A History of Philosophy in EpitomeSchwegler, Albert
Philosophy
A History of Philosophy in Epitome
Schwegler, Albert
Philosophy -- History
3. THE TWO POWERS.—Whence now can arise any becoming, if in matter
itself there is found no principle to account for the change? Since
Empedocles did not, like the Eleatics, deny that there was change, nor
yet, like Heraclitus, introduce it in his matter, as an indwelling
principle, so there was no other course left him but to place, by the
side of his matter, a moving power. The opposition of the one and the
many which had been set up by his predecessors, and which demanded an
explanation, led him to ascribe to this moving power, two originally
diverse directions, viz.: repulsion and attraction. The separation of
the one into the many, and the union again of the many into the one, had
indicated an opposition of powers which Heraclitus had already
recognized. While now Parmenides starting from the one had made love as
his principle, and Heraclitus starting from the many had made strife as
his, Empedocles combines the two as the principle of his philosophy. The
difficulty is, he has not sufficiently limited in respect to one
another, the sphere of operation of these two directions of his power.
Although, to friendship belonged peculiarly the attractive, and to
strife the repelling function, yet does Empedocles, on the other hand,
suffer his strife to have in the formation of the world a unifying, and
his friendship a dividing effect. In fact, the complete separation of a
dividing and unifying power in the movement of the becoming, is an
unmaintainable abstraction.
4. RELATION OF THE EMPEDOCLEAN TO THE ELEATIC AND HERACLITIC
PHILOSOPHY.—Empedocles, by placing, as the principle of the becoming, a
moving power by the side of his matter, makes his philosophy a mediation
of the Eleatic and Heraclitic principles, or more properly a placing of
them side by side. He has interwoven these two principles in equal
proportions in his system. With the Eleatics he denied all arising and
departing, _i. e._ the transition of being into not-being and of
not-being into being, and with Heraclitus he shared the interest to find
an explanation for change. From the former he derived the abiding,
unchangeable being of his fundamental matter, and from the latter the
principle of the moving power. With the Eleatics, in fine, he considered
the true being in an original and indistinguishable unity as a sphere,
and with Heraclitus, he regarded the present world as a constant product
of striving powers and oppositions. He has, therefore, been properly
called an Eclectic, who has united the fundamental thoughts of his two
predecessors, though not always in a logical way.
SECTION IX.
THE ATOMISTIC PHILOSOPHY.
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