Philebus | Page 4

Philolaus and in the
Pythagorean table of opposites) in the same manner as contemporary
Pythagoreans.
There is little in the characters which is worthy of remark. The Socrates
of the Philebus is devoid of any touch of Socratic irony, though here, as
in the Phaedrus, he twice attributes the flow of his ideas to a sudden
inspiration. The interlocutor Protarchus, the son of Callias, who has
been a hearer of Gorgias, is supposed to begin as a disciple of the
partisans of pleasure, but is drawn over to the opposite side by the
arguments of Socrates. The instincts of ingenuous youth are easily
induced to take the better part. Philebus, who has withdrawn from the
argument, is several times brought back again, that he may support
pleasure, of which he remains to the end the uncompromising advocate.
On the other hand, the youthful group of listeners by whom he is
surrounded, 'Philebus' boys' as they are termed, whose presence is
several times intimated, are described as all of them at last convinced
by the arguments of Socrates. They bear a very faded resemblance to
the interested audiences of the Charmides, Lysis, or Protagoras. Other
signs of relation to external life in the dialogue, or references to
contemporary things and persons, with the single exception of the
allusions to the anonymous enemies of pleasure, and the teachers of the

flux, there are none.
The omission of the doctrine of recollection, derived from a previous
state of existence, is a note of progress in the philosophy of Plato. The
transcendental theory of pre-existent ideas, which is chiefly discussed
by him in the Meno, the Phaedo, and the Phaedrus, has given way to a
psychological one. The omission is rendered more significant by his
having occasion to speak of memory as the basis of desire. Of the ideas
he treats in the same sceptical spirit which appears in his criticism of
them in the Parmenides. He touches on the same difficulties and he
gives no answer to them. His mode of speaking of the analytical and
synthetical processes may be compared with his discussion of the same
subject in the Phaedrus; here he dwells on the importance of dividing
the genera into all the species, while in the Phaedrus he conveys the
same truth in a figure, when he speaks of carving the whole, which is
described under the image of a victim, into parts or members,
'according to their natural articulation, without breaking any of them.'
There is also a difference, which may be noted, between the two
dialogues. For whereas in the Phaedrus, and also in the Symposium, the
dialectician is described as a sort of enthusiast or lover, in the Philebus,
as in all the later writings of Plato, the element of love is wanting; the
topic is only introduced, as in the Republic, by way of illustration. On
other subjects of which they treat in common, such as the nature and
kinds of pleasure, true and false opinion, the nature of the good, the
order and relation of the sciences, the Republic is less advanced than
the Philebus, which contains, perhaps, more metaphysical truth more
obscurely expressed than any other Platonic dialogue. Here, as Plato
expressly tells us, he is 'forging weapons of another make,' i.e. new
categories and modes of conception, though 'some of the old ones
might do again.'
But if superior in thought and dialectical power, the Philebus falls very
far short of the Republic in fancy and feeling. The development of the
reason undisturbed by the emotions seems to be the ideal at which Plato
aims in his later dialogues. There is no mystic enthusiasm or rapturous
contemplation of ideas. Whether we attribute this change to the greater
feebleness of age, or to the development of the quarrel between
philosophy and poetry in Plato's own mind, or perhaps, in some degree,
to a carelessness about artistic effect, when he was absorbed in abstract

ideas, we can hardly be wrong in assuming, amid such a variety of
indications, derived from style as well as subject, that the Philebus
belongs to the later period of his life and authorship. But in this, as in
all the later writings of Plato, there are not wanting thoughts and
expressions in which he rises to his highest level.
The plan is complicated, or rather, perhaps, the want of plan renders the
progress of the dialogue difficult to follow. A few leading ideas seem
to emerge: the relation of the one and many, the four original elements,
the kinds of pleasure, the kinds of knowledge, the scale of goods. These
are only partially connected with one another. The dialogue is not
rightly entitled 'Concerning pleasure' or 'Concerning good,' but should
rather be described as treating of the relations of pleasure and
knowledge, after