Philo calls Sokrates ἀνὴρ παρὰ Μωϋσεῖ τὰ προτέλεια τῆς σοφίας ἀναδιδαχθείς: he refers to the terminology of the Platonic Timæus (Gfrörer, 308-327-328).
Eusebius (Præp. Ev. ix. 6, xi. 10), citing Aristobulus and Numenius, says Τί γὰρ ἔστι Πλάτων, ἢ Μωϋσὴς ἀττικίζων; Compare also the same work, xi. 16-25-29, and xiii. 18, where the harmony between Plato and Moses, and the preference of the author for Plato over other Greek philosophers, are earnestly declared.
See also Vacherot, Histoire Critique de l’École d’Alexandrie, vol. i. pp. 110-163-319-335.
Physiology of the Platonic Timæus — subordinate to Plato’s views of ethical teleology. Triple soul — each soul at once material and mental.
Of the vast outline sketched in the Timæus, no part illustrates better the point of view of the author, than what is said about human anatomy and physiology. The human body is conceived altogether as subservient to an ethical and æsthetical teleology: it is (like the Praxitelean statue of Eros[123]) a work adapted to an archetypal model in Plato’s own heart — his emotions, preferences, antipathies.[124] The leading idea in his mind is, What purposes would be most suitable to the presumed character of the Demiurgus, and to those generated Gods who are assumed to act as his ministers? The purposes which Plato ascribes, both to the one and to the others, emanate from his own feelings: they are such as he would himself have aimed at accomplishing, if he had possessed demiurgic power: just as the Republic describes the principles on which he would have constituted a Commonwealth, had he been lawgiver or Oekist. His inventive fancy depicts the interior structure, both of the great Kosmos and of its little human miniature, in a way corresponding to these sublime purposes. The three souls, each with its appropriate place and functions, form the cardinal principle of the organism:[125] the unity of which is maintained by the spinal marrow in continuity with, the brain; all the three souls having their roots in different parts of this continuous line. Neither of these three souls is immaterial, in the sense which that word now bears: even the encephalic rational soul — the most exalted in function, and commander of the other two — has its own extension and rotatory motion: as the kosmical soul has also, though yet more exalted in its endowments. All these souls have material properties, and are implicated essentially with other material agents:[126] all are at once material and mental. The encephalic or rational soul has its share in material properties, while the abdominal or appetitive soul also has its share in mental properties: even the liver has for its function to exhibit images impressed by the rational soul, and to serve as the theatre of prophetic representations.[127]
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Πραξιτέλης ὃν ἔπασχε διηκρίβωσεν Ἔρωτα ἐξ ἰδίης ἕλκων ἀρχέτυπον κραδίης — (Anthologia). |
[124] Plato says (Tim. p. 53 E) that in investigating the fundamental configuration of the elements you must search for the most beautiful: these will of course be the true ones. Again, p. 72 E, ἐκ δὴ λογισμοῦ τοίουδε ξυνίστασθαι μάλιστ’ ἂν αὑτῷ πάντων πρέποι. Galen applies an analogous principle of reasoning to explain the structure of apes, whom he pronounces to be a caricature of man. Man having a rational and intelligent soul, Nature has properly attached to it an admirable bodily organism: with equal propriety she has assigned to the ape a ridiculous bodily organism, because he has a ridiculous soul — λέξειεν ἂν ἡ φύσις, γελοίῳ τὴν ψυχὴν ζώῳ γελοίαν ἐχρῆν δοθῆναι σώματος κατασκευήν (De Usu Partium, i. c. 13, pp. 80-81, iii. 16, p. 284, xiii. 2, p. 127, xv. 8, p. 252, Kühn).
[125] Respecting a view analogous to that of Plato, M. Littré observes, in his Proleg. to the Hippokratic treatise Περὶ Καρδίης (Œuvres d’Hippocrate T. ix. p. 77):— “Deux fois l’auteur s’occupe des fins de la structure (du cœur) et admire avec quelle habileté elles sont atteintes. La première, c’est à propos des valvules sigmöides: il est instruit de leur usage, qui est de fermer le cœur du côté de l’artère; et dès-lors, son admiration ne se méprend pas, quand il fait remarquer avec quelle exactitude ils accomplissent leur office. Mais elle se méprend quand, se tournant vers les oreillettes, elle loue la main de l’artiste habile qui les a si bien arrangées pour souffler l’air dans le cœur. Ces déceptions de la téléologie sont perpétuelles dans l’histoire de la science; à chaque instant, on s’est extasié devant des structures que l’imagination seule appropriait à certaines fonctions. ‘Cet optimisme’ (dit Condorcet dans son Fragment sur l’Atlantide) ‘qui consiste à trouver tout à merveille dans la nature telle qu’on l’invente, à condition d’admirer également sa sagesse, si par malheur on avait découvert qu’elle a suivi d’autres combinaisons; cet optimisme de détail doit être banni de la philosophie, dont le but n’est pas d’admirer, mais de connaître; qui, dans l’étude, cherche la vérité, et non des motifs de reconnaissance.’”
[126] Proklus could hardly make out that Plato recognised any ψυχὴν ἀμέθεκτον, ad Tim. ii. pp. 220, 94 A.