Plato refutes the doctrine,[138] but in a manner not so much to prove its untruth, as to present it for a verbal incongruity. How can you properly say (he argues) that you know the compound AB, when you know neither A nor B separately? Now it may be incongruous to restrict in this manner the use of the words know — knowledge: but the distinction between the two cases is not denied by Plato. Antisthenes said — “I feel a simple sensation (A or B) and can name it, but I do not know it: I can affirm nothing about it in itself, or about its real essence. But the compound AB I do know, for I know its essence: I can affirm about it that it is compounded of A and B, and this is its essence.” Here is a real distinction: and Plato’s argument amounts only to affirming that it is an incorrect use of words to call the compound known, when the component elements are not known. Unfortunately the refutation of Plato is not connected with any declaration of his own counter-doctrine, for Theætêtus ends in a result purely negative.
[138] Plato, Theætêt. ut suprâ.
Remarks of Aristotle upon the same.
Aristotle, in his comment on the opinion of Antisthenes, makes us understand better what it really is:—“Respecting simple essences (A or B), I cannot tell what they really are: but I can tell what they are like or unlike, i.e., I can compare them with other essences, simple or compound. But respecting the compound AB, I can tell what it really is: its essence is, to be compounded of A and B. And this I call knowing or knowledge.”[139] The distinction here taken by Antisthenes (or by his followers) is both real and useful: Plato does not contest it: while Aristotle distinctly acknowledges it, only that among the simple items he ranks both Percepta and Concepta.
[139] Aristot. Metaphys. Η. 1043, b. 24-32, with the Scholia, p. 774, b. Br.
Mr. J. S. Mill observes, Syst. of Logic, i. 5, 6, p. 116, ed. 9:—“There is still another exceptional case, in which, though the predicate is the name of a class, yet in predicating it we affirm nothing but resemblance: the class being founded not on resemblance in any given particular, but on general unanalysable resemblance. The classes in question are those into which our simple sensations, or other simple feelings, are divided. Sensations of white, for instance, are classed together, not because we can take them to pieces, and say, they are alike in this, not alike in that but because we feel them to be alike altogether, though in different degrees. When therefore I say — The colour I saw yesterday was a white colour, or, The sensation I feel is one of tightness — in both cases the attribute I affirm of the colour or of the other sensation is mere resemblance: simple likeness to sensations which I have had before, and which have had that name bestowed upon them. The names of feelings, like other concrete general names, are connotative: but they connote a mere resemblance. When predicated of any individual feelings, the information they convey is that of its likeness to the other feelings which we have been accustomed to call by the same name.”
Later Grecian Cynics — Monimus — Krates — Hipparchia.
Monimus a Syracusan, and Krates a Theban, with his wife Hipparchia,[140] were successors of Diogenes in the Cynic vein of philosophy: together with several others of less note. Both Monimus and Krates are said to have been persons of wealthy condition,[141] yet their minds were so powerfully affected by what they saw of Diogenes, that they followed his example, renounced their wealth, and threw themselves upon a life of poverty; with nothing beyond the wallet and the threadbare cloak, but with fearless independence of character, free censure of every one, and indifference to opinion. “I choose as my country” (said Krates) “poverty and low esteem, which fortune cannot assail: I am the fellow-citizen of Diogenes, whom the snares of envy cannot reach.”[142] Krates is said to have admonished every one, whether they invited it or not: and to have gone unbidden from house to house for the purpose of exhortation. His persistence in this practice became so obtrusive that he obtained the title of “the Door-Opener”.[143] This feature, common to several other Cynics, exhibits an approximation to the missionary character of Sokrates, as described by himself in the Platonic Apology: a feature not found in any of the other eminent heads of philosophy — neither in Plato nor in Aristotle, Zeno, or Epikurus.
[140] Hipparchia was a native of Maroneia in Thrace; born in a considerable station, and belonging to an opulent family. She came to Athens with her brother Mêtroklês, and heard both Theophrastus and Kratês. Both she and her brother became impressed with the strongest admiration for Kratês: for his mode of life, as well as for his discourses and doctrine. Rejecting various wealthy suitors, she insisted upon becoming his wife, both against his will and against the will of her parents. Her resolute enthusiasm overcame the reluctance of both. She adopted fully his hard life, poor fare, and threadbare cloak. She passed her days in the same discourses and controversies, indifferent to the taunts which were addressed to her for having relinquished the feminine occupations of spinning and weaving. Diogenes Laertius found many striking dicta or replies ascribed to her (ἄλλα μυρία τῆς φιλοσόφου vi. 96-98). He gives an allusion made to her by the contemporary comic poet Menander, who (as I before observed) handled the Cynics of his time as Aristophanes, Eupolis, &c., had handled Sokrates —
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Συμπεριπατήσεις γὰρ τρίβων’ ἔχους ἐμοὶ,
ὥσπερ Κράτητι τῷ Κυνικῷ ποθ’ ἡ γυνὴ. Καὶ θυγατέρ’ ἐξέδωκ’ ἐκεῖνος, ὡς ἔφη αὐτὸς, ἐπὶ πειρᾷ δοὺς τριάκονθ’ ἡμέρας. (vi. 93.) |