LITERARY

European Philosophy.

THE SOPHISTS.

"As Pythagoras (584 A.c.), declining the title of the Wise Man, is said to have first named himself Philosopher, or lover of wisdom, so Protagoras, followed by Gorgias, Prodicus, &c. (444 a.c.), found even the former word too narrow for his own opinion of himself, and first assumed the title of Sophist; this word originally signifying one who professes the power of making others wise-a wholesale and retail dealer in wisdom, a wisdom-monger, in the same sense as we say, an ironmonger. In this, and not in their abuse of the arts of reasoning, have Plato and Aristotle placed the essential of the sophistic character."*

Such is the statement of Coleridge regarding the characteristic quality of those who earliest bore the name-honourable in itself, but dishonourable in its connotation-Sophists-wise men; a statement which, though impugned by Hegel, Lewes, Grote, &c., we are afraid we must hold as substantially correct, if not entirely indisputable. We are in general no grave conservers of traditionalism; and yet, in this matter, we doubt tradition has been more accurate and truthful than is her wont.

It is needless, because useless, to enter here into any critically philological disquisition upon the primary signification and the secondary uses of the word Sophist.

Herodotus calls the Seven Sages, and Pythagoras, Sophists; and many other instances of its use in an honourable and reputable sense may be gathered from classic authors. But it is impossible to deny that it did ultimately fall to that low, disgraceful signification given to it by Plutarch, viz., "Sophists, that is to say, counterfeit wise men.' This invidious connotation could scarcely have arisen causelessly, and might easily be paralleled by words in our own language which, in the universal proneness of mankind to drag downward everything noble, have degenerated, and become deteriorated, e. g., crafty, demure, dexterous, officious, timeserving; all of which, originally paiseworthy, tainted by man's depravity, are now expressive of blame.t

Mere philology cannot carry us far on the road to truth on this topic; and even a lengthy and discriminating induction, drawn from the elder writers-such as that contained in the brilliant chapter in which Mr. Grote discusses the social and philosophical

*S. T. Coleridge's "Friend," vol. iii., sec. ii., essay 3.

† See this illustrated in "Trench on the Study of Words," lect. ii.

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position and character of these Athenian teachers,* or the excellent paper in which the Rev. E. M. Cope rebuts the arguments of the learned historiant serves little purpose, and often leads to great misconstruction. The eritical reader will, of course, peruse these disquisitions with delight and improvement, though they should not tend much to the elucidation of the subject: for they are composed with a breadth and exactitude of scholarship which cannot fail to gratify and instruct. But to a person desirous of taking a comprehensive survey of the transitions and progress of the human mind, the specious, if not special, pleading of the philologers is embarrassing without being pleasant, and puzzling rather than practically useful. There is, of course, no question but that, in a full view of the case, the philological, as well as the logical and the chronological, ought to have place; and, in considering this topic, we shall endeavour to bring each separately, and all combinedly, to bear upon the distinct appreciation of the personal position, social status, political significance, and philosophical aspect of that class of teachers which has been usually included under the generic title of the Sophists. We shall content ourselves with results rather than processes, and we shall prefer brief statement, though we shall refer to the sources in which the voluminous proofs of our abbreviated exposition may be found. We hope to place before the reader an idea of the Sophists succinct enough to be easily studied, clear enough to be readily understood, plain enough to show their point of departure from Zeno, their relation to Socrates, and their connection with Plato and Aristotle. While, however, the view we shall strive to give is, on the whole, original, in its several parts it has been admitted or adopted again and again. Truthfulness, however, is better than originality, and we shall willingly waive our claim to the latter if we attain the former.

Those who have read with any attention our previous papers on "European Philosophy "-a series of articles which are already beginning to make us feel aged-will easily remember the transitions by which the various inquiries of the intellect threw back the investigation into herself, and made the settlement of her forms and processes of procedure a necessary preliminary to all satisfactory thought. It would extend our present prelection beyond all reasonable bounds, to attempt any abstract of former theses on this topic. We must presume that our readers have followed the course of our historic sketch, from the first faint dawnings of philosophic thought, to the determinateness of aim it acquired in the exercitations of Zeno; and that they have perceived, in the gradual forthgrowth of human speculation, the need arising for an investigation of all the possible forms and modes of reasoning, i. e., of attaining satisfactory deductions from admitted premises. It is obvious that before any science of reasoning could be finally, or

* "History of Greece," vol. viii., chap. 67.

"The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology," No. II.

even formally arranged, a vast latitude of experiment and of hypothetical endeavour was absolutely requisite; and we have now arrived at the era in which this singular, yet in itself safe and salutary, development of human thought had its period of activity, and it is our design to trace its course, show its reasonableness, advocate its utility, and plead for its aiders and abettors.*

The possession of a science of reasoning had become a want of the age of which we treat. Philosophical systems had multiplied, and schools had arisen, in distressing number and with opposing views. The one tendency of thought had now become an effort at self-mastery. The multitudinous miracles of objective existence were seen to be far less wondrous than the singularly involved and actively perceptive mind, which strove to unwind the mysteries of the outward world. This, the instrument of investigation, seemed in need of being more completely known, and more thoroughly tried, before it could work out all the beneficial projects which suggested themselves to thought. In working, its powers became known; and in practical efforts after the attainment of knowledge, the high worth of the agent of cognition was revealed to itself. Every variety of speculative system, then possible, had been drawn out and settled into form-dogma; every kind of acquisition the human mind could store within it was laid up-treasured; innumerable data had been accumulated, yet the primary principles of Truth were in dispute and conclusions were uncertain. Tentation was unproductive of the ripe and healthy fruit of knowledge; and it began to be felt that experiment was first requisite regarding the power of the mind to gain an acquaintance with the true and real. To accomplish this object, the discursive activities of thought required an opportunity of free and unrestrained exercise, of tense and intense excitement, of attractive and interesting achievement. Every turn, quirk, trick, process, and mode of thinking required to be tried, and so tried, too, as to have an interest issuing from, yet ending in, itself, independent of that arising from the pursuit of an object. The necessary multiplicity of experiments could only be made when the spirit of man was so placed as to be excited to find, or strive to see, a favourable and justifiable side in each given thought. The dialectic of Zeno was essentially controversial, was probing and testing experimental-had for its object the determination of the conditions of right-thinking. He set before the mind crucial and puzzling problems-the solutions of which it was reserved for the present age to discovert-regarding the limits of the thinkable; and inaugurated an era of investigative debate. It was neither an art of lying, nor an art of casuistry, that the Sophists sought. It was an art of knowing. To discover the limits of human

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* "Art of Reasoning," History of Logic, chap. i., pp. xi-xiii.

† See Cousin's "Fragments Philosophiques," vol. i., article, Zeno. Lewes's Biog. Hist. of Philosophy," pp. 48-55. Mill's "Legic," book v. Spalding's

thought, to learn the true ordination of thought to thought, to assign to reason its due place were only possible by wide and divergent experiment, excursion, and observation. These the Sophists made, and Aristotle summed up the whole theory of the Reason in his "Organon," a treatise whose consummate skill is at once a result and a proof of the Sophistic subtlety. Reflection became powerful and useful when wedded to ratiocination.

Society in Greece, but in Athens especially, had got into a state in which the political wants of the people coincided with the intellectual necessities of the age. Energy in action, and dexterity in speech, were qualities on either or both of which political position depended. Indeed, it might almost be averred that personal safety itself depended on cleverness of thought and fluency of talk. In the public courts of law, pleading and impleading were continually going on, and no one could foretell how soon he might be called before the arbiters of law, justice, or caprice. To be able, at the requisite moment, to turn the tide of passion, emotion, or feeling, into the current most favourable to one's own interest, became a necessity and a duty, deriving its sanction from the instinct of selfdefence. Whether, therefore, for personal safety or aggrandizement, for patriotic purposes or for the attainment of the ends of justice, a cultured talent for debate, and a ready power of making the best possible use of the faculties of thought and speech, were needful, laudable. The only means of enforcing on the Demos of Greece the views and interests which seemed to any person to be desirable was dialectic skill-the capacity of being able to lead people to think with and along with you. In any strife or rivalry victory is sweet to the winner; but in the conflict of mind with mind there is a precious consciousness of power elicited, which, though it charms in and for itself, is tenfoldly enhanced when the plume of conquest waves on the helmet. Add to this subjective inducement the opportunity of gaining a name and fame-the distinctions of power or the gauds of glory, of working out measures of policy or polity, of spurring on the state to unreached heights of prosperity, of knitting together confederacies or of unloosing alliances-and you increase the eager anxiety of the mind to drill itself in every art by which mind may overmaster mind. The frank and noble will culture their powers to the topmost stretch of endurance, that they may fight and foil the enemies of freedom; the restlessly adventurous will dash, with the might of daring endeavour, into the gymnasia where new flushings of excitement may be experienced, and fields of unexplored research are opened invitingly to their eager eyes; the selfish and vain would grasp, with the exhilaration of the heart, the weapons by which they might carve their way to the chief seats, or the possession of the lustrous emblems, of power or station. If in such circumstances a one-sided culture, a dishonest application, or a disgraceful use of the arts of reasoning be made, should it be wondered at more than mourned over by sensible men? That such unfortunate issues did flow from the conjoint tendencies of the intellectual and political