The Philosophical Review/Volume 1/Review: Pearson - The Fragments of Zeno and Cleanthes

by William Alexander Hammond

The Fragments of Zeno and Cleanthes. With Introduction and Explanatory Notes. An essay which obtained the Hare Prize in the year 1889. By A. C. Pearson, M.A. London, C. J. Clay & Sons, 1891. — pp. vii, 344.

This volume contains two hundred and two fragments of Zeno and one hundred and fifteen of Cleanthes, besides seventy odd Apophthegmata of the two philosophers. Wellmann's article on the Neue Jahrbücher für Philologie (1873) marked, as Pearson says, "the first serious attempt to discriminate the teaching of Zeno from that of the Stoa in general." The omissions of this collection were supplied by Wachsmuth in two Göttingen programs, — Commentationes I et II de Zenone Citiensi et Cleanthe Assio (1874-1875). To supplement these three papers, Pearson has edited and given us a critical commentary on these three hundred fragments. He prefaces this by an introduction of fifty pages, which, to the general student of the history of Philosophy, will prove the most valuable part of the book. For the student working specially in Greek Philosophy and Literature, the commentary on the fragments will be found a serviceable supplement to Zeller and Hirzel.

William Hammond.