The thought behind this little excursion was to gather together all entries related to Pythagoras and the pythagoreans in all (or at least the available, as the National Library of Scotland has digitized the first five) editions of Encyclopædia Britannica, thinking naively that they must have re-written all entries for each edition with up-to-date information. It would have been neat to follow the development, the growth of knowledge on this admittedly narrow subject, up to the 20th century.
The reality sadly turned out to be different. The first edition didn't even have an entry for Pythagoras, only for pythagoreans. The second edition merely moved most of that entry's text under "Pythagoras" and left the entry on "Pythagoreans" dangling with a single sentence. The third edition greatly improved the entry on Pythagoras but left the pythagoreans once again dangling.
And that's it. Reading up on it's history, due to Colin Macfarquhar's abrupt death, the project started languishing. The fourth edition was published by a new editor, who added a few hundred pages of biographies but left the entry on Pythagoras unmodified from the third edition, merely breaking the 800-page volumes into two-parters and getting rid of the magnificiently lengthy titles, which I naively imagined would only grow longer. The fifth edition is merely a reprint (see the entry on Pythagoras).
This discovery saddens me because I now realize that my reading the third edition is no accident. I didn't merely stumble upon a version of scans that appeal with their photorobot quality. I was somehow algorythmically directed to the pinnacle of Encyclopædia Britannica, its 3rd edition. So, this post is much shorter than I imagined it would be. My world has just shrunk a bit but I'll stiffen my upper lip and carry on.
Encyclopædia Britannica; or, a Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, Compiled upon a new plan, in which The different Sciences and Arts are digested into distinct Treatises or Systems; and The various Technical Terms, &c, are explained as they occur in the order of the Alphabet. Illustrated with one hundred and sixty coppelplates. By a Society of Gentlemen in Scotland. In three volumes. Edinburgh: A. Bell & C. Macfarquhar.
PYTHAGOREANS, a sect of ancient philosophers, so called from their being the followers of Pythagoras of Samos, who lived in the reign of Tarquin the last king of the Romans, in the year of Rome 220; or, according [|] to Livy, in the reign of Servius Tullius, in the year of the world 3472.
His maxims of morality were admirable; for he was for having the study of philosophy solely tend to elevate man to a resemblance of the Deity. He believed that God is a soul diffused through all nature, and that from him human souls are derived; that they are immortal; and that men need only take pains to purge themselves of their vices, in order to be united to the Deity. He made unity the principle of all things; and believed, that between God and man there are various orders of spiritual beings, who are the ministers of the Supreme Being. He conedmned all images of the Deity, and would have him worshipped with as few ceremonies as possible. His disciples brought all their goods into a common stock, contemned the pleasures of sense, abstained from swearing, eat nothing that had life, and believed in the doctrine of a metempsychosis. See METEMPSYCHOSIS.
Pythagoras made his scholars undergo a severe noviciate of silence for at least two years; and it is said, that where he discerned too great an itch for talking, he extended it to fiv. His disciples were therefore divided into two classes: of which the first were simple hearers; and the last such as were allowed to propose their difficulties, and learn the reason of all that was tought there. The Pythagoreans, it is said, on their rising from bed, roused the mind with the sound of the lyre, in order to make them more fit for the actions of the day; and at night resumed the lyre, in order to prepare themselves for sleep, by calming all their tumultuous thoughts. The figurative manner in which he gave his instructions, was borrowed from the Hebrews, Egyptians, and other orientals. Some thing he derived his philosophy from the books of Moses, and that he conversed with Ezekiel and Daniel at Babylon; but this is mere conjecture.
Some authors say, that he left nothing in writing; but Laërtius and others attribute several treatises to him. His golden verses, attributed by some to one of his disciples, are allowed to be an exact copy of the sentiments of that divine philosopher, from whose school proceeded the greatest philosophers and legislators. (EB, 1st ed. vol. 3, 1771: 519-520)
METEMPSYCHOSIS, the doctrine of transmigration, which supposes that human souls, upon leaving the body, become the souls of such kind of brutes as they most resemble in their manners.
This was the doctrine of Pythagoras and his followers; who, held that the souls of vicious men were imprisoned in the bodies of miserable beasts, there to do penance for several ages, at the expiration whereof they returned again to animate men; but if they had lived virtuously, some happier brute, or even a human creature, was to be their lot. What led Pythagoras to this opinion was the persuasion he had that the soul was not of a perishable nature; whence he concluded, that it must move into some other body upon its abandoning this. Lucan thinks this doctrine was contrived to mitigate the apprehension of death, by persuading men that they only changed their lodgings, and ceased to live only to begin a new life. (EB, 1st ed. vol. 3, 1771: 503)
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PYTHAGORAS, a most celebrated philosopher of Samos, was born about 590 years before Christ, and flourished in the time of Tarquin the last king of Rome. He travelled for knowledge to Egypt, Babylon, and various parts of Greece; but settled at Croton in Italy, where he opened a school that was frequented from all parts. After the manner of the Egyptians, he inculcated his doctrines by symbols. He forbad the eating of flesh, taught the transmigration of souls, made considerable discoveries in arts and sciences, and delivered a great variety of precepts for civil and political conduct. His maxims of morality were admirable; for he was for having the study of philosophy solely tend to elevate man to a resemblance of the Deity. He believed that God is a soul diffused through all nature, and that from him human souls are derived; that they are immortal, and that men need only take pains to purge themselves of their vices, in order to be united to the Deity. He made unity the principle of all things; and believed, that between God and man there are various orders of spiritual beings, who are the ministers of the Supreme Being. He condemned all images of the Deity, and would have him worshipped with as few ceremonies as possible. His disciples brought all their goods into a common stock, contemned the pleasures of sense, abstaining from swearing, eat nothing that had life, and believed in the doctrine of a metempsychosis. See the article METEMPSYCHOSIS.
Pythagoras made his scholars undergo a severe noviciate of silence for at least two years; and it is said, that, where he discerned too great an itch for talking, he extended it to five: his disciples were therefore divided into two classes, of which the first were simple hearers, and the last such as were allowed to propose their difficulties, and learn the reason of all that was taught there. The Pythagoreans, it is said, on their rising from bed, roused the mind with the sound of the lyre, in order to make them more fit for the actions of the day; and at night resumed the lyre, in order to prepare themselves for sleep, by calming all their tumultuous thoughts. The figurative manner in which he gave his instructions, was borrowed from the Hebrews, Egyptians, and other orientals. Some thing he derived his philosophy from the books of Moses, and that he conversed with Ezekiel and Daniel at Babylon: but this is mere conjecture.
The circumstances of his death are variously related. Some say that he was burnt at Milo's house at Crotona, together with his disciples. Others say that he escaped from the flames; and, being pursued out of the city, stopped in a field of beans, and chose rather to be killed than open his mouth. Dicærchus says, that he fled to the temple of the Muses at Metapontus, where he died of hunger. Others assert that he was killed, with all his disciples, by the Argigentines. Arnobius affirms, that he was burnt alive in a temple, &c. But Justin seems to insinuate, that after his having lived 20 years at Crotona, he died in peace in a very advanced age at Metapontum, to which city he had retired. His memory was held in such veneration, that his house was converted into a temple, and he was honoured as a god.
Some authors say, that he left nothing in writing; but Laërtius and others attribute several treatises to him. His golden verses, attributed by some to one of his disciples, are allowed to be an exact copy of the sentiments of that divine philosopher, from whose school proceeded the greatest philosophers and legislators. (EB, 2nd ed. vol. 9, 1778: 6584)
PYTHAGOREANS, a sect of ancient philosophers, so called from being the followers of Pythagoras. See the preceding article. (EB, 2nd ed. vol. 9, 1778: 6584)
METEMPSYCHOSIS, the doctrine of transmigration, which supposes, that human souls, upon their leaving the body, become the souls of such kind of brutes as they most resemble in their manners.
This was the doctrine of Pythagoras and his followers, who held, that the souls of vicious men were imprisoned in the bodies of miserable beasts, there to do penance for several ages, at the expiration whereof they returned again to animate men; but if they had lived virtuously, some happier brute, or even a human creature, was to be their lot. What led Pythagoras into this opinion was the persuasion he had that the soul was not of a perishable nature; whence he concluded, that it must move into some other body upon its abandoning this. Lucan thinks this doctrine was contrived to mitigate the apprehension of death, by persuading men that they only changed their lodgings, and ceased to live only to begin a new life. Reuchlin denies this doctrine, and maintains, that the metempsychosis of Pythagoras implied nothing more than a similitude of manners and desires formerly existing in some person deceased, and now reviving in another alive. Pythagoras is said to have borrowed the notion of a metempsychosis from the Egyptians; others say from the ancient brachmans. It is still retained among the ancient Banians, and other idolaters of India and China, and makes the principal foundation of their religion. Many of the modern Jews ares aid to espouse this doctrine; and, to support their opinion, quote these words of Job, "Lo all these things worketh God oftentimes with man (in Hebrew, and thrice) to bring back his soul from the pit to be enlightened with the light of the living." It is certain, that at the time of Jesus Christ this opinion was very common among the Jews: this appears in the gospel, when they say, that some thought Jesus to be John the Baptist, others Elias, others Jeremiah, &c. (EB, 2nd ed. vol. 7, 1778: 4964)
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[|721|] PYTHAGORAS, a celebrated philosopher of antiquity, respecting the time and place of whose birth the learned are much divided. Erastothenes asserts, that in the 48th Olympiad, when he was very young, he was a victor at the Olympic games. Hence Dr Bentley determines the date of his birth to be the 4th year of the 43d Olympiad; whilst Lloyd, who denies that the Olympic victor was the same person with the philosopher, places it about the 3d year of the 48th Olympiad. Mr Dodwell differs from both, and wishes to fix the birth of Pythagoras in the 4th year of the 52d Olympiad. Of the arguments of these learned writers, Le Clerc has given a summary in the Bibliotheque Choisée, tom.x. p. 81. &c. and from a review of the whole, it would appear that he was not born earlier than the 4th year of the 43d Olympiad, nor later than the 4th year of the 52d; but in what particular year of that period his birth took place, cannot with any degree of certainty be ascertained. It is generally believed that he was born in the island of Samos, and that he flourished about 500 years before Christ, in the time of Tarquin the last king of rome. His father Mnesarchus, who is thought by some to have been a lapidary, and by others a merchant of Tyre, appears to have been a man of some distinction, and to have bestowed upon his son the best education.
Jamblichus relates a number of wonderful stories respecting Pythagoras's descent from Jupiter, his birth, and early life; and represents him even in his youth as a prodigy of wisdom and manly seriousness. But most of these idle tales confute themselves, afford nothing of importance to be depended upon, and only prove the credulity, carelessness, and prejudice of their author. Of his childhood and early education we know nothing, except that he was first instructed in his own country by Creophilus, and afterwards in Scyrus by Pherecides (see PHERECYDES). According to the custom of the times he was made acquainted with poetry and music; eloquence and astronomy became his private studies, and in gymnastic exercises he often bore the palm for strength and dexterity. He first distinguished himself in Greece and the Olympic games, where, beside gaining the prize, he is said to have excited the highest admiration by the elegance and dignity of his person, and the brilliancy of his understanding.
Soon after his appearance at these games Pythagoras commenced his travels in quest of knowledge. He first visited Egypt, where, through the interest of Polycrates tyrant of Samos, he obtained the patronage of Amasis king of Egypt, by whose influence, combined with his own assiduity, patience, and perseverance, he at length gained the confidence of the priests; from whom he learned their sacred mysteries, theology, and the whole system of symbolical learning. In Egypt, too, he became acquainted with geometry and the true solar system; and, before he left that country, made himself master of all the learning for which it was so famed among the nations of antiquity.
He afterwards visited Persia and Chaldea, where from the Magi he learnt divination, the interpreting of dreams, and astronomy. He is likewises aid to have travelled into India, to have conversed with the Gymnosophists, and to have acquired from them a knowledge of the philosophy and literature of the east; and such was his ardour in the pursuit of science, that in quest of it, we are told by Cicero, he crossed many seas, and travelled on foot through many barbarous nations.
After Pythagoras had spent many years in gathering information on every subject, especially respecting the nature of the gods, the rites of religion, and the immortality of the human soul, he returned to his native island, and attempted to make his knowledge useful by instituting a school for the instruction of his countrymen. Failing of success in this laudable undertaking, he [|722|] repaired to Delos, where he pretended to receive moral dogmas from the priestess of Apollo. He also visited Crete, where he was initiated into the most sacred mysteries of Greece. He went likewise to Sparta and Elis, and again assisted at the Olympic games; where in the public assumbly he was saluted with the title of sophist or wise man, which he declined for one more humble. See PHILOLOGY, N° 1. and PHILOSOPHY n° 1.
He returned to Samos enriched with mythological learning and mysterious rites, and again instituted a school. His mysterious symbols and oracular precepts made this attempt more successful than the former had been; but meeting with some opposition, or being detected in some pious frauds, he suddenly left Samos, retired to Magna Grecia, and settled at Crotona.
Here he founded the italic sect (see PHILOSOPHY n° 20.); and his mental and personal accomplishments, the fame of his distant travels, and his Olympic crown, soon procured him numerous pupils. His bold and manly eloquence and graceful delivery attracted the most dissolute, and produced a remarkable change in the morals of the people at Crotona. His influence was increased by the regularity of his own example, and its conformity to his precepts. He punctually attended the temples of the gods, and paid his devotions at an early hour; he lived upon the purest and most innocent food, clothed himself like the priests of Egypt, and by his continual purifications and regular offerings appeared to be superior in sanctity to the rest of mankind. He endeavoured to assuage the passions of his scholars with verses and numbers, and made a practice of composing his own mind every morning, by playing on his harp, and singing along with it the pæans of Thales. To avoid the temptations of ease and the seductions of idleness, bodily exercises also made a considerable part of his discipline.
At Crotona he had a public school for the general benefit of the people, in which the haught them their duty, praising virtue and condemning vice; and particularly instructing them in the duties of social life. Beside this, he had a college in his own house, which he denominated κοινοβιον in which there were two classes of students, viz. εξωερικοι, who were also called auscultantes and εσωτερικοι. The former of these were probationers, and were kept under a long examen. A silence of five years was imposed upon them; which Apuleius thinks was intended to teach them modesty and attention; but Clemens Alexandrinus thinks it was for the purpose of abstracting their minds from sensible objects, and inuring them to the pure contemplation of the Deity. The latter class of scholars were called genuini, perfecti, mathematici, and, by way of eminence, Pythagoreans. They alone were admitted to the knowledge of the arcana and depths of Pythagoric discipline, and were taught the use of ciphers and hieroglyptic writings.
Clemens observes, that these orders corresponded very exactly to those among the Hebrews: for in the schools of the prophets there were two classes, viz. the sons of the prophets, who were the scholars, and the doctors or masters, who were also called perfecti; and among the Levites, the novices or tyros, who had thir quinquennial exercises, by way of preparation. Lastly, even among the proselytes there were two orders; exoterici, or proselytes of the gate; and intrinseci or perficti, proselytes of the covenant. He adds, it is highly probable, that Pythagoras himself had been a proselyte of the gate, if not of the covenant. Gale endeavours to prove that Pythagoras borrowed his philosophy from that of the Jews; to this end producing the authorities of many of the fathers and ancient authors, and even pointing out the tracks and footsteps of Moses in several parts of Pythagoras's doctrine. But we believe the learned author was misled by the Christian Platonists.
The authority of Pythagoras among his pupils was so great, that it was even deemed a crime to dispute his word; and their arguments were considered as infallibly convincing, if they could enforce them by adding, that "the master said so;" an expression which afterwards became proverbial in jurare in verba magistri. This influence over his school was soon extended to the world, and even his pupils themselves divided the applause and approbation of the people with their master; and the rules and legislators of all the principal towns of Greece, Sicily, and Italy, boasted of being the disciples of Pythagoras. To give more weight to his exhortations, as some writers mention, Pythagoras retired into a subterraneous cave, where his mother sent him intelligence of every thing which happened during his absence. After a certain number of months he again re-appeared on the earth with a grim and ghastly countenance, and declared in the assembly of the people that he was returned from hell. From similar exaggerations it has been asserted that he appeared at the Olympic games with a golden thigh, and that he could write in letters of blood whatever he pleased on a looking-glass; and that by setting it opposite to the moon, when full, all the characters which were on the glass, became legible on the moon's disc. They also relate, that by some magical words he tamed a bear, stopped the flight of an eagle, and appeared on the same day and at the same instant in the cities of Crotona and Metapontum, &c.
At length his singular doctrines, and perhaps his strenuously asserting the rights of the people against their tyrannical governors, excited a spirit of jealousy, and raised a powerful party against him; which soon became so outrageous as to oblige him to fly for his life. His friends fled to Rhegium; and he himself, after being refused protection by the Locrians, fled to Metapontum, where he was obliged to take refuge in the temple of the muses, and where it is said he died of hunger about 497 years before Christ. Respecting the time, place, and manner of his death, however, there are various opinions, and many think it uncertain when, where, or in what manner, he ended his days. After his death his followers paid the same respect to him as was paid to the immortal gods; they erected statues in honour of him, converted his house at Crotona into a temple of Ceres, appealed to him as a deity, and swore by his name.
Pythagoras married Theano of Crotona, or, according to others, of Crete, by whom he had two sons, Telauges and Mnesarchus, who, after his death, took care of his school. He is said to have had a daughter called Damo.
Whether he left any writings behind him is disputed. It seems possible, however, that he left none, and that [|723|] such as went under his name were written by some of his followers. The golden verses which Hierocles illustrated with a commentary, have been ascribed to Epicharmus or Empedocles, and contain a brief summary of his popular doctrines. From this circumstance, and from the mysterious secrecy with which he taught, our information concerning his doctrine and philosophy is very uncertain, and cannot always be depended on.
The purpose of philosophy, according to the system of Pythagoras, is to free the mind from incumbrances, and to raise it to the contemplation of immutable truth and the knowledge of divine and spiritual objects. To bring the mind to this state of perfection is a work of some difficulty, and requires a variety of intermediate steps. Mathematical science was with him the first step to wisdom, because it inures the mind to contemplation, and takes a middle course between corporeal and incorporeal beings. The whole science he divided into two parts, numbers and magnitude; and each of these he subdivided into two others, the former into arithmetic and music, and the latter into magnitude at rest and in motion the former of which comprehends geometry, and the latter astronomy. Arithmetic he considered as the noblest science, and an acquaintance with numbers as the highest good. He considered numbers as the principles of every thing; and divided them into scientific and intelligible. Scientific number is the production of the powers involved in unity, and its return to the same; number is not infinite, but is the source of that infinite divisibility into equal parts which is the property of all bodies. Intelligible numbers are those which existed in the divine mind before all things. They are the model or archetype of the world, and the cause of the essence of beings. Of the Monad, Duad, Triad, Tetrad, and Decad, various explanations have been given by various authors; but nothing certain or important is known of them. In all probability, numbers were used by Pythagoras as symbolical representations of the first principles and forms of nature, and especially of those eternal and immutable essences which Plato denominated ideas; and in this case the Monad was thesimple root from which he conceived numbers to proceed, and as such, analogous to the simple essence of deity; from whence, according to his system, the various properties of nature proceed.
Music followed numbers, and was useful in raising the mind above the dominion of the passions. Pythagoras considered it as a science to be reduced to mathematical principles and proportions, and is said to have discovered the musical chords from the circumstance of several men successively striking with hammers a piece of heated iron upon an anvil. This story Dr Burney discredits; but allows, from the uniform testimony of writers ancient and modern, that he invented the harmonical canon or monochord, (see MONOCHORD.) The music of the spheres, of which every one has heard, was a most fanciful doctrine of Pythagoras. It was produced, he imagined, by the planets striking on the ether through which in their motion they passed; and he considered their musical proportions as exact, and their harmony perfect.
Pythagoras, as we have already seen, learned geometry in Egypt; but by investigating many new theorems, and by digesting its principles, he reduced it to a more regular science. A geometrical point, which he defines to be a monad, or unity with position, he says corresponds to unity in artithmetic, a line to two, a superficies to three, and a solid to four. He discovered several of the propositions of Euclid; and on discovering the 47th of book 1st, he is said to have offered a hecatomb to the gods; but as he was averse to animal sacrifices, this assertion is surely false. His great progress in astronomical science has been mentioned elsewhere. See ASTRONOMY, n° 11, 22; and PHILOSOPHY, n° 15, 16.
Wisdom, according to Pythagoras, is conversant with those objects which are naturally immutable, eternal, and incorruptible; and its end is to assimilate the human mind to the divine, ad to qualify us to join the assembly of the gods. Active and moral philosophy prescribes rules and precepts for the conduct of life, and leads us to thepractice of public and private virtue. - On these heads many of his precepts were excellent, and some of them were whimsical and useless. Theoretical philosophy treats of nature and its origin, and is, according to Pythagoras, the highest object of study. It included all the profound mysteries which he taught, of which but little is now known. God he considers as the universal mind, diffused through all things, and the self-moving principle of all things (αυτοματισμος τῶν παντῶν), and of whom every human soul is a portion. It is very probable, that he conceived of the Deity as a subtle fire, eternal, active, and intelligent; which is not inconsistent with the idea of incorporeality, as the ancients understood that term. This Deity was primarily combined with the chaotic mass of passive matter, but he had the power of separating himself, and since the separation he has remained distinct. The learned Cudworth contends, that Pythagoras maintained a trinity of hypostases in the divine nature, similar to the Platonic triad (see PLATONISM). We cannot say that his arguments appear to have much force; but we think the conclusion which he wishes to establish extremely probable, as Plato certainly drew his doctrine from some of the countries which Pythagoras had visited before him.
Subordinate to the Deity there were the Pythagorean creed three orders of intelligence, gods, demons, and heroes, of different degrees of excellence and dignity. These, together with the human soul, were considered as emanations from the Deity, the particles of subtle ether assuming a grosser clothing the farther they receded from the fountain. Hierocles defines a hero te be a rational mind united with a luminous body. God himself was represented under the notion of monad, and the subordinate intelligences as numbers derived from and included in unity. Man is considered as consisting of an elementary nature and a divine or rational soul. His soul, a self-moving principle, is composed of two parts; the rational, seated in the brain; and the irrational, including the passions, in the heart. In both these respects he participated with the brutes, whom the temperament of their body, &c. allows not to act rationally. The sensitive soul perishes; the other assumes an ethereal vehicle, and passes to the regions of the dead, till sent back to the earth to inhabit some other body, brutal or human. See METEMPSYCHOSIS. It was unquestionably this notion which led Pythagoras and his followers to deny themselves the use of flesh, and to be so peculiarly merciful to animals of every description. Some authors, however, say, that flesh and beans, the use of which he also forbad, were prohibited, [|724|] because he supposed them to have been produced from the same putrified matter, from which, at the creation of the world, man was formed.
Of the symbols of Pythagoras little is known. They have been religiously concealed; and though they have awakened much curiosity, and occasioned many ingenious conjectures, they still appear to us dark and trifling. As a specimen we give the following: "Adore the sound of the whispering wind. Stil not the fire with a sword. Turn aside from an edged tool. Pass not over a balance. Setting out on a journey, turn not back, for the furies will return with you. Breed nothing that hath crooked talons. Receive not a swallow into your house. Look not in a mirror by the light of a candle. At a secrifice pair not your nails. Eat not the heart or brain. Taste not that which hath fallen from the table. Break not bread. Sleep not at noon. When it thunders touch the earth. Pluck not a crown. Roast not that which has been boiled. Pluck not a crown. Roast not that which has been boiled. Sail not on the ground. Plant not a palm. Breed a cock, but do not sacrifice it, for it is sacred to thes un and moon. Plant mallows in thy garden, but eat them not. Abstain from beans."
The following precepts are more important: "Discourse not of Pythagorean doctrines without light. Above all things govern your tongue. Engrave not the image of God in a ring. Quit not your station without the command of your general. Remember that the paths of virtue and of vice resemble the letter Y. To this symbol Persius refers, when he says,
Et tibi quæ Samios diduxit litera ramos,
Surgentem dextro monstravit limite collem.
There has the Samian Y's instructive make
Pointed the road thy doubtful foot should take;
There warn'd thy raw and yet unpractis'd youth,
To tread the rising right-hand path of truth.
The scantiness and uncertainty of our information respecting Pythagoras, renders a regular and complete account of his life and doctrines impossible. A modern author of profound erudition, pronounces him to have been unquestionably the wisest man that ever lived, if his masters the Egyptian priests must not be excepted. This is saying a great deal too much; but that he was one of the most distinguished philosophers of antiquity, or, as Cicero expresses it, vir præstanti sapientia, appears very evident; and his moral character has never been impeached. The mysterious air which he threw over his doctrines, nad the apparent inanity of some of his symbols, have indeed subjected him to the charge of imposture, and perhaps the charge is not wholly groundless: but when we consider the age in which he lived, and the nature of the people with whom he had to deal, who would in all probabilty have resisted more open innovations, even this will not appear so blameable as at first sight we are apt to think it; and it is worthy of notice, that the worst stories of this kind have come down to us in a very questionable shape, and with much probability appear to be false. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 15, 1797: 721-724)
PYTHAGOREANS, a sect of ancient philosophers, so called from being the followers of Pythagoras. See the preceding article. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 15, 1797: 724)
PHERECYDES, a native of Scyros, flourished about the year 560 before the Christian era, and was disciple of Pittacus, one of the seven wise men of Greece (see PITTACUS). He is said to have been the first, it is said, who held the ridiculous opinion, "that animals are mere machines." He was Pythagoras's master, who loved him as his own father. This grateful scholar having heard that Pherecydes lay dangerously ill in the island of Delos, immediately repaired thither, in order to give every necessary assistance to the old man, and to take care that no means should be left untried for the recovery of his health. His great age, however, and the violence of his disease, having rendered every prescription ineffectual, his next care was to see him decently buried; and when he had paid the last duty to his remains, and erected a monument to his memory, he set out again for Italy. Other causes have been assigned for the death of Pherecydes: some say he was eaten up by lice, and others that he fell headlong from the top of Mount Corycius in his way to Delphos. He lived to the age of 85 years, and was one of the first prose writers among the Greeks.
"Marvellous circumstances have been related of him, which only deserve to be mentioned, in order to show that what has been deemed supernatural by ignorant spectators may be easily conceived to have happened from natural causes. A ship in full sail was at a distance approaching its harbour; Pherecydes predicted that it would never come into the haven, and it happened accordingly; for a storm arose which sunk the vessel. After drinking water from a well, he predicted an earthquake, which happened three days afterwards. It is easy to suppose that these predictions might have been the result of a careful observation of those phenomena which commonly precede storms or earthquakes in a climate where they frequently happen.
"It is difficult to give in any degree an accurate account of the doctrines of Pherecydes; both because he delivered them, after the manner of the times, under the concealment of symbols; and because very few memoirs of this philosopher remain. It is most probable that he taught those opinions concerning the gods and the origin of the world which the ancient Grecian theogonists borrowed from Egypt;" and of which the reader will find accounts in different articles [|] of this work. See EGYPT, METAPHYSICS, MYSTORIES, MYTHOLOGY, and POLYTHEISM. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 14, 1797: 465-457)
PHILOLOGY is compounded of the two Greek words φιλος and λογος, and imports "the desire of investigating the properties and affections of words." The sages of Greece were, in the most ancient times, denominated Σοφοι, that is, wise men. Pythagoras renounced this pompous appellation, and assumed the more humble title of φιλοσοφος, that is, a lover of wise men; and in process of time, in imitation of this epiteth, the word philologer was adopted, to import "a man deeply versed in languages, etymology, antiquities, &c." Hence the term philology, which denotes the science that we propose briefly to discuss in the following article. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 14, 1797: 485)
PHILOSOPHY is a word derived from the Greek, and literally signifies the love of wisdom. In its usual acceptation, however, it denotes a science, or collection of sciences, of which the universe is the object; and of the term thus employed many definitions have been given, differing from one another according to the different views of their several authors. By Pythagoras, philosophy is defined επιστημη των οντων, "the knowledge of things existing;" by Cicero, after Plato, scientia rerum divinarum et humanarum cum CAUSIS; and by the illustrious Bacon, interpretatio naturæ. Whether any of these definitions be sufficiently precise, and at the same time sufficiently comprehensive, may be questioned; but if philosophy in its utmost extent be capable of being adequately defined, it is not here that the definition should be given. "Explanation (says an acute water), is the first office of a teacher; definition, if it be good, is the last of the inquirer after truth; but explanation is one thing, and definition quite another." It may be proper, hawever, to observe, that the definition given by Cicero is better than that of Pythagoras, because the chief object of the philosopher is to ascertain the causes of things; and in this consists the difference between his studies and those of the natural historian, who merely enumerates phenomena, and arranges them into separate classes. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 14, 1797: 573)
Of the ITALIC SCHOOL were, 1. The Italic sect proper: it was founded by Pythagoras, a disciple of Pherecydes. The followers of Pythagoras were Aristæus, Mnesarchus, Alcmæon, Ecphantus, Hippo, Empedocles, Epicharmus, Ocellus, Timæus, Archytas, Hippasus, Philolaus, and Eudoxus. 2. The Eleatic sect, of which Xenophanes was the author: his successors, Parmenides, Melissus, Zeno, belonged to the metaphysical class of this sect; Leucippus, Democritus, Protagoras, Diagoras, and Anaxarchus, to the physical. 3. The Heraclitean sect, which was founded by Heraclitus, and soon afterwards expired: Zeno and Hippocrates philosophised after the manner of Heraclitus, and other philosophers borrowed freely from his system. 4. The Epicurean sect, a branch of the Eleatic, had Epicurus for its author; among whose followers were Metrodorus, Polyænus, Hermachus, Polystratus, Basilides, and Protarchus. 5. The Pyrrhonic or Sceptic sect, the parent of which was Pyrrho: his doctrine was taught by Timon the Philisian; and after some interval was continued by Ptolemy a Cyrenean, and at Alexandria by Ænesidemus. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 14, 1797: 580)
But though it is thus evident that the rudiments of almost every useful science were known in Egypt from the remotest antiquity, it does not appear that any of them was carried to a great degree of perfection, unless perhaps chemistry alone must be excepted. One would think that no science could have been more indispensably requisite to them than geometry. And yet though Pythagoras is said to have spent 22 years in Egypt studying that science and astronomy, he himself discovered the famous 47th Prop. of Euclid's first book after his return to Samos. This, though a very useful, is yet a simple theorem; and since it was not reached by the Egyptian geometry, we cannot suppose that those people had then advanced far in such speculations. The same conclusion must be drawn with respect to astronomy; for Thales is said to have been the first that calculated an eclipse of the sun; and we nowhere read that the Egyptians pretended to dispute that honour with him. To this it may be replied, that Pythagoras was in Egypt undoubtedly taught the true constitution of the solar system, and what is more extraordinary, the doctrine of comets in particular, and of their revolutions, like the other planets, round the sun. We grant that he was taught all this; but it was not scientifically, but dogmatically, as facts which the priests had received by tradition from their early ancestors, and of which they had never questioned the truth nor enquired into the reasons. Of this we need no better proof than that the Pythagorean system of the sun was totally neglected by the Greeks as soon as they began to frame hypotheses and to speculate in philosophy.
But it may seem strange, and certainly is so, that the Egyptian priests, in the days of Pythagoras, should have preserved so great a discovery of their ancestors, and at the same time have totally forgotten the principles and reasoning which led to a conclusion apparently contrary to the evidence of sense. This is a difficulty which we pretend not to remove, though the fact which involves it seems to be beyond the reach of controversy. Perhaps the following observations may throw upon it a feeble light. According to Manetho, the written monuments of the first Thoth were lost of neglected in certain civil revolutions or natural calamities which befel the kingdom of Egypt. After many ages great part of them were recovered by an ingenious interpretation of the symbols whcih he had inscribed upon ancient columns; and the man who made this interpretation was called the second Thoth or Hermes Trismegistus. But thrice illustrious as this personage was, it is at least possible that he may have been much inferior to the former Hermes, and have read his writings and transcribed his conclusions without being able to comprehend the principles or reasoning which led to those conclusions. Any man who understands Latin might translate into his own tongue the conclusions of Newton; but much more would be requisite to make him comprehend the demonstrations of his sublime geometry. By what mode of reasoning the first Hermes was led to the true idea of the solar system, or whether it was by reasoning at all, cannot now be known; but it seems very evident, that when the intercourse between the Egyptian and Greeks first commenced, the wisdom of the former people consisted chiefly in the science of legislation and civil policy, and that the philosopher, [|] the divine, the legislator, and the poet, were all united in the same person. Their cosmology (for all the ancients who pretended to science framed cosmogonies) differed little from that of the Phœnicians already mentioned. They held that the world was produced from chaos by the energy of an intelligent principle; and they likewise conceived that there is in nature a continual tendency towards dissolution. In Plato's Timæus, an Egyptian priest is introduced describing the destruction of the world, and asserting that it will be effected by means of water and fire. They conceive that the universe undergoes a periodical conflagration; after which all things are restored to their original form, to pass again through a similar succession of changes. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 14, 1797: 578-579)
METEMPSYCHOSIS, (formed of μετα "beyond," and εμφυχω "I animate or enliven"), in the ancient philosophy, the passage or transmigration of the soul of a man, after death, into the body of some other animal.
Pythagoras and his followers held, that after death mens souls passed into other bodies, of this or that kind, according to the manner of life they had led. If they had been vicious, they were imprisoned in the bodies of miserable beasts, there to do penance for several ages; at the expiration whereof, they returned afresh to animate men. But, if they lived virtuously, some happier brute, or even a human creature, was to be their lot.
What led Pythagoras into this opinion was, the persuasion he had that the soul was not of a perishable nature: whence he concluded that it must remove into some other body upon its abandoning this. Lucan treats this doctrine as a kind of officious lie, contrived to mitigate the apprehension of death, by persuading men that they only changed their lodging, and only ceased to live to begin a new life.
Reuchlin denies this doctrine; and maintains that the metempsychosis of Pythagoras implied nothing more than a similitude of manner, desires, and studies, formerly existing in some person deceased, and now revived in another alive. Thus when it was said that Euphorbus was revived in Pythagoras, no more was meant than that the martial virtue which had shone in Euphorbus at the time of the Trojan war, was now, in some measure, revived in Pythagoras, by reason of the great respect he bore the athletæ. For those people wondering how a philosopher should be so much taken with men of the sword, he palliated the matter, by saying, that the soul of Euphorbus, i.e. his genius, disposition, and inclinations, were revived in him. And this gave occasion to the report, that Euphorbus's soul, who perished in the Trojan war, had transmigrated into Pythagoras.
Ficinus asserts, that what Plato speaks of the migration of a human soul into a brute, is intended allegorically, and is to be understood only of the manners, affections, and habits, degenerated into a beastly nature by vice. Serranus, though he allows some force to this interpretation, yet inclines rather to understand the metempsychosis of a resurrection.
Pythagoras is said to have borrowed the notion of a metempsychosis from the Egyptians; others say, from the ancient Brachmans. It is still retained among the Banians and other idolaters of India and China; and makes the principal foundation of their religion. So extremely are they bigotted to it, that they do not only [|] forbear eating any thing that has life, but many of them even refuse to defend themselves from wild beasts. They burn no wood, lest some little animalcule should be in it; and are so very charitable, that they will redeem from the hands of strangers any animals that they find ready to be killed. See PYTHAGOREANS. (EB, 3rd ed. vol. 11, 1797: 613-614)
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