Sophist | Page 4

he probably
means to imply that he is making a closer approach to the schools of
Elea and Megara. He had much in common with them, but he must first
submit their ideas to criticism and revision. He had once thought as he
says, speaking by the mouth of the Eleatic, that he understood their
doctrine of Not- being; but now he does not even comprehend the
nature of Being. The friends of ideas (Soph.) are alluded to by him as
distant acquaintances, whom he criticizes ab extra; we do not recognize
at first sight that he is criticizing himself. The character of the Eleatic
stranger is colourless; he is to a certain extent the reflection of his
father and master, Parmenides, who is the protagonist in the dialogue
which is called by his name. Theaetetus himself is not distinguished by
the remarkable traits which are attributed to him in the preceding
dialogue. He is no longer under the spell of Socrates, or subject to the
operation of his midwifery, though the fiction of question and answer is
still maintained, and the necessity of taking Theaetetus along with him
is several times insisted upon by his partner in the discussion. There is
a reminiscence of the old Theaetetus in his remark that he will not tire
of the argument, and in his conviction, which the Eleatic thinks likely
to be permanent, that the course of events is governed by the will of

God. Throughout the two dialogues Socrates continues a silent auditor,
in the Statesman just reminding us of his presence, at the
commencement, by a characteristic jest about the statesman and the
philosopher, and by an allusion to his namesake, with whom on that
ground he claims relationship, as he had already claimed an affinity
with Theaetetus, grounded on the likeness of his ugly face. But in
neither dialogue, any more than in the Timaeus, does he offer any
criticism on the views which are propounded by another.
The style, though wanting in dramatic power,--in this respect
resembling the Philebus and the Laws,--is very clear and accurate, and
has several touches of humour and satire. The language is less fanciful
and imaginative than that of the earlier dialogues; and there is more of
bitterness, as in the Laws, though traces of a similar temper may also
be observed in the description of the 'great brute' in the Republic, and in
the contrast of the lawyer and philosopher in the Theaetetus. The
following are characteristic passages: 'The ancient philosophers, of
whom we may say, without offence, that they went on their way rather
regardless of whether we understood them or not;' the picture of the
materialists, or earth-born giants, 'who grasped oaks and rocks in their
hands,' and who must be improved before they can be reasoned with;
and the equally humourous delineation of the friends of ideas, who
defend themselves from a fastness in the invisible world; or the
comparison of the Sophist to a painter or maker (compare Republic),
and the hunt after him in the rich meadow-lands of youth and wealth;
or, again, the light and graceful touch with which the older
philosophies are painted ('Ionian and Sicilian muses'), the comparison
of them to mythological tales, and the fear of the Eleatic that he will be
counted a parricide if he ventures to lay hands on his father Parmenides;
or, once more, the likening of the Eleatic stranger to a god from
heaven.--All these passages, notwithstanding the decline of the style,
retain the impress of the great master of language. But the equably
diffused grace is gone; instead of the endless variety of the early
dialogues, traces of the rhythmical monotonous cadence of the Laws
begin to appear; and already an approach is made to the technical
language of Aristotle, in the frequent use of the words 'essence,'
'power,' 'generation,' 'motion,' 'rest,' 'action,' 'passion,' and the like.
The Sophist, like the Phaedrus, has a double character, and unites two

enquirers, which are only in a somewhat forced manner connected with
each other. The first is the search after the Sophist, the second is the
enquiry into the nature of Not-being, which occupies the middle part of
the work. For 'Not-being' is the hole or division of the dialectical net in
which the Sophist has hidden himself. He is the imaginary
impersonation of false opinion. Yet he denies the possibility of false
opinion; for falsehood is that which is not, and therefore has no
existence. At length the difficulty is solved; the answer, in the language
of the Republic, appears 'tumbling out at our feet.' Acknowledging that
there is a communion of kinds with kinds, and not merely one Being or
Good having different names, or several isolated ideas or classes
incapable of communion, we discover 'Not-being' to be the