vii. 131), who maintained, that among the wise wives ought to be in

common, and that all marital jealousy ought to be discarded. [Greek: A)re/skei d' au)toi=s kai\ koina\s ei)=nai ta\s gunai=kas dei=n para\ toi=s sophoi=s ô(/ste to\n e)ntucho/nta tê=| e)ntuchou/sê| chrê=sthai, katha/ phêsi Zê/nôn e)n tê=| Politei/a| kai\ Chru/sippos e)n tô=| peri\ Politei/as, a)lla/ te Dioge/nês o( Kuniko\s kai\ Pla/tôn; pa/ntas te pai=das e)pi/sês ste/rxomen pate/rôn tro/pon, kai\ ê( e)pi\ moichei/a| zêlotupi/a periairethê/setai]. Compare Sextus Emp. Pyrrh. H. iii. 205.]

[Footnote 186: Diog. L. ii. 68. The like reply is ascribed to Aristotle. Diog. L. v. 20; Plutarch, De Profect. in Virtut. p. 80 D.]

[Footnote 187: Diog. L. ii. 79.]

[Footnote 188: Diog. L. ii. 72-74.]

[Footnote 189: Xenoph. Memor. i. 3, 11-14; Symposion, iv. 38; Diog. L. vi. 3. [Greek: (A)ntisthe/nês) e)/lege suneche\s--Manei/ên ma=llon ê)\ ê(sthei/ên--kai\--chrê\ toiau/tais plêsia/zein gunaixi/n, ai(\ cha/rin ei)/sontai.]]

[Footnote 190: Xenoph. Cyropæd. v. 1, 2-18.]

[Side-note: Aristippus compared with Antisthenes and Diogenes--Points of agreement and disagreement between them.]

Aristippus is thus remarkable, like the Cynics Antisthenes and Diogenes, not merely for certain theoretical doctrines, but also for acting out a certain plan of life.[191] We know little or nothing of the real life of Aristippus, except what appears in Xenophon. The biography of him (as of the Cynic Diogenes) given by Diogenes Laertius, consists of little more than a string of anecdotes, mostly sayings, calculated to illustrate a certain type of character.[192] Some of these are set down by those who approved the type, and who therefore place it in a favourable point of view--others by those who disapprove it and give the opposite colour.

[Footnote 191: Sextus Empiricus and others describe this by the Greek word [Greek: a)gôgê/] (Pyrrhon. Hypotyp. i. 150). Plato's beautiful epigram upon Archeanassa is given by Diogenes L. iii. 31. Compare this with the remark of Aristippus--Plutarch, Amatorius, p. 750 E.

That the society of these fascinating Hetæræ was dangerous, and exhaustive to the purses of those who sought it, may be seen from the expensive manner of life of Theodotê, described in Xenophon, Mem. iii. 11, 4.

The amorous impulses or fancies of Plato were censured by Dikæarchus. See Cicero, Tusc. Disp. iv. 34, 71, with Davies's note.]

[Footnote 192: This is justly remarked by Wendt in his instructive Dissertation, De Philosophiâ Cyrenaicâ, p. 8 (Göttingen, 1841).]

We can understand and compare the different types of character represented by Antisthenes or Diogenes, and by Aristippus: but we have little knowledge of the real facts of their lives. The two types, each manifesting that marked individuality which belongs to the Sokratic band, though in many respects strongly contrasted, have also some points of agreement. Both Aristippus and Diogenes are bent on individual freedom and independence of character: both of them stand upon their own appreciation of life and its phenomena: both of them are impatient of that servitude to the opinions and antipathies of others, which induces a man to struggle for objects, not because they afford him satisfaction, but because others envy him for possessing them--and to keep off evils, not because he himself feels them as such, but because others pity or despise him for being subject to them; both of them are exempt from the competitive and ambitious feelings, from the thirst after privilege and power, from the sense of superiority arising out of monopolised possession and exclusion of others from partnership. Diogenes kept aloof from political life and civil obligations as much as Aristippus; and would have pronounced (as Aristippus replies to Sokrates in the Xenophontic dialogue) that the task of ruling others, instead of being a prize to be coveted, was nothing better than an onerous and mortifying servitude,[193] not at all less onerous because a man took up the burthen of his own accord. These points of agreement are real: but the points of disagreement are not less real. Diogenes maintains his free individuality, and puts himself out of the reach of human enmity, by clothing himself in impenetrable armour: by attaining positive insensibility, as near as human life permits. This is with him not merely the acting out of a scheme of life, but also a matter of pride. He is proud of his ragged garment and coarse[194] fare, as exalting him above others, and as constituting him a pattern of endurance: and he indulges this sentiment by stinging and contemptuous censure of every one. Aristippus has no similar vanity: he achieves his independence without so heavy a renunciation: he follows out his own plan of life, without setting himself up as a pattern for others. But his plan is at the same time more delicate; requiring greater skill and intelligence, more of manifold sagacity, in the performer. Horace, who compares the two and gives the preference to Aristippus, remarks that Diogenes, though professing to want nothing, was nevertheless as much dependent upon the bounty of those who supplied his wallet with provisions, as Aristippus upon the favour of princes: and that Diogenes had only one fixed mode of proceeding, while Aristippus could master and turn to account a great diversity of persons and situations--could endure hardship with patience and dignity, when it was inevitable, and enjoy the opportunities of pleasure when they occurred. "To Aristippus alone it is given to wear both fine garments and rags" is a remark ascribed to Plato.[195] In truth, Aristippus possesses in eminent measure that accomplishment, the want of which Plato proclaims to be so misleading and mischievous--artistic skill in handling human affairs, throughout his dealings with mankind.[196]

[Footnote 193: It is this servitude of political life, making the politician the slave of persons and circumstances around him, which Horace contrasts with the philosophical independence of Aristippus:--

Ac ne forté roges, quo me duce, quo lare tuter; Nullius addictus jurare in verba magistri Quo me cunque rapit tempestas, deferor hospes. Nunc agilis fio et mersor civilibus undis, Virtutis veræ custos rigidusque satelles: Nunc in Aristippi furtim præcepta relabor, Et mihi res, non me rebus, subjungere conor. (Epist. i. 1, 15.)

So also the Platonic Sokrates (Theætêt. pp. 172-175) depicts forcibly the cramped and fettered lives of rhetors and politicians; contrasting them with the self-judgment and independence of speculative and philosophical enquirers--[Greek: ô(s oi)ke/tai pro\s e)leuthe/rous tethra/phthai--o( me\n tô=| o)/nti e)n e)leutheri/a| te kai\ scholê=| tethramme/nos, o(\n dê\ philo/sophon kalei=s.]]

[Footnote 194: Diog. L. ii. 36. [Greek: stre/psantos A)ntisthe/nous to\ dier)r(ôgo\s tou= tri/bônos ei)s tou)mphane/s, O(rô= sou=, e)/phê (Sôkra/tês), dia\ tou= tri/bônos tê\n kenodoxi/an.]]

[Footnote 195: Horat. Epistol. i. 17, 13-24; Diog. L. vi. 46-56-66.

"Si pranderet olus patienter, regibus uti Nollet Aristippus." "Si sciret regibus uti, Fastidiret olus, qui me notat." Utrius horum Verba probes et facta, doce: vel junior audi Cur sit Aristippi potior sententia. Namque Mordacem Cynicum sic eludebat, ut aiunt: "Scurror ego ipse mihi, populo tu: rectius hoc et Splendidius multò est. Equus ut me portet, alat rex, Officium facio: tu poscis vilia rerum, Dante minor, quamvis fers te nullius egentem." Omnis Aristippum decuit color, et status, et res, Tentantem majora, ferè præsentibus æquum.

(Compare Diog. L. ii. 102, vi. 58, where this anecdote is reported as of Plato instead of Aristippus.)

Horace's view and scheme of life are exceedingly analogous to those of Aristippus. Plutarch, Fragm. De Homero, p. 1190; De Fortunâ Alex. p. 330 D. Diog. Laert. ii. 67. [Greek: dio/ pote Stra/tôna, oi( de\ Pla/tôna, pro\s au)to\n ei)pei=n, Soi\ mo/nô| de/dotai kai\ chlani/da phorei=n kai\ r(a/kos]. The remark cannot have been made by Straton, who was not contemporary with Aristippus. Even Sokrates lived by the bounty of his rich friends, and indeed could have had no other means of supporting his wife and children; though he accepted only a portion of what they tendered to him, declining the remainder. See the remark of Aristippus, Diog. L. ii. 74.]

[Footnote 196: Plato, Phædon, p. 89 E. [Greek: o(/ti a)/neu te/chnês tê=s peri\ ta)nthrô/peia o( toiou=tos chrê=sthai e)picheirei= toi=s a)nthrô/pois.]]

[Side-note: Attachment of Aristippus to ethics and philosophy--contempt for other studies.]

That the scheme of life projected by Aristippus was very difficult requiring great dexterity, prudence, and resolution, to execute it--we may see plainly by the Xenophontic dialogue; wherein Sokrates pronounces it to be all but impracticable. As far as we can judge, he surmounted the difficulties of it: yet we do not know enough of his real life to determine with accuracy what varieties of difficulties he experienced. He followed the profession of a Sophist, receiving fees for his teaching: and his attachment to philosophy (both as contrasted with ignorance and as contrasted with other studies not philosophy) was proclaimed in the most emphatic language. It was better (he said) to be a beggar, than an uneducated man:[197] the former was destitute of money, but the latter was destitute of humanity. He disapproved varied and indiscriminate instruction, maintaining that persons ought to learn in youth what they were to practise in manhood: and he compared those who, neglecting philosophy, employed themselves in literature or physical science, to the suitors in the Odyssey who obtained the favours of Melantho and the other female servants, but were rejected by the Queen Penelopê herself.[198] He treated with contempt the study of geometry, because it took no account, and made no mention, of what was good and evil, beautiful and ugly. In other arts (he said), even in the vulgar proceeding of the carpenter and the currier, perpetual reference was made to good, as the purpose intended to be served and to evil as that which was to be avoided: but in geometry no such purpose was ever noticed.[199]

[Footnote 197: Diog. L. ii. 70; Plutarch, Fragm. [Greek: U(pomnê/mat' ei)s Ê(si/odon], s. 9. [Greek: A)ri/stippos de\ a)p' e)nanti/as o( Sôkratiko\s e)/lege, sumbou/lou dei=sthai chei=ron ei)=nai ê)\ prosaitei=n.]]

[Footnote 198: Diog. L. ii. 79-80. [Greek: tou\s tô=n e)gkukli/ôn paideuma/tôn metascho/ntas, philosophi/as de\ a)poleiphthe/ntas], &c. Plutarch, Fragm. [Greek: Strômate/ôn], sect. 9.]

[Footnote 199: Aristot. Metaph. B. 996, a 32, M. 1078, a. 35. [Greek: ô(/ste dia\ tau=ta kai\ tô=n sophistô=n tine\s oi(=on A)ri/stippos _proepêla/kizon_ au)ta\s], &c.]

[Side-note: Aristippus taught as a Sophist. His reputation thus acquired procured for him the attentions of Dionysius and others.]

This last opinion of Aristippus deserves particular attention, because it is attested by Aristotle. And it confirms what we hear upon less certain testimony, that Aristippus discountenanced the department of physical study generally (astronomy and physics) as well as geometry; confining his attention to facts and reasonings which bore upon the regulation of life.[200] In this restrictive view he followed the example and precepts of Sokrates--of Isokrates--seemingly also of Protagoras and Prodikus though not of the Eleian Hippias, whose course of study was larger and more varied.[201] Aristippus taught as a Sophist, and appears to have acquired great reputation in that capacity both at Athens and elsewhere.[202] Indeed, if he had not acquired such intellectual and literary reputation at Athens, he would have had little chance of being invited elsewhere, and still less chance of receiving favours and presents from Dionysius and other princes:[203] whose attentions did not confer celebrity, but waited upon it when obtained, and doubtless augmented it. If Aristippus lived a life of indulgence at Athens, we may fairly presume that his main resources for sustaining it, like those of Isokrates, were derived from his own teaching: and that the presents which he received from Dionysius of Syracuse, like those which Isokrates received from Nikokles of Cyprus, were welcome additions, but not his main income. Those who (like most of the historians of philosophy) adopt the opinion of Sokrates and Plato, that it is disgraceful for an instructor to receive payment from the persons taught will doubtless despise Aristippus for such a proceeding: for my part I dissent from this opinion, and I therefore do not concur in the disparaging epithets bestowed upon him. And as for the costly indulgences, and subservience to foreign princes, of which Aristippus stands accused, we must recollect that the very same reproaches were advanced against Plato and Aristotle by their contemporaries: and as far as we know, with quite as much foundation.[204]

[Footnote 200: Diog. L. ii. 92. Sext. Emp. adv. Math. vii. 11. Plutarch, apud Eusebium Præp. Ev. i. 8, 9.]

[Footnote 201: Plato, Protagor. p. 318 E, where the different methods followed by Protagoras and Hippias are indicated.]

[Footnote 202: Diog. Laert. ii. 62. Alexis Comicus ap. Athenæ. xii. 544.

Aristokles (ap. Euseb. Præp. Ev. xiv. 18) treats the first Aristippus as a mere voluptuary, who said nothing generally [Greek: peri\ tou= te/lous]. All the doctrine (he says) came from the younger Aristippus. I think this very improbable. To what did the dialogues composed by the first Aristippus refer? How did he get his reputation?]

[Footnote 203: Several anecdotes are recounted about sayings and doings of Aristippus in his intercourse with _Dionysius_. _Which_ Dionysius is meant?--the elder or the younger? Probably the elder.

It is to be remembered that Dionysius the Elder lived and reigned until the year 367 B.C., in which year his son Dionysius the Younger succeeded him. The death of Sokrates took place in 399 B.C.: between which, and the accession of Dionysius the Younger, an interval of 32 years occurred. Plato was old, being sixty years of age, when he first visited the younger Dionysius, shortly after the accession of the latter. Aristippus cannot well have been younger than Plato, and he is said to have been older than Æschines Sokraticus (D. L. ii. 83). Compare D. L. ii. 41.

When, with these dates present to our minds, we read the anecdotes recounted by Diogenes L. respecting the sayings and doings of Aristippus with _Dionysius_, we find: that several of them relate to the contrast between the behaviour of Aristippus and that of Plato at Syracuse. Now it is certain that Plato went _once_ to Syracuse when he was forty years of age (Epist. vii. init.), in 387 B.C.--and according to one report (Lucian, De Parasito, 34), he went there _twice_--while the elder Dionysius was in the plenitude of power: but he made an unfavourable impression, and was speedily sent away in displeasure. I think it very probable that Aristippus may have visited the elder Dionysius, and may have found greater favour with him than Plato found (see Lucian, l. c.), since Dionysius was an accomplished man and a composer of tragedies. Moreover Aristippus was a Kyrenæan, and Aristippus wrote about Libya (D. L. ii. 83).]

[Footnote 204: See the epigram of the contemporary poet, Theokritus of Chios, in Diog. L. v. 11; compare Athenæus, viii. 354, xiii. 566. Aristokles, ap. Eusebium Præp. Ev. xv. 2.]

Aristippus composed several dialogues, of which the titles alone are preserved.[205] They must however have been compositions of considerable merit, since Theopompus accused Plato of borrowing largely from them.

[Footnote 205: Diog. L. ii. 84-85.]

[Side-note: Ethical theory of Aristippus and the Kyrenaic philosophers.]

As all the works of Aristippus are lost, we cannot pretend to understand fully his theory from the meagre abstract given in Sextus Empiricus and Diogenes. Yet the theory is of importance in the history of ancient speculation, since it passed with some modifications to Epikurus, and was adopted by a large proportion of instructed men. The Kyrenaic doctrine was transmitted by Aristippus to his disciples Æthiops and Antipater: but his chief disciple appears to have been his daughter Arêtê: whom he instructed so well, that she was able to instruct her own son, the second Aristippus, called for that reason Metrodidactus. The basis of his ethical theory was, pleasure and pain: pleasure being _smooth motion_, pain, _rough motion_:[206] pleasure being the object which all animals, by nature and without deliberation, loved, pursued, and felt satisfaction in obtaining pain being the object which they all by nature hated and tried to avoid. Aristippus considered that no one pleasure was different from another, nor more pleasurable than another:[207] that the attainment of these special pleasurable moments, or as many of them as practicable, was The End to be pursued in life. By _Happiness_, they understood the sum total of these special pleasures, past, present, and future: yet Happiness was desirable not on its own account, but on account of its constituent items, especially such of those items as were present and certainly future.[208] Pleasures and pains of memory and expectation were considered to be of little importance. Absence of pain or relief from pain, on the one hand--they did not consider as equivalent to positive pleasure--nor absence of pleasure or withdrawal of pleasure, on the other hand--as equivalent to positive pain. Neither the one situation nor the other was a _motion_ ([Greek: ki/nêsis]), _i.e._ a positive situation, appreciable by the consciousness: each was a middle state--a mere negation of consciousness, like the phenomena of sleep.[209] They recognised some mental pleasures and pains as derivative from bodily sensation and as exclusively individual--others as not so: for example, there were pleasures and pains of sympathy; and a man often felt joy at the prosperity of his friends and countrymen, quite as genuine as that which he felt for his own good fortune. But they maintained that the bodily pleasures and pains were much more vehement than the mental which were not bodily: for which reason, the pains employed by the laws in punishing offenders were chiefly bodily. The fear of pain was in their judgments more operative than the love of pleasure: and though pleasure was desirable for its own sake, yet the accompanying conditions of many pleasures were so painful as to deter the prudent man from aiming at them. These obstructions rendered it impossible for any one to realise the sum total of pleasures constituting Happiness. Even the wise man sometimes failed, and the foolish man sometimes did well, though in general the reverse was the truth: but under the difficult conditions of life, a man must be satisfied if he realised some particular pleasurable conjunctions, without aspiring to a continuance or totality of the like.[210]

[Footnote 206: Diog. L. ii. 86-87. [Greek: du/o pa/thê u(phi/stanto, po/non kai\ ê(donê/n; tê\n me\n lei/an ki/nêsin, tê\n ê(donê/n, to\n de\ po/non, trachei=an ki/nêsin; mê\ diaphe/rein te ê(donê\n ê(donê=s, mêde\ ê(/dion ti ei)=nai; kai\ tê\n me\n, eu)dokêtê\n** pa=si zô/ois, to\n de\ a)pokroustiko/n.]]

[Footnote 207: Diog. L. ii. p. 87. [Greek: mê\ diaphe/rein te ê(donê\n ê(donê=s, mêde\ ê(/dion ti ei)=nai]. They did not mean by these words to deny that one pleasure was more vehement and attractive than another pleasure, or that one pain is more vehement and deterrent than another pain: for it is expressly said afterwards (s. 90) that they admitted this. They meant to affirm that one pleasure did not differ from another _so far forth as pleasure_: that all pleasures must be ranked as a class, and compared with each other in respect of intensity, durability, and other properties possessed in greater or less degree.]

[Footnote 208: Diog. L. ii. pp. 88-89. Athenæus, xii. p. 544.]

[Footnote 209: Diog. L. ii. 89-90. [Greek: mê\ ou)/sês tê=s a)poni/as ê)\ tê=s a)êdoni/as kinê/seôs, e)pei\ ê( a)poni/a oi(onei\ katheu/donto/s e)sti kata/stasis--me/sas katasta/seis ô)no/mazon a)êdoni/an kai\ a)poni/an].

A doctrine very different from this is ascribed to Aristippus in Galen--Placit. Philos. (xix. p. 230, Kühn). It is there affirmed that by pleasure Aristippus understood, not the pleasure of sense, but that disposition of mind whereby a person becomes insensible to pain, and hard to be imposed upon ([Greek: a)na/lgêtos kai\ dusgoê/teutos]).]

[Footnote 210: Diog. L. ii. 91.

It does not appear that the Kyrenaic sect followed out into detail the derivative pleasures and pains; nor the way in which, by force of association, these come to take precedence of the primary, exercising influence on the mind both more forcible and more constant. We find this important fact remarkably stated in the doctrine of Kalliphon.

Clemens Alexandr. Stromat. ii. p. 415, ed. 1629. [Greek: Kata\ de\ tou\s peri\ Kalliphô=nta, e(/neka me\n tê=s ê(donê=s pareisê=lthen ê( a)retê/; chro/nô| de\ u(/steron, to\ peri\ au)tê\n ka/llos katidou=sa, i)so/timon e(autê\n tê=| a)rchê=|, toute/sti tê=| ê(donê=|, pare/schen.]]

[Side-note: Prudence--good, by reason of the pleasure which it ensured, and of the pains which it was necessary to avoid. Just and honourable, by law or custom--not by nature.]

Aristippus regarded prudence or wisdom as good, yet not as good _per se_, but by reason of the pleasures which it enabled us to procure and the pains which it enabled us to avoid--and wealth as a good, for the same reason. A friend also was valuable, for the use and necessities of life: just as each part of one's own body was precious, so long as it was present and could serve a useful purpose.[211] Some branches of virtue might be possessed by persons who were not wise: and bodily training was a valuable auxiliary to virtue. Even the wise man could never escape pain and fear, for both of these were natural: but he would keep clear of envy, passionate love, and superstition, which were not natural, but consequences of vain opinion. A thorough acquaintance with the real nature of Good and Evil would relieve him from superstition as well as from the fear of death.[212]

[Footnote 211: Diog. L. ii. 91. [Greek: tê\n phro/nêsin a)gatho\n me\n ei)=nai le/gousin, ou) di' e(autê\n de\ ai(retê/n, a)lla\ dia\ ta\ e)x au)tê=s perigino/mena; to\n phi/lon tê=s chrei/as e(/neka; kai\ ga\r me/ros sô/matos, me/chris a)\n parê=|, a)spa/zesthai].

The like comparison is employed by the Xenophontic Sokrates in the Memorabilia (i. 2, 52-55), that men cast away portions of their own body, so soon as these portions cease to be useful.]

[Footnote 212: Diog. L. ii. p. 92.]

The Kyrenaics did not admit that there was anything just, or honourable, or base, by nature: but only by law and custom: nevertheless the wise man would be sufficiently restrained, by the fear of punishment and of discredit, from doing what was repugnant to the society in which he lived. They maintained that wisdom was attainable; that the senses did not at first judge truly, but might be improved by study; that progress was realised in philosophy as in other arts, and that there were different gradations of it, as well as different gradations of pain and suffering, discernible in different men. The wise man, as they conceived him, was a reality; not (like the wise man of the Stoics) a sublime but unattainable ideal.[213]

[Footnote 213: Diog. L. ii. p. 93.]

[Side-note: Their logical theory--nothing knowable except the phenomenal, our own sensations and feelings--no knowledge of the absolute.]

Such were (as far as our imperfect evidence goes) the ethical and emotional views of the Kyrenaic school: their theory and precepts respecting the plan and prospects of life. In regard to truth and knowledge, they maintained that we could have no knowledge of anything but human sensations, affections, feelings, &c. ([Greek: pa/thê]): that respecting the extrinsic, extra-sensational, absolute, objects or causes from whence these feelings proceeded, we could know nothing at all. Partly for this reason, they abstained from all attention to the study of nature--to astronomy and physics: partly also because they did not see any bearing of these subjects upon good and evil, or upon the conduct of life. They turned their attention mainly to ethics, partly also to logic as subsidiary to ethical reasoning.[214]

[Footnote 214: Diog. L. ii. p. 92. Sextus Empiric. adv. Mathemat. vi. 53.]

Such low estimation of mathematics and physics and attention given almost exclusively to the feelings and conduct of human life--is a point common to the opposite schools of Aristippus and Antisthenes, derived by both of them from Sokrates. Herein Plato stands apart from all the three.

The theory of Aristippus, as given above, is only derived from a meagre abstract and from a few detached hints. We do not know how he himself stated it: still less how he enforced and vindicated it.--He, as well as Antisthenes, composed dialogues: which naturally implies diversity of handling. Their main thesis, therefore--the text, as it were, upon which they debated or expatiated (which is all that the abstract gives)--affords very inadequate means, even if we could rely upon the accuracy of the statement, for appreciating their philosophical competence. We should form but a poor idea of the acute, abundant, elastic and diversified dialectic of Plato, if all his dialogues had been lost--and if we had nothing to rely upon except the summary of Platonism prepared by Diogenes Laertius: which summary, nevertheless, is more copious and elaborate than the same author has furnished either of Aristippus or Antisthenes.

[Side-note: Doctrines of Antisthenes and Aristippus passed to the Stoics and Epikureans.]

In the history of the Greek mind these two last-mentioned philosophers (though included by Cicero among the _plebeii philosophi_) are not less important than Plato and Aristotle. The speculations and precepts of Antisthenes passed, with various enlargements and modifications, into the Stoic philosophy: those of Aristippus into the Epikurean: the two most widely extended ethical sects in the subsequent Pagan world.--The Cynic sect, as it stood before it embraced the enlarged physical, kosmical, and social theories of Zeno and his contemporaries, reducing to a minimum all the desires and appetites--cultivating insensibility to the pains of life, and even disdainful insensibility to its pleasures--required extraordinary force of will and obstinate resolution, but little beyond. Where there was no selection or discrimination, the most ordinary prudence sufficed. It was otherwise with the scheme of Aristippus and the Kyrenaics: which, if it tasked less severely the powers of endurance, demanded a far higher measure of intelligent prudence. Selection of that which might safely be enjoyed, and determination of the limit within which enjoyment must be confined, were constantly indispensable. Prudence, knowledge, the art of mensuration or calculation, were essential to Aristippus, and ought to be put in the foreground when his theory is stated.

[Side-note: Ethical theory of Aristippus is identical with that of the Platonic Sokrates in the Protagoras.]

That theory is, in point of fact, identical with the theory expounded by the Platonic Sokrates in Plato's Protagoras. The general features of both are the same. Sokrates there lays it down explicitly, that pleasure _per se_ is always good, and pain _per se_ always evil: that there is no other good (_per se_) except pleasure and diminution of pain--no other evil (_per se_) except pain and diminution of pleasure: that there is no other object in life except to live through it as much as possible with pleasures and without pains;[215] but that many pleasures become evil, because they cannot be had without depriving us of greater pleasures or imposing upon us greater pains while many pains become good, because they prevent greater pains or ensure greater pleasures: that the safety of life thus lies in a correct comparison of the more or less in pleasures and pains, and in a selection founded thereupon. In other words, the safety of life depends upon calculating knowledge or prudence, the art or science of measuring.

[Footnote 215: Plato, Protag. p. 355 A. [Greek: ê)\ a)rkei= u(mi=n to\ ê(de/ôs katabiô=nai to\n bi/on a)/neu lupô=n? ei) de\ a)rkei=, kai\ mê\ e)/chete mêde\n a)/llo pha/nai ei)=nai a)gatho\n ê)\ kako/n, o(\ mê\ ei)s tau=ta teleuta=|, to\ meta\ tou=to a)kou/ete].

The exposition of this theory, by the Platonic Sokrates, occupies the latter portion of the Protagoras, from p. 351 to near the conclusion. See below, ch. xxiii. of the present work.

The language held by Aristippus to Sokrates, in the Xenophontic dialogue (Memor. ii. 1. 9), is exactly similar to that of the Platonic Sokrates, as above cited--[Greek: e)mauto\n ta/ttô ei)s tou\s boulome/nous ê(=| r(a=|sta/ te kai\ ê(/dista bioteu/ein.]]

[Side-note: Difference in the manner of stating the theory by the two.]

The theory here laid down by the Platonic Sokrates is the same as that of Aristippus. The purpose of life is stated almost in the same words by both: by the Platonic Sokrates, and by Aristippus in the Xenophontic dialogue--"to live through with enjoyment and without suffering." The Platonic Sokrates denies, quite as emphatically as Aristippus, any good or evil, honourable or base, except as representing the result of an intelligent comparison of pleasures and pains. Judicious calculation is postulated by both: pleasures and pains being assumed by both as the only ends of pursuit and avoidance, to which calculation is to be applied. The main difference is, that the prudence, art, or science, required for making this calculation rightly, are put forward by the Platonic Sokrates as the prominent item in his provision for passing through life: whereas, in the scheme of Aristippus, as far as we know it, such accomplished intelligence, though equally recognised and implied, is not equally thrust into the foreground. So it appears at least in the abstract which we possess of his theory; if we had his own exposition of it, perhaps we might find the case otherwise. In that abstract, indeed, we find the writer replying to those who affirmed prudence or knowledge, to be good _per se_--and maintaining that it is only good by reason of its consequences:[216] that is, that it is not good as End, in the same sense in which pleasure or mitigation, of pain are good. This point of the theory, however, coincides again with the doctrine of the Platonic Sokrates in the Protagoras: where the art of calculation is extolled simply as an indispensable condition to the most precious results of human happiness.

[Footnote 216: Diog. L. ii. p. 91.]

What I say here applies especially to the Protagoras: for I am well aware that in other dialogues the Platonic Sokrates is made to hold different language.[217] But in the Protagoras he defends a theory the same as that of Aristippus, and defends it by an elaborate argument which silences the objections of the Sophist Protagoras; who at first will not admit the unqualified identity of the pleasurable, judiciously estimated and selected, with the good. The general and comprehensive manner in which Plato conceives and expounds the theory, is probably one evidence of his superior philosophical aptitude as compared with Aristippus and his other contemporaries. He enunciates, side by side, and with equal distinctness, the two conditions requisite for his theory of life. 1. The calculating or measuring art. 2. A description of the items to which alone such measurement must be applied--pleasures and pains.--These two together make the full theory. In other dialogues Plato insists equally upon the necessity of knowledge or calculating prudence: but then he is not equally distinct in specifying the items to which such prudence or calculation is to be applied. On the other hand, it is quite possible that Aristippus, in laying out the same theory, may have dwelt with peculiar emphasis upon the other element in the theory: _i.e._ that while expressly insisting upon pleasures and pains, as the only data to be compared, he may have tacitly assumed the comparing or calculating intelligence, as if it were understood by itself, and did not require to be formally proclaimed.

[Footnote 217: See chapters xxiii., xxiv.,** xxxii. of the present work, in which I enter more fully into the differences between the Protagoras, Gorgias, and Philêbus, in respect to this point.

Aristippus agrees with the Platonic Sokrates in the Protagoras, as to the general theory of life respecting pleasure and pain.

He agrees with the Platonic Sokrates _in the Gorgias_ (see pp. 500-515), in keeping aloof from active political life. [Greek: a\ au(tou= pra/ttein, kai\ ou) polupragmonei=n e)n tô=| bi/ô|]--which Sokrates, in the Gorgias (p. 526 C), proclaims as the conduct of the true philosopher, proclaimed with equal emphasis by Aristippus. Compare the Platonic Apology, p. 31 D-E.]

[Side-note: Distinction to be made between a general theory--and the particular application of it made by the theorist to his own tastes and circumstances.]

A distinction must here be made between the general theory of life laid down by Aristippus--and the particular application which he made of that theory to his own course of proceeding. What we may observe is, that the Platonic Sokrates (in the Protagoras) agrees in the first, or general theory: whether he would have agreed in the second (or application to the particular case) we are not informed, but we may probably assume the negative. And we find Sokrates (in the Xenophontic dialogue) taking the same negative ground against Aristippus--upon the second point, not upon the first. He seeks to prove that the course of conduct adopted by Aristippus, instead of carrying with it a preponderance of pleasure, will entail a preponderance of pain. He does not dispute the general theory.

[Side-note: Kyrenaic theorists after Aristippus.]

Though Aristippus and the Kyrenaic sect are recognised as the first persons who laid down this general theory, yet various others apart from them adopted it likewise. We may see this not merely from the Protagoras of Plato, but also from the fact that Aristotle, when commenting upon the theory in his Ethics,[218] cites Eudoxus (eminent both as mathematician and astronomer, besides being among the hearers of Plato) as its principal champion. Still the school of Kyrênê are recorded as a continuous body, partly defending, partly modifying the theory of Aristippus.[219] Hegesias, Annikeris, and Theodôrus are the principal Kyrenaics named: the last of them contemporary with Ptolemy Soter, Lysimachus, Epikurus, Theophrastus, and Stilpon.

[Footnote 218: Aristot. Ethic. Nikom. x. 2.]

[Footnote 219: Sydenham, in his notes on Philêbus (note 39, p. 76), accuses Aristippus and the Kyrenaics of prevarication and sophistry in the statement of their doctrine respecting Pleasure. He says that they called it indiscriminately [Greek: a)gatho\n] and [Greek: ta)gatho/n]--(a good--The Good)--"they used the fallacy of changing a particular term for a term which is universal, or vice versâ, by the sly omission or insertion of the definite article _The_ before the word Good" (p. 78). He contrasts with this prevarication the ingenuousness of Eudoxus, as the advocate of Pleasure (Aristot. Eth. N. x. 2). I know no evidence for either of these allegations: either for the prevarication of Aristippus or the ingenuousness of Eudoxus.]

[Side-note: Theodôrus--Annikeris--Hegesias.]

Diogenes Laertius had read a powerfully written book of Theodôrus, controverting openly the received opinions respecting the Gods:--which few of the philosophers ventured to do. Cicero also mentions a composition of Hegesias.[220] Of Annikeris we know none; but he, too, probably, must have been an author. The doctrines which we find ascribed to these Kyrenaics evince how much affinity there was, at bottom, between them and the Cynics, in spite of the great apparent opposition. Hegesias received the surname of the Death-Persuader: he considered happiness to be quite unattainable, and death to be an object not of fear, but of welcome acceptance, in the eyes of a wise man. He started from the same basis as Aristippus: pleasure as the _expetendum_, pain as the _fugiendum_, to which all our personal friendships and aversions were ultimately referable. But he considered that the pains of life preponderated over the pleasures, even under the most favourable circumstances. For conferring pleasure, or for securing continuance of pleasure--wealth, high birth, freedom, glory, were of no greater avail than their contraries poverty, low birth, slavery, ignominy. There was nothing which was, by nature or universally, either pleasurable or painful. Novelty, rarity, satiety, rendered one thing pleasurable, another painful, to different persons and at different times. The wise man would show his wisdom, not in the fruitless struggle for pleasures, but in the avoidance or mitigation of pains: which he would accomplish more successfully by rendering himself indifferent to the causes of pleasure. He would act always for his own account, and would value himself higher than other persons: but he would at the same time reflect that the mistakes of these others were involuntary, and he would give them indulgent counsel, instead of hating them. He would not trust his senses as affording any real knowledge: but he would be satisfied to act upon the probable appearances of sense, or upon phenomenal knowledge.[221]

[Footnote 220: Diog. L. ii. 97. [Greek: Theo/dôros--panta/pasin a)nairô=n ta\s peri\ theô=n do/xas]. Diog. L. ii. 86, 97. Cicero, Tusc. Disp. i. 34, 83-84. [Greek: Ê(gêsi/as o( peisitha/natos].]

[Footnote 221: Diog. L. ii. 93, 94.]

[Side-note: Hegesias--Low estimation of life--renunciation of pleasure--coincidence with the Cynics.]

Such is the summary which we read of the doctrines of Hegesias: who is said to have enforced his views,[222]--of the real character of life, as containing a great preponderance of misfortune and suffering--in a manner so persuasive, that several persons were induced to commit suicide. Hence he was prohibited by the first Ptolemy from lecturing in such a strain. His opinions respecting life coincide in the main with those set forth by Sokrates in the Phædon of Plato: which dialogue also is alleged to have operated so powerfully on the Platonic disciple Kleombrotus, that he was induced to terminate his own existence. Hegesias, agreeing with Aristippus that pleasure would be the Good, if you could get it--maintains that the circumstances of life are such as to render pleasure unattainable: and therefore advises to renounce pleasure at once and systematically, in order that we may turn our attention to the only practicable end--that of lessening pain. Such deliberate renunciation of pleasure brings him into harmony with the doctrine of the Cynics.

[Footnote 222: Compare the Pseudo-Platonic dialogue entitled Axiochus, pp. 366, 367, and the doctrine of Kleanthes in Sext. Empiric. adv. Mathemat. ix. 88-92. Lucretius, v. 196-234.]

[Side-note: Doctrine of Relativity affirmed by the Kyrenaics, as well as by Protagoras.]

On another point, however, Hegesias repeats just the same doctrine as Aristippus. Both deny any thing like absolute knowledge: they maintain that all our knowledge is phenomenal, or relative to our own impressions or affections: that we neither do know, nor can know, anything about any real or supposed ultra-phenomenal object, _i.e._, things in themselves, as distinguished from our own impressions and apart from our senses and other capacities. Having no writings of Aristippus left, we know this doctrine only as it is presented by others, and those too opponents. We cannot tell whether Aristippus or his supporters stated their own doctrine in such a way as to be open to the objections which we read as urged by opponents. But the doctrine itself is not, in my judgment, refuted by any of those objections. "Our affections ([Greek: pa/thê]) alone are known to us, but not the supposed objects or causes from which they proceed." The word rendered by _affections_ must here be taken in its most general and comprehensive sense--as including not merely sensations, but also remembrances, emotions, judgments, beliefs, doubts, volitions, conscious energies, &c. Whatever we know, we can know only as it appears to, or implicates itself somehow with, our own minds. All the knowledge which I possess, is an aggregate of propositions affirming facts, and the order or conjunction of facts, as they are, or have been, or may be, relative to myself. This doctrine of Aristippus is in substance the same as that which Protagoras announced in other words as--"Man is the measure of all things". I have already explained and illustrated it, at considerable length, in my chapter on the Platonic Theætêtus, where it is announced by Theætetus and controverted by Sokrates.[223]

[Footnote 223: See below, vol. iii. ch. xxviii. Compare Aristokles ap. Eusebium, Præp. Ev. xiv. 18, 19, and Sextus Emp. adv. Mathemat. vii. 190-197, vi. 53. Sextus gives a summary of this doctrine of the Kyrenaics, more fair and complete than that given by Aristokles--at least so far as the extract from the latter in Eusebius enables us to judge. Aristokles impugns it vehemently, and tries to fasten upon it many absurd consequences--in my judgment without foundation. It is probable that by the term [Greek: pa/thos] the Kyrenaics meant simply sensations internal and external: and that the question, as they handled it, was about the reality of the supposed Substratum or Object of sense, independent of any sentient Subject. It is also probable that, in explaining their views, they did not take account of the memory of past sensations--and the expectation of future sensations, in successions or conjunctions more or less similar--associating in the mind with the sensation present and actual, to form what is called a permanent object of sense. I think it likely that they set forth their own doctrine in a narrow and inadequate manner.

But this defect is noway corrected by Aristokles their opponent. On the contrary, he attacks them on their strong side: he vindicates against them the hypothesis of the ultra phenomenal, absolute, transcendental Object, independent of and apart from any sensation, present, past, or future--and from any sentient Subject. Besides that, he assumes them to deny, or ignore, many points which their theory noway requires them to deny. He urges one argument which, when properly understood, goes not against them, but strongly in their favour. "If these philosophers," says Aristokles (Eus. xiv. 19, 1), "know that they experience sensation and perceive, they must know something beyond the sensation itself. If I say [Greek: e)gô\ kai/omai], 'I am being burned,' this is a proposition, not a sensation. These three things are of necessity co-essential--the sensation itself, the Object which causes it, the Subject which feels it ([Greek: a)na/gkê ge tri/a tau=ta sunuphi/stasthai--to/ te pa/thos au)to\ kai\ to\ poiou=n kai\ to\ pa/schon])." In trying to make good his conclusion--That you cannot know the sensation without the Object of sense--Aristokles at the same time asserts that the Object cannot be known apart from the sensation, nor apart from the knowing Subject. He asserts that the three are by necessity _co-essential--i.e._ implicated and indivisible in substance and existence: if distinguishable therefore, distinguishable only logically ([Greek: lo/gô| chôrista\]), admitting of being looked at in different points of view. But this is exactly the case of his opponents, when properly stated. They do not deny Object: they do not deny Subject: but they deny the independent and separate existence of the one as well as of the other: they admit the two only as relative to each other, or as reciprocally implicated in the indivisible fact of cognition. The reasoning of Aristokles thus goes to prove the opinion which he is trying to refute. Most of the arguments, which Sextus adduces in favour of the Kyrenaic doctrine, show forcibly that the Objective Something, apart from its Subjective correlate, is unknowable and a non-entity; but he does not include in the Subjective as much as ought to be included; he takes note only of the present sensation, and does not include sensations remembered or anticipated. Another very forcible part of Sextus's reasoning may be found, vii. sect. 269-272, where he shows that a logical Subject _per se_ is undefinable and inconceivable--that those who attempt to define Man (_e.g._) do so by specifying more or fewer of the predicates of Man--and that if you suppose all the predicates to vanish, the Subject vanishes along with them.]