Aristotle, line engraving by P. Fidanza after Raphael Sanzio

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Part 1 of 2

Plato and Aristotle are the twin peaks of Ancient Greek philosophy. Aristotle was Plato’s student. But in one way, Aristotle seems to backslide from Plato. Plato was interested in theoretical topics like mathematics and the philosophy of nature. But following Socrates, his conception of wisdom was primarily moral and practical. Aristotle, however, defends the superiority of the purely contemplative life over the practical life. This seems to be a return to pre-Socratic, theory-centered philosophy.

The earliest Greek philosophers were primarily interested in nature and were unconcerned with practical matters. This is nicely encapsulated by the story about Thales, the very first Greek philosopher, who was so fascinated with the heavens that he did not notice a well at his feet and thus fell into it.

When Socrates was young, he was fascinated with natural philosophy. But in middle age, he realized that his fascination with theories about nature had blinded him to the human realm: psychology, ethics, politics, the pursuit of happiness.[1] Thus, Socrates turned from theory to practice, from the cosmos to the polis, from science to the human things.

As Cicero put it, “Socrates . . . was the first to call philosophy down from the heavens and set her in the cities of men and bring her also into their homes and compel her to ask questions about life, morality, and things good and evil.”[2]

Socrates did not see wisdom as knowledge of the whole or knowledge of the ultimate causes of things. He denied knowing the things above the heavens and below the earth. He denied knowing the great and the small. These were the things that natural philosophers studied.

But Socrates did not deny knowledge of the middle-sized realm of humanity. He did not deny knowledge of human nature. In fact, knowledge of human nature became the basis for his essentially moral account of wisdom: the ability to make right use of all things to pursue human well-being.

Despite Socrates’ moral conception of wisdom and his skepticism about some forms of knowledge, he was still interested in metaphysical questions, including the nature of the soul, its ability to survive death, its postmortem prospects, and the ordering of the cosmos toward the good.

In fact, Socrates fused moral wisdom with metaphysical speculation. If it is imperative to care for the soul, then Socrates believed that entitled him to speculate about things above the heavens, below the earth, and after death if such speculations would help us better care for our souls in this life.[3]

Plato, in his “post-Socratic” dialogues, returned to and appropriated pre-Socratic ideas to create a speculative philosophy of nature.[4] Plato also took an active interest in the science of his day. But he remained wholly Socratic in his moral idea of wisdom and his skeptical sense of the limits of theoretical knowledge.

Aristotle was not just a philosopher. He was also a scientist. Fully a third of his surviving works deal with what we would today classify not as philosophy but as science, mostly biology. These studies were purely theoretical, pursued simply for the sake of knowledge. Thus it would be natural for Aristotle to defend the theoretical life.

But is defending the goodness of the theoretical life the same thing as defining wisdom as essentially theoretical? There’s no contradiction between having a Socratic moral idea of wisdom and defending the goodness of the theoretical life—the life of the scholar, scientist, or philosopher—unless one defines wisdom as simply theoretical knowledge.

Aristotle’s Protrepticus

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In Antiquity, Aristotle’s most famous work was his dialogue Protrepticus. A protreptic is an “exhortation,” a call to do something. Philosophical protreptics explain the nature of philosophy and why one should study it. Like all of Aristotle’s published writings, the Protrepticus was lost in the collapse of the Ancient world.

Fortunately, Iamblichus the Neoplatonist quoted extensively from Aristotle’s Protrepticus in two of his works, On the General Science of Mathematics and his own Protrepticus.[5] Based on Iamblichus’ quotations of surviving works by Plato, D. S. Hutchinson and Monte Ransome Johnson argue persuasively that Iamblichus’ practice was to accurately quote extensive blocs of text, adding only introductory sentences and transitions, and omitting only small dialogical exchanges (“Yes, Socrates.”) while accurately presenting the substance of the argument. In short, these books were anthologies.[6]

If Iamblichus treated Aristotle like he treated Plato, then we can reconstruct most of the argument of Aristotle’s Protrepticus from Iamblichus, as well as some papyrus fragments. The only things missing are an unknown number of pages from the beginning and some dialogical transitions. The dramatic details are a serious loss if Aristotle wrote dialogues like Plato did in which the overall meaning is not just in the speeches but also the dramatic events.

There are apparently four speakers in the Protrepticus: Isocrates, Heraclides of Pontus, an unnamed critic of philosophy as such, and Aristotle himself.

Isocrates (436–338 BCE) was an eminent Athenian teacher of rhetoric and the liberal arts who called himself a philosopher. Isocrates advocated a practical idea of wisdom as a tool for pursuing the good life. He was a critic of purely theoretical ideas of wisdom, regarding such studies at best as a kind of mental gymnastics to sharpen the mind for the practical tasks of life. Hutchinson and Johnson claim that Aristotle’s Protrepticus is a response to Isocrates’ protreptic in his Antidosis.

But Isocrates’ idea of wisdom in the Protrepticus better resembles the protreptic offered by Socrates (without the “I”) in Plato’s Euthydemus. This should come as no surprise, for Isocrates identified himself with Socrates. For instance, the Antidosis—which both defends Isocrates’ approach to philosophy and attacks Plato’s Academy—is modeled after Plato’s Apology of Socrates, with Isocrates playing the role of Socrates.

Heraclides of Pontus (c. 390–c. 310 BCE) was a student of Plato who almost became the head of the Academy after the death of Plato’s nephew Speusippus. Although Heraclides’ writings have perished, he was apparently the first person to argue that the Earth rotated on its axis. In the Protrepticus, Heraclides argues for the Pythagorean idea of philosophy, which held that the soul’s entanglement with the material world is a source of suffering, which can be combatted by separating the soul from the body through theoretical pursuits.

Isocrates was worldly, Heraclides unworldly, but they both subordinated pure theory to practical ends: living in or escaping from the world. By contrast, Aristotle argues for the intrinsic goodness of theoretical studies within the context of a worldly philosophy.

It should be noted, however, that although Aristotle differentiates his thinking from the views represented by Isocrates and Heraclides and offers criticisms of them, it appears that all three philosophers were primarily concerned with refuting the wholesale rejection of philosophy by the unnamed skeptic. Thus all three thinkers presented their positive cases for philosophy side by side. Naturally, Aristotle gives himself the last word.

My focus here is Aristotle’s reply to the I/Socratic concept of philosophy.

I/Socratic Wisdom in the Protrepticus

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Iamblichus did not anthologize all of Isocrates’ Socratic arguments from the Protrepticus. (Nor did he include Socrates’ protreptic from the Euthydemus, although he includes other protreptic arguments from Plato.) But some additional arguments from Isocrates have survived in papyrus fragments from Egypt. Since these fragments seem to be from the beginning of the Protrepticus, we will deal with them first.

In the Euthydemus, Socrates’ case for philosophy begins from the assumption that all men are pursuing happiness. Happiness requires certain goods. But it is not enough merely to have goods. One must use them. And it is not enough to use goods, for one must use them rightly. The standard of right and wrong is simply the promotion of the happiness we seek. Wisdom is the ability to make right use of all things.

Thus Socrates argues that all the good things we pray for—wealth, good looks, high birth, etc.—are not necessarily good for us. They are good only if used rightly, which presupposes that wisdom has come to reside in one’s soul. If used wrongly, the very same goods can be curses. Indeed, if a foolish man is rich, handsome, and well-connected, he simply has more resources with which to wreck his life.

Against this background, passages like this from Isocrates make sense:

[We should] consider success in life as in fact not consisting in the possession of lots of things as much as in the condition of the soul [i.e., the presence of practical wisdom]. For one would not say that a body is also successful by being adorned with splendid clothing, but rather by being healthy and in a good condition, even if none of the things just mentioned is present in it; rather and, in the same way, a soul too, if it has been educated, such a soul and such a man must be hailed as being successful, not if he is splendidly furnished with the externals but is himself worth nothing. . . . Apart from what’s been said, what happens to those who are worth nothing, when they do happen across wealth and the goods that come by fortune, is that their possessions are worth more than they are—the most disgraceful thing of all! For just as anybody who is inferior to his own servants would turn into a laughingstock, in the same way it turns out that those for whom their possessions are more important than their own nature should be considered pathetic.

And this is truly how it is; as the proverb says, “satisfaction begets insolence, and ignorance with power beget senselessness,” since for those whose condition is bad in those respects that concern the soul, neither wealth nor strength nor beauty is anything good; but rather, the more these bad conditions obtain to an excessive degree, the more greatly and the more often those things harm the man who possesses them, if he comes by them without intelligence. For the saying “no knife for a child” means “don’t hand the permit to the ones who are bad.” (pp. 2–3)

In another papyrus fragment, we find a similar argument, to wit that conventional assets are not actually good for us unless we have the virtue to use them rightly. Huchinson and Johnson speculate that this argument belongs to Heraclides, but it seems to me simply a continuation of Isocrates’ position.

. . . “For a man,” he said, “whose life is unprofitable and harmful, what is it useful for him to possess?” . . .  “So for a man,” he said, “whose life is bad, isn’t his life unprofitable and harmful?” “Unprofitable, certainly,” he said. “So then,” he said, “the life of everyone uneducated is bad, and so are his actions, right?” “Yes, indeed,” he said. “So what possession,” he said “would be profitable for such a person? In fact if someone examined them one by one,” he said, “wealth, reputation, strength, beauty—all these things are so to speak unprofitable to such a person. Yes, it’s pretty much just like ‘a knife to a child’ how any of such things turns out for an uneducated human. For if he has wealth his weak self-control gives him an impulse to self-indulgence and even gambling and women and the other [breaks off]. (p. 3)

If wisdom is simply the ability to make right use of all things in the pursuit of happiness, then purely theoretical knowledge of the whole or the ultimate causes of things does not constitute wisdom. This argument is not from Isocrates’ Antidosis, but it is consistent with Socrates’ protreptic in the Euthydemus. But it is important to recognize that this argument is not inconsistent with the Antidosis either.

Later in the Protrepticus, Isocrates offers a critique of theoretical philosophy that is consistent with the Antidosis. I will begin with two texts from the Antidosis, then we will look at some passages from the Protrepticus.

First, Isocrates defends a wholly practical concept of wisdom and philosophy: “I hold that man to be wise who was able by his powers of conjecture to arrive generally at the best course, and I hold that man to be a philosopher who occupies himself with the studies from which he will most quickly gain that kind of insight.”[7] Clearly, if philosophy pursues the quickest route to practical wisdom, it is unphilosophical to tarry with purely theoretical matters.

Second, Isocrates denies that theoretical topics like mathematics, astronomy, and the ultimate constituents of the material world are part of philosophy:

I do not, however, think it proper to apply the term “philosophy” to a training which is no help to us in the present either in our speech or in our actions, but rather I would call it a gymnastic of the mind and a preparation for philosophy. . . . I would, therefore, advise young men to spend some time on these disciplines, but not to allow their minds to be dried up by these barren subtleties, nor to be stranded on the speculations of the ancient wise men [including accounts of the ultimate elements of reality offered by Empedocles, Parmenides, and Gorgias]. I hold that men who want to do some good in the world must banish utterly from their interests all vain speculations and all activities which have no bearing on our lives.[8]

Aristotle pointedly responds to this sort of view in his portions of the Protrepticus.

In the Protrepticus, Isocrates speaks of purely theoretical and “useless” studies, including “knowledge of what is unjust and just and bad and good, a knowledge similar to geometry and the other sciences of that sort” (p. 14). This is surprising, for shouldn’t knowledge of justice and injustice, the bad and the good, have practical implications? Apparently not, though, if it is modeled on “geometry” and similar sciences. Could Isocrates be alluding here to Plato’s famous lecture “On the Good,” in which he discoursed entirely about numbers? He also mentions, “intelligence about nature as well as that sort of truth, the sort of intelligence that those around Anaxagoras and Parmenides proposed” (p. 14). Could this be an allusion to Anaxagoras’ purely mechanical conception of nous that disappointed the young Socrates because it did not aim at the good?

Isocrates continues:

So it should not be overlooked by someone who is going to scrutinize these subjects that everything that is good and beneficial for the life of humans consists in being used and put into action, and not in the mere knowledge. [This echoes the argument of Socrates in the Euthydemus that it is not enough to have goods to attain happiness. One must also use them.] For we are not healthy by being acquainted with what produces health, but rather by applying it to our bodies, nor are we wealthy by knowing about wealth, but by possessing a very substantial amount nor, most important of all, do we live well by knowing certain sorts of beings, but by acting well, for this is truly what being successful is. Hence it is appropriate for philosophy as well, if indeed it is beneficial, to be either a practice of good things or else useful for those sorts of practices. (p. 14)

Isocrates then goes on to argue that theoretical geometry is useless for surveying land, theoretical harmonics is useless for making music, and theoretical astronomy is useless for navigating the seas: “Hence for practical activities sciences like this will be entirely useless, and if among activities they miss out on the correct ones, the love of learning misses out on the greatest of goods” (p. 14).

Aristotle’s Concession to Isocrates

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Aristotle opens his response to Isocrates with a disarming concession: Yes, right use is important. Thus, if theoretical geometry, harmonics, and astronomy are parts of the theoretical way of life, they too must be used rightly:

The things that support our way of life [I take these to be the aforementioned sciences, now recast as a way of life] support it just as certain tools do [These sciences are means to the theoretical life insofar as they are parts of the theoretical life], the use of which is risky, and fashions more harm than good for those who don’t use them as required. (p. 15)

If, as Isocrates says, these theoretical disciplines are not used rightly:

Well then, we must aspire to the knowledge [i.e., the aforementioned sciences], both to possess it and to use it appropriately, by means of which we will deploy all these things well. Hence we should do philosophy, if we are going to govern correctly and lead our own life beneficially. (p. 15)

In short, Aristotle seems to be conceding here that philosophy must seek the ability to make right use of all things, i.e., the Socratic concept of wisdom.

Aristotle goes on to distinguish between higher and lower forms of knowledge. Higher forms direct. Lower forms serve. It is in the higher, directing forms of knowledge that “the good in the strict sense exists, as if they were more commanding kinds of knowledge” (p. 15).

Philosophy is the most commanding knowledge, which can make right use of all things: “only the knowledge which is correct when judging, which makes use of reason, and which observes the whole good—which is philosophy—is capable of using everything and directing it according to nature” (p. 15). This being the case, “by all means one should do philosophy, since only philosophy contains in itself this correct judgment and this unerring directive intelligence” (p. 15).

This is basically the Socratic protreptic from the Euthydemus expressed in Aristotle’s more ponderous fashion. So where does Aristotle part ways with I/Socrates? As we will see, Aristotle simply wishes to incorporate theoretical pursuits within this essentially Socratic conception of philosophy. Theoretical knowledge is, at least for those so inclined, part of the good life that Socratic moral wisdom pursues.

Notes

[1] Plato, Phaedo, 96a–100a, esp. 97c and 98b.

[2] Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, trans. J. E. King (Cambridge, Mass.: Loeb Classical Library, 1971), book V, iv, p. 435.

[3] Greg Johnson, “The Myths of Plato,” From Plato to Postmodernism (San Francisco: Counter-Currents, 2019).

[4] Charles H. Kahn. Plato and The Post Socratic Dialogue: The Return to the Philosophy of Nature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014).

[5] Aristotle, Protrepticus or Exhortation to Philosophy (Fragments, Quotations, Reports, and Other Evidence), edited and translated by D. S. Hutchinson and Monte Ransome Johnson. Online publication at protrepticus.info. Henceforth cited parenthetically in the text.

[6] D. S. Hutchinson and Monte Ransome Johnson, “Authenticating Aristotle’s Protrepticus,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 29, pp. 193–294.

[7] Isocrates, Antidosis, 271, trans. George Norlin, Isocrates, vol. II (Cambridge, Mass.: Loeb Classical Library, 1929), p. 235.

[8] Isocrates, Antidosis, 266–69, pp. 333–35.