The remarks made by Plato on the effect of this preparatory curriculum, and on the various studies composing it, are highly interesting and instructive — even when they cannot be defended as exact. Much of what he so eloquently enunciates respecting philosophy and the philosophical character, is in fact just and profound, whatever view we may take as to Universals: whether we regard them (like Plato) as the only Real Entia, cognizable by the mental eye, and radically disparate from particulars — or whether we hold them to be only general Concepts, abstracted and generalised more or less exactly from particulars. The remarks made by Plato on the educational effect produced by Arithmetic and the other studies, are valuable and suggestive. Even the discredit which he throws on observations of fact, in Astronomy and Acoustics — the great antithesis between him and modern times — is useful as enabling us to enter into his point of view.[179]
[179] Plato, Repub. vii. p. 529 C-D.
The manner in which Plato here depreciates astronomical observation is not easily reconcileable with his doctrine in the Timæus. He there tells us that the rotations of the Nous (intellective soul) in the interior of the human cranium, are cognate or analogous to those of the cosmical spheres, but more confused and less perfect: our eyesight being expressly intended for the purpose, that we might contemplate the perfect and unerring rotations of the cosmical spheres, so as to correct thereby the disturbed rotations in our own brain (Timæus, pp. 46-47).
Malebranche shares the feeling of Plato on the subject of astronomical observation. Recherche de la Vérité, liv. iv. ch. vii. vol. ii. p. 219, ed. 1772 (p. 278, ed. 1721).
“Car enfin qu’y a-t-il de grand dans la connoissance des mouvemens des planètes? et n’en sçavons nous pas assez présentement pour régler nos mois et nos années? Qu’avons nous tant à faire de sçavoir, si Saturne est environné d’un anneau ou d’un grand nombre de petites lunes, et pourquoi prendre parti là-dessus? Pourquoi se glorifier d’avoir prédit la grandeur d’une éclipse, où l’on a peut-être mieux rencontré qu’un autre, parcequ’on a été plus heureux? Il y a des personnes destinées, par l’ordre du Prince, à observer les astres; contentons nous de leurs observations… Nous devons être pleinement satisfaits sur une matière qui nous touche si peu, lorsqu’ils nous font partie de leurs découvertes.”
Differences between the Republic and other dialogues — no mention of reminiscence nor of the Elenchus.
But his point of view in the Republic differs materially from that which we read in other dialogues: especially in two ways.
First, The scientific and long-continued Quadrivium, through which Plato here conducts the student to philosophy, is very different from the road to philosophy as indicated elsewhere. Nothing is here said about reminiscence — which in the Menon, Phædon, Phædrus, and elsewhere, stands in the foreground of his theory, as the engine for reviving in the mind Forms or Ideas. With these Forms it had been familiar during a prior state of existence, but they had become buried under the sensible impressions arising from its conjunction with the body. Nor do we find in the Republic any mention of that electric shock of the negative Elenchus, which (in the Theætêtus, Sophistês, and several other dialogues) is declared indispensable for stirring up the natural mind not merely from ignorance and torpor, but even from a state positively distempered — the false persuasion of knowledge.
Different view taken by Plato in the Republic about Dialectic — and different place assigned to it.
Secondly, following out this last observation, we perceive another discrepancy yet more striking, in the directions given by Plato respecting the study of Dialectic. He prescribes that it shall upon no account be taught to young men: and that it shall come last of all in teaching, only after the full preceding Quadrivium. He censures severely the prevalent practice of applying it to young men, as pregnant with mischief. Young men (he says) brought up in certain opinions inculcated by the lawgiver, as to what is just and honourable, are interrogated on these subjects, and have questions put to them. When asked What is the just and the honourable, they reply in the manner which they have learnt from authority: but this reply, being exposed to farther interrogatories, is shown to be untenable and inconsistent, such as they cannot defend to their own satisfaction. Hence they lose all respect for the established ethical creed, which however stands opposed in their minds to the seductions of immediate enjoyment: yet they acquire no new or better conviction in its place. Instead of following an established law, they thus come to live without any law.[180] Besides, young men when initiated in dialectic debate, take great delight in the process, as a means of exposing and puzzling the respondent. Copying the skilful interrogators whom they have found themselves unable to answer, they interrogate others in their turn, dispute everything, and pride themselves on exhibiting all the negative force of the Elenchus. Instead of employing dialectic debate for the discovery of truth, they use it merely as a disputatious pastime, and thus bring themselves as well as philosophy into discredit.[181]