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honest calling, for his trade seems to have been that of a stone-cutter, he wasted his time in discoursing with such youths as his lecherous countenance and satyr-like person could gather around him, leading them astray from the gods of his country, the flimsy veil of his hypocrisy being too transparent to conceal his infidelity. Nevertheless, he was a very brave soldier, as those who served with him testify. It does not appear that he was observant of those cares which by most men are probably considered as paramount, giving himself but little concern for the support of his children and wife. The good woman Xantippe is, to all appearance, one of those characters who are Xantippe his unfairly judged of by the world. Socrates wife. married her because of her singular conversational powers; and though he himself, according to universal testimony, possessed extraordinary merits in that respect, he found to his cost, when too late, so commanding were her excellencies, that he was altogether her inferior. Among the amusing instances related of his domestic difficulties were the consequences of his invitations to persons to dine with him when there was nothing in the house wherewith to entertain them, a proceeding severely trying to the temper of Xantippe, whose cause would unquestionably be defended by the matrons of any nation. It was nothing but the mortification of a high-spirited woman at the acts of a man who was too shiftless to have any concern for his domestic honour. He would not gratify her urgent entreaties by accepting from those upon whom he lavished his time the money that was so greatly needed at home. After his condemnation, she carried her children with her to his prison, and was dismissed by him, as he told his friends, from his apprehension of her deep distress. To the last we see her bearing herself in a manner honourable to a woman and a wife. There is surely something wrong in a man's life when the mother of his children is protesting against his conduct, and her complaints are countenanced by the community. In view of all the incidents of the history of Socrates, we can come to no other conclusion than that the Athenians regarded him as an unworthy, and perhaps troublesome member of society. Tehre can be no doubt that his trial and condemnation were connected

He is really the victim of

mosity.

with political measures. He himself said that he should have suffered death previously, in the affair of Leon of Salamis, had not the government been political ani- broken up. His bias was toward aristocracy, not toward democracy. In common with his party, he had been engaged in undertakings that could not do otherwise than entail mortal animosities; and it is not to be overlooked that his indictment was brought forward by Anytus, who was conspicuous in restoring the old order of things. The mistake made by the Athenians was in applying a punishment altogether beyond the real offence, and in adding thereto the persecution of those who had embraced the tenets of Socrates by driving them into exile. Not only admiration for the memory of their master, but also a recollection of their cwn wrongs, made these men eloquent eulogists. Had Socrates appeared to the Athenians as he appears to us, it is not consistent with human proceedings that they should have acted in so barbarous and totally indefensible a manner.

If by the Dæmon to whose suggestions Socrates is said The Dæmon to have listened anything more was meant of Socrates. than conscience, we must infer that he laboured under that mental malady to which those are liable who, either through penury or designedly, submit to extreme abstinence, and, thereby injuring the brain, fall into hallucination. Such cases are by no means of infrequent occurrence. Mohammed was affected in that manner.

wise should

to pain.

After the death of Socrates there arose several schools The Megarte professing to be founded upon his principles. school. The The divergences they exhibited when compared be insensible with one another prove how little there was of precision in those principles. Among these imitators is numbered Euclid of Megara, who had been in the habit of incurring considerable personal risk for the sake of listening to the great teacher, it being a capital offence for a native of Megara to be found in Athens. Upon their persecution, Plato and other disciples of Socrates fled to Euclid, and were well received by him. His system was a mixture of the Eleatic and Socratic, the ethical preponderating in his doctrine. He maintained the existence ut one Being, the Good, having various aspects—Wisdom,

The Cyrenaic

school. Pleasure is the

God, Reason, and showed an inclination to the tendency afterward fully developed by the Cynical school in his dogma that the wise man should be insensible to pain. With the Megaric school is usually classified the Cyrenaic founded by Aristippus. Like Socrates, he held in disdain physical speculations, and directed his attention to the moral. In his opinion, happiness consists in pleasure; and, indeed, he recognized in pleasure and pain the criteria of external things. He denied that we can know anything with certainty, our senses being so liable to deceive us; but, though we may not perceive things truly, it is true that we perceive. With the Cyrenaic school, pleasure was the great end and object of life.

object of life.

others and

To these may be added the Cynical school, founded by Antisthenes, whose system is personal and The Cynical ferocious: it is a battle of the mind against the school: a conbody; it is a pursuit of pleasure of a mental kind, tempt for corporeal enjoyment being utterly unworthy of a gratification man. Its nature is very well shown in the of self. character of its founder, who abandoned all the conveniences and comforts of life, voluntarily encountering poverty and exposure to the inclemency of the seasons. His garments were of the meanest kind, his beard neglected, his person filthy, his diet bordering on starvation. To the passers-by this ragged misanthrope indulged in contemptuous language, and offended them by the indecency of his gestures. Abandoned at last by every one except Diogenes of Sinope, he expired in extreme wretchedness. It had been a favourite doctrine with him that friendship Antisthenes. and patriotism are altogether worthless; and in his last agony, Diogenes asking him whether he needed a friend, "Will a friend release me from this pain?" he inquired. Diogenes handed him a dagger, saying, “This will.”

I want to be free from pain, but not from life." Into such degradation had philosophy, as represented by the Cynical school, fallen, that it may be doubted whether it is right to include a man like Antisthenes among those who derive their title from their love of wisdom-a man who condemned the knowledge of reading and writing, who depreciated the institution of marriage, and professed that

he saw no other advantage in philosophy than that it enabled him to keep company with himself.

The wretched doctrines of Cynicism were carried to their utmost application by Diogenes of Sinope. In early life Diogenes of he had been accustomed to luxury and ease; Sinope. but his father, who was a wealthy banker, having been convicted of debasing the coinage, Diogenes, who in some manner shared in the disgrace, was in a very fit state of mind to embrace doctrines implying a contempt for the goods of the world and for the opinions of men. He may be considered as the prototype of the hermits of a later period in his attempts at the subjugation of the natural appetites by means of starvation. Looking upon the body as a mere clog to the soul, he mortified it in every possible manner, feeding it on raw meat and leaves, and making it dwell in a tub. He professed that the nearer a man approaches to suicide the nearer he approaches to virtue. He wore no other dress than a scanty cloak; a wallet, a stick, and a drinking-cup completed his equipment: the cup he threw away as useless on seeing a boy take water in the hollow of his hand. It was his delight to offend every idea of social decency by performing all the acts of life publicly, as erting that whatever is not improper in itself ought to be done openly. It is said that his death, which occurred in his ninetieth year, was in consequence of devouring a neat's foot raw. From his carrying the Socratic notions to an extreme, he merits the designation applied to him, "the mad Socrates." His contempt for the opinions of others, and his religious disbelief, are illustrated by an incident related of him, that, having in a moment of weakness made a promise to some friends that His irreve he would offer a sacrifice to Diana, he repaired the next day to her temple, and, taking a louse from his head, cracked it upon her altar.

rence.

What a melancholy illustration of the tendency of the human mind do these facts offer. What a quick, yet inevitable descent from the morality of Socrates. SelfishDecline of ness is enthroned; friendship and patriotism are looked upon as the affairs of a fool: happy is the man who stands in no need of a friend; still happier he who has not one. No action is intrinsically bad; even

morality.

robbery, adultery, sacrilege, are only crimes by public agreement. The sage will take care how he indulges in the weakness of gratitude or benevolence, or any other such sickly sentiment. If he can find pleasure, let him enjoy it; if pain is inflicted on him, let him bear it; but, above all, let him remember that death is just as desirable as life.

If the physical speculations of Greece had ended in sophistry and atheism, ethical investigations, it thus appears, had borne no better fruit. Both systems, when carried to their consequences, had been found to be not only useless to society, but actually prejudicial to its be t interests. As far as could be seen, in the times of which we are speaking, the prospects for civilization were dark and discouraging nor did it appear possible that any successful attempts could be made to extract from philosophy anything completely suitable to the wants of man. Yet, in the midst of these discreditable delusions, one of the friends and disciples of Socrates-indeed, it may be said, his chief disciple, Plato, was laying the foundation of another system, which, though it contained much that was false and more that was vain, contained also some things vigorous enough to descend to our times.

Birth o Plato.

Plato was born about B.C. 426. Antiquity has often delighted to cast a halo of mythical glory around its illustrious names. The immortal works of this great philosopher seemed to entitle him to more than mortal honours. A legend, into the authenticity of which we will abstain from inquiring, asserted that his mother Perictione, a pure virgin, suffered an immaculate conception through the influences of Apollo. The god declared to Ariston, to whom she was about to be married, the parentage of the child. The wisdom of this great writer may justify such a noble descent, and, in some degree, excuse the credulity of his admiring and affectionate disciples, who gave a ready ear to the impossible story.

To the knowledge acquired by Plato during the eight or ten years he had spent with Socrates, he added all that could be obtained from the philosophers of Egypt, Cyrene, Persia, and Tarentum. With every advantage arising from wealth and an illustrious parentage, if even it was only of an earthly kind, for he numbered Solon among his

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