A HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY Vol.I by Johann Eduard Erdmann 1890

§46.] EMPEDOCLES. 57
reverence for all the manifestations of Love. The religious
doctrines, contained chiefly in the KaOapixoi, refer especially to
the future life, alike of the blessed in the seat of the gods,
and of those who are guilt-laden and hunted through the world
in restless flight. They breathe a priestly spirit, and show many
points of contact with Pythagorean doctrines ;
but they do not
always agree with those of Empedocles himself. The same
applies to his treatment of the popular deities, where he does
not, as above, mean the elements. Zeller has given a full
account and a just estimate of these doctrines. (Vol. i.,
p.
547
f., 2nd ed.)
His collected fragments in H. Stephanus, l.c. pp. 17-31. Sturz, i.c. with
supplements by Peyron (1810), and Bergk (1835-39). Karsten, l.c.
Ritter and Preller, § 168-181. Mullach, i. pp. 1-14.
§ 46.
The reproach which could be brought against Heraclitus
with a show of reason, against his successors with an abundance
of reason— that they really affirmed Non-Being only, will
be brought against Empedocles by no one. Rather the contrary
reproach : for he expressly denies the void, which is
Non-Being regarded physically. Not only does this in a way
justify his being counted altogether among the Eleatics, but it
also involves him in contradictions, which, perhaps, induced
Plato to place him so far below Heraclitus. That all multiplicity
is generated only by Siaa-nj/uLara, i.e. interpositions of
the void, had been shown by the Pythagoreans ;
that motion is
only possible by reason of the void, was known already to the
Eleatics. But since it is through these that the world comes
into existence, Empedocles affirms its reality, while denying
its conditions. It is a similar contradiction when the segregated
part of the universe receives the honourable title of
Koa-fxo^, and then the unseparated portion of the a-(paipo? is preferred,
ie. chaotic disorder to order, to say nothing of the subordinate
contradiction involved, when one who denies the void
explains so many things by the assumption of pores, etc. Hence
the advance required by such contradictions will consist in
this, that in opposition to the Eleatics and Heraclitus, the
metaphysical principle is maintained, that Being and Non-Being
are alike justified ;
that the time of mere metaphysics being
past, this principle is carried out in a system of physics, in
58 FIRST PERIOD OF ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY. [§ 47, L 2.
which Non-Being is
opposed to the many unchangeable substrata
which represent Being ;
and that the two entering into
each other produce Becoming, viewed physically, Le.y motion
and change. This advance is made by the Atomism of the
Abderite philosophy. .Hence, even if its champions had not
been acquainted with their predecessors in philosophy, as may
be proved to have been the case with its chief representative,
we should have to say that their point of view surpassed all
previous ones, because it combined them.
C.—THE ATOMISTS.
F. Papencordt: De Atomicorum doctrina. Berl., 1832. F. G. A. Mullach :
Democriti Abderitce Operum fragmenta, Berl., 1843.
S 47-
1. As hardly anything is known of Leucippus, and the
accounts of his date vary, while none of his writings have
come down to us, and since, moreover, it is perhaps nothing
more than a misunderstanding that Theophrastus is said to
have ascribed to him one of the writings of Democritus, we
must regard as the true representative of Atomism his countryman
and disciple, or younger companion, Democritus, the
son of Hegesistratus, especially as he would probably have
included in his work the whole teaching of his predecessor.
Democritus, born about Ol. 80, spent his large fortune in
travels undertaken with the object of accumulating treasures
of knowledge in all lands then known, laden with which he
returned to his native city, and died at a very great age. Of his
numerous writings, which Thrasyllus arranged in tetralogies,
many are, perhaps, subdivisions of larger works. The most
important, probably, were the fxeya^ and the ^iKpo^ StaKocr/xoSy
which, together, contained his doctrine of atoms and of the
construction of the world. Probably many of the fragments
preserved belonged to them. In spite of occasional solecisms,
the style of Democritus was famous in antiquity.
2. The agreement of the atomist doctrine with that of the
Eleatics, which ancient authorities explain by historical connections,
is seen in the fact that both deny the reality of
Becoming, both of the Many out of One, or of the One into
Many also in their conception of extended matter,
;
as to
ov, and the unchangeable reality attributed to it ;
and, finally,