[43] Plat. Hipp. Maj. 301 B. Ἀλλὰ γὰρ δὴ σύ, ὦ Σώκρατες, τὰ μὲν ὅλα τῶν πραγμάτων οὐ σκοπεῖς, οὐδ’ ἐκεῖνοι, οἷς σὺ εἴωθας διαλέγεσθαι, κρούετε δὲ ἀπολαμβάνοντες τὸ καλὸν καὶ ἕκαστον τῶν ὄντων ἐν τοῖς λόγοις κατατέμνοντες· διὰ ταῦτα οὕτω μεγάλα ὑμᾶς λανθάνει καὶ διανεκῆ σώματα τῆς οὐσίας πεφυκότα. Compare 301 E.
The words διανεκῆ σώματα τῆς οὐσίας πεφυκότα correspond as nearly as can be to the logical term Concrete, opposed to Abstract. Nature furnishes only Concreta, not Abstracta.
Men who dealt with real life, contrasted with the speculative and analytical philosophers.
Hippias accuses Sokrates of never taking into his view Wholes, and of confining his attention to separate parts and fragments, obtained by logical analysis and subdivision. Aristophanes, when he attacks the Dialectic of Sokrates, takes the same ground, employing numerous comic metaphors to illustrate the small and impalpable fragments handled, and the subtle transpositions which they underwent in the reasoning. Isokrates again deprecates the over-subtlety of dialectic debate, contrasting it with discussions (in his opinion) more useful; wherein entire situations, each with its full clothing and assemblage of circumstances, were reviewed and estimated.[44] All these are protests, by persons accustomed to deal with real life, and to talk to auditors both numerous and commonplace, against that conscious analysis and close attention to general and abstract terms, which Sokrates first insisted on and transmitted to his disciples. On the other side, we have the emphatic declaration made by the Platonic Sokrates (and made still earlier by the Xenophontic[45] or historical Sokrates) — That a man was not fit to talk about beautiful things in the concrete — that he had no right to affirm or deny that attribute, with respect to any given subject — that he was not even fit to live unless he could explain what was meant by The Beautiful, or Beauty in the abstract. Here are two distinct and conflicting intellectual habits, the antithesis between which, indicated in this dialogue, is described at large and forcibly in the Theætêtus.[46]
[44] Aristophan. Nubes, 130. λόγων ἀκριβῶν σχινδαλάμους — παιπάλη. Nub. 261, Aves, 430. λεπτοτάτων λήρων ἱερεῦ, Nub. 359. γνώμαις λεπταις, Nub. 1404. σκαριφισμοῖσι λήρων, Ran. 1497. σμιλεύματα — id. 819. Isokrates, Πρὸς Νικοκλέα, s. 69, antithesis of the λόγοι πολιτικοὶ and λόγοι ἐριστικοί — μάλιστα μὲν καὶ ἀπὸ των καιρῶν θεωρεῖν συμβουλεύοντας, εἰ δὲ μὴ, καθ’ ὅλων τῶν πραγμάτων λέγοντας — which is almost exactly the phrase ascribed to Hippias by Plato in this Hippias Major. Also Isokrates, Contra Sophistas, s. 24-25, where he contrasts the useless λογίδια, debated by the contentious dialecticians (Sokrates and Plato being probably included in this designation), with his own λόγοι πολιτικοί. Compare also Isokrates, Or. xv. De Permutatione, s. 211-213-285-287.
[45] Xen. Mem. i. 1, 16.
[46] Plato, Theætêt. pp. 173-174-175.
Concrete Aggregates — abstract or logical Aggregates. Distinct aptitudes required by Aristotle for the Dialectician.
When Hippias accuses Sokrates of neglecting to notice Wholes or Aggregates, this is true in the sense of Concrete Wholes — the phenomenal sequences and co-existences, perceived by sense or imagined. But the Universal (as Aristotle says)[47] is one kind of Whole: a Logical Whole, having logical parts. In the minds of Sokrates and Plato, the Logical Whole separable into its logical parts and into them only, were preponderant.
[47] Aristot. Physic. i. 1. τὸ γὰρ ὅλον κατὰ τὴν αἴσθησιν γνωριμώτερον, τὸ δὲ καθόλου ὅλον τι ἐστι· πολλὰ γὰρ περιλαμβάνει ὡς μέρη τὸ καθόλου. Compare Simplikius, Schol. Brandis ad loc. p. 324, a. 10-26.