Al qual' aggiunge, a chì dal Cielo è dato.* P. 385. Hippias Major. We learn from this dialogue in how poor a condition the art of reasoning on moral and abstracted subjects was before the time of Socrates: for it is impossible that Plato should introduce a sophist of the first reputation for eloquence and knowledge in several kinds, talking in a manner below the absurdity and weakness of a child; unless he had really drawn after the life. No less than twenty-four pages are here spent in vain, only to force it into the head of Hippias that there is such a thing as a general idea; and that, before we can dispute on any subject, we should give a definition of it. i. Is not this, its improbability out of the question, contradicted by the Protagoras of Plato's own drawing? Are there no authors, no physicians in London at the present moment, of "the first reputation," e. whom a certain class cry up: for in no other sense is the phrase historically applicable to Hippias, whom a Sydenham redivivus or a new Stahl might not exhibit as pompous ignoramuses? no one Hippias amongst them? But we need not flee to conjectures. The ratiocination assigned by Aristotle and Plato himself to Gorgias and then to the Eleatic school, are positive proofs that Mr. Gray has mistaken the satire of an individual for a characteristic of an age or class. May I dare whisper to the reeds without proclaiming that I am in the state of Midas, - may I Petrarch's Trionfo della Fuma, cap. terz. v. 4-6. dare to hint that Mr. Gray himself had not, and through the spectacles of Mr. Locke and his followers, could not have seen the difficulties which Hippias found in a general idea, secundum Platonem? S. T. C. P. 386. Notes 289. Passages of Heraclitus. Πιθηκῶν ὁ κάλλιστος αἰσχρὸς ἄλλῳ γένει συμβαλεῖν. ̓Ανθρώπων ὁ σοφώτατος πρὸς θεὸν πιθηκὸς φανεῖται. This latter passage is undoubtedly the original of that famous thought in Pope's Essay on Man, B. 2: "And shewed a Newton as we shew an ape." I remember to have met nearly the same words in one of our elder Poets. P. 390-91. That a sophist was a kind of merchant, or rather a retailer of food for the soul, and, like other shopkeepers, would exert his eloquence to recommend his own goods. The misfortune was, we could not carry them off, like corporeal viands, set them by a while, and consider them at leisure, whether they were wholesome or not, before we tasted them that in this case we have no vessel but the soul to receive them in, which will necessarily retain a tincture, and perhaps, much to its prejudice, of all which is instilled into it. Query, if Socrates, himself a scholar of the sophists, is accurate, did not the change of ỏ copós into Zopiors, in the single case of Solon, refer to the wisdom-causing influences of his legislation? Mem: -to examine whether povriorns was, or was not, more generally used at first in malum sensum, or rather the proper force originally of the termination ioris, doris-whether (as it is evidently verbal) it imply a reflex or a transitive act. Ρ. 399. Ότι 'Αμαθία. This is the true key and great moral of the dialogue, that knowledge alone is the source of virtue, and ignorance the source of vice; it was Plato's own principle, see Plat. Epist. 7. p. 336. 'Αμαθία, ἐξ ἧς πάντα κακὰ πᾶσιν ἐῤῥίζωται καὶ βλαστάνει καὶ εἰς ὕστερον ἀποτελεῖ καρπὸν τοῖς γεννήσασι TIKOÓTаTOV. See also Sophist. p. 228 and 229, and Euthydemus from p. 278 to 281, and De Legib. L. 3. p. 688.) and probably it was also the principle of Socrates: the consequence of it is, that virtue may be taught, and may be acquired: and that philosophy alone can point us out the way to it. More than our word, Ignorance, is contained in the 'Aualia of Plato. I, however, freely acknowledge, that this was the point of view, from which Socrates did for the most part contemplate moral good and evil. Now and then he seems to have taken a higher station, but soon quitted it for the lower, more generally intelligible. Hence the vacillation of Socrates himself: hence, too, the immediate opposition of his disciples, Antisthenes and Aristippus. But that this was Plato's own principle I exceedingly doubt. That it was not the principle of Platonism, as taught by the first Academy under Speusippus, I do not doubt at all. See the xivth Essay, p. 129-39 of The Friend, vol. i. In the sense in which ἀμαθίας πάντα κατὰ ἐῤῥίζωται, κ. , κ.τ.λ. is maintained in that Essay, so and no otherwise can it be truly asserted, and so and no otherwise did ὡς εμοί γε δοκεί, Plato teach it. BA BARRY CORNWALL.* : ARRY CORNWALL is a poet, me saltem judice and in that sense of the term, in which I apply it to C. Lamb and W. Wordsworth. There are poems of great merit, the authors of which I should yet not feel impelled so to designate. The faults of these poems are no less things of hope, than the beauties; both are just what they ought to be,—that is, now. If B. C. be faithful to his genius, it in due time will warn him, that as poetry is the identity of all other knowledges, so a poet cannot be a great poet, but as being likewise inclusively an historian. and naturalist, in the light, as well as the life, of philosophy all other men's worlds are his chaos. Hints obiter are:- not to permit delicacy and exquisiteness to seduce into effeminacy. Not to permit beauties by repetition to become mannerisms. To be jealous of fragmentary composition,as epicurism of genius, and apple-pie made all of quinces. Item, that dramatic poetry must be poetry Ed. * Written in Mr. Lamb's copy of the Dramatic Scenes.' L hid in thought and passion,-not thought or passion disguised in the dress of poetry. Lastly, to be economic and withholding in similes, figures, &c. They will all find their place, sooner or later, each as the luminary of a sphere of its own. There can be no galaxy in poetry, because it is language,ergo processive,―ergo every the smallest star must be seen singly. There are not five metrists in the kingdom, whose works are known by me, to whom I could have held myself allowed to have spoken so plainly. But B. C. is a man of genius, and it depends on himself-(competence protecting him from gnawing or distracting cares)-to become a rightful poet,that is, a great man. Oh! for such a man worldly prudence is transfigured into the highest spiritual duty! How generous is self-interest in him, whose true self is all that is good and hopeful in all ages, as far as the language of Spenser, Shakspeare, and Milton shall become the mother-tongue! A map of the road to Paradise, drawn in Purgatory, on the confines of Hell, by S. T. C. July 30, 1819. |