Page:Early Greek philosophy by John Burnet, 3rd edition, 1920.djvu/372

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
358
EARLY GREEK PHILOSOPHY
358

a single world, he has probably been misled by the "accommodators."[1]

190.Animals and plants. Living creatures arose from the earth, doubtless under the influence of heat. Their souls, of course, were air, and their differences were due to the various degrees in which it was rarefied or condensed (fr. 5). No special seat, such as the heart or the brain, was assigned to the soul; it was simply the warm air circulating with the blood in the veins.

The views of Diogenes as to generation, respiration, and the blood, belong to the history of Medicine;[2] his theory of sensation too, as it is described by Theophrastos,[3] need only be mentioned in passing. Briefly stated, it amounts to this, that all sensation is due to the action of air upon the brain and other organs, while pleasure is aeration of the blood. But the details of the theory can only be studied properly in connexion with the Hippokratean writings; for Diogenes does not really represent the old cosmological tradition, but a fresh development of reactionary philosophical views combined with an entirely new enthusiasm for detailed investigation and accumulation of facts.


III. Archelaos of Athens

191.Anaxagoreans. The last of the early cosmologists was Archelaos of Athens, who was a disciple of Anaxagoras.[4] He is also said, by Aristoxenos and Theophrastos, to have been the teacher of Sokrates, and there is not the slightest reason for doubting it.[5] There is no reason either to doubt the tradition

  1. Simpl. Phys. p. 1121, 12. See Chap. I. p. 59.
  2. See Censorinus, quoted in Dox. p. 191 sq.
  3. Theophr. de Sens. 39 sqq. (R. P. 213, 214). For a full account, see Beare, pp. 41 sqq., 105, 140, 169, 209, 258. As Prof. Beare remarked, Diogenes "is one of the most interesting of the pre-Platonic psychologists" (p. 258).
  4. Diog. ii. 16 (R. P. 216).
  5. See Chiapelli in Arch. iv. pp. 369 sqq. Ion of Chios said that Sokrates accompanied Archelaos to Samos (fr. 73 Köpke). If this refers to the siege of Samos, it is interesting to think of the youthful Sokrates serving against a force commanded by Melissos.