of the antithesis. The antithesis is ultimate or fundamental, that is to say, there is nothing higher than it in the region of thought, no higher category under which these two extremes may be conciliated or reduced to unity. It denotes a radical and thoroughgoing opposition. This, at any rate, is the point of view from which at first we are compelled to regard it, and this is the point of view from which Xenophanes and the other Eleatic philosophers regarded the antithesis. The necessities of thinking seemed to them to declare that the distinction was absolute and irreconcilable. A strict logic seemed to necessitate this conclusion
10. But now observe what follows from this conclusion. This follows from it, that whatever epithet or predicate is applied to one of the terms of the antithesis, the counter-predicate must be applied to the other term. Unless this were so, the opposition would not be absolute and complete. It follows, then, that if we call the unchangeable, or the one, true, we must call the changeable, or the many, untrue; that if we call the unchangeable, or the one, real, we must call the changeable, or the many, unreal. In short, if we say that the one, the permanent, or the unchangeable, is, we must say that the many, the fluctuating, the unchangeable, are not. Such was the logic by which the Eleatic school found themselves compelled to maintain the nonentity (the comparative nonentity at least) of all sensible existence. For it was the
