← Back to the beginning of Parmenides
Now the question of the possibility of the knowledge of things rests on the one side immediately upon that of the tenability and constancy of ideas, and on their relation to the objects themselves, and consequently, it is this point which is chiefly discussed in the first part, which is indeed something more than an introduction. But, as we are accustomed to see in the majority of these dialogues hitherto translated, it is only treated of indirectly, by a statement of the manifold difficulties involving the consideration of ideas as something independent of the mutable, and as existing of themselves. This however is hardly the proper place for deciding the strange dispute about Plato’s peculiar doctrine of ideas, as this dialogue, accurately taken, can be considered as the seat of that doctrine. Only thus much appears certain in reference to this dialogue, even if we only consider the words with which Parmenides concludes the statement of the difficulties which beset the assumption of ideas independently, that the substantiation of ideas, as it is called, is by no means the matter here in dispute, and which it is the purpose of Socrates to establish. And what is said elsewhere upon this subject can only be brought under consideration in its proper place. For if Plato has been generally viewed, I do not say improperly, as a precursor of the sacred writers, he resembles them especially in this, that it is necessary, in judging of the doctrines ascribed to him, whether they are his own or not, to consider every expression in its own proper place, and in the connection in which it is there found. There is however much that is remarkable in the examples under which Parmenides states his doubts, in so far as they involve a division of ideas, which if not systematically carried out, is at all events very striking. For he divides them, first, into those which, like the moral ideas, most easily subject themselves to the faculty of original conception; secondly, into the physical, the objects of which are the ever recurring creations of nature, and which therefore appear to be produced only by observation; thirdly, into those to the objects of which no independent and constant existence seems to belong, inasmuch as they signify only parts of universal nature, or transitory operations of natural powers; and, finally, into those which represent relations only, and under which, at last, the idea of knowledge itself is again brought.
And to the reader who does not overlook this distinguishing character, the notion will scarcely suggest itself that Plato had in view to contradict any particular theory as to the conception of truth, or the existence of ideas, whether peculiar to Parmenides or Socrates; but it must be clear to him that Plato’s object is generally to draw attention to the difficulties which the susceptibility of distinction does itself oppose to any one who attempts to give a general answer to the question as to what mode of existence or reality must be ascribed to ideas exclusively of the appearances which fall under our observation. But this was far from being the place in which these difficulties were to be solved, and the more so as with the preparations here made for that purpose, a whole series of successive dialogues from the Theætetus upwards is occupied with the question. Even Plato indicates them exactly in the manner which he generally pursues with questions which he is yet unable to solve by means of what he has hitherto imparted or satisfactorily investigated himself, or which suppose more profound views and a higher degree of philosophical perfection than any to which he can yet hope to have brought his readers. Meanwhile, for those who have well considered all up to this point, it will not be difficult to conceive that highest philosophical problem which already at times was haunting Plato’s mind as the only means of escaping from these difficulties—we speak of discovering somewhere an original identity of thought and existence, and deriving from it that immediate connexion of man with the intelligible world, expressed preliminarily in the Phædrus by the doctrines there mythically set forth of original contemplation and recollection, connected with which and dependent upon it is a higher state of knowledge, by means of which an eminence is obtained above the subordinate matter of ideas of relation.
As, then, this first part annexes itself to the assertion of Socrates, that there is no art involved in predicating various contradictions of individual real things, but that the only process deserving admiration would be to shew the same of ideas themselves, so also upon this sentiment as upon the hinge of the whole, the second part of the dialogue turns. For Parmenides, after having subjoined to this request of Socrates that he would enter upon the investigation of ideas still further, rules as to the method of pursuing it, allows himself to be persuaded to illustrate these rules by an example, and thus actually to follow out a thesis upon a manifold and exhaustive plan; and with this view he selects the instance of unity—a choice very natural for Parmenides to make, but also considered by Plato as of great importance as regards the whole subject of the dialogue. And he is to shew what are the consequences to unity itself and all besides unity, according as the former is supposed to exist or not to exist. And with this, notwithstanding that he had not pledged himself that such would be the result, he finds himself in the strange predicament, as it were involuntarily, of enunciating manifold contradictions concerning the notion he selected. For the whole investigation separates into four parts, formed by the supposed existence or non-existence of unity, and the consequences which follow for unity itself and all besides, and each of these parts attains to two contradictory results. For while the two investigations, that into the nature of unity and that into all that remains constituting plurality, are worked out in a double series of notions related each to the other, it turns out that to each and every one of these notions none of all these predicates can belong, and then again that two opposite predicates may be applied to all: and in many cases the contradictions are accumulated still more strangely. And those results in general, as well as the detailed proofs in particular of a similar description, have given rise to the belief with many persons that the whole investigation consists of mere sophisms; and with others, who could not believe this of Plato, to the notion, that he intended only to give a proof of false dialectics, or even put into Parmenides’ and Zeno’s own mouth their own refutation. But to these suppositions the reader who takes a proper comprehensive survey of the whole will certainly refuse his assent. To follow up, however, and elucidate this whole, with the view of making intelligible every point brought forward in it, would be an undertaking not at all appropriate here, and if it should still appear necessary to do so after what may here be said, must at least be spared for another place. But in this the following particulars only can be noticed. First, it must by all means be remembered that Parmenides had expressly recognised the request of Socrates to institute an investigation into the nature of ideas, and that he therefore contemplates, in pursuing that investigation, unity in general, and as an abstract notion. Hence, then, it is not allowable to quit this point of view, though by so doing we might perhaps be enabled more conveniently to explain this or that particular point. It is also self-evident, that, taken in the main, the contradictory results arise chiefly from the different significations of the word existence or being, consequently from the different conditions under which the notion is brought. And it is by this in particular that the second part is connected in spirit with the first, where otherwise only an extremely loose connection would be perceptible, by the prevalent purpose, I mean, observable, of drawing attention to the different significations of existence, and their relation to one another and to ideas. And in this process it cannot indeed be denied, that the idea of unity is considered also according to its’ own separate potentialities: but this is, first, not an educt from the idea of unity; and, secondly, Plato indicates so clearly when this is the case, that neither can the attentive reader go wrong, nor can any one suppose in the writer the intention of deluding by this course. If however, and this cannot be denied, the idea is worked out by such predicates as do not appear applicable at all to an idea, still let it be remembered, that nothing definite had been previously established to determine in what manner an abstraction with no objective existence can be classed among ideas, or what abstraction can be so classed, and that every point is to be essayed, in order, by this dialectic process, to bring the question nearer to a decision. And this indeed would suffice for an explanation as regards the great bulk of the difficulties; the following consideration however may be further added. The most intricate developements, and those most considered as intentionally sophistical, are distinguished by the circumstance, that the train of consequences resulting from them and strictly belonging to the general series might have been discovered by a far easier method, also that nothing peculiar to unity is discovered by probing deeper in the investigation; a fact to which Parmenides himself frequently calls attention. The object therefore for which these particular parts are here, is not the immediate result, but the actual mode of proof, by means of which, as it recurs in the different parts of the investigation, Plato intends, in his own peculiar manner, to draw attention to the nature of certain ideas of relation. It is very profitable to follow this collateral object through all the turnings of the dialogue, and to see how Plato makes way towards it, and how one elucidation always refers to another. That these ideas constituted an important subject of consideration in his mind, and that he held it by all means necessary to put them in a clear point of view, may be seen from a passage in the Charmides, where he speaks of it as an important and difficult matter to investigate, whether any, and what, Ideas exist in reference to themselves alone, or only in relation to others.
Now as regards the particular train of consequences in which we have a comprehensive view of the peculiar properties of unity, it must not be forgotten, that unity is the general form of all ideas alike, which Plato himself sometimes calls unities; and that, accordingly, it is from this dialectic point that the opposition of unity to all not comprised under that term, which would otherwise have no proper keeping, is to be considered, as well as the opposing results in particular. But the different views and hypotheses which co-operate towards establishing this connection, will not be easily followed out by any one to his own satisfaction who does not first compare, with much pains and accuracy, the mutally opposing sections of the investigation with one another, as well as the modes of treating homogeneous points in particular in all the several sections. And the attentive reader will find something eminently remarkable in the attempt made at the end of the first section, certainly the most ancient in philosophy, to construct knowledge by the reconciliation of antitheses. But few persons have divined the antiquity of this method, and will perhaps be disposed to recognize the mighty dialectical and speculative mind in this slight attempt, so similar to much that has appeared among ourselves, sooner than in many theories of Plato properly of more importance. Still more remarkable are two notions developed in the course of the investigation, the one in the attempt just noticed, the other where unity is supposed non-existent—I speak of the idea of the infinitesimally small in time, or of something objective existing in it, and of the idea of magnitudes or spacial repletion without unity. They are, as regards this dialogue, the result of that peculiar manner in which, in Plato, from the fundamental character of his philosophy, which some have most unjustly considered to be a confusion of thought with knowledge, speculation of the more lofty kind is combined with the dialectic process. The manner in which this notion of magnitude, if we may so call it, is discovered, and the way in which, notwithstanding its obstinate resistance to all management, it is nevertheless grasped and described, appears so deserving of admiration, that it is difficult to conceive how a philosophical critic, who deserves in other respects some merit in his exposition of this dialogue, gives up, not long before this section, on receiving notice of the subject, as if he were weary of pursuing further this loose web of sophisms. One should have thought that a commentator who, even in the middle, had met with much that had less claim upon his attention, would at least, on notice given, have been glad to work to the end through these difficulties, were it only to reach this remarkable discovery. Above all, the sincerely earnest reader must be on the watch beforehand every way, for all conclusions drawn from the hypothesis of a non-existent unity, to which, as constituting an indispensable supplementary part, even Parmenides himself so significantly points. It is not difficult to adduce still more, though of less importance—but the temptation must be withstood; perhaps for the reason that many readers, from their own self-search into and explanation of this investigation, in which almost every point radiates with the germs of whole lines of fresh investigations, and each succeeding one, by reason of the gradually increasing and manifold significancy, admits of a more extended and comprehensive survey of all connected with it, may be induced, sooner than they would be by deficient information, to share the notion, that this strange piece of logical art, as far as a similarity can obtain between philosophical and poetical creations, corresponds to those imaginative and pregnant compositions, which, under the modest name of tales, represent the inward form of things, and the true history of the world, with a richness and a depth which no one can ever be fully conscious of having fathomed to the bottom; even though perhaps many readers who go along with their author in thought and composition, may sometimes discover particular relations which have lain concealed from the composer himself.
And further, the reason why, in the present work at all events, as well as in those poetical compositions, we are not in a condition to come to a perfect understanding of every particular, is grounded upon our ignorance of many probably existing relations. Who, for instance, can tell whether many of those points at which we take most offence, do not refer to passages in the books of Zeno? We may divine that something like this is the case to a considerable extent, if we compare the propositions of Zeno still preserved to us with several of the passages in the Parmenides, which seem to us here superfluous and sophistical. It would be a serviceable undertaking, though one that does not belong to this place, to follow out this track further. That Plato respected Zeno very highly as a dialectician, and has here adopted his method, he himself says clearly enough; but it also seems quite as certain that he put no great value upon his genius as a philosopher as exhibited in the work here brought forward. Similarly also, in another place, where he has to deal with the Eleatic philosophers, Zeno is mentioned not independently, but only as connected with Parmenides. How far, then, the notices drawn from the higher province of speculation relate to the philosophy of Parmenides in particular, and whether, for instance, the world as deprived of unity in opposition to that grounded upon and resolving itself into it, is intended to be a fresh illustration and corroboration of the opposition which Parmenides institutes between the world of reason and the world of sense; to decide this accurately we possess, and ever shall possess, too scanty remains of the compositions of the wise Eleatic. For it might be a fallacious process to listen to testimony, since Parmenides is one of those who were earliest misunderstood, and even the means to which we must resort are still in an extremely unproven and imperfect state. Even in Plato himself there is much that will not unite with what is generally assumed from these sources; only that Parmenides is intended to contradict himself by the contradictions in which unity is involved, is a thing not to be thought of. Had Plato at that time had so little respect for him as to allow himself such liberty towards him,—that is, far less than for Protagoras or Gorgias—such a proceeding would certainly have been accompanied by the most wanton display of irony. But whatever value may be put upon certain expressions according to which Plato seems to be dissatisfied with his earlier views of Parmenides, all that can be intended by them, at the most, is that he did not just at first respect him quite so highly as he deserved. It is moreover clear enough that Plato makes Parmenides speak quite in his own spirit, that many particular dialectical strokes are borrowed at once from him, and, consequently, that this whole method does indisputably owe very much to him. And it would certainly be an injustice to look here for Plato’s opinion generally upon the system of Parmenides. This work, supposing even we were to assume that Plato, at the time of its composition, had already made up his opinion upon the Eleatic philosophy, is in no degree nor in any part devoted to that object. Much rather is the main point of view on the strength of which Parmenides here comes forward, and for which in fact he conducts the dialogue, that of having been the first to make the attempt to start with dialectics, and thus enter into the province of the higher philosophy.
Plato makes an endeavour, which betrays itself clearly enough, to bring Parmenides historically also into connection with Socrates, and to derive the dialectics which he praises in him from those of the first as well as the universal founder of the art. Hence his visible endeavour to represent the dialogue as one that actually took place, and to put its authenticity beyond a doubt. For otherwise it might have been a matter of perfect indifference to him to be tauntingly asked by an over-curious critic, whence he could know this dialogue, as Socrates, after the lapse of so many years, did certainly narrate nothing of the kind. How far then it was possible for this conversation, or rather for any meeting whatever of Socrates with Parmenides to have taken place—upon that point we cannot, I think, decide upon external grounds. For there is in point of fact no impossibility in the time; but the question only is at what time Parmenides was in Athens, and how far reliance is to be placed upon the assertion that this took place in the eightieth olympiad. Only thus much is certain, that if it is a fiction which Plato has here allowed himself, and one moreover of a description which is at variance with actual facts, he might in that case either have left the matter as far as possible obscure and indefinite, or, if he wished to reduce it to objective certainty, he had greater licences at his command than the considerably advanced age which he ascribes to Parmenides; and of these he would have unhesitatingly availed himself. To what purpose this definite description, if Plato neither knew how the circumstance had taken place, nor had calculated how it might have taken place? But without reference to truth of fact, and suggested only by Plato’s undeniable endeavour to gain the dialogue an appearance of historical foundation, a circumstance is here to be brought into notice, with regard to which no one yet seems to have entertained any suspicion, although the general opinion of it tends to charge Plato with an absurdity of which I should be sorry to believe him guilty. For who, I would ask, is Cephalus who repeats the dialogue, who are Glaucon and Adimantus whom he meets, and Antipho of whom he is supposed to tell the story?
In Cephalus, first, every one thinks of the son of Lysanias and the father of Lysias, who, like the naturalized resident of that name, had travelled to Athens as a stranger. But the father of Lysias is generally a Syracusan, and this Cephalus comes from home at Clazomenae. Yet it is difficult to believe that any other is meant. For he who as the intermediate person could bring the dialogue so far in order to repeat it in Plato’s presence, and such is the supposition, must have reached an advanced period of old age, and therefore be generally known. And such a man must Cephalus, the father of Lysias, have indisputably been. Whence therefore Clazomenae comes, let every one decide for himself from the two following cases, which seem the only possible. Either this is a fiction of Plato’s; but to what purpose? in order not to make Sicilian men inquire curiously after dialogues of Plato? But that would be a somewhat ponderous and complicated process in order to remedy a more trifling evil, and one that might have been avoided with perfect ease. To introduce, then, men of Clazomenae, and to think in so doing that on the mention of unity, the reason, and on that of the remainder (all besides unity,) the original plurality of Anaxagoras, was to be suggested to the mind? But, in the first place, this would certainly intrude itself more upon the notice, and, in the next, Cephalus need not on that account be made a Clazomenian, but need only have hospitable acquaintances there. Or Cephalus the Syracusan has, before travelling to Athens, lived a certain period at Clazomenae, and Plato mentions this with a degree of emphasis as a circumstance not generally known. But this only in passing. The principal question is, who are Glaucon, Adimantus and Antipho? The first two, every one answers, are the well-known brothers of Plato, and Antipho is a half brother of his, not indeed otherwise known, the offspring of a second marriage, mentioned, it must be allowed, no where else except in reference to this dialogue, of his mother Perictione with one Pyrilampes, who could not therefore have been the well-known person of that name, his own uncle and the friend of Pericles. But do these things come even within the range of possibility? For it cannot, notwithstanding the uncertainty which attaches to Cephalus, be meant to be said, that Plato’s brothers, in the Republic, when Cephalus appears as a person of advanced age, are young men, and here, at the period of the same Cephalus’ arrival at Athens, already settled and ready to promise him their interest. But even supposing Cephalus to have been another of that name far younger, consider the strange circumstance that Plato, in order to prove the authenticity of the dialogue, makes a Cephalus relate it who has himself heard it from Plato’s own younger brother; so that Plato might have had it by a far less roundabout process. And the yet much stranger circumstance that a younger brother of Plato should have heard this dialogue immediately, and while still a growing boy, from an ear-witness, whose minion he appears to have been, and, notwithstanding, should be already a man at the time of Socrates’ early youth. Whoever considers these things will allow that nothing more irrational can be easily conceived, and that such a plan was calculated to make the meeting, the actual occurence of which Plato wished to warrant, a mere baby tale. Let us therefore without more ado relieve Plato from this half-brother who has been forced upon him, whom even Plutarch and Proclus appropriate to him manifestly only on the ground of this passage of ours; and let us rather confess that we do not know who Glaucon and Adimantus were, unless perhaps Glaucon the elder and Callæschrus had yet another brother called Adimantus from whom the name was transposed to the younger. But too much already about the outward circumstances of the dialogue, as there is yet something remaining to be said upon the internal matter itself.
The dialogue, I should say, comes to such a strikingly abrupt conclusion, that it might easily be doubted whether this really is the conclusion. For to conclude such a result of the investigation, and at the same time the whole dialogue, only with a simple expression of assent, such as has occurred a hundred times in the dialogue itself, seems, whether we regard it as disproportionate or over simple, entirely unworthy of Plato. Whoever recollects how in the Protagoras also the investigation concluded with a confession of a contradiction prevailing throughout its whole course, will, in this dialogue too, expect in conclusion at least a similar indication of surprise, and an express confession that a still more searching investigation is requisite. How then such a conclusion, supposing it to have been there, could have been lost, it is difficult to conceive; for whoever had worked on through so much that was tiresome would hardly have refused to add the little that was gratifying. There remains, accordingly, scarce any other supposition except that Plato was interrupted for a considerable time by some external circumstances while he was bringing the dialogue to a termination; and that perhaps he did not afterwards subjoin the conclusion, because he already had in his mind the sketches at least of other dialogues which were intended to approximate to the same ultimate point by another method. And that external interruption, if the supposition is to be more accurately made out, may have been either the flight to Megara, which followed after the death of Socrates, or even Plato’s first journey, upon which he started from that place. The last, according to my notion, would be the most agreeable with probabilities. For even supposing Plato, and this supposition is of itself hardly credible, to have composed such a work during the unquiet times in which Socrates’ accusation was prepared and finished, in that case, nothing could prevent him from giving it the finishing touch at Megara. It is much more probable that it was composed at Megara, when, during Plato’s stay there, and certainly not without his having exercised important influence upon it, the school which took its name from the place, and devoted itself especially to dialectics, was formed. But if any one, though with the view of setting up a more plenary defence of the work, should think to found still more important suppositions upon the condition in which the end is at present found, as that, generally, the best part and the right conclusion are lost, and that otherwise the second part would be put in connection with the first, and the doctrine of ideas more accurately defined according to dialectical investigation, we could not assent to such a view. For whoever is convinced by the exposition as brought up to the point at which it ceases, that the Parmenides is a counterpiece to the Protagoras, though not without the advancement which is never wanting in the progress from one work of Plato’s to another, will find in the work as we at present have it, a character perfectly agreeing with that dialogue, and will have no occasion to look for anything further. But as to the reader who is not convinced of this, we can only lay before him the following considerations which to the reader yet unacquainted with Plato can be verified only by the sequel. The difficulties which are here adduced in opposition to every theory of ideas, are not to be solved in the philosophy of Plato otherwise than by an accurate comparison of the purer or higher knowledge with that which is empiric, and further, by the doctrines of Original Contemplation and Recollection; subjects, therefore, to the exposition of which Plato has devoted a series of important dialogues from the Theætetus upwards. Now if he is to be supposed to have already completed this in the Parmenides, to what purpose are all these dialogues, every one of which treats its subject as if, from the very bottom, it had never been at all explained before? But if the composition of the Parmenides is to be dated later than that of these dialogues, the Theætetus, the Meno, and even, as Tennemann assumes, than the Sophist, what an unhappy toil it would be for one who knew how to do better, to propose as riddles what had ceased to be such; and to repeat with useless obscurity at a later period what had been said clearly at an earlier? Even the language is a proof that the place of the Parmenides is only in the transition to the dialogues of that class, for, partly of itself, and partly as compared with them, it shews itself to be technical language still in a state of earliest infancy, by its unsteady wavering, by the manner in which it grasps, not always successfully, at correct expression, and by the fact that it can scarcely clench the most important distinctions in words. This circumstance occasioned great difficulties in the translation. But there was here no other expedient, unless the spirit of the whole was to be extinguished, and under the appearance of facilitating the understanding of it, the difficulty of doing so infinitely aggravated, there was, I say, no other expedient but that of observing the most accurate fidelity, and of introducing the reader altogether to the simplicity, and, if one may so speak, the helplessness of the growing philosophical language—a process by which alone a translator is prevented from attaching to his author what does not belong to him, and, on the other, his own merit in having seen the truth through all its ambiguities, and himself especially conceived it, is diminished.