Sophist | Page 8

Plato, we
find no other trace in Greek philosophy; he combines the teacher of
virtue with the Eristic; while in his omniscience, in his ignorance of
himself, in his arts of deception, and in his lawyer-like habit of writing
and speaking about all things, he is still the antithesis of Socrates and of
the true teacher.
II. The question has been asked, whether the method of 'abscissio

infinti,' by which the Sophist is taken, is a real and valuable logical
process. Modern science feels that this, like other processes of formal
logic, presents a very inadequate conception of the actual complex
procedure of the mind by which scientific truth is detected and verified.
Plato himself seems to be aware that mere division is an unsafe and
uncertain weapon, first, in the Statesman, when he says that we should
divide in the middle, for in that way we are more likely to attain species;
secondly, in the parallel precept of the Philebus, that we should not
pass from the most general notions to infinity, but include all the
intervening middle principles, until, as he also says in the Statesman,
we arrive at the infima species; thirdly, in the Phaedrus, when he says
that the dialectician will carve the limbs of truth without mangling
them; and once more in the Statesman, if we cannot bisect species, we
must carve them as well as we can. No better image of nature or truth,
as an organic whole, can be conceived than this. So far is Plato from
supposing that mere division and subdivision of general notions will
guide men into all truth.
Plato does not really mean to say that the Sophist or the Statesman can
be caught in this way. But these divisions and subdivisions were
favourite logical exercises of the age in which he lived; and while
indulging his dialectical fancy, and making a contribution to logical
method, he delights also to transfix the Eristic Sophist with weapons
borrowed from his own armoury. As we have already seen, the division
gives him the opportunity of making the most damaging reflections on
the Sophist and all his kith and kin, and to exhibit him in the most
discreditable light.
Nor need we seriously consider whether Plato was right in assuming
that an animal so various could not be confined within the limits of a
single definition. In the infancy of logic, men sought only to obtain a
definition of an unknown or uncertain term; the after reflection scarcely
occurred to them that the word might have several senses, which
shaded off into one another, and were not capable of being
comprehended in a single notion. There is no trace of this reflection in
Plato. But neither is there any reason to think, even if the reflection had
occurred to him, that he would have been deterred from carrying on the
war with weapons fair or unfair against the outlaw Sophist.
III. The puzzle about 'Not-being' appears to us to be one of the most

unreal difficulties of ancient philosophy. We cannot understand the
attitude of mind which could imagine that falsehood had no existence,
if reality was denied to Not-being: How could such a question arise at
all, much less become of serious importance? The answer to this, and to
nearly all other difficulties of early Greek philosophy, is to be sought
for in the history of ideas, and the answer is only unsatisfactory because
our knowledge is defective. In the passage from the world of sense and
imagination and common language to that of opinion and reflection the
human mind was exposed to many dangers, and often
'Found no end in wandering mazes lost.'
On the other hand, the discovery of abstractions was the great source of
all mental improvement in after ages. It was the pushing aside of the
old, the revelation of the new. But each one of the company of
abstractions, if we may speak in the metaphorical language of Plato,
became in turn the tyrant of the mind, the dominant idea, which would
allow no other to have a share in the throne. This is especially true of
the Eleatic philosophy: while the absoluteness of Being was asserted in
every form of language, the sensible world and all the phenomena of
experience were comprehended under Not-being. Nor was any
difficulty or perplexity thus created, so long as the mind, lost in the
contemplation of Being, asked no more questions, and never thought of
applying the categories of Being or Not-being to mind or opinion or
practical life.
But the negative as well as the positive idea had sunk deep into the
intellect of man. The effect of the paradoxes of Zeno extended far
beyond the Eleatic circle. And now an unforeseen consequence began
to arise. If the Many were