History of Western Philosophy

Scepticism, as a doctrine of the schools, was first proclaimed by Pyrrho, who was in Alexander’s army, and campaigned with it as far as India.

Most philosophy since Descartes has had this intellectually individualistic aspect in a greater or less degree.

A better period began with the accession of Trajan in A.D. 98, and continued until the death of Marcus Aurelius in A.D. 180. During this time, the government of the Empire was as good as any despotic government can be. The third century, on the contrary, was one of appalling disaster. The army realized its power, made and unmade emperors in return

Nevertheless, when it is your lot to have to endure something that is (or seems to you) worse than the ordinary lot of mankind, Spinoza’s principle of thinking about the whole, or at any rate about larger matters than your own grief, is a useful one. There are even times when it is comforting to reflect that human life, with all that it contains of

It is sometimes supposed that Hell was a Christian invention, but this is a mistake. What Christianity did in this respect was only to systematize earlier popular beliefs. From the beginning of Plato’s Republic it is clear that the fear of punishment after death was common in fifth-century Athens, and it is not likely that it grew less in the inter

In the society that he founded, men and women were admitted on equal terms; property was held in common, and there was a common way of life. Even scientific and mathematical discoveries were deemed collective, and in a mystical sense due to Pythagoras even after his death.

Fear of invisible power, if publicly allowed, is religion; if not allowed, superstition.

CHAPTER XVIII Knowledge and Perception in Plato

John’s greatest work was called (in Greek) On the Division of Nature. This book was what, in scholastic times, would have been termed “realist”; that is to say, it maintained, with Plato, that universals are anterior to particulars. He includes in “Nature” not only what is, but also what is not. The whole of Nature is divided into four classes: (1)