normal and the abnormal from the historical standpoint of universal thought? The position would then have remained quite unassailed, that true,' in the strictest sense, that is certain,' is merely the individual feeling of the particular person; but, besides, a fixed standard of values might have been attained for the different perceptions in accordance with their current acceptation in human inter

course.

If one would apply such a scale of current value to the just developed universals in the Nominalistic sense, the idea of probability would have almost irresistibly presented itself. So near, apparently, in this case, did the Sophistic standpoint lie to the ripest fruit of modern speculation. The path of progress was to all appearance open. Why must the great reaction intervene which was to lead the world for thousands of years in the mazes of Platonic Idealism?

The answer to this question has been already indicated. The fact is, that we have to deal not with a philosophy that develops itself continuously, whether by antagonisms or in a direct line, but only with philosophising men, who, like their doctrines, are children of their time. The misleading appearance of an advance through antagonisms, as Hegel supposes, rests upon this very fact, that the thoughts which dominate an era, or which appear as philosophical ideas, form only one portion of the intellectual life of a nation, and that very different influences, often the more powerful because so little apparent, are at the same time in activity, until they suddenly become in turn the dominant ones, while the others retire into the background.

Ideas that hasten onwards too rapidly for their age live themselves out, and must invigorate themselves once more oy a struggle with reaction before they painfully, and yet more surely, again struggle to the front. But how is it that this is brought about? The more rapidly the bearers of new ideas and new theories snatch at the control of public

opinion, the more violent will be the opposition of traditional ideas in the minds of their contemporaries. After being long blinded and stunned, as it were, prejudice gathers itself together, either by external persecution and suppression, or by new intellectual creations to battle with and overcome the inconvenient opinions. If such new intellectual creations are in themselves poor and empty, and endured only from hatred of progress, they can, as in the case of Jesuitism against the Reformation, only prosecute their purpose in alliance with cunning and force and a policy of universal suppression. But if they have, in addition to their reactionary importance, a germ of life within themselves, a content which in other respects leads to progress, they may often produce more brilliant and satisfactory results than the activity of a faction which has become arrogant from the possession of new truths, and which, as happens only too frequently after a conspicuous success, becomes enfeebled and inadequate to the proper following up of what has been attained.

Of this latter kind was the situation in Athens when Sokrates faced the Sophists. We have shown above how, abstractly considered, the standpoint of the Sophists might have been further developed; but if we had to point out the forces which, but for the intervention of the Sokratic reaction, might have effected this development, we should have some difficulty. The great Sophists were content, of course, with their practical successes. The very boundlessness of their relativity, their vague acceptance of the middle-class morality without the establishment of any principle, the pliant individualism which everywhere assumes to itself the right to throw down or let stand as suits the purpose of the moment-these were, it is obvious, admirable foundations for the education of 'practical statesmen' of the well-known stamp, which, from the dim beginning of time until our own days, has everywhere secured the greatest external success. No wonder that the Sophists more and more went over from Philosophy to Politic, from

Dialectic to Rhetoric! And we find, indeed, even in Gorgias, a clear consciousness that philosophy had been degraded to the level of a mere preparation for practical life.

Under such circumstances, it is no cause for surprise that the younger generation of Sophists betrayed not the least inclination to carry on the development of philosophy on the basis of the view reached by Protagoras, with the omission of the transcendental and mythical universal introduced by Plato, and so to press on to the standpoint of modern Nominalism and Empiricism. On the contrary, the later Sophists distinguished themselves merely by a confident insistance upon the principle of subjectivity or individual will, and by outbidding their masters in framing a convenient theory for the holders of power in the Greek states. There was, therefore, retrogression as regards the strictly philosophical germ in this philosophy-a sign that the more earnest and deeper natures no longer felt themselves drawn in this direction.

All this is, of course, not in the same degree applicable to the severe and earnest Materialism of Demokritos; yet we have seen that Demokritos founded no school. This was due, indeed, partly to his own tendency and inclination, but partly also to the character of the time. For once Materialism, with its belief in eternally existing atoms, was outbid by Sensationalism, which denied the existence of any thing-in-itself behind phenomena. It would have needed a great advance, however-a much greater than the just-mentioned continuations of the Sensationalist philosophy-to reintroduce the atom as a necessary mode of presentation of an unknown relation, and so to maintain the basis of physical science. Consequently, at this period, the interest in objective investigations generally disappeared. In this respect, Aristotle may almost be regarded as the true successor of Demokritos; of course, a successor who uses the results and the principles by which they have been attained for completely opposite purposes. In the summertide of the new Athenian philosophy, how

ever, ethical and logical questions came so much to the front that they caused everything else to be forgotten.

Whence came this one-sided prominence of ethical and logical problems? The answer to this question must at once show us what was the inmost principle of life through which the new tendency arose, and whose force gives it a higher and more independent value than that of a mere reaction against Materialism and Sensationalism. Here, however, it is impossible to separate the men from the doctrines, the purely philosophical elements from the whole intellectual movement, if we wish to understand why certain philosophical innovations could attain such an important significance. It was Sokrates who called the new tendency into life. Plato gave it its idealistic stamp, and Aristotle, by connecting it with empirical elements, created out of it that ultimate system which thenceforth dominated the thought of so many centuries. Opposition to Materialism culminates in Plato; the Aristotelian system made the most obstinate stand against Materialistic theories; but the attack was begun by one of the most remarkable men of whom history tells, a character of rare greatness and resolution-the Athenian Sokrates.

All the portraitures of Sokrates show him to us as a man of great physical and intellectual force, a stout, stubborn nature, of stern self-command and few necessities, brave in fight, enduring not only of fatigues, but also, if need be, of the drinking-bout, moderately as he otherwise lived. His self-control was not the tranquillity of a nature which has nothing to control, but the preponderance of a great mind over strong sensual traits and a naturally passionate temperament.41 His thoughts and endeavours were concen

41 We do not refer to the insufficiently authenticated stories of Zopyros and the like, according to which Sokrates, at all events in his youth, was choleric and licentious (comp. Zeller, ii. 2 Aufl. 54, where, indeed, the stories of Aristoxenos are too uncon

ditionally rejected), but we hold to his character as it is presented to us in Xenophon and Plato, and especially to the well-known description in the Symposion. We do not therefore assert that Sokrates at any period of his life did not control his

trated upon a few important points, and the whole latent energy of his nature entered into the service of these thoughts and endeavours. The earnestness that worked within him, the fire that glowed in him, lent to his address a marvellous influence. In his presence alone of all men could Alkibiades feel ashamed; the power of his unadorned address drew tears from impressionable souls.42 His was an apostle nature, burning with the desire to communicate to his fellow-citizens, and especially the young, the fire that lived within him. His work he him self felt was holy, and behind the playful irony that marked his dialectic lurked the eager energy of a spirit that knew and prized nothing but the ideas by which it was pos sessed.

Athens was a pious city, and Sokrates was a genuine. Athenian. Enlightened as he was, his theory of the world still remained a distinctly religious theory. The teleological conception of nature, to which he adhered with zeal, not to say fanaticism, was to him only a proof of the existence and activity of the gods, as in truth the need of regarding the gods as creating and working in human fashion may be called the mainspring of all teleology.43

That a man like this should be the very man to be arraigned for Atheism, need not, however, cause us overmuch surprise. At all times it has been the faithful reformers, and not the worldly freethinkers, who have been crucified and burnt; and the work of Sokrates, even in the sphere of religion, was that of a reformer. The whole tendency of the time set just then to the purification of religious ideas; not among the philosophers only, but even among the most influential Greek priest

passionate disposition, but merely that this fierce natural foundation, which was converted into the enthusiasm of the apostle of morality, must have assigned to it its due importance.

in the Platonic Symposion, especially 215 D, E.

43 This is most clearly shown, as far as Sokrates is concerned, in his discussion with Aristodemos (Xen. Memor., i. 4), detailed at length in

42 Comp. the eulogy of Alkibiades Lewes, Hist. Phil., i. 168-173.