OBSERVATIONS ON THE PROTAGORAS MYTH

I

Before calling attention to some important points in this Myth, I must allude to a view maintained by some critics— that it is not a Platonic Myth at all, but only a Sophistic Apologue, or Illustrative Story, like Prodicus's Choice of Hercules. This view is stated, and objected to, by Grote in the following passage:1

The speech is censured by some critics as prolix. But to me it seems full of matter and argument, exceedingly free from superfluous rhetoric. The fable with which it opens presents, of course, the poetical ornament which belongs to that manner of handling. It is, however, fully equal, in point of perspicuity as well as charm,—in my judgment, it is even superior,-to any fable in Plato.

When the harangue, lecture, or sermon of Protagoras is concluded, Sokrates both expresses his profound admiration of it, and admits the conclusion-that virtue is teachable-to be made out, as well as it can be made out by any continuous exposition.

Very different, indeed, is the sentiment of the principal Platonic commentators. Schleiermacher will not allow the mythus of Protagoras to be counted among the Platonic myths. He says that it is composed in the style of Protagoras, and perhaps copied from some real composition of that Sophist. He finds in it nothing but a grobmaterialistiche Denkungsart, die über die sinnliche Erfahrung nicht hinaus philosophirt" (Einleitung zum Protagoras, vol. i. pp. 233, 234).

To the like purpose Ast (Plat. Leb. p. 71), who tells us that what is expressed in the mythus is, "The vulgar and mean sentiment and manner of thought of the Sophist; for it deduces everything, both arts and the social union itself, from human wants and necessity." Apparently these critics, when they treat this as a proof of meanness and vulgarity, have forgotten that the Platonic Sokrates himself does exactly the same thing in the Republic— deriving the entire social union from human necessities (Republ. ii. 369 c).

K. F. Hermann is hardly less severe upon the Protagorean discourse (Gesch. und Syst. der Plat. Phil. p. 460). For my part, I take a view altogether opposed to these learned persons. I think the discourse one of the most striking and

1 Plat. ii. pp. 46, 47.

instructive portions of the Platonic writings; and if I could believe that it was the composition of Protagoras himself, my estimation of him would be considerably raised.

Steinhart pronounces a much more rational and equitable judgment than Ast and Schleiermacher upon the discourse of Protagoras (Einleitung zum Protagoras, pp. 422, 423).1

I entirely agree with Grote; and hope that I shall be able in the following observations to show reason for the opinion that this is not a mere illustrative story, designed to put popularly in a picture what might be put abstrusely, but a genuine Myth containing suggestions of the kind which must be put dià μvooroyías or not at all. The mark of a true Myth, it μυθολογίας must be remembered, is that it sets forth the a priori elements in man's experience. An Illustrative Story or Allegory, as such, merely makes easier and more pleasant the task of receiving and recalling a posteriori data. This is the broad distinction between Myth and Allegory—a distinction which we must not lose sight of, although we observe that Allegory in the hands of a man of genius, like Plato, or Dante, or Bunyan, always tends to become Myth; and that there are few Myths, as distinguished from Allegories, which are not built up of parts, some of which are Allegories.

While contending strongly for the view that the discourse delivered by Protagoras is a true Myth, not an Allegory, I do not forget that it is delivered by Protagoras. But even this, I submit, is quite consistent with its being a Myth, and that, even if Stallbaum (Note on Protag. 320 c) is right in thinking that Plato is parodying Protagoras's style and borrowing from his book περὶ τῆς ἐν ἀρχῇ καταστάσεως. The Timaeus, at any rate, is a Myth, although it is not spoken by Socrates and imitates a style very different from that of the Myths spoken by Socrates. If we are to take the concrete view necessary to the proper understanding of Plato's Myths as they come up individually for critical judgment, we must allow for the dramatic circumstances of each case. The Myth told in the Symposium by Aristophanes, being told by Aristophanes, has

...

1 Professor Campbell (Politicus, Introd. p. xxxii.) is apparently with the critics from whom Grote differs :-"The myth in the Protagoras. is meant to convey an idea which Socrates combats, and which Plato evidently does not fully accept. So also the elaborate myth of Aristophanes in the Symposium contains a phase of thought about the Origin of Love which is afterwards glanced at as an hypothesis of little value (Sympos. 205 E)."

a comic vein; similarly, the Myth put into the mouth of Protagoras is somewhat pompous and confused. None the less, these, I would contend, and the other non-Socratic Myths are true Platonic Myths. It is always Plato the Dramatist who, through the mouth of Aristophanes, or Protagoras, or the Eleatic Stranger, sets forth for the Imagination the Universal of which the Scientific Understanding can give no account.

II

The second observation I have to make on the Protagoras Myth is that it sets forth the distinction between the Mechanical and the Teleological explanations of the world and its parts the distinction with which Kant is occupied in his Kritik der Urtheilskraft. According to Kant, the antinomy between these two explanations exists for the Determinant Judgment (the Judgment which, given the Universal, brings the Particular under it) but not for the Reflective Judgment (the Judgment which, given the Particular, finds a Universal by which to explain it). The Universal of Teleology -a σKOTÓS, or Purpose, to serve which all things in the world are designed by a Personal God-is a Principle, or Universal, which may be posited by the Reflective Judgment, without contradiction, by the side of the mechanical principle of explanation—indeed, must be posited, for without the guidance it affords we could not understand the world at all; but, for all that, we are not warranted in assuming that it is a principle objectively existing and operative in the world. Natural objects which we can understand only as results of purpose may very well be due to mere mechanism. "Purposiveness is a concept which has its origin solely in the Reflective Judgment ";1 i.e. it is a Universal which we think of, which we find useful; but it does not, therefore, exist independently of our thought, as a real cause.

1

What in the end does the most complete teleology prove? Does it prove that there is such an Intelligent Being? No. It only proves that according to the constitution of our cognitive

1 Bernard's Transl. of the Kritik der Urtheilskraft (Critique of Judgment), p. 18.

2 Bernard's Transl. of the Critique of Judgment, pp. 311, 312, and 260, 261.

faculties .. we can form absolutely no concept of the possibility of such a world as this save by thinking a designedly working Supreme Cause thereof. . . . If we expressed ourselves dogmatically, we should say, "There is a God." But all we are justified in saying is, "Things are so internally constituted as if there were a God"; i.e. we cannot otherwise think that purposiveness which must lie at the bottom of our cognition of the internal possibility of many natural things, than by representing it, and the world in general, as a product of an Intelligent Cause-a God. Now, if this proposition, based on an inevitably necessary maxim of our Judgment, is completely satisfactory, from every human point of view, for both the speculative and practical use of our Reason, I should like to know what we lose by not being able to prove it as also valid for higher beings, from objective grounds (which are unfortunately beyond our faculties). It is, indeed, quite certain that we cannot adequately cognise, much less explain, organised beings and their internal possibility, according to mere mechanical principles of nature; and, we can say boldly, it is alike certain that it is absurd for men to make any such attempt, or to hope that another Newton will arise in the future, who shall make comprehensible by us the production of a blade of grass according to natural laws which no design has ordered. We must absolutely deny this insight to men.1 But then, how do we know that in nature, if we could penetrate to the principle by which it specifies the universal laws known to us, there cannot lie hidden (in its mere mechanism) a sufficient ground of the possibility of organised beings, without supposing any design in their production? Would it not be judged by us presumptuous to say

this?

Probabilities here are of no account, when we have to do with judgments of the Pure Reason; we cannot, therefore, judge objectively, either affirmatively or negatively, concerning the proposition: Does a Being, acting according to design, lie at the basis of what we rightly call natural purposes, as the cause of the world, and consequently as its author?... The teleological act of judgment is rightly brought to bear, at least problematically, upon the investigation of nature, but only in order to bring it under principles of observation and inquiry according to the analogy with the causality of purpose, without any pretence to explain it thereby. It belongs, therefore, to the Reflective and not to the Determinant Judgment. The concept of combinations and forms of nature in accordance with purposes is then at least one principle more for bringing its phenomena under rules where the laws of simply mechanical causality do not suffice. For we bring in a teleological ground, when we attribute causality in respect of

1 1 Is Kant right here? This is the great Question of Philosophy.

an Object to the concept of an Object, as if it were to be found in nature (not in ourselves),1 or rather when we represent to ourselves the possibility of the Object after the analogy of that causality which we experience in ourselves, and consequently think nature technically as through a special faculty. If, on the other hand, we did not ascribe to it such a method of action, its causality would have to be represented as blind mechanism. If, on the contrary, we supply to nature causes acting designedly, and consequently place at its basis teleology, not merely as a regulative principle for the mere judging of phenomena, to which nature can be thought as subject in its particular laws, but as a constitutive principle of the derivation of its products from their causes, then would the concept of a natural purpose no longer belong to the Reflective but to the Determinant Judgment. Then, in fact, it would not belong specially to the Judgment (like the concept of beauty regarded as formal subjective purposiveness), but as a rational concept it would introduce into a natural science a new causality, which we only borrow from ourselves and ascribe to other beings, without meaning to assume them to be of the same kind with ourselves.

Now let us return to the Protagoras Myth, which I have said sets forth the distinction between the teleological and the mechanical methods of explaining the world and its parts.

In the animals as equipped by Epimetheus, Afterthought, "who was not very wise," the world and its parts are presented as products of mere mechanism which are regarded by foolish Afterthought as due to his own design. The qualities with which Epimetheus equips the animals are only those by which they barely survive in their struggle for existence. An animal that is small and weak burrows in the earth, and survives. But to suppose that its power of burrowing was designed with a view to its survival is to forget that it was only Afterthought who conferred the power, not Forethought. To suppose design here is as unnecessary surely as it would be to suppose that gold ore was hidden in the quartz in order that men might have difficulty in finding it. As a matter of fact, small weak animals that burrow are not generally found by their enemies; as a matter of fact, animals with thick fur do not generally perish in a cold climate; as a matter of fact, swift animals are not generally caught; as a matter of fact,

The proper understanding of the Doctrine of idéal seems to me to depend on the proper appreciation of the point here put by Kant.