A
HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY
IN EPITOME,
BY
DR. ALBERT SCHWEGLER.
TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL GERMAN,
BY
JULIUS H. SEELYE.
THIRD EDITION.
NEW YORK:
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY,
443 & 445 BROADWAY.
LONDON: 16 LITTLE BRITAIN.
1864.
Entered, according to act of Congress, in the year 1856,
By Julius H. Seelye,
In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States for the
Northern District of New York.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
BY HENRY B. SMITH, D. D.
The History of Philosophy, by Dr. Albert Schwegler, is considered in Germany as the best concise manual upon the subject from the school of Hegel. Its account of the Greek and of the German systems, is of especial value and importance. It presents the whole history of speculation in its consecutive order. Though following the method of Hegel’s more extended lectures upon the progress of philosophy, and though it makes the system of Hegel to be the ripest product of philosophy, yet it also rests upon independent investigations. It will well reward diligent study, and is one of the best works for a text-book in our colleges, upon this neglected branch of scientific investigation. The translation is made by a competent person, and gives, I doubt not, a faithful rendering of the original.
Henry B. Smith.
Union Theological Seminary, New York, Nov. 6, 1855.
TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE.
Schwegler’s History of Philosophy originally appeared in the “Neue Encyklopädie für Wissenschaften und Künste.” Its great value soon awakened a call for its separate issue, in which form it has attained a very wide circulation in Germany. It is found in the hands of almost every student in the philosophical department of a German university, and is highly esteemed for its clearness, conciseness, and comprehensiveness.
The present translation was commenced in Germany three years ago, and has been carefully finished. It was undertaken with the conviction that the work would not lose its interest or its value in an English dress, and with the hope that it might be of wider service in such a form to students of philosophy here. It was thought especially, that a proper translation of this manual would supply a want for a suitable text-book on this branch of study, long felt by both teachers and students in our American colleges.
The effort has been made to translate, and not to paraphrase the author’s meaning. Many of his statements might have been amplified without diffuseness, and made more perceptible to the superficial reader without losing their interest to the more profound student, but he has so happily seized upon the germs of the different systems, that they neither need, nor would be improved by any farther development, and has, moreover, presented them so clearly, that no student need have any difficulty in apprehending them as they are. The translator has therefore endeavored to represent faithfully and clearly the original history. As such, he offers his work to the American public, indulging no hope, and making no efforts for its success beyond that which its own merits shall ensure.
J. H. S.
Schenectady, N. Y., January, 1856.
CONTENTS.
PAGE INTRODUCTORY NOTE, by Henry B. SMITH, D. D. iii TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE v TABLE OF CONTENTS vii Section I.— WHAT IS MEANT BY THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 11 II.— CLASSIFICATION 16 III.— GENERAL VIEW OF THE PRE-SOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 17 1. The Ionics 17 2. The Pythagoreans 18 3. The Eleatics 18 4. Heraclitus 18 5. The Atomists 19 6. Anaxagoras 19 7. The Sophists 20 IV.— THE IONIC PHILOSOPHERS 21 1. Thales 21 2. Anaximander 22 3. Anaximenes 23 4. Retrospect 23 V.— PYTHAGOREANISM 23 1. Its Relative Position 23 2. Historical and Chronological 23 3. The Pythagorean Principle 24 4. Carrying out of this Principle 25 VI.— THE ELEATICS 27 1. The Relation of the Eleatic Principle to the Pythagorean 27 2. Xenophanes 28 3. Parmenides 28 4. Zeno 30 VII.— HERACLITUS 31 1. Relation of the Heraclitic Principle to the Eleatic 31 2. Historical and Chronological 32 3. The Principle of the Becoming 32 4. The Principle of Fire 33 5. Transition to the Atomists 33 VIII.— EMPEDOCLES 35 1. General View 35 2. The Four Elements 35 3. The Two Powers 36 4. Relation of the Empedoclean to the Eleatic and Heraclitic Philosophy 36 IX.— THE ATOMISTIC PHILOSOPHY 37 1. Its Propounders 37 2. The Atoms 37 3. The Fulness and the Void 38 4. The Atomistic Necessity
1. His Youth
722. His Years of Discipline
733. His Years of Travel
734. His Years of Instruction
74 II. The Inner Development of the Platonic Philosophy and Writings 75 III. Classification of the Platonic System 82 IV. The Platonic Dialectics 831. Conception of Dialectics
832. What is Science?
84 (1.) As opposed to Sensation 84 (2.) The Relation of Knowing to Opinion 86 (3.) The Relation of Science to Thinking 863. The Doctrine of Ideas in its Genesis
874. Positive Exposition of the Doctrine of Ideas
915. The Relation of Ideas to the Phenomenal World
936. The Idea of the Good and the Deity
95 V. The Platonic Physics 961. Nature
962. The Soul
98 VI. The Platonic Ethics 1001. Good and Pleasure
1002. Virtue
1023. The State
102 XV.— THE OLD ACADEMY 107 XVI.— ARISTOTLE 108 I. Life and Writings of Aristotle1. Conception and Relation of the Two
1122. Logic
1133. Metaphysics
115 (1.) The Aristotelian Criticism of the Platonic Doctrine of Ideas 116 (2.) The Four Aristotelian Principles, or Causes, and the Relation of Form and Matter 120 (3.) Potentiality and Actuality 123 (4.) The Absolute Divine Spirit 124 IV. The Aristotelian Physics 1271. Motion, Matter, Space, and Time
1272. The Collective Universe
1283. Nature
1294. Man
129 V. The Aristotelian Ethics 1311. Relation of Ethics to Physics
1312. The Highest Good
1323. Conception of Virtue
1344. The State
135 VI. The Peripatetic School 136 VII. Transition To the Post-aristotelian Philosophy 137 XVII.— STOICISM 1381. Logic
1392. Physics
1403. Ethics
142 (1.) Respecting the Relation of Virtue to Pleasure 142 (2.) The View of the Stoics concerning External Good 142 (3.) Farther Verification of this View 143 (4.) Impossibility of furnishing a System of Concrete Moral Duties from this Standpoint 143 XVIII.— EPICUREANISM 145 XIX.— SCEPTICISM AND THE NEW ACADEMY 148 1. The Old Scepticism 149 2. The New Academy 150 3. The Later Scepticism 151 XX.— THE ROMANS 152 XXI.— NEW PLATONISM 154 1. Ecstasy as a Subjective State 154 2. The Cosmical Principles 154 3. The Emanation Theory of the New Platonists 155 XXII.— CHRISTIANITY AND SCHOLASTICISM 157 1. The Christian Idea 157 2. Scholasticism 159 3. Nominalism and Realism 160 XXIII.— TRANSITION TO THE MODERN PHILOSOPHY 161 1. Fall of Scholasticism 161 2. The Results of Scholasticism 162 3. The Revival of Letters 163 4. The German Reformation 164 5. The Advancement of the Natural Sciences 165 6. Bacon of Verulam 166 7. The Italian Philosophers of the Transition Epoch 167 8. Jacob Boehme 169 XXIV.— DESCARTES 172 1. The Beginning of Philosophy with Doubt 173 2. Cogito ergo sum 173 3. The Nature of Mind deduced from this Principle