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Bipartition of the Soul in the Early Academy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

D. A. Rees
D. A. Rees
Affiliation:
Jesus College, Oxford
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Extract

Among the topics this paper will discuss, the leading one is that of the moral psychology of the Laws; it will not, however, attempt a general study of this, but will confine itself to the question whether that work presupposes any particular division of the soul into parts. The problem seems to have been on the whole neglected by scholars. Apelt in his Platon-Index says briefly that the soul is there treated as tripartite, which is certainly not true without qualification. Neither England's commentary nor Ritter's affords much help. The latter does, indeed, touch on the question in Volume II of his Platon; he there states that the Laws treats the soul as tripartite, and supports this by referring to I. 644C and IX. 863B, but neither passage proves his point, the second actually suggesting that it requires some modification, as will be argued below. The best treatment known to me is the discussion of the second of these passages by L. Gernet in his translation (with commentary) of Book IX, but it requires some expansion and supplementation.

It will be well to begin by recapitulating briefly the main points in the moral psychology of the Republic. The soul is there divided into three parts or (better) elements, the rational, the spirited and the appetitive, and this division has two aspects: (a) an analysis is thus provided which can be used in the interpretation and appraisal of all action whatever, the soul being in the right state and the agent's actions right in consequence when the rational element controls the appetitive through the agency of the spirited; (b) at the same time each of the three elements represents a drive towards one of three goals, the rational towards knowledge, the spirited towards honour and public distinction, and the appetitive towards pleasure (interpreted as bodily pleasure), or towards material gain as a means to the attainment of pleasure. Secondly, each of these three drives may predominate in any individual soul (though it is commonest for the last to do so, and least common for the first), and the three are therefore to be correlated with three ways of life, that of the thinker, that of the soldier or man in public life, and that of the merchant or other person engaged in a money-making enterprise, and further these ways of life are specially characteristic of different races. Thirdly, the three elements in the soul and the three types of character are correlated by Plato with the three classes in his ideal state, the rulers, the auxiliaries and the artisans. Fourthly, the distinction of three elements in the soul is made the basis for interpreting the four virtues, wisdom being the virtue of the rational element and courage of the spirited (ideally under the control of the rational), while justice consists in the maintenance of the proper relation between the three elements, the rational controlling the appetitive through the agency of the spirited, and temperance in the willing acquiescence of the appetites in the rule of reason. On the larger canvas of state organisation, the three classes will have as their specially characteristic virtues wisdom, courage and temperance respectively, while the state as a whole will be just if the correct relation between the three classes is maintained and the reason of the rulers preserves its control with the help of the auxiliaries. Fifthly, the tripartition of the soul is applied in Book IX to the discussion of pleasure, pleasures being graded as higher or lower according to the element in the soul which enjoys them; indeed, Plato argues that the pleasures of the rational element are not simply superior to those of the other two but more real as well.Finally, Book X suggests at least that the rational element is the real self, that it alone is immortal, and that the other two exist merely in virtue of our temporary attachment to a body.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 77 , Issue 1 , November 1957 , pp. 112 - 118
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1957

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References

1 s.v. ‘Seelenlehre’.

2 P. 451.

3 Paris, 1917. See pp. 105–6 (n. 70).

4 Cf. esp. IV. 435 B ff.

5 Rep. 435E–436A.

6 Ibid., e.g. 440E–441A.

7 Ibid. 441 C ff., 443C ff.

8 Ibid. 428C ff.

9 Ibid. 433A, etc.

10 580D ff.

11 611B–612A. One might add that the imperfect types of state and character depicted in Books VIII–IX can be interpreted in terms of the relations of the three parts of the soul.

12 Phdr. 246A–B.

13 Phdr. 247D.

14 Ibid. 253D, cf. 246B.

15 Ibid.

16 Ibid. D–E.

17 Ibid. 253E.

18 Ti. 42A–B.

19 Cf. Ti. 65A, 69C–D, 70A, 72D.

20 A Commentary on Plato's Timaeus (1928), p. 496.

21 Platon, vol. i, p. 395 (ed. 1920).

22 44D–45B, 69D–71A.

23 71A–72C.

24 Cf. 42A–B.

25 65A. But the pleasures of smell are also mentioned in Rep. IX. 584B.

26 17C–19B.

27 (sc. γήνος) 17C.

28

29 There seems to me to be great force in Mr. G. E. L. Owen's arguments for placing the date of the Timaeus not long after that of the Republic (‘The Place of the Timaeus in Dialogues', Plato's (Cl. Qu., N.S., vol. iii (1953), pp. 79–95)Google Scholar). Perhaps the Phaedrus was written about the same time, though this too is a matter of controversy.

30 Ti. 65A, 69C–D, 72D. Burnet, (The Ethics of Aristotle (1900), p. 63 n.)Google Scholar questions the relevance of these passages and of Plt. 309C (discussed below) to the bipartition of the soul into a rational element and an irrational, but he presents no good reasons for his view.

31 De An. iii. 432a24–6.

32 Cornford, F. M., ‘Psychology and Social Structure in the Republic of Plato’ (Cl. Qu., vi (1912), pp. 246–65Google Scholar); Hackforth, R., ‘The Modification of Plan in Plato's Republic’ (Cl. Qu., vii (1913), pp. 265–72).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

33 (sc. ), 309C.

34 Phlb. 21D–22C, 60E.

35 Ibid. 21A–D, 22D, 23 A, 60D–E.

36 Ibid. 22A ff., 61B.

37 Phlb. 22B–C; cf. Arist. E.N. X. 1177b26–1178a2.

38 Cf. Rep. IX. 581C–583A, with IV. 435E–436A.

39 θυμός is classed by Aristotle as a πάθος at De An. I. 403a16–17 and E.N. VII. 1147a14–16. The threefold classification of appetite, spirit and thought occurs at E.E. II. 1223a26–1224a7 (cf. also ibid. 1225b25 and E.N. III. 1111b10 ff.).

40 Cf. (sc. ) Rep. IV. 440E; ibid. 440E;–441A.

41 627D ff., esp. 628D–E and 630A–D. Cf. 626E.

42 Cf. 631C–D, 647C–D.

43 Cf. esp. 635E.

44 633E–634A, 636D–E, 647C–648E, and cf. also the juxtaposition of pleasure, pain and desire at 631 E.

45 653A–C.

46

47 A. E. Taylor's translation. Similar views have been adopted in recent centuries, as by Kant and T. H. Green (cf. also Rousseau).

48 Fr. 5, p. 33.15–20 Ross = Fr. 5a, p. 29.20–25 Walzer.

49 Pol. VII. 1323b33–36, 1334a22–36. E.E. III. devotes special attention to courage and temperance.

50 Lg. IX. 870.

51 V. 739.

52 VIII. 846 D.

53 III. 690A ff., 693D–E, IV. 712B ff.

54 Epin. 981C–985B, esp. 983D–E.

55 Ibid. 982A–E.

56 This seems to be the implication of 982A–B, taken with the emphatic injunction that man must study astronomy if he would be perfect.

57 Ti. 41D–42D, 90E–92C.

58 Contrast the Phaedo: but the theory of aether is later than that dialogue.

59 Epin. 977B–978B, 979C–D.

60 De An. II. 414b16–19, III. 429a4–8, Met. A. 980a27–981a5. But Bonitz's Index s.v. φρόνιμος gives several passages where that word isused of animals. De An. II. 421a22–3 speaks of man as φρονιμώτατον τῶν ζῴων.

61 The Protrepticus seems to have been written shortly after the Eudemus, which was written in or shortly after 354 (cf. Moraux, P., Les Listes anciennes des Ouvrages d'Aristote (1951), pp. 324–5Google Scholar, with the references there given; Festugière, A. J., La Révélation d'Hermès Trismégiste, vol. ii (1949), P. 168, n. 2).Google Scholar

62 fr. 6, p. 35, ll. 6–8 Ross (fr. 6 Walzer) (from Iambl. Protr., ch. 7). Jaeger, (Aristotle, E.T., p. 65)Google Scholar claims to be the first to attribute this chapter of Iamblichus to the Protrepticus; see, however, Bywater, I., ‘On a Lost Dialogue of Aristotle’ (J. Ph., ii (1869), pp. 55–69).Google Scholar esp. 57–8.

63 I. 1254a24–b24, esp. b4–8.

64 Loc. cit., ll. 11–12 Ross, Cf. E.N. IX. 1168b28–1169a3, X. 1177b31–1178a3.

65 (sc. )

66 (sc. ),

67 Bernays, J., Die Dialoge des Aristoteles (Berlin, 1863), p. 91.Google Scholar For Bernays' view of the dialogues in general, see pp. 45, 127–8.

68 Ibid. pp. 63–9.

69 Diels, H., ‘Über die exoterischen Reden des Aristo teles’ (Sitzungsberichte der preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (1883), pp. 477–94, esp. p. 492)Google Scholar; Aristotle, , Politics, I–V (i.e. I–III, VII, VIII), ed. Susemihl, F. and Hicks, R. D. (1894), pp. 561–5.Google Scholar

70 Jaeger, , Aristotle (E.T.), pp. 246 ff.Google Scholar

71 Heinze, R., Xenokrates (1892), pp. 141–3Google Scholar; Burnet, J., The Ethics of Aristotle (1900)Google Scholar, note ad loc., and pp. 63–4.

72 Met. E. 1028b24; Met. M and N (frequently); De An. I. 404b27, 408b32–409b18.

73 Top. II. 112a37, VI. 141a6, VII. 152a7, a27.

74 Die Dialoge des Aristoteles, pp. 63–9.

75 E.N. I. 1095b32–1096a4 (cf. Protr. fr. 9, p. 38 ad fin.–p. 39, l.1 Ross.

76 E.E. II. 1218b32–34, Pol. VII. 1323a21–7.

77 P. 191, n. 133.

78 D.L. IV. 11–14. The list includes a in two books, and several works on ethics, among them a Περὶ ψυθῶν.

79 Heinze, , Xenokrates, pp. 123–47.Google Scholar But cf. Jones, R. M., ‘Posidonius andSolar Eschatology’ (Class. Phil., xxvii (1932), pp. 113–35)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hamilton, W., ‘The Myth in Plutarch's De Facie (940F–945D)’ (Class. Quart., xxviii (1934). pp. 24–30).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

80 ( coni. Bernays) Anonymus ap. Olympiodori, In Platonis Phaedonem Commentaria, ed. Norvin, W. (1913), p. 124Google Scholar, ll. 13–20; Xenocrates, fr. 75 Heinze. Cf. Speusippui, fr. 55, ed. Lang, P. (De Speusippi Academici Scriptis, accedunt Fragmenta, 1911).Google Scholar The Plutarch is Plutarch of Athens, a Neoplatonic philosopher of the first half of the fifth century.

81 See above, p. 113 f.