Page:A Short History of the World.djvu/156

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136 A Short History of The World traditions and usages with scarcely a question. Plato said plainly to mankind : " Most of the social and political ills from which you suffer are under your control, given only the will and courage to change them. You can live in another and a wiser fashion if you choose to think it out and work it out. You are not awake to your own power." That is a high adventurous teaching that has still to soak in to the common intelligence of our race. One of his earliest works was the Republic, a dream of a communist aristocracy ; his last unfinished work was the Laws, a scheme of regulation for another such Utopian state. The criticism of methods of thinking and methods of govern- ment was carried on after Plato's death by Aristotle, who had been his pupil and who taught in the Lyceum. Aristotle came from the city of Stagira in Macedonia, and his father was court physician to the Macedonian king. For a time Aristotle was tutor to Alexander, the king's son, who was destined to achieve very great things of which we shall soon be telling. Aristotle's work upon methods of think- ing carried the science of Logic to a level at which it remained for THE CARYATIDES OF THE ERECHTHEUM The ancieaC sanctuary on the Acropolis at Athens /V/p/o Fred BoiiiO)^na