Platonicae quaestiones

Since Plato in his Commonwealth, discoursing of the faculties of the soul, has very well compared the symphony of reason and of the irascible and the concupiscent faculties to the harmony of the middle, lowest, and highest chord,[*](See Republic, IV. p. 443 D.) some men may properly ask this question:—

DID PLATO PLACE THE RATIONAL OR THE IRASCIBLE FACULTY IN THE MIDDLE? FOR HE IS NOT CLEAR IN THE POINT.

Indeed, according to the natural order of the parts, the place of the irascible faculty must be in the middle, and of the rational in the highest, which the Greeks call hypate. For they of old called the chief and supreme ὕπατος. So Xenocrates calls Jove, in respect of immutable things, ὕπατος (or highest), in respect of sublunary things

νέατος (or lowest.) And long before him, Homer calls the chief God ὕπατος κρειότων, Highest of Rulers. And Nature has of due given the highest place to what is most excellent, having placed reason as a steersman in the head, and the concupiscent faculty at a distance, last of all and lowest. And the lowest place they call νεάτη, as the names of the dead, νέρτεροι and ἔνεροι, do show. And some say, that the south wind, inasmuch as it blows from a low and obscure place, is called νότος. Now since the concupiscent faculty stands in the same opposition to reason in which the lowest stands to the highest and the last to the first, it is not possible for the reason to be uppermost and first, and yet for any other part to be the one called ὕπατος (or highest). For they that ascribe the power of the middle to it, as the ruling power, are ignorant how they deprive it of a higher power, namely, of the highest, which is competible neither to the irascible nor to the concupiscent faculty; since it is the nature of them both to be governed by and obsequious to reason, and the nature of neither of them to govern and lead it. And the most natural place of the irascible faculty seems to be in the middle of the other two. For it is the nature of reason to govern, and of the irascible faculty both to govern and be governed, since it is obsequious to reason, and commands the concupiscent faculty when this is disobedient to reason. And as in letters the semi-vowels are middling between mutes and vowels, having something more than those and less than these; so in the soul of man, the irascible faculty is not purely passive, but hath often an imagination of good mixed with the irrational appetite of revenge. Plato himself, after he had compared the soul to a pair of horses and a charioteer, likened (as every one knows) the rational faculty to the charioteer, and the concupiscent to one of the horses, which was resty and unmanageable altogether, bristly about the ears, deaf and disobedient both to whip and spur; and the irascible he makes for the most part very obsequious to the bridle of reason, and assistant to it. As therefore in a chariot, the middling one in virtue and power is not the charioteer, but that one of the horses which is worse than his guider and yet better than his fellow; so in the soul, Plato gives the middle place not to the principal part, but to that faculty which has less of reason than the principal part and more than the third. This order also observes the analogy of the symphonies, i.e. the relation of the irascible to the rational (which is placed as hypate) forming the diatessaron (or fourth), that of the irascible to the concupiscent (or nete) forming the diapente (or fifth), and that of the rational to the concupiscent (as hypate to nete) forming an octave or diapason. But should you place the rational in the middle, you would make the irascible farther from the concupiscent; though some of the philosophers have taken the irascible and the concupiscent faculty for the selfsame, by reason of their likeness.

But it may be ridiculous to describe the first, middle, and last by their place; since we see hypate highest in the harp, lowest in the pipe; and wheresoever you place the mese in the harp, provided it is tunable, it sounds more acute than hypate, and more grave than nete. Nor does the eye possess the same place in all animals; but whereever it is placed, it is natural for it to see. So a pedagogue, though he goes not foremost but follows behind, is said to lead (ἄγειν), as the general of the Trojan army,

Now in the front, now in the rear was seen,

And kept command;

[*](Il. XI. 64.)

but wherever he was, he was first and chief in power. So the faculties of the soul are not to be ranged by mere force in order of place or name, but according to their power and analogy. For that in the body of man reason is in the highest place, is accidental. But it holds the chief and highest power, as mese to hypate, in respect of the concupiscent; as mese to nete, in respect of the irascible; insomuch as it depresses and heightens,—and in fine makes a harmony,—by abating what is too much and by not suffering them to flatten and grow dull. For what is moderate and symmetrous is defined by mediocrity. Still more is it the object of the rational faculty to reduce the passions to moderation, which is called sacred, as effecting a harmony of the extremes with reason, and through reason with each other. For in chariots the best of the beasts is not in the middle; nor is the skill of driving to be placed as an extreme, but it is a mediocrity between the inequality of the swiftness and the slowness of the horses. So the force of reason takes up the passions irrationally moved, and reducing them to measure, constitutes a mediocrity betwixt too much and too little.

WHY SAID PLATO, THAT SPEECH WAS COMPOSED OF NOUNS AND VERBS?[*](Plato’s Sophist, p. 262 A.)

For he seems to make no other parts of speech but them. But Homer in a sportive humor has comprehended them all in one verse:

1. Αὐτός ἰὼν κλισίηνδε τὸ σὸν γέρας, ὄφρ᾽ εὖ εἰδῇς.
[*](Il. I. 185.)

For in it there is pronoun, participle, noun, preposition, article, conjunction, adverb, and verb, the particle -δε being put instead of the preposition εἰς; for κλισίηνδε, to the tent, is said in the same sense as Ἀθηνάζε to Athens. What then shall we say for Plato?

Is it that at first the ancients called that λόγος, or speech, which once was called protasis and now is called axiom or proposition,—which as soon as a man speaks, he speaks either true or false? This consists of a noun and verb, which logicians call the subject and predicate. For when we hear this said, Socrates philosophizeth or Socrates is changed, requiring nothing more, we say the one is true, the other false. For very likely in the beginning men wanted speech and articulate voice, to enable them to express clearly at once the passions and the patients, the actions and the agents. Now, since actions and affections are sufficiently expressed by verbs, and they that act and are affected by nouns, as he says, these seem to signify. And one may say, the rest signify not. For instance, the groans and shrieks of stage-players, and even their smiles and reticence, make their discourse more emphatic. But they have no necessary power to signify any thing, as a noun and verb have, but only an ascititious power to vary speech; just as they vary letters who mark spirits and quantities upon letters, these being the accidents and differences of letters. This the ancients have made manifest, whom sixteen letters sufficed to speak and write any thing.

Besides, we must not neglect to observe, that Plato says that speech is composed of these, not by these; nor must we blame Plato for leaving out conjunctions, prepositions, and the like, any more than we should cavil at a man who should say such a medicine is composed of wax and galbanum, because fire and utensils are omitted, without which it cannot be made. For speech is not composed of these; yet by their means, and not without them, speech must be composed. As, if a man pronounce beats or is beaten, and put Socrates and Pythagoras to the same, he offers us something to conceive and understand. But if a man pronounce indeed or for or about, and no more,

none can conceive any notion of a body or matter; and unless such words as these be uttered with verbs and nouns, they are but empty noise and chattering. For neither alone nor joined one with another do they signify any thing. And join and confound together conjunctions, articles, and prepositions, supposing you would make something of them; yet you will be taken to babble, and not to speak sense. But when there is a verb in construction with a noun, the result is speech and sense. Therefore some do with good reason make only these two parts of speech; and perhaps Homer is willing to declare himself of this mind, when he says so often,

1. Ἐπος τ᾽ ἔφατ᾽ ἔκ τ᾽ ὀνόμαζεν.

For by ἔπος he usually means a verb, as in these verses.

Ὦ γύναι, ἤ μάλα τοῦτο ἔπος θυμαλγές ἔειπες,

and,

1. Χαῖρε, πάτερ, ὦ ξεῖνε, ἔπος δ᾽ εἴπερ τι λέλεκται
2. Δεινὸν, ἄφαρ τὸ φέροιεν ἀναρπάξασαι ἄελλαι.
[*](Odyss. XXIII. 183; VIII. 408.)

For neither conjunction, article, nor preposition could be called δεινόν (terrible) or θυμαλγές (soul-grieving), but only a verb expressing a base action or a foolish passion of the mind. Therefore, when we would praise or dispraise poets or writers, we are wont to say, such a man uses Attic nouns and good verbs, or else common nouns and verbs; but none can say that Thucydides or Euripides used Attic or good or common articles.