Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Plato's philosophy is elusive; he never sets out a system of doctrines, nor does he tell us
which of his ideas are most basic, nor rank them in hierarchical order, nor show how they
interrelate. Nevertheless, certain themes recur. He believed that men possess immortal souls
separate from their mortal bodies. Knowledge, he believed, was the recollection of what our
souls already know; we do not gain knowledge from experience, rather by using our reasoning
capacity to draw more closely to the realm of our souls. The true objects of knowledge are not
the transient, material things of this world, which are only reflections of a higher essence that
Plato called Forms or Ideas. Forms are objects of pure thinking, cut off from our experience; but
also Forms motivate us to grasp them, so that the reasoning part of us is drawn to Forms as a
kind of mystic communion.
Plato's notion of a mystic union with a higher essence would play an important role in later
religious thought. But more immediately his teachings at the Academy concerned themselves
with logic, mathematics, astronomy and above all political science, for its purpose was to train
a new ruling class. Prominent families sent him their sons to learn the arts of government.
Plato taught that the best form of government was a constitutional monarchy, at its head a
wise and just philosopher-king. Though it was a utopian vision, Plato's political philosophy
helped prepare the intellectual ground for the acceptance of an absolutist solution to the
increasing uncertainties of fourth-century BC Greece.
ARISTOTLE
384
322 BC
Aristotle grew up in Pella, the capital of an increasingly powerful Macedonia, where his father
had been appointed doctor to King Amyntas II; it is therefore not unlikely that Amyntas' son,
the future Philip II, and Aristotle were boyhood friends. Aged seventeen, Aristotle was sent to
Plato's Academy at Athens to continue his education, and he remained there, first as a student,
then as a teacher, a faithful follower of Plato's ideas. His independent philosophy matured later,
during the years he spent, again at Pella, as tutor to Alexander the Great, and later still, after
335 BC, when he founded his own school, the Lyceum, in Athens.
Aristotle came to reject Plato's dualism. He did not believe that the soul was of a substance
separate from the body, rather that it was an aspect of the body. Instead of Plato's inward-
looking view, Aristotle sought to explain the physical world and human society from the
viewpoint of an outside observer. Essentially a scientist and a realist, he was bent on
discovering the true rather than establishing the good, and he believed sense perception was
the only means of human knowledge. His vast output covered many fields of knowledge
- logic, metaphysics, ethics, politics, rhetoric, art, poetry, physiology, anatomy, biology, zoology,
physics, astronomy and psychology. Everything could be measured, analyzed and described,
and he was the first to classify organisms into genera and species.
The exactitude of Aristotle's writings does not make them easy reading, and Plato has always
enjoyed a wider appeal owing to his literary skill. All the same, Aristotle's influence on Western
intellectual and scientific tradition has been enormous.
Macedonians had built up a formidable navy which inflicted heavy losses on the
Athenian fleet. Unable to lift the Macedonian blockade of Piraeus, Athens surrendered
and a pro-Macedonian government was installed. The episode marked the end of
Athens as a sea power and left it permanently weakened.
Greece was now irrevocably part of a new dominion, one that entirely altered the
scale and orientation of the Greek world. Alexander's strategic vision had been to see
the Mediterranean and the East as two halves of a greater whole. Opened to Greek
86 BC
31 BC
49-52 AD
Romans, led by Sulla, sack
Athens.
Defeat of Antony and Cleopatra
at the Battle of Actium brings all
of Greece and the Middle East
under Roman sway.
St Paul lives and preaches in Corinth and
Athens, first introducing Christianity to
Greece.
