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discovery and learning are the same things in all men, namely, remembrance. In like manner the relation to be established between language and knowledge connects itself further and more particularly with polemics, against the strange and all-confusing denial of the possibility of error in the province of conception; polemics which we find begun in the Theætetus, and continued in the Euthydemus. If, then, we remember moreover the temptation which presented itself to overwhelm the hostile Antisthenes with a whole body of ridicule, we see the Cratylus form itself as it were into an exclusive whole, out of the Theætetus and Euthydemus, and by means of its character, as well as what is connected with the immediate subject, secure its place in this series of the Platonic works; for it is as little devoted to personal polemics as the Euthydemus. Moreover it contains not only supplementary matter and illustrations of this dialogue and the Theætetus-as, for example, just at the beginning the decisively repeated declaration in opposition to Protagoras, from a point at which, in order to continue the dialogue, Plato had himself opened a loophole for the philosopher to escape through; and immediately thereupon the manner in which he describes the peculiar nature of the sophistical philosophy exposed in the Euthydemus; and further on the distinction, which also in the Theatetus is allowed to drop, between a whole and a collective mass, is explained from the opposition between quality and quantity; and there are many particulars of the same kind. Quite as little can it be said that our dialogue only states the unity of the theoretical and practical as we have already found it stated in the Theætetus and Gorgias, and their relation to one another-although this too is

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done partly by particular allusions in the etymological part, which remind us very strongly of the Gorgias, partly by the manner in which the reality of the Beautiful and Good is here also at last connected with that of knowledge. But besides all this, the Cratylus also advances the scientific object of Plato in the same way as the character of this series carries it along with it. Two things especially are here to be taken into account. First of all, the doctrine of the relation of Types to the Archetypes; where in fact language and its relation to things is only to be considered as an example, but one by which Plato did really intend to throw out a first notice of the doctrine of ideas and their relation to the material world, which is immediately preparatory to the Sophist. Secondly, as in the Euthydemus the kingly art, the object of which can only be absolutely the good, is set up as that which exists for itself in the identity of use and production, while all other arts, the object of which, whether as producing or using, is only partial, are merely its instruments and subordinate agents; so, on the other hand, dialectics are here represented as the art whose object is absolutely the true in the identity of knowledge and external expression, while every thing else connected with it, and conception and language especially, is only its instrument. Now this parallel visibly draws the connection between those apparent opposites closer together; and by being placed a step higher we at once more clearly perceive the philosopher on the summit, uniting in himself the dialectician and the statesman. Nay, in this respect the Cratylus is in a peculiar manner placed in connection with the Gorgias by means of the strange and obscure analogy, and which is certain only intelli

gible upon the view we have taken of the whole-that analogy which is here set up between law and language, inasmuch as it is repeatedly said that language exists in virtue of a law, so that the law-giver and word-maker are viewed almost as identical. This is introduced by the circumstance, that as, according to the saying of Hermogenes, language is to be regarded only as the work of caprice and convention; though it must be remembered that convention, even though tacit, and law, merged into one another more among the Hellenes than among us; so likewise the sophists and the school of Aristippus explained even moral ideas to be the offspring of caprice, and only introduced from without by the ordinances of the law-giver, and even by means of language itself. Plato, on the contrary, discovers in the moral judgment the same inward necessity that he does in language, though this necessity cannot be outwardly expressed in either, purely and perfectly, except by one profoundly acquainted with the nature of each. And if we pursue this indication, a further application will reveal itself for what is said upon the subject of the capricious element which enters into the works of the legislator.

Now as to the etymological part, which is for the most part ironical,-although in this likewise much that is seriously meant may be found dispersed, if not in the etymologies, at all events in the explanations of them, we should still be best able to judge how merciful and just, or how unmerciful and exaggerated, the satirical imitation is, if the works of Antisthenes that are mentioned, especially those about the use of words, had been preserved to us, where we should also pro

bably meet with Euthyphro again, and obtain some information about him. For if he is not a person taken out of some satirized dialogue, it is impossible to conceive how he comes here. And, what is most important, we should then be better able to see what other allusions may be here further concealed. For it is certain that what we find in the dialogue is not all directed at the one person who is the object of the satire, but, as we have seen also in the Euthydemus, a large share is intended to be devoted to self-defence. This is here the more evident, as the playful manner in which Plato sometimes used language may have found censurers enough, especially among those who were in the habit of availing themselves of much not very different from this play in proof of their opinions. And in this point of view too we should naturally expect to see this play here pushed to extremities, and to find our dialogue indulging in the very last degree of epideixis as it were in this kind; as strange explanations brought in from elsewhere are outdone in it by still stranger of

its own.

And this etymological part has been the crux of the translator, and it was matter of long and perplexing deliberation with him how to extricate himself from the difficulty. The introduction generally of the Greek words appeared an intolerable expedient, and it seemed better to let the Socrates who was speaking German once for all derive German from German. On the other hand, it was not possible to do this with the proper names in these it was necessary to preserve the original tongue; and since both methods now stand in company with one another, the reader will at all events

have occasion to congratulate himself that no one exclusively pervades the whole. But as that which elsewhere occurs only in detached particulars comes out here in a mass, so on the other hand it cannot be denied that the art of dialogic composition goes somewhat back; and when we compare the Cratylus with the Euthydemus, with which it stands most nearly connected in so many respects, we shall find that in the latter the ironical and the serious parts are interwoven far more beautifully with one another. Here, on the contrary, Plato appears almost overcome by the superabundance of philological jest, so harsh and abrupt are the transitions in the latter part of the dialogue; sometimes, after short digressions, he turns back to what has gone before, as if it were something new rather than what had been already said—sometimes he does bring forward matter actually new, but for which no preparation whatever has been made and which is harshly subjoined to what immediately precedes, in a manner that might almost lead us to doubt, if we were to consider such passages as these exclusively, whether it is Platonic. This is particularly noticeable at the point from which the signification of the letters is explained. But the whole will admit no manner of doubt of its genuineness, and the most that can be said is, that Plato after that point returned to his subject with no great inclination to do so, and sketched as slightly as possible what still remained to be said. Of the persons of the dialogue, there is I fear but little to be said: Hermogenes is also known from Xenophon as a not rich brother of the rich Callias Cratylus is mentioned not only as a pupil of Heraclitus, but also as a teacher of Plato in his youth-a piece of information which

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