Page:History of the Literature of Ancient Greece (Müller) 2ed.djvu/485

463 LITERATURE OF ANCIENT GREECE. 4(]3 knowledge regarding the hidden nature of things. Accordingly, nothing was more likely than that every flight of speculation should he succeeded by an epoch of scepticism, in which the universality of all science would be doubted or denied. That all knowledge is subjective, that it is true only for the individual, was the meaning of the celehrated saying * of Protagoras ok Abhera, who made his appearance at Athens in the time of Periclcs,t and for a long time enjoyed a great reputation there, till at last a reaction was caused by the bold scepticism of his opinions, and he was banished from Athens and his books were publicly burnt.]; Agreeing with Heraclitus in regard to the doctrine of a perpetual motion and of a continual change in the impressions and perceptions of men, he deduced from this that the individual could know nothing beyond these ever varying perceptions ; consequently, that whatever appeared to be, was so for the individual. According to this doctrine, opposite opinions on the same subject might be equally true ; and if an opinion were only supported by a momentary appearance of truth, this was suf- ficient to make it true for the moment. Hence, it was one of the great feats which Protagoras and the other Sophists professed to perform, fo be able to speak with equal plausibility for and against the same position ; not in order to discover the truth, but in order to show the nothingness of truth. It was not, however, the intention of Protagoras to deprive virtue, as well as truth, of its reality : but he reduced virtue to a mere state or condition of the subject, — a set of impressions and feelings which rendered the subject more capable of active usefulness. Of the gods, he said at the very beginning of the book which caused his banishment from Athens : " With regard to the gods, I cannot determine whether they are or are not; for there are many obstacles in the way of this inquiry — the uncertainty of the matter, and the shortness of human life." § 2. Gorgias, of Leontini, in Sicily, who visited Athens for the first time in 01. 88, 2. b.c 427, as an ambassador from his native town, belonged to an entirely different part of the Hellenic world, had differ- ent teachers, and proceeded from an older philosophical school than Protagoras, but yet there was a great correspondence between the pur- suits of these two men ; and from this we may clearly see how strongly the spirit of the age must have inclined to the form and mode of specu- lation which was common to them both. Gorgias employed the dialec- tical method of the Eleatic school, but arrived at an opposite result by means of it : while the Eleatic philosophers directed all their efforts towards establishing the perpetuity and unity of existence, Gorgias availed Yla-vruv /jA.rpov ci.vtywz'/i:. t About 01. 84. b.c. 444, according to the chronology of Apollodorus. Protagoras was prosecuted for atheism and expelled from Athens, on the accusation of Pythodorus, one of the council of the Four-hundred: this would be in Ol. 92, 1. or 2. e z. 411, if the event happened during the time of the i'our-hun» dred, but this is by no means established.'