GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

58 ETHICS AND POLITICS: THE GREEKS
the manifestation in it of what Plato called the Forms
(the Greek word for Forms is sometimes misleading^
translated as Ideas) the collection or assembly of which
constitute what Plato meant by reality. Thus all white
things were, Plato held, white because of the manifestation
in them of the Form of whiteness, the Form conferring
upon them such whiteness as they art found to possess.
Similarly, all square things were square because they
participated in the Form of squareness. Any metaphor
which is used to describe the relation between the Forms
and the world of physical things of which our senses make
us aware, is inevitably to some extent misleading;* but, if
we think of the Forms as a set of seals, and of the stuff
of the physical world as a formless, featureless wax, upon
which the seals set their impress, we shall not be very
far from the conception which Plato sought to convey.
While the wax, which is the stuff of the physical world, is
changing and perishable, the Forms are unchangeable
and eternal.
Among the Forms is the Form of the Good, which
confers the quality of being ethically valuable upon the
actions, institutions and characters which participate in
it, or in which it manifests itself, just as the Form of squareness
confers the quality of being square upon such objects
as chess-boards or paving stones, which participate in it
or in which it manifests itself.
In a famous passage in the Republic Plato attributes to
the Form of the Good a position of pre-eminence among
the other Forms* These are arranged in a hierarchy
leading up to the Form of the Good, which exceeds them
in degree of reality as they exceed in degree of reality the
physical world. If we may accept the somewhat ambiguous
intimations of this passage, -the Form of the Good is to
be regarded as constituting at once the fundamental unity
and the essential reality of the universe. There is, however,
no support for or development of this view in any other
Dialogue, and it is not necessary for our present purpose
o discuss it
t
further.