Page:The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, Volume 1, 1854.djvu/184

 174r Journal of Philology. Kpdaia KaTa<TK(vaei' tv fih na irpwrov ori ovbev eoriv* devrtpop ort el Kai ZfjTiv aKarakrytrrov avdpuncp' rpirou on d Ka KaTiikTjTrrop, aa roiye dpeoioTov Kai avpp,r}V(vTop roJ neXas. Isocrates also in two passages speaks distinctly on this point, de Perm. 268. 6 pb antipov t6 nXfjdos <pr)o-tv (Lpai rap oprtop Ilapficpidrjs de Kai Mtkicraos (P, Fop- ylas fie rraprcXois ovdep' and Helen. 3. ttws yap ap tis virfpfiaXoiro Topyiap top ToX/xjyo-avra Xtyetj/ oJv ovbep rap optcop Zotip. I have been obliged to quote these statements which seem explicit enough - at length, because Mr Grote, p. 507, has put a different con- struction upon Gorgias* thesis to that which it has been hitherto understood to bear. He holds it to be a denial not of existence in general, but only of "existence" in the Eleatic sense ; that is, the to ep, or ultra-phsenomenal existence. How this can be proved from the words in which the theory is stated I am at a loss to conceive. There are not two ways of interpreting ovfcv Ion. It cannot mean "the Eleatic One is not" or "ultra-phse- nomenal existence is not," which would have been t6 h or ro t>p ovk em-ip, or in short any thing but " nothing is." And further, why should Gorgias, if he " followed in the steps of Zeno and Melissus" (p. 507, not. 1), who acknowledged the existence of "the one" and denied that of "the many" or phaenomena, have directed their arguments (see Brandis in Biogr. Diet. art. Gorgias) against that which they were invented to defend, and not have used them against the possibility of motion, change, and objects of sense in general, which Zeno's logic was expressly employed to call in question ? And why in Gorgias* case should there be any "legitimate filiation" of his doctrines "from the Eleatic phi- losophers?" Gorgias was not a pupil of Parmenides or Zeno or Melissus, but of Empedocles ; Men. 76. c. Stallb. not. : and Em- pedocles taught nothing about t6 V or ultra-phaenomenal exist- ence : there is therefore no reason why he should have denied ultra-phaenomenal rather than phenomenal existence; positive statements are directly against such a supposition ; and it may fairly be concluded that Gorgias as well as Protagoras fully de- serves the charge of scepticism that has been brought against him (see p. 509) ; and that this their philosophical creed entirely justified the ill opinion which sounder and more serious thinkers entertained of their teaching. As Protagoras and Gorgias with Prodicus are universally admitted to have been the most re- spectable members of the class, I might here quit this part of