2: PLATO AND THE DOCTRINE OF REST

An illustrious athlete; then a mendicant dealer in water-melons; chief pontiff lastly of the sect of the Stoics; Cleanthes, as we see him in anecdote [49] at least, is always a loyal, sometimes a very quaintly loyal, follower of the Parmenidean or Stoic doctrine of detachment from all material things. It was at the most critical points perhaps of such detachment, that somewhere about the year three hundred before Christ, he put together the verses of his famous "Hymn." By its practical indifference, its resignation, its passive submission to the One, the undivided Intelligence, which dia pantôn phoita+--goes to and fro through all things, the Stoic pontiff is true to the Parmenidean schooling of his flock; yet departs from it also in a measure by a certain expansion of phrase, inevitable, it may be, if one has to speak at all about that chilly abstraction, still more make a hymn to it. He is far from the cold precept of Spinoza, that great re-assertor of the Parmenidean tradition: That whoso loves God truly must not expect to be loved by Him in return. In truth, there are echoes here from many various sources. Ek sou gar genos esmen+:--that is quoted, as you remember, by Saint Paul, so just after all to the pagan world, as its testimony to some deeper Gnôsis than its own. Certainly Cleanthes has conceived his abstract monotheism a little more winningly, somewhat better, than dry, pedantic Xenophanes; perhaps because Socrates and Plato have lived meanwhile. You might even fancy what he says an echo from Israel's devout response to the announcement: "The Lord thy God is one Lord." The Greek [50] certainly is come very near to his unknown cousin at Sion in what follows:--

     kydist', athanatôn, polyônyme, pankrates aiei
     Zeu, physeos archêge, nomou meta panta kybernôn,
     chaire· se gar pantessi themis thnêtoisi prosaudan, k.t.l.

          Mullach, Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, I. p. 151.

     Thou O Zeus art praised above all gods: many are Thy names and
     Thine is all power for ever.

     The beginning of the world was from Thee: and with law Thou
     rulest over all things.

     Unto Thee may all flesh speak: for we are Thy offspring.

     Therefore will I raise a hymn unto Thee: and will ever sing of
     Thy power.

     The whole order of the heavens obeyeth Thy word: as it moveth
     around the earth:

     With little and great lights mixed together: how great art Thou,
     King above all for ever!

     Nor is anything done upon earth apart from Thee: nor in the
     firmament, nor in the seas:

     Save that which the wicked do: by their own folly.

     But Thine is the skill to set even the crooked straight: what is
     without fashion is fashioned and the alien akin before Thee.

     Thus hast Thou fitted together all things in one: the good with
     the evil:

     That Thy word should be one in all things: abiding for ever.

     Let folly be dispersed from our souls: that we may repay Thee
     the honour, wherewith Thou hast honoured us:

     Singing praise of Thy works for ever: as becometh the sons of
     men.+

NOTES

29. +Transliteration: To Syngramma. Translation: "The Prose."

32. +Transliteration: ousia achrômatos, aschêmatistos, anaphês. E-text editor's translation: "the colorless, utterly formless, intangible essence." Plato, Phaedrus 247c. See also Appreciations, "Coleridge," where Pater uses the same quotation.

33. +Transliteration: aphasia. Liddell and Scott definition: "speechlessness."

34. +Transliteration: to on. Translation: "that which is."

35. +The principle is that of Baruch Spinoza.

36. +Transliteration: Kosmos. Liddell and Scott definition: "I. 1. order; 2. good order, good behaviour, decency; 3. a set form or order: of states, government; 4. the mode or fashion of a thing; II. an ornament...; III. the world or universe, from its perfect arrangement."

36. +Transliteration: kosmiotês. Liddell and Scott definition: "propriety, decorum, orderly behaviour."

36. +Transliteration: archê. Liddell and Scott definition: "I. beginning, first cause, origin. II. 1. supreme power, sovereignty, dominion; 2. office."

37. +Transliteration: para panta legomena. Pater's translation: "in spite of common language."

38. "The Lord thy God. . . ." Deuteronomy 6:4. "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: . . ." See also Mark 12:29: "And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: . . ."

38. +Transliteration: Peri physeôs. E-text editor's translation: "Regarding Nature--i.e. the title De Naturâ Rerum."

39. +Transliteration: hê men hopôs estin te kai hôs ouk esti mê einai. Pater's translation: "that what is, is; and that what is not, is not." Parmenides, Epeôn Leipsana [Fragmentary Song or Poem], line 35. Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 117. Ed. F.W.A. Mullach. Darmstadt: Scientia Verlag Aalen, 1967 (reprint of the Paris, 1860 edition).

39. +Transliteration: peithous esti keleuthos; alêtheiê gar opêdei. Pater's translation: "this is the path to persuasion, for truth goes along with it." Parmenides, Epeôn Leipsana [Fragmentary Song or Poem], line 36. Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 118. Although I have left the quotation as Pater renders it, the semicolon should be a comma, as in the Mullach collection Pater used--otherwise the first half of the sentence would be a question, and that is not how Pater himself translates the verse.

39. +Transliteration: tên dê toi phrazô panapeithea emmen atarpon; oute gar an gnoiês to ge mê eon ou gar ephikton. Pater's translation: "I tell you that is the way which goes counter to persuasion: That which is not, never could you know: there is no way of getting at that." Parmenides, Epeôn Leipsana, lines 38-9. Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 118.

39. +Transliteration: To gar auto voein estin te kai einai. Pater's translation in Latin: "idem est enim cogitare et esse"; in English, that may be translated, "Thinking and being are identical." Parmenides, Epeôn Leipsana, line 40. Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 118.

39. +Transliteration: tothi gar palin hixomai authis. Pater's translation: "at what point I begin; for thither I shall come back over again." Parmenides, Epeôn Leipsana, line 42. Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 118.

43. +Transliteration: heteron epistêmês doxa; eph' heterô ara heteron ti dynamenê hekatera autôn pephyke; ouk enchôrei gnôston kai doxaston tauton einai. E-text editor's translation: "opinion differs from scientific knowledge...To each of them belongs a different power, so to each falls a different sphere...it is not possible for knowledge and opinion to be one and the same." Plato, Republic, 478a-b.

44. +Transliteration: aei kata tauta hôsautôs echousan. Pater's translation: "ever in the same condition in regard to the same things." Plato, Republic 478.

45. +Transliteration: ho philotheamôn. Liddell and Scott definition "fond of seeing, fond of spectacles or shows." This word is from the same passage just cited, note for page 44.

46. +Transliteration: to on. Translation: "that which is."

48. Transliteration: monochronos hêdonê. Pater's definition "the pleasure of the ideal now." The adjective monochronos means, literally, "single or unitary time." See also Marius the Epicurean, Vol. 1, Cyrenaicism, and Vol. 2, Second Thoughts, where Pater quotes the same key Cyrenaic language.

49. +Transliteration: dia pantôn phoita. E-text editor's translation: "which courses through all things." Cleanthes (300-220 B.C.), Hymn to Zeus, lines 12-13. Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 151. Ed. F.W.A. Mullach. Darmstadt: Scientia Verlag Aalen, 1967 (reprint of the Paris, 1860 edition). Pater has translated Cleanthes' phrase koinos logos as "undivided Intelligence." The relevant verse reads, "su kateuthynês koinon logon, hos dia pantôn phoita," which may be translated, "You guide the Universal Thought that courses through all things." But the word logos is multivalent and subject to philosophical nuance, so any translation of it is bound to be limited.

49. +Transliteration: Ek sou gar genos esmen. E-text editor's translation: "For we are born of you." Cleanthes (300-220 B.C.), Hymn to Zeus, line 4. Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 151. Pater alludes also to Saint Paul's words in Acts 17:28: "For in him we live, and move, and have our being."

50. +Here Pater provides a somewhat abbreviated translation of the Hymn to Zeus. As above, the Greek is from Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, Vol. 1, 151.

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