Page:History of Greece Vol VIII.djvu/473

SOKRATES AND BACON. 451 negative instar.ces, too, so dexterously chosen as generally to show the way to new truth, in place of that error which they set aside, Forma, ct id Genus ; scd < mines phantastictc ct male terminataj. Notiones infimarum specierum, Hominis, Canis, et prehensionum immediatarum sensus, Albi, Nigri, non fallunt magnopcre : reliquae omnes (quibus homines hactenus vsi stint) aberrationcs sun/, nee debitis modis a rebus abstract et excitata;." (Aphor. 14, 15, 16.) "Nemo adhtic tanti mentis constantia et rigorc inventus est, ut decreverit et sibi imposuerit, theorias et notiones com- munes penitus abolere, et inteUectum dbrasum et ccquum ad particularia de inteyro applicare. Itaqne ratio ilia quam habemus, ex multd fide et multo etiam casu, necnon ex puerilibus, quas primo hausimus, notionibus, farrago qucedam est et congeries." (Aphor. 97.) "Nil magis philosophise offecissc deprehendimus, quam quod res quae familiares sunt et frequenter occurrunt, contemplatio- nem hominum non morentur et detineant, scd recipiantur obiter, neqne earum causaj quasi soleant ; ut non saepius requiratur informatio de rebus ignotis, quam attentio in notis." (Aphor. 119.) These passages, and many others to the same effect which might be extracted from the Novum Organon, afford a clear illustration and an interesting parallel to the spirit and purpose of Sokrates. He sought to test the fundamental notions and generalizations respecting man and soci- ety, in the same spirit in which Bacon approached those of physics : he suspected the unconscious process of the growing intellect, and desired to revise it, by comparison with particulars ; and from particulars too the most clear and certain, but which, from being of vulgar occurrence, were least attended to. And that which Sokrates described in his language as "conceit of knowledge without the reality," is identical with what Bacon designates as the primary notions, the puerile notions, the aberrations, of the intellect left to itself, which have become so familiar and appear so certainly known, that the mind cannot shake them off, and has lost all habit, we might almost say all power, of examining them. The su-ingcnt process or electric shock, to use the simile in Plato's Menon of the Sokratic clenchus, afforded the best means of resuscitating this lost power. And the manner in which Plato speaks of this cross- examining elcnchus, as " the great and sovereign purification, without which every man, be he the great king himself, is unschooled, dirty, and full of unclcanncss in respect to the main conditions of happiness," nal rov D.eyxpv T.EK.TEOV <l>c upa (JteyiGTrj Kal Kvpiururrj TUV w&upofuv lorl, icai rbv uvifayKTOv av vouiareov, av Kal rvyxavij fieyaf /3aer<Aei'f >v, ra uiyiara uxu&apTov ovra- uTTaioevrov re Kal alaxpdv yeyovivai ratra, u Ka-Bapurarov h.al KU&LOTOV IrrpcTre rt)v ovruf iaouevov evdaifiova elvai ; Plato, Sophist, r;. 34, p. 230, E, precisely corresponds to that " cross-examination of human tason in its native or spontaneous process" which Bacon specifics as one of the thiee things essential to the expurgation of the intellect, so as to qualify it for the attainment of truth : " Itaque doctrina ista de expurgatione Intel- Uctus, ut ipse ad vcritatem habilis sit, tribus rcdargutionibus absolvitur ;