order that every variety of character may be included. We may add here, according to Plato himself, [Greek: Nou=s] (intelligence or reason) belongs not to all human beings, but only to a small fraction of them (Timæus, p. 51 E). Except in these few, the immortal soul is therefore irrecoverably debased by its union with the body.]

[Side-note: Proceedings of the generated Gods--they fabricate the cranium, as miniature of the Kosmos, with the rational soul rotating within it.]

Accordingly the Gods, sons of the Demiurgus, entered upon the task, trying to imitate their father. Borrowing from the Kosmos portions of the four elements, with engagement that what was borrowed should one day be paid back, they glued them together, and fastened them by numerous minute invisible pegs into one body. Into this body, always decaying and requiring renovation, they introduced the immortal soul, with its double circular rotations--the Circles of the Same and of the Diverse: embodying it in the cranium, which was made spherical in exterior form like the Kosmos, and admitting within it no other motion but the rotatory. The head, the most divine portion of the human system, was made master; while the body was admitted only as subject and ministerial. The body was endowed with all the six varieties of motive power, forward, backwards--upward, downward--to the right, to the left.[55] The phenomena of nutrition and sensation began. But all these irregular movements, and violent multifarious agitations, checked or disturbed the regular rotations of the immortal soul in the cranium, perverting the arithmetical proportion, and harmony belonging to them. The rotations of the Circles of Same and Diverse were made to convey false and foolish affirmation. The soul became utterly destitute of intelligence, on being first joined to the body, and for some time afterwards.[56] But in the course of time the violence of these disturbing currents abates, so that the rotations of the Circles in the head can take place with more quiet and regularity. The man then becomes more and more intelligent. If subjected to good education and discipline, he will be made gradually sound and whole, free from corruption: but if he neglect this precaution, his life remains a lame one, and he returns back to Hades incomplete and unprofitable.[57]

[Footnote 55: Plato, Timæus, pp. 43 B, 44 D.

Plato supposes an etymological connection between [Greek: ai)sthê/seis] and [Greek: a)i+/ssô], p. 43 C.]

[Footnote 56: Plato, Timæus, p. 44 B. [Greek: kai\ dia\ dê\ pa/nta tau=ta ta\ pathê/mata nu=n kat' a)rcha/s te a)/nous psuchê\ gi/gnetai to\ prô=ton, o(/tan ei)s sô=ma e)ndethê=| thnêto/n.]]

[Footnote 57: Plato, Timæus, p. 44 C.]

[Side-note: The cranium is mounted on a tall body--six varieties of motion--organs of sense. Vision--Light.]

The Gods, when they undertook the fabrication of the body, foresaw the inconvenience of allowing the head--with its intelligent rotations, and with the immortal soul enclosed in it--to roll along the ground, unable to get over a height, or out of a hollow.[58] Accordingly they mounted it upon a tall body; with arms and legs as instruments of movement, support, and defence. They caused the movements to be generally directed forward and not backward; since front is more honourable and more commanding than rear. For the same reason, they placed the face, with the organs of sense, in the fore part of the head. Within the eyes, they planted that variety of fire which does not burn, but is called light, homogeneous with the light without. We are enabled to see in the daytime, because the light within our eyes pours out through the centre of them, and commingles with the light without. The two, being thus confounded together, transmit movements from every object which they touch, through the eye inward to the soul; and thus bring about the sensation of sight. At night no vision takes place: because the light from the interior of our eyes, even when it still comes out, finds no cognate light in the air without, and thus becomes extinguished in the darkness. All the light within the eye would thus have been lost, if the Gods had not provided a protection: they contrived the eyelids which drop and shut up the interior light within. This light, being prevented from egress, diffuses itself throughout the interior system, and tranquillises the movements within so as to bring on sleep: without dreams, if all the movements are quenched--with dreams, corresponding to the movements which remain if there are any such.[59]

[Footnote 58: Plato, Timæus, p. 44 D-E. [Greek: i(/n' ou)=n mê\ kulindou/menon e)pi\ gê=s, u(/lê te kai\ ba/thê pantodapa\ e)chou/sês, a)poroi= ta\ me\n u(perbai/nein, e)/nthen de\ e)kbai/nein, o)/chêm' au)tô=| tou=to kai\ eu)pori/an e)/dosan.]]

[Footnote 59: Plato, Timæus, p. 45. The theory of vision here given by Plato is interesting. A theory, similar in the main, had been propounded by Empedoklês before him. Aristotel. De Sensu, p. 437 b.; Theophrast. De Sensu, cap. 5-9, p. 88 of Philipson's [Greek: U(/lê A)nthrôpi/nê]. Aristotle himself impugns the theory. It is reported and discussed in Galen, De Hippocratis et Platonis Dogmat. vii. 5, 6, p. 619 seqq. ed. Kühn.

The different theories of vision among the ancient philosophers anterior to Aristotle are thus enumerated by E. H. von Baumhauer (De Sententiis Veterum Philosophorum Græcorum de Visu, Lumine, et Coloribus, Utrecht, 1843, p. 137):--"De videndi modo tres apud antiquos primarias theorias invenimus: et primam quidem, emanatione lucis ex oculis ad corpora externa, ejusque reflexu ad oculos (Pythagorei, Alcmæon): alteram emanationibus e corporibus, quæ per oculos veluti per canales ad animum penetrent (Eleatici, Heraclitus, Gorgias): quam sententiam Anaxagoras et Diogenes Apolloniates eatenus mutarunt, quod dicerent pupillam quasi speculum esse quod imagines acceptas ad animum rejiciat. Tertia theoria, orta è conjunctione duarum priorum, statuebat tam ex oculis quam corporibus emanationes fieri, et ambarum illarum concursu visum effici, quum conformata imago per meatus ad animum perveniat (Empedocles, Protagoras, Plato). Huic sententiæ etiam Democritus annumerari potest; qui eam planè secundum materiam, ut dicunt, exposuit."

The theory of Plato is described in the same treatise, pp. 106-112.]

[Side-note: Principal advantages of sight and hearing. Observations of the rotation of the Kosmos.]

Such are the auxiliary causes (continues Plato), often mistaken by others for principal causes, which the Gods employed to bring about sight. In themselves, they have no regularity of action: for nothing can be regular in action without mind and intelligence.[60] But the most important among all the advantages of sight is, that it enables us to observe and study the rotations of the Kosmos and of the sidereal and planetary bodies. It is the observed rotations of days, months, and years, which impart to us the ideas of time and number, and enable us to investigate the universe. Hence we derive philosophy, the greatest of all blessings. Hence too we learn to apply the celestial rotations as a rule and model to amend the rotations of intelligence in our own cranium--since the first are regular and unerring, while the second are disorderly and changeful.[61] It was for the like purpose, in view to the promotion of philosophy, that the Gods gave us voice and hearing. Both discourse and musical harmony are essential for this purpose. Harmony and rhythm are presents to us, from the Muses, not, as men now employ them, for unreflecting pleasure and recreation--but for the same purpose of regulating and attuning the disorderly rotations of the soul, and of correcting the ungraceful and unmeasured movements natural to the body.[62]

[Footnote 60: Plato, Timæus, p. 46 D-E.]

[Footnote 61: Plato, Timæus, pp. 47 B-C, 90 C.]

[Footnote 62: Plato, Timæus, p. 47 D-E. [Greek: ê( de\ a(rmoni/a . . . xu/mmachos u(po\ Mousô=n de/dotai; kai\ r(uthmo\s au)= . . . u(po\ tô=n au)tô=n e)do/thê.] Here we see Plato, in the usual Hellenic vein, particularising the functions and attributes of the different Gods and Goddesses.]

[Side-note: The Kosmos is product of joint action of Reason and Necessity. The four visible and tangible elements are not primitive.]

At this point of the exposition, the Platonic Timæus breaks off the thread, and takes up a new commencement. Thus far (he says) we have proceeded in explaining the part of Reason or Intelligence in the fabrication of the Kosmos. We must now explain the part of Necessity: for the genesis of the Kosmos results from co-operation of the two. By necessity (as has been said before) Plato means random, indeterminate, chaotic, pre-existent, spontaneity of movement or force: spontaneity ([Greek: ê( planôme/nê ai)ti/a]) upon which Reason works by persuasion up to a certain point, prevailing upon it to submit to some degree of fixity and regularity.[63] Timæus had described the body of the Kosmos as being constructed by the Demiurgus out of the four elements; thus assuming fire, air, earth, water, as pre-existent. But he now corrects himself, and tells us that such assumption is unwarranted. We must (he remarks) give a better and fuller explanation of the Kosmos. No one of these four elements is either primordial, or permanently distinct and definite in itself.

[Footnote 63: Plato, Timæus, p. 48 A.]

The only primordial reality is, an indeterminate, all-recipient _fundamentum_: having no form or determination of its own, but capable of receiving any form or determination from without.

[Side-note: Forms or Ideas and Materia Prima--Forms of the Elements--Place, or Receptivity.]

In the second explanation now given by Plato of the Kosmos and its genesis, he assumes this invisible _fundamentum_ (which he had not assumed before) as "the mother or nurse of all generation". He assumes, besides, the eternal Forms or Ideas, to act upon it and to bestow determination or quality. These forms fulfil the office of father: the offspring of the two is--the generated, concrete, visible, objects,[64] imitations of the Forms or Ideas, begotten out of this mother. How the Ideas act upon the Materia Prima, Plato cannot well explain: but each Form stamps an imitation or copy of itself upon portions of the common _Fundamentum_.[65]

[Footnote 64: Plato, Timæus, p. 51 A. [Greek: tê\n tou= gegono/tos o(ratou= kai\ pa/ntôs ai)sthêtou= mête/ra kai\ u(podochê/n.]]

[Footnote 65: Plato, Timæus, pp. 50-51. 50 C: [Greek: tupôthe/nta a)p' au)tô=n tro/pon tina\ du/sphraston kai\ thaumasto/n.] 51 A: [Greek: a)no/raton ei)=do/s ti, kai\ a)/morphon, pandeche/s, _metalamba/non de\ a)porô/tata/ pê| tou= noêtou=_ kai\ dusalôto/taton.]]

But do there really exist any such Forms or Ideas--as Fire _per se_, the Generic Fire--Water _per se_, the Generic Water, invisible and intangible?[66] Or is this mere unfounded speech? Does there exist nothing really anywhere, beyond the visible objects which we see and touch?[67]

[Footnote 66: Plato, Timæus, p. 51 C.]

[Footnote 67: Ueberweg, in a learned Dissertation, Ueber die Platonische Weltseele (pp. 52-53), seeks to establish a greater distinction between the Phædrus, Phædon, and Timæus, in respect to the way in which Plato affirms the separate substantiality of Ideas, than the language of the dialogues warrants. He contends that the separate substantiality of the Platonic Ideas is more peremptorily affirmed in the Timæus than in the Phædrus. But this will not be found borne out if we look at Phædrus, p. 247, where the affirmation is quite as peremptory as that in the Timæus; correlating too, as it does in the Timæus, with [Greek: Nou=s] as the contemplating subject. Indeed the point may be said to be affirmed more positively in the Phædrus, because the [Greek: u(peroura/nios to/pos] is assigned to the Ideas, while in the Timæus all [Greek: to/pos] or local existence is denied to them (p. 52 B-C). Sensible objects are presented in the Phædrus as faint resemblances of the archetypal Ideas (p. 250 C), just as they are in the Timæus: on the other hand, [Greek: to\ metalamba/nein tou= noêtou=] occurs in the Timæus (p. 51 A), equivalent to [Greek: to\ mete/chein], which Ueberweg states to be discontinued.]

We must assume (says Plato, after a certain brief argument which he himself does not regard as quite complete) the Forms or Ideas of Fire, Air, Water, Earth, as distinct and self-existent, eternal, indestructible, unchangeable--neither visible nor tangible, but apprehended by Reason or Intellect alone--neither receiving anything else from without, nor themselves moving to anything else. Distinct from these--images of these, and bearing the same name--are the sensible objects called Fire, Water, &c.--objects of sense and opinion--always in a state of transition--generated and destroyed, but always generated in some place and destroyed out of some place. There is to be assumed, besides, distinct from the two preceding--as a third _fundamentum_--the place or receptacle in which these images are localised, generated, and nursed up. This place, or formless primitive receptivity, is indestructible, but out of all reach of sense, and difficult to believe in, inasmuch as it is only accessible by a spurious sort of ratiocination.[68]

[Footnote 68: Plato, Timæus, p. 52 B. [Greek: au)to\ de\ met' a)naisthêsi/as a(pto\n logismô=| tini\ no/thô|, mo/gis pisto/n.]]

[Side-note: Primordial Chaos--Effect of intervention by the Demiurgus.]

Anterior to the construction of the Kosmos, the Forms or Ideas of the four elements had already begun to act upon this primitive recipient or receptacle, but in a confused and irregular way. Neither of the four could impress itself in a special and definite manner: there were some vestiges of each, but each was incomplete: all were in stir and agitation, yet without any measure or fixed rule. Thick and heavy, however, were tending to separate from thin and light, and each particle thus tending to occupy a place of its own.[69] In this condition (the primordial moving chaos of the poets and earlier philosophers), things were found by the Demiurgus, when he undertook to construct the Kosmos. There was no ready made Fire, Water, &c. (as Plato had assumed at the opening of the Timæus), but an agitated _imbroglio_ of all, with the portions tending to separate from each other, and to agglomerate each in a place of its own. The Demiurgus brought these four elements out of confusion into definite bodies and regular movements. He gave to each a body, constructed upon the most beautiful proportions of arithmetic and geometry, as far as this was possible.[70]

[Footnote 69: Plato, Timæus, pp. 52-53. 53 A: [Greek: ta\ te/ttara ge/nê seio/mena u(po\ tê=s dexame/nês, kinoume/nês au)tê=s oi(=on o)rga/nou seismo\n pare/chontos, ta\ me\n a)nomoio/tata plei=ston au)ta\ a)ph' au(tô=n o(ri/zein, ta\ d' o(moio/tata ma/lista ei)s tau)to\n xunôthei=n; dio\ dê\ kai\ chô/ran tau=ta a)/lla a)/llên i)/schein, pri\n kai\ to\ pa=n e)x au)tô=n diakosmêthe\n gene/sthai.] 57 C: [Greek: die/stêke me\n ga\r tou= ge/nous e(ka/stou ta\ plê/thê kata\ to/pon i)/dion dia\ tê\n tê=s dechome/nês ki/nêsin.] 58 C.]

[Footnote 70: Plato, Timæus, p. 53 B. [Greek: to\ de\ ê(=| dunato\n ô(s ka/llista a)/rista/ te e)x ou)ch ou(/tôs e)cho/ntôn to\n theo\n au)ta\ xunista/nai, para\ pa/nta ê(mi=n, ô(s a)ei/, tou=to lego/menon u(parche/tô.]

This is the hypothesis pervading all the Timæus--construction the best and finest which the case admitted. The limitations accompany the assumed purpose throughout.]

[Side-note: Geometrical theory of the elements--fundamental triangles--regular solids.]

Respecting such proportions, the theory which Plato here lays out is admitted by himself to be a novel one; but it is doubtless borrowed, with more or less modification, from the Pythagoreans. Every solid body is circumscribed by plane surfaces: every plane surface is composed of triangles: all triangles are generated out of two--the right-angled isoskeles triangle--and the right-angled scalene or oblong triangle. Of this oblong there are infinite varieties: but the most beautiful is a right-angled triangle, having the hypotenuse twice as long as the lesser of the two other sides.[71] From this sort of oblong triangle are generated the tetrahedron or pyramid--the octahedron--and the eikosihedron: from the equilateral triangle is generated the cube. The cube, as the most stable and solid, was assigned by the Demiurgus for the fundamental structure of earth: the pyramid for that of fire: the octahedron for that of air: the eikosihedron for that of water. The purpose was that the four should be in continuous geometrical proportion: as Fire to Air, so Air to Water: as Air to Water, so Water to Earth. Lastly, the Dodekahedron was assigned as the basis of structure for the spherical Kosmos itself or universe.[72] Upon this arrangement each of the three elements--fire, water, air--passes into the other; being generated from the same radical triangle. But earth does not pass into either of the three (nor either of these into earth), being generated from a different radical triangle. The pyramid, as thin, sharp, and cutting, was assigned to fire as the quickest and most piercing of the four elements: the cube as most solid and difficult to move, was allotted to earth, the stationary element. Fire was composed of pyramids of different size, yet each too small to be visible by itself, and becoming visible only when grouped together in masses: the earth was composed of cubes of different size, each invisible from smallness: the other elements in like manner, each from its respective solid,[73] in exact proportion and harmony, as far as Necessity could be persuaded to tolerate. All the five regular solids were thus employed in the configuration and structure of the Kosmos.[74]

[Footnote 71: Plato, Timæus, pp. 53-54. 53 C: [Greek: a)êthei= lo/gô| dêlou=n].]

[Footnote 72: That Plato intended, by this elaborate geometrical construction, to arrive at a continuous geometrical proportion between the four elements, he tells us (p. 32 A-B), adding the qualifying words [Greek: kath' o(/son ê)=n dunato/n]. M. Boeckh, however (De Platonicâ Corporis Mundani Fabricâ, pp. viii.-xxvi.), has shown that the geometrical proportion cannot be properly concluded from the premisses assumed by Plato:--"Platonis elementorum doctrinam et parum sibi constare, neque omnibus numeris absolutam esse, immo multis incommodis laborare, et divini ingenii lusui magis quam disciplinæ severitati originem debere fatebimur; nec profundiorem et abstrusiorem naturæ cognitionem in eâ sitam esse suspicabimur--in quem errorem etiam Joh. Keplerus, summi ingenii homo, incidit".

Respecting the Dodekahedron, see Zeller, Gesch. der Philos. ii. p. 513, ed. 2nd. There is some obscurity about it. In the Epinomis (p. 981 C) Plato gives the Æther as a fifth element, besides the four commonly known and recited in the Timæus. It appears that Philolaus, as well as Xenokrates, conceived the Dodekahedron as the structural form of Æther (Schol. ad Aristot. Physic. p. 427, a. 16, Brandis): and Xenokrates expressly says, that Plato himself recognised it as such. Zeller dissents from this view, and thinks that nothing more is meant than the implication, that the Dodekahedron can have a sphere described round it more readily than any of the other figures named.

Opponents of Plato remarked that he [Greek: katemathêmatikeu/sato tê\n phu/sin], Schol. ad Aristot. Metaph. A. 985, b. 23, p. 539, Brandis. Aristotle devotes himself in many places to the refutation of the Platonic doctrine on this point; see De Coelo, iii. 8, 306-307, and elsewhere.]

[Footnote 73: Plato, Timæus, p. 56 C. [Greek: o(/pêper ê( tê=s A)na/gkês e(kou=sa peisthei=sa te phu/sis u(pei=ke.]]

[Footnote 74: Plato, Timæus, pp. 55-56.]

Such was the mode of formation of the four so-called elemental bodies.[75] Of each of the four, there are diverse species or varieties: and that which distinguishes one variety of the same element from another variety is, that the constituent triangles, though all similar, are of different magnitudes. The diversity of these combinations, though the primary triangles are similar, is infinite: the student of Nature must follow it out, to obtain any probable result.[76]

[Footnote 75: Plato, Timæus, p. 57 C. [Greek: o(/sa a)/krata kai\ prô=ta sô/mata.]

The Platonist Attikus (ap. Eusebium, Præp. Ev. xv. 7) blames Aristotle for dissenting from Plato on this point, and for recognising the celestial matter as a fifth essence distinct from the four elements. Plato (he says) followed both anterior traditions and self-evident sense ([Greek: tê=| peri\ au)ta\ e)nargei/a|]) in admitting only the four elements, and in regarding all things as either compounds or varieties of these. But Aristotle, thinking to make parade of superior philosophical sagacity, [Greek: proskatêri/thmêse toi=s phainome/nois te/ttarsi sô/masi tê\n pe/mptên ou)si/an, pa/nu me\n lamprô=s kai\ philodô/rôs tê=| phu/sei chrêsa/menos, mê\ sunidô\n de\ _o(/ti ou) nomothetei=n dei= phusiologou=nta, ta\ de\ tê=s phu/seôs au)tê=s e)xistorei=n_.] This last precept is what we are surprised to read in a Platonist of the third century B.C. "When you are philosophising upon Nature, do not lay down the law, but search out the real facts of Nature." It is truly Baconian: it is justly applicable as a caution to Aristotle, against whom Attikus directs it; but it is still more eminently applicable to Plato, against whom he does not direct it.]

[Footnote 76: Plato, Timæus, p. 57 D.]

[Side-note: Varieties of each element.]

Plato next enumerates the several varieties of each element--fire, water, earth.[77] He then proceeds to mention the attributes, properties, affections, &c., of each: which he characterises as essentially relative to a sentient Subject: nothing being absolute except the constituent geometrical figures. You cannot describe these attributes (he says) without assuming (what has not yet been described) the sensitive or mortal soul, to which they are relative.[78] Assuming this provisionally, Plato gives account of Hot and Cold, Hard and Soft, Heavy and Light, Rough and Smooth, &c.[79] Then he describes, first, the sensations of pleasure and pain, common to the whole body--next those of the special senses, sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch.[80] These descriptions are very curious and interesting. I am compelled to pass them over by want of space, and shall proceed to the statements respecting the two mortal souls and the containing organism--which belong to a vein more analogous to that of the other Platonic dialogues.

[Footnote 77: Plato, Timæus, pp. 58-61 C.]

[Footnote 78: Plato, Timæus, p. 61 C-D. [Greek: Prô=ton me\n ou)=n u(pa/rchein ai)/sthêsin dei= toi=s legome/nois (ge/nesin) a)ei/; sarko\s de\ kai\ tô=n peri\ sa/rka ge/nesin, psuchê=s te o(/son thnêto/n, ou(/pô dielêlu/thamen. Tugcha/nei de\ ou)/te tau=ta chôri\s tô=n peri\ ta\ pathê/mata o(/sa ai)sthêtika/, ou)/t' e)kei=na a)/neu tou/tôn dunata\ i(kanô=s lechthê=nai; to\ de\ a(/ma schedo\n ou) dunato/n. U(pothete/on dê\ pro/teron tha/tera, ta\ d' u(/stera u(potethe/nta e)pa/nimen au)=this. I(/na ou)=n e(xê=s ta\ pathê/mata le/gêtai toi=s ge/nesin, e)/stô pro/tera ê(mi=n ta\ peri\ sô=ma kai\ psuchê\n o)/nta.]]

[Footnote 79: Plato, Tim. pp. 62-64 B. Demokritus appears to have held on this point an opinion approaching to that of Plato. See Democr. Frag. ed. Mullach, pp. 204-215: Aristot. Metaph. A. p. 985, b. 15; De Sensu, s. 62-65; Sextus Empiric. adv. Math. vii. 135.

[Greek: Peri\ me\n ou)=n bare/os kai\ kou/phou kai\ sklêrou= kai\ malakou=, e)n tou/tois a)phori/zei--tô=n d' a)/llôn ai)sthêtô=n ou)deno\s ei)=nai phu/sin, a)lla\ pa/nta pa/thê tê=s ai)sthê/seôs a)lloioume/nês.] We may remark that Plato includes hardness and softness, the different varieties of resistance, among the secondary or relative qualities of matter; all that he seems to conceive as absolute are extension and figure, the geometrical conception of matter. In the view of most modern philosophers, resistance is considered as the most obviously and undeniably _absolute_ of all the attributes of matter, as that which serves to prove that matter itself is absolute. Dr. Johnson refuted the doctrine of Berkeley by knocking a stick against the ground; and a similar refutation is adopted in words by Reid and Stewart (see Mill's System of Logic, Book vi. ad finem, also Book i. ch. 3, s. 7-8). To me the fact appealed to by Johnson appears an evidence in favour of Berkeley's theory rather than against it. The Resistant ([Greek: o(\ pare/chei prosbolê\n kai\ e)paphê/n tina], Plato, Sophist. p. 246 A) can be understood only as a correlate of something which is resisted: the fact of sense called Resistance is an indivisible fact, involving the implication of the two. In the first instance it is the resistance experienced to our own motions (A. Bain, The Senses and the Intellect, p. 91, 3rd ed.), and thus involves the feeling of our own spontaneous muscular energy.

The Timæus of Plato is not noticed by Sir W. Hamilton in his very learned and instructive Dissertation on the Primary and Secondary Qualities of Body (notes to his edition of Reid's Works, p. 826), though it bears upon his point more than the Theætêtus, which he mentions.]

[Footnote 80: Plato, Timæus, pp. 65-69 E.]

[Side-note: Construction of man imposed by the Demiurgus upon the secondary Gods. Triple Soul. Distribution thereof in the body.]

The Demiurgus, after having constructed the entire Kosmos, together with the generated Gods, as well as Necessity would permit--imposed upon these Gods the task of constructing Man: the second best of the four varieties of animals whom he considered it necessary to include in the Kosmos. He furnished to them as a basis an immortal rational soul (diluted remnant from the soul of the Kosmos); with which they were directed to combine two mortal souls and a body.[81] They executed their task as well as the conditions of the problem admitted. They were obliged to include in the mortal souls pleasure and pain, audacity and fear, anger, hope, appetite, sensation, &c., with all the concomitant mischiefs. By such uncongenial adjuncts the immortal rational soul was unavoidably defiled. The constructing Gods however took care to defile it as little as possible.[82] They reserved the head as a separate abode for the immortal soul: planting the mortal soul apart from it in the trunk, and establishing the neck as an isthmus of separation between the two. Again the mortal soul was itself not single but double: including two divisions, a better and a worse. The Gods kept the two parts separate; placing the better portion in the thoracic cavity nearer to the head, and the worse portion lower down, in the abdominal cavity: the two being divided from each other by the diaphragm, built across the body as a wall of partition: just as in a dwelling-house, the apartments of the women are separated from those of the men. Above the diaphragm and near to the neck, was planted the energetic, courageous, contentious, soul; so placed as to receive orders easily from the head, and to aid the rational soul in keeping under constraint the mutinous soul of appetite, which was planted below the diaphragm.[83] The immortal soul[84] was fastened or anchored in the brain, the two mortal souls in the line of the spinal marrow continuous with the brain: which line thus formed the thread of connection between the three. The heart was established as an outer fortress for the exercise of influence by the immortal soul over the other two. It was at the same time made the initial point of the veins, the fountain from whence the current of blood proceeded to pass forcibly through the veins round to all parts of the body. The purpose of this arrangement is, that when the rational soul denounces some proceeding as wrong (either on the part of others without, or in the appetitive soul within), it may stimulate an ebullition of anger in the heart, and may transmit from thence its exhortations and threats through the many small blood channels to all the sensitive parts of the body: which may thus be rendered obedient everywhere to the orders of our better nature.[85]

[Footnote 81: Plato, Timæus, p. 69 C.]

[Footnote 82: Plato, Tim. p. 69 D. [Greek: xugkerasa/menoi/ t' au)ta\ a)nagkai/ôs to\ thnêto\n ge/nos xune/thesan. kai\ dia\ tau=ta dê\ sebo/menoi miai/nein to\ thei=on, o(/ ti mê\ pa=sa ê)=n a)na/gkê], &c.]

[Footnote 83: Plato, Timæus, pp. 69-70.]

[Footnote 84: Plato, Timæus, p. 73 B-D.]

[Footnote 85: Plato, Timæus, p. 70 B-C.]

[Side-note: Functions of the heart and lungs. Thoracic soul.]

In such ebullitions of anger, as well as in moments of imminent danger, the heart leaps violently, becoming overheated and distended by excess of fire. The Gods foresaw this, and provided a safeguard against it by placing the lungs close at hand with the wind-pipe and trachea. The lungs were constructed soft and full of internal pores and cavities like a sponge; without any blood,[86]--but receiving, instead of blood, both the air inspired through the trachea, and the water swallowed to quench thirst. Being thus always cool, and soft like a cushion, the lungs received and deadened the violent beating and leaping of the heart; at the same time that they cooled down its excessive heat, and rendered it a more equable minister for the orders of reason.[87]

[Footnote 86: Plato, Timæus, p. 70 C. [Greek: tê\n tou= pleu/monos i)de/an e)nephu/teusan, prô=ton me\n malakê\n kai\ a)/naimon, ei)=ta sê/raggas e)nto\s e)/chousan oi(=on spo/ggou katatetrême/nas.]

Aristotle notices this opinion as held by some persons (not naming Plato), but impugns it as erroneous. He affirms that the lungs have more blood in them than any of the other viscera (Histor. Animal. i. 17, p. 496, b. 1-8; De Respirat. c. 15, p. 478, a. 13).]

[Footnote 87: Plato, Timæus, p. 70.]

[Side-note: Abdominal Soul--difficulty of controuling it--functions of the liver.]

The third or lowest soul, of appetite and nutrition, was placed between the diaphragm and the navel. This region of the body was set apart like a manger for containing necessary food: and the appetitive soul was tied up to it like a wild beast; indispensable indeed for the continuance of the race, yet a troublesome adjunct, and therefore placed afar off, in order that its bellowings might disturb as little as possible the deliberations of the rational soul in the cranium, for the good of the whole. The Gods knew that this appetitive soul would never listen to reason, and that it must be kept under subjection altogether by the influence of phantoms and imagery. They provided an agency for this purpose in the liver, which they placed close upon the abode of the appetitive soul.[88] They made the liver compact, smooth, and brilliant, like a mirror reflecting images:--moreover, both sweet and bitter on occasions. The thoughts of the rational soul were thus brought within view of the appetitive soul, in the form of phantoms or images exhibited on the mirror of the liver. When the rational soul is displeased, not only images corresponding to this feeling are impressed, but the bitter properties of the liver are all called forth. It becomes crumpled, discoloured, dark and rough; the gall bladder is compressed; the veins carrying the blood are blocked up, and pain as well as sickness arise. On the contrary, when the rational soul is satisfied, so as to send forth mild and complacent inspirations,--all this bitterness of the liver is tranquillised, and all its native sweetness called forth. The whole structure becomes straight and smooth; and the images impressed upon it are rendered propitious. It is thus through the liver, and by means of these images, that the rational soul maintains its ascendancy over the appetitive soul; either to terrify and subdue, or to comfort and encourage it.[89]

[Footnote 88: Plato, Timæus, p. 71 A. [Greek: ei)do/tes de\ au)to\ ô(s lo/gou me\n ou)/te xunê/sein e)/mellen, ei)/te pê| kai\ metala/mbanoi tino\s au)= tô=n ai)sthê/seôn, ou)k e)/mphuton au)tô=| to\ me/lein tinô=n e)/soito lo/gôn, u(po\ de\ ei)dô/lôn kai\ phantasma/tôn nukto/s te kai\ meth' ê(me/ran ma/lista psuchagôgê/soito, tou/tô| dê\ theo\s e)pibouleu/sas au)tô=| tê\n tou= ê(/patos i)de/an xune/stêsen.]]

[Footnote 89: Plato, Timæus, p. 71 C-D.]

[Side-note: The liver is made the seat of the prophetic agency. Function of the spleen.]

Moreover, the liver was made to serve another purpose. It was selected as the seat of the prophetic agency; which the Gods considered to be indispensable, as a refuge and aid for the irrational department of man. Though this portion of the soul had no concern with sense or reason, they would not shut it out altogether from some glimpse of truth. The revelations of prophecy were accordingly signified on the liver, for the instruction and within the easy view of the appetitive soul: and chiefly at periods when the functions of the rational soul are suspended--either during sleep, or disease, or fits of temporary ecstasy. For no man in his perfect senses comes under the influence of a genuine prophetic inspiration. Sense and intelligence are often required to interpret prophecies, and to determine what is meant by dreams or signs or prognostics of other kinds: but such revelations are received by men destitute of sense. To receive them, is the business of one class of men: to interpret them, that of another. It is a grave mistake, though often committed, to confound the two. It was in order to furnish prophecy to man, therefore, that the Gods devised both the structure and the place of the liver. During life, the prophetic indications are clearly marked upon it: but after death they become obscure and hard to decipher.[90]

[Footnote 90: Plato, Timæus, pp. 71-72. 71 E: [Greek: i(kano\n de\ sêmei=on, ô(s mantikê\n a)phrosu/nê| theo\s a)nthrôpi/nê| de/dôken; ou)dei\s ga\r e)/nnous e)pha/ptetai mantikê=s e)nthe/ou kai\ a)lêthou=s.]]

The spleen was placed near the liver, corresponding to it on the left side, in order to take off from it any impure or excessive accretions or accumulations, and thus to preserve it clean and pure.[91]

[Footnote 91: Plato, Timæus, p. 72 D.]

Such was the distribution of the one immortal and the two mortal souls, and such the purposes by which it was dictated. We cannot indeed (says Plato) proclaim this with full assurance as truth, unless the Gods would confirm our declarations. We must take the risk of affirming what appears to us probable--and we shall proceed with this risk yet further.[92] The following is the plan and calculation according to which it was becoming that our remaining bodily frame should be put together.

[Footnote 92: Plato, Timæus, p. 72 D-E. [Greek: to\ me\n a)lêthe/s, ô(s ei)/rêtai, theou= xumphê/santos to/t' a)\n ou(/tô mo/nôs dii+schurizoi/metha; to/ ge mê\n ei)ko\s ê(mi=n ei)rêsthai kai\ nu=n kai\ e)/ti ma=llon a)naskopou=si diakinduneute/on to\ pha/nai, kai\ pepha/sthô . . . e)k dê\ logismou= toiou=de xuni/stasthai ma/list' a)\n au)to\ pa/ntôn pre/poi.]]

[Side-note: Length of the intestinal canal, in order that food might not be frequently needed.]

The Gods foresaw that we should be intemperate in our appetite for food and drink, and that we should thus bring upon ourselves many diseases injurious to life. To mitigate this mischief, they provided us with a great length of intestinal canal, but twisted it round so as to occupy but a small space, in the belly. All the food which we introduce remains thus a long time within us, before it passes away. A greater interval elapses before we need fresh supplies of food. If the food passed away speedily, so that we were constantly obliged to renew it, and were therefore always eating--the human race would be utterly destitute of intelligence and philosophy. They would be beyond the controul of the rational soul.[93]

[Footnote 93: Plato, Timæus, p. 73 A.]

[Side-note: Bone--Flesh--Marrow.]

Bone and flesh come next to be explained. Both of them derive their origin from the spinal marrow: in which the bonds of life are fastened, and soul is linked with body--the root of the human race. The origin of the spinal marrow itself is special and exceptional. Among the triangles employed in the construction of all the four elements, the Gods singled out the very best of each sort. Those selected were combined harmoniously with each other, and employed in the formation of the spinal marrow, as the universal seed ground ([Greek: panspermi/an]) for all the human race. In this marrow the Gods planted the different sorts of souls; distributing and accommodating the figure of each portion of marrow to the requirements of each different soul. For that portion (called the encephalon, as being contained in the head) which was destined to receive the immortal soul, they employed the spherical figure and none other: for the remaining portion, wherein the mortal soul was to be received, they employed a mixture of the spherical and the oblong. All of it together was called by the same name _marrow_, covered and protected by one continuous bony case, and established as the holding ground to fasten the whole extent of soul with the whole extent of body.[94]

[Footnote 94: Plato, Timæus, p. 73 C-D.]

[Side-note: Nails--Mouth--Teeth. Plants produced for nutrition of man.]

Plato next explains the construction of ligaments and flesh--of the mouth, tongue, teeth, and lips: of hair and nails.[95] These last were produced with a long-sighted providence: for the Gods foresaw that the lower animals would be produced from the degeneration of man, and that to them nails and claws would be absolutely indispensable: accordingly, a sketch or rudiment of nails was introduced into the earliest organisation of man.[96] Nutrition being indispensable to man, the Gods produced for this purpose plants (trees, shrubs, herbs, &c.)--with a nature cognate to that of man, but having only the lowest of the three human souls.[97] They then cut ducts and veins throughout the human body, in directions appropriate for distributing the nutriment everywhere. They provided proper structures (here curiously described) for digestion, inspiration, and expiration.[98] The constituent triangles within the body, when young and fresh, overpower the triangles, older and weaker, contained in the nutritive matters swallowed, and then appropriate part of them to the support and growth of the body: in old age, the triangles within are themselves overpowered, and the body decays. When the fastenings, whereby the triangles in the spinal marrow have been fitted together, are worn out and give way, they let go the fastenings of the soul also. The soul, when thus released in a natural way, flies away with delight. Death in this manner is pleasurable: though it is distressing, when brought on violently, by disease or wounds.[99]

[Footnote 95: Plato, Tim. pp. 75-76.]

[Footnote 96: Plat. Tim. p. 76 E. [Greek: o(/then e)n a)nthrô/pois eu)thu\s gignome/nois _u(petupô/santo_ tê\n tô=n o)nu/chôn ge/nesin.]]

[Footnote 97: Plat. Tim. p. 77 B-C.]

[Footnote 98: Plat. Tim. pp. 78-79.]

[Footnote 99: Plat. Tim. p. 81.]

[Side-note: General view of Diseases and their Causes.]

Here Plato passes into a general survey of diseases and the proper treatment of them. "As to the source from whence diseases arise (he says) this is a matter evident to every one. They arise from unnatural excess, deficiency, or displacement, of some one or more of the four elements (fire, air, water, earth) which go to compose the body."[100] If the element in excess be fire, heat and continuous fever are produced: if air, the fever comes on alternate days: if water (a duller element), it is a tertian fever: if earth, it is a quartan--since earth is the dullest and most sluggish of the four.[101]

[Footnote 100: Plat. Tim. p. 81 E. [Greek: to\ de\ tô=n no/sôn o(/then xuni/statai, dê=lo/n pou kai\ panti/.]]

[Footnote 101: Plat. Tim. p. 86 A. [Greek: to\ de\ gê=s, teta/rtôs o)\n nôthe/staton tou/tôn.]]

[Side-note: Diseases of mind--wickedness is a disease--no man is voluntarily wicked.]

Having dwelt at considerable length on the distempers of the body, the Platonic Timæus next examines those of the soul, which proceed from the condition of the body.[102] The generic expression for all distemper of the soul is, irrationality--unreason--absence of reason or intelligence. Of this there are two sorts--madness and ignorance. Intense pleasures and pains are the gravest cause of madness.[103] A man under either of these two influences--either grasping at the former, or running away from the latter, out of season--can neither see nor hear any thing rightly. He is at that moment mad and incapable of using his reason. When the flow of sperm round his marrow is overcharged and violent, so as to produce desires with intense throes of uneasiness beforehand and intense pleasure when satisfaction arrives,--his soul is really distempered and irrational, through the ascendancy of his body. Yet such a man is erroneously looked upon in general not as distempered, but as wicked voluntarily, of his own accord. The truth is, that sexual intemperance is a disorder of the soul arising from an abundant flow of one kind of liquid in the body, combined with thin bones or deficiency in the solids. And nearly all those intemperate habits which are urged as matters of reproach against a man--as if he were bad willingly,--are urged only from the assumption of an erroneous hypothesis. No man is bad willingly, but only from some evil habit of body and from wrong or perverting treatment in youth; which is hostile to his nature, and comes upon him against his own will.[104]

[Footnote 102: Plato, Timæus, p. 86 B. [Greek: Kai\ ta\ me\n peri\ to\ sô=ma nosê/mata tau/tê| xumbai/nei gigno/mena, ta\ de\ peri\ psuchê\n dia\ sô/matos e(/xin tê=|de.]]

[Footnote 103: Plato, Timæus, p. 86 B. [Greek: no/son me\n dê\ psuchê=s a)/noian xugchôrête/on. Du/o d' a)noi/as ge/nê, to\ me\n mani/an, to\ de\ a)mathi/an.]]

[Footnote 104: Plato, Timæus, p. 86 C-D.]

[Side-note: Badness of mind arises from body.]

Again, not merely by way of pleasures, but by way of pains also, the body operates to entail evil or wickedness on the soul. When acid or salt phlegm--when bitter and bilious humours--come to spread through the body, remaining pent up therein, without being able to escape by exhalation,--the effluvia which ought to have been exhaled from them become confounded with the rotation of the soul, producing in it all manner of distempers. These effluvia attack all the three different seats of the soul, occasioning great diversity of mischiefs according to the part attacked--irascibility, despondency, rashness, cowardice, forgetfulness, stupidity. Such bad constitution of the body serves as the foundation of ulterior mischief. And when there supervene, in addition, bad systems of government and bad social maxims, without any means of correction furnished to youth through good social instruction--it is from these two combined causes, both of them against our own will, that all of us who are wicked become wicked. Parents and teachers are more in fault than children and pupils. We must do our best to arrange the bringing up, the habits, and the instruction, so as to eschew evil and attain good.[105]

[Footnote 105: Plato, Timæus, p. 87 A-C.]

[Side-note: Preservative and healing agencies against disease--well-regulated exercise, of mind and body proportionally.]

After thus describing the causes of corruption, both in body and mind, Plato adverts to the preservative and corrective agencies applicable to them. Between the one and the other, constant proportion and symmetry must be imperatively maintained. When the one is strong, and the other weak, nothing but mischief can ensue.[106] Mind must not be exercised alone, to the exclusion of body; nor body alone, without mind. Each must be exercised, so as to maintain adequate reaction and equilibrium against the other.[107] We ought never to let the body be at rest: we must keep up within it a perpetual succession of moderate shocks, so that it may make suitable resistance against foreign causes of movement, internal and external.[108] The best of all movements is, that which is both in itself and made by itself: analogous to the self-continuing rotation both of the Kosmos and of the rational soul in our cranium.[109] Movement in itself, but by an external agent, is less good. The worst of all is, movement neither in itself nor by itself. Among these three sorts of movement, the first is, Gymnastic: the second, propulsion backwards and forwards in a swing, gestation in a carriage: the third is, purgation or medicinal disturbance.[110] This last is never to be employed, except in extreme emergencies.

[Footnote 106: Plat. Tim. pp. 87-88 A.]

[Footnote 107: Plat. Tim. p. 88 C.]

[Footnote 108: Plat. Tim. p. 88 D-E.]

[Footnote 109: Plat. Tim. p. 89 A. [Greek: tô=n d' au)= kinê/seôn ê( e)n e(autô=| u(ph' e(autou= a)ri/stê ki/nêsis; ma/lista ga\r tê=| dianoêtikê=| kai\ tê=| tou= panto\s kinê/sei xuggenê/s; ê( d' u(p' a)/llou chei/rôn.]]

[Footnote 110: Plat. Tim. p. 89 A. [Greek: deute/ra de\ ê( dia\ tô=n ai)ôrê/seôn].

Foes, in the Oeconomia Hippocratica v. [Greek: Ai)ô/ra], gives information about these _pensiles gestationes_, upon which the ancient physicians bestowed much attention.]

[Side-note: Treatment proper for mind alone, apart from body--supremacy of the rational soul must be cultivated.]

We must now indicate the treatment necessary for mind alone, apart from body. It has been already stated, that there are in each of us three souls, or three distinct varieties of soul; each having its own separate place and special movements. Of these three, that which is most exercised must necessarily become the strongest: that which is left unexercised, unmoved, at rest or in indolence,--will become the weakest. The object to be aimed at is, that all three shall be exercised in harmony or proportion with each other. Respecting the soul in our head, the grandest and most commanding of the three, we must bear in mind that it is this which the Gods have assigned to each man as his own special Dæmon or presiding Genius. Dwelling as it does in the highest region of the body, it marks us and links us as akin with heaven--as a celestial and not a terrestrial plant, having root in heaven and not in earth. It is this encephalic or head-soul, which, connected with and suspended from the divine soul of the Kosmos, keeps our whole body in its erect attitude. Now if a man neglects this soul, directing all his favour and development towards the two others (the energetic or the appetitive),--all his judgments will infallibly become mortal and transient, and he himself will be degraded into a mortal being, as far as it is possible for man to become so. But if he devotes himself to study and meditation on truth, exercising the encephalic soul more than the other two--he will assuredly, if he seizes truth,[111] have his mind filled with immortal and divine judgments, and will become himself immortal, as far as human nature admits of it. Cultivating as he does systematically the divine element within him, and having his in-dwelling Genius decorated as perfectly as possible, he will be eminently well-inspired or happy.[112]

[Footnote 111: Plato, Timæus, p. 90 C. [Greek: a)/n per a)lêthei/as e)pha/ptêtai.]]

[Footnote 112: Plato, Timæus, p. 90 B-D. [Greek: e)/chonta/ te au)to\n eu)= ma/la kekosmême/non to\n dai/mona xu/noikon e)n au(tô=|, diaphero/ntôs eu)dai/mona ei)=nai.]

It is hardly possible to translate this play upon the word [Greek: eu)dai/môn].]

[Side-note: We must study and understand the rotations of the Kosmos--this is the way to amend the rotations of the rational soul.]

The mode of cultivating or developing each soul is the same--to assign to each the nourishment and the movement which is suitable to it. Now the movements which are kindred and congenial to our divine encephalic soul, are--the rotations of the Kosmos and the intellections traversing the Kosmical soul. It is these that we ought to follow and study. By learning and embracing in our minds the rotations and proportions of the Kosmos, we shall assimilate the comprehending subject to the comprehended object, and shall rectify that derangement of our own intra-cranial rotations, which was entailed upon us by our birth into a body. By such assimilation, we shall attain the perfection of the life allotted to us, both at present and for the future.[113]

[Footnote 113: Plato, Timæus, pp. 90 D, 91 C-D. The phrase of Plato in describing the newly introduced mode of procreation--[Greek: ô(s ei)s a)/rouran tê\n mê/tran a)o/rata u(po\ smikro/têtos kai\ a)dia/plasta zô=a kataspei/rantes]--is remarkable, as it might be applied to the spermatozoa, which nevertheless he cannot have known.]

[Side-note: Construction of women, birds, quadrupeds, fishes, &c., all from the degradation of primitive man.]

We have thus--says the Platonic Timæus in approaching his conclusion--gone through all those matters which we promised at the beginning, from the first construction of the Kosmos to the genesis of man. We must now devote a few words to the other animals. All of these derive their origin from man, by successive degradations. The first transition is from man into woman. Men whose lives had been characterised by cowardice or injustice, were after death and in their second birth born again as women. It was then that the Gods planted in us the sexual impulse, reconstructing the bodily organism with suitable adjustment, on the double pattern, male and female.[114]

[Footnote 114: Plat. Tim. p. 91 D. Whoever compares the step of marked degeneration here indicated--in passing from men to women--with that which is affirmed by Plato in the fifth book of the Republic about the character, attributes, and capacities of women, will recognise a material difference between the two.]

Such was the genesis of women, by a partial transformation and diversification of the male structure.

We next come to birds; who are likewise a degraded birth or formation, derived from one peculiar mode of degeneracy in man: hair being transmuted into feathers and wings. Birds were formed from the harmless, but light, airy, and superficial men; who, though carrying their minds aloft to the study of kosmical phenomena, studied them by visual observation and not by reason, foolishly imagining that they had discovered the way of reaching truth.[115]

[Footnote 115: Plato, Timæus, p. 91 E.]

The more brutal land animals proceeded from men totally destitute of philosophy, who neither looked up to the heavens nor cared for celestial objects: from men making no use whatever of the rotations of their encephalic soul, but following exclusively the guidance of the lower soul in the trunk. Through such tastes and occupations, both their heads and their anterior limbs became dragged down to the earth by the force of affinity. Moreover, when the rotations of the encephalic soul, from want of exercise, became slackened and fell into desuetude, the round form of the cranium was lost, and converted into an oblong or some other form. These men thus degenerated into quadrupeds and multipeds: the Gods furnishing a greater number of feet in proportion to the stupidity of each, in order that its approximations to earth might be multiplied. To some of the more stupid, however, the Gods gave no feet nor limbs at all; constraining them to drag the whole length of their bodies along the ground, and to become Reptiles.[116]

[Footnote 116: Plato, Timæus, pp. 91-92.]

Out of the most stupid and senseless of mankind, by still greater degeneracy, the Gods formed Fishes or Aquatic Animals:--the fourth and lowest genus, after Men, Birds, Land-Animals. This race of beings, from their extreme want of mind, were not considered worthy to live on earth, or to respire thin and pure air. They were condemned to respire nothing but deep and turbid water, many of them, as oysters, and other descriptions of shellfish, being fixed down at the lowest depth or bottom.[117]

[Footnote 117: Plato, Timæus, p. 92 B.]