With the rotations of the Kosmos, began the course of Time — years, months, days, &c. Anterior to the Kosmos, there was no time: no past, present, and future: no numerable or mensurable motion or change. The Ideas are eternal essences, without fluctuation or change: existing sub specie æternitatis, and having only a perpetual present, but no past or future.[38] Along with them subsisted only the disorderly, immeasurable, movements of Chaos. The nearest approach which the Demiurgus could make in copying these Ideas, was, by assigning to the Kosmos an eternal and unchanging motion, marked and measured by the varying position of the heavenly bodies. For this purpose, the sun, moon, and planets, were distributed among the various portions of the circle of Different: while the fixed stars were placed in the Circle of the Same, or the outer Circle, revolving in one uniform rotation and in unaltered position in regard to each other. The interval of one day was marked by one revolution of this outer or most rational Circle:[39] that of one month, by a revolution of the moon: that of one year, by a revolution of the sun. Among all these sidereal and planetary Gods the Earth was the first and oldest. It was packed close round the great axis which traversed the centre of the Kosmos, by the turning of which axis the outer circle of the Kosmos was made to revolve, generating night and day. The Earth regulated the movement of this great kosmical axis, and thus become the determining agent and guarantee of night and day.[40]
[38] Plato, Timæus, pp. 37-38. Lassalle, in his copious and elaborate explanation of the doctrine of Herakleitus (Die Philosophie Herakleitos des Dunkeln, Berlin, 1858, vol. ii. p. 210, s. 26), represents this doctrine of Plato respecting Time as “durch und durch heraklitisch”. To me it seems quite distinct from, or rather the inversion of, that which Lassalle himself sets down as the doctrine of Herakleitus. Plato begins with τὸ ἀΐδιον or αἰώνιον, an eternal sameness or duration, without succession, change, generation or destruction, — this passes into perpetual succession or change, with frequent generation and destruction. Herakleitus, on the other hand, recognises for his primary or general law perpetual succession, interchange of contraries, generation and destruction; this passes into a secondary state, in which there is temporary duration and sameness of particulars — the flux being interrupted.
The ideal λόγος or law of Herakleitus is that of unremitting process, flux, revolution, implication of Ens with Non-Ens: the real world is an imperfect manifestation of this law, because each particular clings to existence, and thereby causes temporary halts in the process. Now Plato’s starting point is τὸ αἰώνιον τὸ ἀεὶ ὡσαύτως ἔχον τὸ ὄντως ὄν: the perishable world of sense and particulars is the world of process, and is so far degenerate from the eternal uniformity of primordial Ens. See Lassalle, pp. 39-292-319.
[39] Plato, Timæus, p. 39 C. ἡ τῆς μιᾶς καὶ φρονιμωτάτης κυκλήσεως περίοδος. Plato remarks that there was a particular interval of time measured off and designated by the revolution of each of the other planets, but that these intervals were unnoticed and unknown by the greater part of mankind.
[40] My explanation of this much controverted sentence differs from that of previous commentators. I have given reasons for adopting it in a separate Dissertation (‘[Plato and the Rotation of the Earth],’ Murray), to which I here refer. In that Dissertation I endeavoured to show cause for dissenting from the inference of M. Boeckh: who contends that Plato cannot have believed in the diurnal rotation of the Earth, because he (Plato) explicitly affirms the diurnal rotation of the outer celestial sphere, or Aplanes. These two facts nullify each other, so that the effect would be the same as if there were no rotation of either. My reply to this argument was, in substance, that though the two facts really are inconsistent — the one excluding the other — yet we cannot safely conclude that Plato must have perceived the inconsistency; the more so as Aristotle certainly did not perceive it. To hold incompatible doctrines without being aware of the incompatibility, is a state of mind sufficiently common even in the present advanced condition of science, which I could illustrate by many curious examples if my space allowed. It must have been much more common in the age of Plato than it is now.
Batteux observes (Traduction et Remarques sur Ocellus Lucanus, ch. iv. p. 116):— “Il y a un maxime qu’on ne doit jamais perdre de vue en discutant les opinions des Anciens: c’est de ne point leur prêter les conséquences de leurs principes, ni les principes de leurs conséquences”.
As a general rule, I subscribe to the soundness of this admonition.
Divine tenants of the Kosmos. Primary and Visible Gods — Stars and Heavenly Bodies.
It remained for the Demiurgus, — in order that the Kosmos might become a full copy of its model the Generic Animal or Idea of Animal, — to introduce into it those various species of animals which that Idea contained. He first peopled it with Gods: the eldest and earliest of whom was the Earth, planted in the centre as sentinel over night and day: next the fixed stars, formed for the most part of fire, and annexed to the circle of the Same or the exterior circle, so as to impart to it light and brilliancy. Each star was of spherical figure and had two motions, — one, of uniform rotation peculiar to itself, — the other, an uniform forward movement of translation, being carried along with the great outer circle in its general rotation round the axis of the Kosmos.[41] It is thus that the sidereal orbs, animated beings eternal and divine, remained constantly turning round in the same relative position: while the sun, moon, and planets, belonging to the inner circles of the Different, and trying to revolve by their own effort in the opposite direction to the outer sphere, became irregular in their own velocities and variable in their relative positions.[42] The complicated movements of these planetary bodies, alternately approaching and receding — together with their occultations and reappearances, full of alarming prognostic as to consequences — cannot be described without having at hand some diagrams or mechanical illustrations to refer to.[43]
[41] Plato, Timæus, p. 40.