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 356 D. G. EITCHIE : able to identify this with the theory of Recollection, divested of its mythical setting ; but we are not therefore justified in arguing that this mythical setting never had any real signi- ficance for Plato himself. 2. If the doctrine of Recollection be merely a figurative way of expressing the logical nature of knowledge, what becomes of the Pre-existence of the Soul about which so much is said, not only in the Mcno, Phacdo and Phaedrus, but in the end of the Republic itself? The pre-existence of the soul is ' proved ' in the Phacdo sooner and more easily than its existence after death ; and all the arguments in the Phacdo, as well as the argument in the Phaedrus, prove existence after death only in such a way that existence before birth is neces- sarily implied also. This is not the case with the argument in the Republic, although the "Vision of Er" introduces pre- existence as much as do the Apocalypses of the Phaedo and Phaedrus. Mr. Archer-Hind goes so far as to say : " It is in fact impossible to bring forward any sound arguments for the future existence of the soul which do not also involve its pre- vious existence, its everlasting duration. The creational theory is matter of dogmatic assertion, not of philosophical discussion " (p. 19). The idea of pre-existence was rejected by most Christian theologians, because it seemed inconsis- tent with the creation of the human soul by God. (It was accepted by Origen ; but then Origen was not accepted by the Church.) Quite consistently, the idea of a neccssari/ immortality of the soul was rejected by most of the early Christian theologians. It is only later theology that has fallen back on the metaphysical doctrine of immortality. As we have obviously, in the ordinary sense of the term, no recollection of having existed before our birth, it might be argued that, since Plato puts the existence of the soul after death on the same level with its existence before birth, either (1) he did not seriously hold the immortality of the soul at all, or (2) the immortality in which he believed was not what people ordinarily mean, or think they mean, by immortality, since it does not imply consciousness and memory : Plato, it might be said, maintains an individual but not a person"/ immortality, i.e., the individual soul remains permanently self-identical, but consciousness and memory pass away at death. 1 It is somewhat strange that Plato should have made by degrees to endure the sight of being and of the brightest and best of being, or, in other words, of the Good." (Jowett's Translation, according to which most of the other quotations in this paper are given.) 1 In this sense of the terms TV i chin tiller (['uxtrrl:licliL-cif tier F&'le, pp. 147-149) maintains that individual immortality can be apodeictically proved, but that personal immortality cannot be apodeictically proved or