Note 54 — Chapter XXVII · PARMENIDES.

I agree with Schleiermacher, in considering that the purpose of the Parmenides is nothing beyond γυμνασία, or exercise in the method and perplexities of philosophising (Einl. p. 83): but I do not agree with him, when he says (pp. 90-105) that the objections urged by Parmenides (in the middle of the dialogue) against the separate substantiality of Forms or Ideas, though noway answered in the dialogue itself, are sufficiently answered in other dialogues (which he considers later in time), especially in the Sophistes (though, according to Brandis, Handb. Gr.-Röm. Phil. p. 241, the Sophistes is earlier than the Parmenides). Zeller, on the other hand, denies that these objections are at all answered in the Sophistes; but he maintains that the second part of the Parmenides itself clears up the difficulties propounded in the first part. After an elaborate analysis (in the Platon. Studien, pp. 168-178) of the Antinomies or contradictory Demonstrations in the concluding part of the dialogue, Zeller affirms the purpose of them to be “die richtige Ansicht von den Ideen als der Einheit in dem Mannichfaltigen der Erscheinung dialektisch zu begründen, die Ideenlehre möglichen Einwürfen und Missverständnissen gegenüber dialektisch zu begründen” (pp. 180-182). This solution has found favour with some subsequent commentators. See Susemihl, Die genetische Entwickelung der Platon. Philosophie, pp. 341-353; Heinrich Stein, Vorgeschichte und System des Platonismus, pp. 217-220.

To me it appears (what Zeller himself remarks in p. 188, upon the discovery of Schleiermacher that the objections started in the Parmenides are answered in the Sophistes) that it requires all the acuteness of so able a writer as Zeller to detect any such result as that which he here extracts from the Parmenidean Antinomies — from what Aristeides calls (Or. xlvii. p. 430) “the One and Many, the multiplied twists and doublings, of this divine dialogue”. I confess that I am unable to perceive therein what Zeller has either found or elicited. Objections and misunderstandings (Einwürfe und Missverständnisse), far from being obviated or corrected, are accumulated from the beginning to the end of these Antinomies, and are summed up in a formidable total by the final sentence of the dialogue. Moreover, none of these objections which Parmenides had advanced in the earlier part of the dialogue are at all noticed, much less answered, in the concluding Antinomies.

The general view taken by Zeller of the Platonic Parmenides, is repeated by him in his Phil. der Griech. vol. ii. pp. 394-415-429, ed. 2nd. In the first place, I do not think that he sets forth exactly (see p. 415) the reasoning as we read it in Plato; but even if that were exactly set forth, still what we read in Plato is nothing but an assemblage of difficulties and contradictions. These are indeed suggestive, and such as a profound critic may meditate with care, until he finds himself put upon a train of thought conducting him to conclusions sound and tenable in his judgment. But the explanations, sufficient or not, belong after all not to Plato but to the critic himself. Other critics may attach, and have attached, totally different explanations to the same difficulties. I see no adequate evidence to bring home any one of them to Plato; or to prove (what is the main point to be determined) that any one of them was present to his mind when he composed the dialogue.

Schwegler also gives an account of what he affirms to be the purpose and meaning of the Parmenides — “The positive meaning of the antinomies contained in it can only be obtained by inferences which Plato does not himself expressly enunciate, but leaves to the reader to draw” (Geschichte der Philosophie im Umriss, sect. 14, 4 c. pp. 52-53, ed. 5).

A learned man like Schwegler, who both knows the views of other philosophers, and has himself reflected on philosophy, may perhaps find affirmative meaning in the Parmenides; just as Sokrates, in the Platonic Protagoras, finds his own ethical doctrine in the song of the poet Simonides. But I venture to say that no contemporary reader of Plato could have found such a meaning in the Parmenides; and that if Plato intended to communicate such a meaning, the whole structure of the dialogue would be only an elaborate puzzle calculated to prevent nearly all readers from reaching it.

By assigning the leadership of the dialogue to Parmenides (Schwegler says) Plato intends to signify that the Platonic doctrine of Ideas is coincident with the doctrine of Parmenides, and is only a farther development thereof. How can this be signified, when the discourse assigned to Parmenides consists of a string of objections against the doctrine of Ideas, concluding with an intimation that there are other objections, yet stronger, remaining behind?

The fundamental thought of the Parmenides (says Schwegler) is, that the One is not conceivable in complete abstraction from the Many, nor the Many in complete abstraction from the One, — that each reciprocally supposes and serves as condition to the other. Not so: for if we follow the argumentation of Parmenides (p. 131 E), we shall see that what he principally insists upon, is the entire impossibility of any connection or participation between the One and the Many — there is an impassable gulf between them.

Is the discussion of τὸ ἓν (in the closing Antinomies) intended as an example of dialectic investigation — or is it per se the special object of the dialogue? This last is clearly the truth (says Schwegler). “otherwise the dialogue would end without result, and its two portions would be without any internal connection”. Not so; for if we read the dialogue, we find Parmenides clearly proclaiming and singling out τὸ ἓν as only one among a great many different notions, each of which must be made the subject of a bilateral hypothesis, to be followed out into its consequences on both sides (p. 136 A). Moreover, I think that the “internal connection” between the first and the last half of the dialogue, consists in the application of this dialectic method, and in nothing else. If the dialogue ends without result, this is true of many other Platonic dialogues. The student is brought face to face with logical difficulties, and has to find out the solution for himself; or perhaps to find out that no solution can be obtained.