by disciplined intellect alone. He was, in fact, the founder of logic, a logician and a poet, but he was
not a mystic, he never exalted feeling above reason.
The Sphinx: Well, well. What do you think Cairns would say to the following quote from The Statesman? He turns
to page #1082.
STRANGER: When there arises in the soul of men a right opinion concerning what is good, just, and
profitable, and what is the opposite of these - an opinion based on absolute truth and settled as an
unshakable conviction - I declare that such a conviction is a manifestation of the divine occurring in
a race which is in truth of supernatural lineage.
YOUNG SOCRATES: It could not be more suitably described.
The Chimæra: (dryly) He would probably say that, since sphinxes and chimæras do not really exist, nothing we
say is to be taken seriously.
The Sphinx: So, where Plato is concerned, a great deal hinges upon the basis for mathematics itself. Is it acquired
through reason or through mystical vision, so to speak?
The Chimæra: This is rather curious. Plato actually sets his dialectic process in contrast to mathematics, almost
as though the object of the Dialogues is to arrive at a Form greater than that of mathematics. He turns to
page #746.
I understand, he said, not fully, for it is no slight task that you appear to have in mind, but I do
understand that you mean to distinguish the aspect of reality and the intelligible, which is
contemplated by the power of dialectic, as something truer and more exact than the object of the so-
called arts and sciences whose assumptions are arbitrary starting points. And though it is true that
those who contemplate them are compelled to use their understanding and not their senses, yet
because they do not go back to the beginning in the study of them but start from assumptions you
do not think they possess true intelligence about them although the things themselves are
intelligibles when apprehended in conjunction with a first principle. And I think you call the mental
habit of geometers and their like mind or understanding and not reason because you regard
understanding as something intermediate between opinion and reason.
The Sphinx: It’s all very well for Plato to say that, and I’m sure that dialecticians are not displeased to consider
themselves more intellectual than mathematicians. Yet we have found, in both The Sophist and The
Statesman, that Plato cannot proceed with his arguments unless he assumes the divinely-inspired ability to
perceive not only greater, but absolute perfection when he is confronted with it. That is not reason; it is
revelation. Plato does mathematics an injustice: While mathematicians openly admit that their
conclusions are originally based upon assumptions (axioms), Plato pretends that his are not. And of course
they are. Just as Einstein required a concrete assumption - a constant speed of light - upon which to build
his mathematical philosophy, so Plato must have an assumption - the ability to recognize absolute
perfection - upon which to build his dialectic philosophy.
The Chimæra: Plato seems to be caught in a trap between the relativistic Sophists on one hand - who denied the
reliability of intuitive assumptions - and the Pythagoreans on the other - who permitted original
assumptions via revelation/intuition. Plato rejects the notion that axioms are necessary for reason, yet he
cannot reason without them. No wonder he was so touchy about the Sophists.
The Sphinx: Note the very precise manner in which the Pythagoreans discussed the original assumptions of
mathematics: Again he indicates page #522 of the Stanley text.
The whole science of Mathematicks, the Pythagoreans divided into four parts, attributing one to
Multitude, another to Magnitude; and subdividing each of these into two. For Multitude either
subsists by it self, or is consider’d with respect to another; Magnitude either stands still, or is
moved. Arithmetick contemplates Multitude in it self: Musick with respect to another: Geometry,
unmoveable magnitude; Sphaerick, moveable.
These Sciences consider not Multitude and Magnitude simply, but in each of these that which is
determinate: for Sciences consider this abstracted from infinite, that they may not (in vain) attempt
in each of these that which is infinite. When therefore the wise persons say thus, we conceive it is
not to be understood of that multitude which is in the sensible things themselves, nor of that
- 22 -
magnitude which we perceive in bodies, for the contemplation of these I think pertains to Physick,
not to Mathematick. But because the Maker of all things took Union and Division, and Identity, and
Alterity, and Station and Motion to compleat the soul, and framed it of these kinds, as Timæus
teacheth, we must conceive that the Intellect, consisting according to the diversity thereof, and the
division of proportions and multitude, and knowing it self to be both one and many, proposeth
numbers to it self, and produceth them and the Arithmetical knowledg of them. According to the
union of multitude and communication with it self, and colligation, it acquireth to it self Musick: for
which reason Arithmetick excels Musick in antiquity, the soul it self being first divided by the
Maker, then collected by proportions. And again establishing the operation within it self, according
to its station, it produceth Geometry out of it self, and one figure, and the principles of all figures,
but according to its motion, Sphaerick: for she is moved by circles, but consists always in the same
manner according to the causes of those circles, the straight and the circular: and for this reason
likewise Geometry is precedent to Sphaerick, as Station is to Motion.
But forasmuch as the Soul produced these Sciences, not looking on the excitation of Ideas, which is
of infinite power, but upon the boundure of that which is limited in their several kinds, therefore
they say that they take infinite from multitude and magnitude, and are conversant only about finite:
for the mind hath placed in her self all principles both of multitude and magnitude, because being
wholly of like parts within her self, and being one and indivisible, and again divisible, and producing
the world of Ideas, it doth participate essential finiteness and infiniteness from the things which it
doth understand: But it understands according to that which is finite in them, and not according to
the infiniteness of its life. This is the opinion of the Pythagoreans, and their division of the four
Sciences. Hitherto Proclus.
The Chimæra: In the final analysis, whether Cairns would enjoy the idea or not, Plato must be classed with the
Pythagoreans as a “mystic”, in that he assumed that humans possess a supernatural power beyond reason to
recognize perfection/ absolute Forms.
The Sphinx: Yes. The Sophists were the only ones who could claim to be “non-mystics”, because they would not
admit to revealed accuracy of any sort. Plato tried to strike a balance between the Sophists and the
Pythagoreans, but there is just no halfway position that holds water. The Pythagoreans would have been
amused by Plato’s laborious argumentative process, holding it to be a waste of time, in that the final answer
to a given problem could be known only by revelation/recollection. As for the Sophists, they would have
faulted Plato’s arguments by denying the primary assumptions/revelations in them
.
The Chimæra: All of which leaves us where?
The Sphinx: Well, I think we have pretty well finished with The Statesman. But our discussion concerning the
Pythagorean aspects of “Plato’s” philosophy raises yet another question: To what extent was Plato an
original thinker?
The Chimæra: On that thorny little problem I will let you take the lead.
The Sphinx: I think we would be wise to start with some observations about time - not just the way most humans
regard it, but the way Plato himself perceived it. I recall a pertinent comment of G.J. Whitrow’s in his book
The Nature of Time:
The first question to consider is the origin of the idea that time is a kind of linear progression
measured by the clock and the calendar. In modern civilization this conception of time so dominates
our lives that it seems to be an inescapable necessity of thought. But this is far from true ... Most
civilizations, prior to our own of the last two or three hundred years, have tended to regard time as
essentially cyclic in nature. In the light of history, our conception of time is as exceptional as our
rejection of magic.
The Chimæra: Well said. Modern academicians are conditioned to an essentially Newtonian attitude towards
time. They regard it as a simple progression of events. The past may be referred to, and visions of the future
may be projected, but neither past nor future has any intrinsic effect upon the present - nor do they exist
objectively at all.
The Sphinx: In a cyclical system of time, by contrast, past, present, and future would all be part of a single
continuum. This wouldn’t necessarily mean that “history repeats itself” either. Rather the components of
fourth-dimensional existence would continue to exist, although they might be undergoing periodic
rearrangement and recomposition. One might draw an analogy to the interchangeability of matter and
- 23 -
energy; a seemingly-endless variety of transmutation takes place, but the “sum of the whole” remains the
same.
The Chimæra: Take the Platonic notion of the transmigration of souls. It wouldn’t make much sense if entirely
new souls could come into being “out of nothing”, would it? Yet the transmigration theory has been
ridiculed on the grounds that (a) world population is expanding, and (b) past incarnations have not been
recalled to standards of scientific proof. If “the stuff of which souls are made” can transmutate from other
components of a unified time-continuum, then the first objection disappears. And limited recomposition
[short of transmutation] would account for the second.
The Sphinx: And this would put the concept of the recollective basis of knowledge in a new light as well. Instead of
knowledge being cumulative or progressive [again a purely-linear concept] with the linear “passage” of time,
it can be considered “circular” - rearrangements and recombinations of certain all-inclusive principles
which are part of the cyclical continuum, i.e. “timeless”.
The Chimæra: A provocative way of approaching the Theory of the Forms
The Sphinx: Let us try to “clear the air” of modem presuppositions and place ourselves in the time-environment
that Plato himself perceived. As he looked at the world around him and observed changes taking place,
wouldn’t linear time have seemed obvious to him? Within the scope of his own consciousness, for example,
he could tell that things “weren’t the way they used to be” and that new events were regularly taking place.
The Chimæra: On a small scale, yes. But, seen at the “Forms level”, various events could be viewed as
modifications of a single Form of political behavior or as more complex combinations involving more than
one Form. Thus the conquest of Athens by Sparta or the conquest of Sparta by Athens were essentially
variations on the same Form [of conquest], distinguished by variable applications of other Forms [such as
economic pressures, military power, political imperialism, etc.]. Viewed in this context, events could indeed
be considered cyclical.
The Sphinx: Well, have we justification to presume that Plato truly thought in that context? After all, it is a
perspective so broad that it could have been attacked as useless for concrete applications. In point of fact
this was the basic Sophist criticism of Plato - that his philosophy, while it might be true on a macrocosmic
scale - was of no help to people who were trying to solve immediate problems. So the Sophists advocated
problem-solving techniques that ignored macrocosmic Forms.
The Chimæra: In the Republic, Laws, arid Statesman we have three attempts by Plato to make his political
philosophy relevant. But it would be a mistake to say that he merely attempted to “scale down” this Form or
that Form to a problem-solving level, in order to compete with the Sophists. A Form is not that sort of
“thing”; it is not an axiom which can be applied to various problems. Rather it is a sort of sum-total of
identifying characteristics in various phenomena which relate them, as sphinxes and chimæras are
variations of the Form “mythical beast”.
The Sphinx: Speak for yourself. But we have now reached a point where we can explore the development of Forms-
theory prior to Plato’s time ... excuse me, Plato’s point of focus in the continuum. Because the Forms - and
especially the ones that were applicable to statesmanship - weren’t all that nebulous. In fact they were the
developed political system as well. I am talking, of course, about Egypt.
The Chimæra: The most highly-developed political system? You’re going to get some objections on that score. The
accepted impression of Egypt is that it was a simple military monarchy, reinforced by a death-obsessed
religion, which cared nothing for philosophy. I quote Bertrand Russell:
Philosophy begins with Thales, who, fortunately, can be dated by the fact that he predicted an
eclipse which, according to the astronomers, occurred in the year 585 B.C. Philosophy and science -
which were not originally separate - were therefore born together at the beginning of the sixth
century. 1
The Sphinx: Bertrand Russell was ever quaint. “Sixth century” my claw! For thirty recorded centuries before
Thales, Egypt had existed as a national system - not a mere city-state or even federation of city-states. It was
older to the Greeks than the Greeks are to present-day humans. Scientifically it developed architecture to a
1 Russell, Bertrand, A History of Western Philosophy, page 3.
- 24 -
precision unapproached again until the present century [and in some aspects still unequaled]. 2 It developed
elaborate, codified medical skills [including that of open-skull brain surgery] which were used with a high
measure of success.3 It possessed the only accurate calendar in the entire Mediterranean until the time of
Julius Cæsar [when Cæsar introduced a modified Egyptian calendar to the Roman Empire]; the Egyptians’
own records date back to 4241 BCE!4 And what of the hieroglyphic alphabet, introduced more than seven
thousand years ago? 5
The Chimæra: I expect that part of the problem lies in the fact that the alphabet you just mentioned was so very
hard to read. Indeed it was almost a sort of cipher used exclusively among the Egyptian intelligentsia.
Trainin
g of a scribe took about twelve years, and even then a scribe was not in a position to understand the
significance of most of the philosophical material he was recording. By Plato’s time other, less complex
linguistic systems had come into use for both reading and writing, and probably no one in Athens could
read hieroglyphic, let alone gain access to philosophical texts hoarded by the Egyptian priesthoods. So it is
not so very surprising that Egyptian philosophy was not discussed by the Greeks, except for tourist-type
accounts such as that of Herodotus and the Egyptian passage of Plato’s own Timæus.
The Sphinx: The last known use of hieroglyphic writing even in Egypt itself was in 394 CE [on the Temple of Isis at
Philæ]. 6 Thereafter all knowledge of the language vanished from human knowledge until Champollion
decoded the Rosetta Stone in 1822 CE. And only a small number of Egyptian texts have been translated
today -by a smaller handful of people who can read the language. So perhaps Russell’s statement can be
partially excused, if not condoned.
The Chimæra: Then, too, Egypt has suffered a savage pillaging over the centuries. As a symbol of “heathen
paganism” it was viciously despoiled by the early Christians and their Moslem successors. Countless ancient
temples were either appropriated or razed by the Catholics, and thousands of statues and inscriptions were
disfigured. In 389 CE a Christian mob, acting on the orders of the Christian Roman Emperor Theodosius,
burned the great library of Alexandria to the ground. 7 Even so, millions of book-rolls were rescued or
gathered together from other repositories and the library was reestablished - until 636. In that year
Alexandria was taken by Omar, the Third Caliph of Islam, who decreed: “The contents of these books are in
conformity with the Koran or they are not. If they are, the Koran is sufficient without them; if not, they are
pernicious. Therefore let them be destroyed.” They were burned as fuel to heat the city’s baths; it took six
months for all of them to be consumed. 8 So it is not too surprising that modern researchers have only a
pitiful few scraps of information from previously-undiscovered tombs or overlooked monuments.
The Sphinx: Before we explore the links between the Egyptians and Plato, it may help if we bring out some of the