teaching in the Nubes, to the prosecution of Anaxagoras, the banishment of Protagoras, the charge of impiety against Diagoras and his consequent flight, and finally to the trial and death of Socrates and all philosophers and philosophy shared for a time in the general odium. The middle of this century was the period of the general awakening of the reflective powers in Greece; the age of poetry and of simple faith was passing away, and the age of reason commencing; and as usually happens at a time of revolution, intellectual as well as political, the unwonted exercise of new powers, and the exulting sense of a new freedom, led men into error and excess. An audacious and undiscriminating criticism of things divine and human aroused an undefined feeling of alarm, and provoked an equally undiscriminating opposition. The Athenians saw their religious creed and their moral and social code exposed to unsparing attacks, and threatened, as they believed, with subversion: what wonder that they did not make any very nice distinctions between the different orders of speculators and the different objects they had in view, and involved them all alike in one sweeping condemnation? But may we infer from this that there were no such distinctions, or that the sophistical method of instruction philosophical and moral might fairly be placed in the same category with that of Socrates? And this brings me to the last point which we are required to examine, the distinction between Socrates and the Sophists. I should hardly have supposed that any discussion was needed on such a point; nor can I see that any thing in Mr Grote's own chapter warrants the statement of the Quarterly Reviewer (p. 550) "that, according to Mr Grote, Socrates was the great representative of the Sophists." If the Reviewer only means by this that they acted alike as public instructors, that is undoubtedly a fact— only if that be the meaning it is expressed somewhat obscurely— in any other sense I can see no ground whatever for such an assertion. The Reviewer adds to be sure "that Socrates was distinguished from them by his higher eminence, and by the peculiarity of his life and teaching." If "teaching" includes philosophy, as it no doubt did in Socrates' case, this is a tolerably liberal admission of a distinction between them; for Socrates was a philosopher and a teacher, and nothing else: but then what becomes of the difference between Mr Grote's and the common view?" I can hardly suppose that Mr Grote himself, 66 whose admirable delineation of the intellectual and moral character of Socrates sets the distinction between him and the Sophists in the clearest light, could ever have spoken of him as their representative; however, as he does not except this part of the Reviewer's summary from the approbation which he expresses of it as a whole, I must endeavour in as few words as I can to point out the essential difference in almost all points between them. Socrates was a man of serious and earnest purpose, who acting under the persuasion of a divine mission devoted a life passed in poverty and self-denial to the instruction and improvement of his countrymen; and for this end he employed all his efforts to eradicate from their minds the false conceit of knowledge, and to convince them of their ignorance as the first step towards the attainment of true wisdom. This he endeavoured to effect by the exercise of a very peculiar method; those cross-examining dialectics which have been since unrivalled as they were before unprecedented. The only profession he made was that of universal ignorance. He never pretended to teach rhetoric, or indeed virtue except indirectly; though he freely offered good advice to those who sought it. He never took fees for such instruction as he gave. He was the founder of true philosophy; since he first, as Aristotle tells us in the well known passages of the Metaphysics, introduced inductive reasoning and general definitions, "both of which belong to the very foundation of science." Finally, his influence was exerted for good upon those with whom he came in contact, as Xenophon shows at large in the Memorabilia. As there was a Judas amongst the Apostles, so there might be an Aristippus, an Alcibiades, and a Critias, amongst Socrates' intimates; but upon the whole, as Xenophon assures us, his teaching was beneficial, as his intentions were honest. The Sophists of whom he was "the representative" were showy ostentatious pretenders to universal accomplishments, who professed to give instructions in rhetoric and virtue; dishonest rhetoric and questionable virtue; the latter of which they failed to teach-as Xenophon and Isocrates, to say nothing of Plato and Aristotle, attest. Their philosophy tended to pure scepticism, and their method of reasoning has become a by-word: in Ethics they taught that virtue is a convention, and in religion that the existence of the gods was an open question: they instructed their pupils in the art of arguing with equal plausibility on either side of a question, and appear to have set them a brilliant example by talking themselves for effect without any pretence of a scientific object or endeavour to arrive at the truth. What was there in common between them and Socrates but their office of instructors? It may be said that they held in common the Eudæmonistic theory of Ethics, which assigns utility or one's own interest as the end of virtue. See especially Memor. Iv. 6, 8, 9. Explained as Socrates explained it, that men were to look to the interest of others as well as their own; and guarded as he guarded it by his doctrine that virtue is wisdom, i. e. a comprehensive view of one's own highest interest, which includes attention to the rights of others and a consideration of our obligations to them; the theory, though faulty in itself, was not likely to prove mischievous in practice: whereas the testimony of the ancient writers themselves the best informed and contemporary writers—has shown us that the Sophists disseminated unsound principles which naturally led to the disregard of social and moral obligations. Finally I will attempt to anticipate an objection which arises from the connection of men like Alcibiades and Critias, and the "Sophists" Aristippus and Antisthenes, with Socrates. As regards the two first, the charge was actually made by his accusers on his trial and mainly instrumental in bringing about his condemnation. To it Xenophon, Memor. 1. 2, 12, sq. replies, that Alcibiades and Critias came to Socrates with no intention of profiting by his instruction in any other way than by catching if they could his wonderful skill and subtlety in argument, which enabled him to do whatever he pleased with all that conversed with him;" to be employed by them in the law-courts and public assemblies: that they sought nothing but distinction, and were by nature indisposed to listen to exhortations to virtue: and to oppose to these he produces (1. c. § 48) a list of exemplary characters who did profit by Socrates' moral lessons, "and of whom not one, young or old, either did any harm or was ever accused of it." With respect to Aristippus the same reply may be made, he was a profligate unprincipled man who loved nothing but his own ease and enjoyment, deserted his master and friend in the hour of need, and was doubtless incapable of deriving benefit from the lessons even of Socrates 22. Besides, Socrates had not the opportunity of forming his character, for Aristippus did not join his society at a very early age. This remark applies still more strongly to Antisthenes the pans; who had moreover been a pupil of Gorgias before he came to Socrates. It certainly was not the proper application of Socrates' philosophical methodfor that is the foundation of true science-which led Antisthenes to his sceptical doctrine; and no teacher can be held responsible for the abuse of his principles, but only for the deductions which may be logically and legitimately made from them. E. M. COPE. II. On the Martyrdom and Commemorations of THE memory of St Hippolytus has had wonderful transitions from fame to obscurity and round again to glory. The splendour of his name has waxed and waned most strangely. He was the earliest and in his own time the only preacher at Rome; against two1 popes he fought successfully for integrity in discipline and truth of doctrine; he wrote on a great variety of the most interesting subjects in divinity, philosophy, chronology; his books were voluminous and widely spread. The "Abulides" of Ethiopia, the "Iflites" of Chaldæa, he framed the canons which are to this day the basis of church-order in those countries. Yet shortly after, Eusebius only knew that he had 22 In Memor. II. I. a conversation between them is reported in which Aristippus asserts his peculiar opinions, and Socrates combats them. The latter obtains the victory in the argument (Ib. III. 8. 1) but fails to convince his antagonist. 1 So says Hippolytus himself: Dr Döllinger finds it necessary for his theory to presume that he prolonged the strife with Pope Pontian (and hence with Urban) also, and that he and Pontian were selected for banishment under Maximin as being the heads of the rival factions (p. 71.) Dr Wordsworth had drawn from this same banishment a pledge of the restored unity of the Church (p. 113.) At least as Hippolytus wrote sometime after Callistus' death we may judge that so heavyhanded an antagonist would not have spared Pontian had he been a perpetuator of the Callistian heresies. ruled some church, and Jerome who endeavoured to learn the name of his see failed wholly to discover it2. But in the fifth century, upon the road from Rome to Tivoli, in an estate called either by the name of its ancient owner Verus or by that of Cyriaca, a Christian lady who had allowed the catacombs which there belonged to her family to be used for the burial of martyred Christians, there stood, hard by the church of the great St Laurence, a crypt with a chapel and splendid shrine, where St Hippolytus was believed to rest. Thither came upon the Ides of August, the day of the saint's entombment, crowds from Etruria, crowds from Campania, and all with wives and children: the Nolan, the still haughty Capuan, the Picenian, the rough Samnite. From the nearer Alba they came in great processions; from Rome, through the gate in Aurelian's wall, distant but a mile, they came, Plebeians and Patricians, umbonibus æquis, shouldering together, confessing one faith, seeking the patronage of one saint. From sunrise to sunset the crowds came and went; they descended to the crypt by zig-zag flights of steps, so steep that the glare of the outer light was lost almost at once; they passed onward through the long dark galleries of the catacombs, lighted only by shafts sunk through the roof, till they came to the shrine and altar: there they gazed upon that strange picture which we almost seem to gaze on yet, so lively are the words of our eyewitness,-on the sharp stones and thorns of the briars crimsoned with the blood of the saint where the wild horses had hurried him; on the dispersed limbs, on the weeping faithful, following every winding way among the rocks, gathering every shred and relic of the sacred body, the white head, the blessed hands, with sponges and with garments wiping clean the blood. The scene never failed to awaken the deepest and most passionate emotions-the people kissed the walls lined throughout with silver, they wept upon the ground, the chapel was filled with the voice of prayer and with the fragrance of ointments poured out3. Two or three centuries elapse, and one of the chiefest statesmen and ecclesiastics of the age, prime minister to Pepin and to Charlemagne, the powerful friend through whom Boniface, before 2 Although Chev. Bunsen does say, "I have no doubt he could easily have found out what place Eusebius meant." Vol. I. p. 204. 210. 3 Prudentius. Peristeph. xi. 115 |