III.-The Military Operations at Cabul, which ended in the Retreat and Destruction of the British Army, January 1842, with a Journal of Imprisonment in Affghanistan. By Lieutenant VINCENT V.-The Spanish Question. Histoire Politique de l'Espagne Moderne. Par M. VI.-1. A Hand-Book of the History of Painting. By 2. A Hand-Book to the Public Galleries of Art in 3. De la Poésie Chrétienne, dans son Principe, VII. 1. Statistik des Oestreichischen Kaiserstaates. 2. Unpublished Official Reports and other Docu 467 512 THE BRITISH AND FOREIGN REVIEW. ARTICLE I. 1. The Memorabilia of Xenophon, translated by several hands. 2. The Comedies of Aristophanes. By T. MITCHELL, A.M. THE School of Socrates and the teaching of Christ,-morals and religion, great and venerable names, we desire to do justice to each! We detest the Frenchman's antichristian sneer, and answer it by pointing to the deeds of Clarkson and Wilberforce, a practical answer which cannot be gainsayed. English philosophers and statesmen, it appears, may question, or, to speak more correctly, deny the moral claims of Socrates, and no one answers. It is, at least, bold and daring. They put their own character for knowledge and fairness on its trial. We desire that truth may prevail. If the name of Socrates has been lauded more than it deserves, let the wreath be taken from his honoured brow-detur digniori, to Bacon or to Bentham. But if hasty and irreverent hands have been laid on a sacred head, sacred for piety, morality and public principle, -sacred to philosophy, and not disowned by science, then let those irreverent hands be as openly withdrawn as they have been put forth. Let his modern accusers express regret for having spoken lightly and slightingly of his philosophy. The great names of Bacon and Bentham would be tarnished, their VOL. XIV.-No. XXVIII. U philosophy, if not their science, would be called in question, could it be supposed that they would not recommend restitution and penitence for wrong done. We need not be told that to express doubt or disbelief of the moral claims of a heathen, be he philosopher or statesman, is popular with a large and influential party. Such mystifications, we suppose they must be called, are thought to establish the doctrines of original sin and human corruption more firmly. Alas! these doctrines need no such false support. They may more safely be rested on the fact that the many require and the few yield such poor compliances, than on doubting or denying the moral claims of Socrates. But, it will be urged, our learned universities, the supposed guardians of the mighty dead of Greece and Rome, silently permit these assertions to be made;-nay, that their more celebrated scholars, when they write about Socrates, give their countenance to the learned men of foreign countries who have raised doubts about his character and philosophy; and that all this is in agreement with the fact that that philosophy is very insufficiently studied in our universities. A scholar of whom England may be proud has urged the claims of that portion of ancient history which includes the period of Socrates upon the especial attention of our own times, on the ground that the history of Thucydides exhibits a great example of the very evils, political and moral (we add religious also), which are threatening ourselves. We would ask scholars and historians whether the philosophy of those times does not come home to our business and bosoms quite as as closely as its history. If Thucydides exhibits the very diagnosis of our own case, Socrates no less certainly indicates what, mutatis mutandis, should be its treatment. If the one shows our danger, the other points out our means of escape. And though we may regret that the reviewer of Bacon and the editor of Bentham have spoken of Socrates in a manner so slighting, as to indispose their readers from any serious inquiry into his philosophy, and consequently into the remedies he recommends, yet if we succeed in proving that they have spoken lightly and inconsiderately, rhetorically and ad captandum *See Notes in the first vol. of Dr Arnold's Thucydides. vulgus, we will hope that their names may do more towards giving interest to the question, than their opinions obstruct its fair consideration. The reviewer of Bacon contrasts a foolish dictum of Seneca, "Non est, inquam, instrumentorum ad usus necessarios opifex, philosophia," with what he sets forth as the very motto of Bacon's philosophy,"dignitatem ingenii et nominis mei, si quæ sit, sæpius sciens et volens projicio, dum commodis humanis inserviamt," and then arrives at his conclusion, rather more rhetorically, we think, than logically, (for he takes no notice of the peculiar wants of the different periods, and the consequently different objects of philosophy in each,) in the following words: "The spirit which appears in the passage of Se"neca to which we have referred, tainted the whole body of "the ancient philosophy, from the time of Socrates down"wards; and took possession of intellects with which that of "Seneca cannot, for a moment, be compared. It pervades "the Dialogues of Plato. It may be distinctly traced in many "parts of the works of Aristotle. Bacon has dropped hints “from which it may be inferred, that in his opinion the pre"valence of this feeling was in a great measure to be attri"buted to the influence of Socrates. Our great countryman "evidently did not consider the revolution which Socrates ef"fected in philosophy as a happy event; and he constantly "maintained that the earlier Greek speculators, Democritus "in particular, were, on the whole, superior to their more "celebrated successors.-Assuredly," continues the reviewer of Bacon, "if the tree which Socrates planted, and Plato wa tered, is to be judged of by its flowers and leaves, it is the "noblest of trees. But if we take the homely test of Bacon, "-if we judge of the tree by its fruits, our opinion of it may perhaps be less favourable. We are forced to say with. "Bacon, that this celebrated philosophy ended in nothing but "disputation." If this be so, it was indeed a most impotent conclusion to a swelling prologue. But we shall see. Having passed this sweeping condemnation on the philo "Philosophy is no inventor of machines for everyday wants." "I willingly sacrifice the dignity of my genius and reputation, if I have any, whenever I can promote men's comforts." Edinburgh Review, No. 132, p. 67. |