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1. Introduction
The section of Sextus, Adversus mathematicos, vii, devoted to the
history of theories on the criterion
present paper, owe much to a seminar held in Cambridge in 1985, with Myles
Burnyeat and others. I am also grateful to Margaret Atkins, Jonathan Barnes, Myles
Burnyeat, Ian Kidd, John Procopé, and Harold Tarrant for their helpful written
comments on an earlier draft.
46-7: views on the criterion: 1, there is no criterion; 2 (a), the criterion
is in logos·, (b) the criterion is in enargeia; (c) the criterion is in logos
and enargeia.
(1) Those who say there is no criterion
Thus, in the event, 2 (b) and 2 (c) are conflated, and we end up
with three principal divisions. It is instructive to note that the
philosophers conventionally known to us as “atomists” are distributed
between these three divisions: Metrodorus of Chios and Anaxarchus fall
into the no-criterion group, Democritus into the logos-only group, and
Epicurus into the enargeia group. This serves as a reminder, if one were
needed, that atomism is to some extent a doxographical fiction, in-
deed one to which modern doxographers are more wedded than their
ancient counterparts. Although the names of Democritus and Epicurus
are often linked in the ancient sources with regard to their basic physical
tenets — “atomism” in the strict sense — they are equally often con-
trasted with regard to their theories of knowledge and numerous other
doctrines. Sextus himself is no exception to this patternPH iii 32, Μ ix 363, x 45, 181, 318. Juxtaposed: PH ii 23-5, Μ vii
265-7, 321, viii 139, ix 24-5, 42-3. Contrasted: M vii 369, viii 6-9, 62-3, 184-5,
355. For discussions of Sextus’ treatment of atomism, see especially F. DeclevaCaizzi, Democrito e Sesto Empirico, in Democrito e l'atomismo antico, Atti del
Convegno internazionale, Catania, 18-21 apr. 1979, a c. di F. Romano, Catania
pp. 393-410 and M. Gigante, Scetticismo e epicureismo (“Elenchos” iv), Napoli
esp. pp. 109 ff. Among earlier treatments, P. Natorp, Forschungen zur Ge-schichte des Erkenntnisproblems im Altertum, Berlin 1884, pp. 256-85 is outstanding.
respects his treatment of the two principal atomist philosophers is rather
conventional. There is little evident consciousness of the special relation-
ship that you might expect a Pyrrhonist to feel with either the one school
or the other — either with Democritus as a forerunner of Pyrrho’s scepti-
cism, much revered by Pyrrho himself, or with Epicurus as an admirer
of Pyrrho’s ethical outlook, who even shared the Pyrrhonist official moral
goal of ataraxia, tranquillity.
With regard to Democriteanism, the furthest Sextus goes is at Out-lines of Pyrrhonism, i 213-4, where it appears among the philosophies he
deems close enough to Pyrrhonism for the difference to need under-
lining. And he maintains, sensibly enough, that although the ou mallondictum is superficially common ground between the two movements, the
Democriteans (a) use it in order to deny the reality of sensible properties,
and (b) positively assert the existence of atoms and void, while the
Pyrrhonists retain an open mind on the existence of both. As for
Epicureanism, he alludes to its kinship with Pyrrhonism only once, at
the opening of Adversus grammaticos. There Epicurus is described as a
disciple of Pyrrho’s pupil Nausiphanes. But Sextus proceeds to make the
sharpest possible contrast between the Epicureans and Pyrrhonists as
regards their grounds for opposition to the mathemataM i 1-6. The attack on Epicurus here stems from Timocrates, his renegade
pupil; see my Epicurus and his professional rivals, in Etudes sur l’épicurisme antique,ed. by J. Bollack, A. Laks (“Cahiers de Philologie” i), Lille 1976, pp. 119-59.
At M i 272, 281-5 the contrast between Epicurus and Pyrrho is less pronounced.
A question which would reward close examination — on some other
occasion — is how far Sextus’ perception of Democritus has been shaped
by the EpicureansDecleva Caizzi, art. cit., p. 402.
absence of the name Leucippus from Sextus’ works. This may reflect
the studied silence about him in Epicurean texts generally, stemming
from Epicurus’ well-known denial of his existenceDiog. Laert. x 13. Cfr. M.X.G., argued to be a Pyrrhonist work by J. Man-sfeld, ‘De Melisso Xenophane Gorgia’: Pyrrhonising Aristotelianism, «Rheinisches Mu-
seum», cxxxi (1988) pp. 239-76, which speaks of the «so-called logoi of Leucippus»
(980 a 8-9).
But by far the most intriguing passage in Sextus bearing on the
atomist tradition is the one I mentioned at the outset: the history of
theories of the criterion at M vii 46-262
G. Striker, Κριτήριον τῆς ἀληθείας, Göttingen 1974; A. A. Long, Sextus Empiricuson the criterion of truth, «Bulletin of the Inst. of Class. Studies of Univ. of London»,xxv (1978) pp. 35-49; J. Brunschwig, Sextus Empiricus on the “Kriterion”: the Skepticas conceptual legatee, in The Question of Eclecticism, ed. by J. M. Dillon, A. A. Long,Berkeley 1988, pp. 145-75.
Epicurus it contains what are arguably the richest treasuries of surviving
data on their attitudes to empirical cognition. Yet when it comes to evalu-
ating those data we may seem to know little of what kind of source we
are dealing with, and what kinds of filters or distorting media they have
been passed through.
The section on Democritus is our primary source of his sceptical utter-
ances. It would be easy to jump to the conclusion, as some have doneMcKim, Democritus against skepticism: all sense-impressions aretrue, Proceedings of the First International Congress on Democritus, ed. by L. G.Benakis, Xanthi 1984, pp. 281-90. Cfr. C. Farrar, The Origins of Democratic Think-ing, Cambridge 1988, pp. 205, 207. The latter book contains (pp. 197-215) a particu-
larly powerful and coherent defence of a non-sceptical interpretation of Democritus.
My own aim as regards Democritus will be limited to showing how Sextus’ evidence
should be read, without prejudice to the interpretation of any overall position he
may be thought to have adopted. But for the record, I am not fully convinced that
there was any such position.
that this massive emphasis on his cognitive pessimism is to be explained
by the fact that Sextus is himself a sceptic, anxious to maximise his indirect
forerunner’s endorsement of his own school’s philosophical outlook. This,
we will see, radically misrepresents the character of the passage.
In the long doxographical passage on the criterion, Sextus is himself
an entirely transparent figure. Whenever you try to focus on him, you
find yourself looking straight through him, and what you see instead is
the early first century B.C. You find yourself in the hands of first-century
B.C. interpreters like Posidonius and Antiochus. The reason for this is
not very far to seek. Sextus will be repeating here, as often, material
from the writings of his principal forerunner and authority, Aenesi-
demus, the founder of the neo-Pyrrhonist movement in the mid first
century B.C. And Aenesidemus himself, we may speculate, compiled his
own account of the dogmatist theories of the criterion largely by consult-
ing recent historical or critical textbooks. Hence we find ourselves, in
this passage, more in Aenesidemus’ philosophical world than in Sextus’.
This practice of relying on the latest available studies is not particu-
larly shocking or surprising. If we want to know the position of Kant
or Aquinas on some specific issue, we often cannot afford the luxury
of turning to their works for enlightenment: even if we happen to have
their collected works on our shelves, we may not have the least idea
which of them to turn to, or which ones are deemed the most reliable
guide to their views. How much easier to browse through a convenient
encyclopedia article, a pre-digested masterpiece of synthesis by someone
much better informed (we hope) than ourselves, or through the latest
critical study to appear in the bookshops. The absence of indexes in an-
cient books made such shortcuts even more irresistible. To arrive at the
principles of Hellenistic epistemology by checking through the 300 books
of Epicurus, the 700 of Chrysippus, and thousands more, would have
been a massive and perhaps a foolhardy undertaking. We can hardly con-
demn Aenesidemus if he preferred to rely on the very latest surveys,
some of them written by the most eminent philosophers of the day.
The trouble is that such surveys are not always an innocent guide
to history. The philosopher who plays historian of his subject will proba-
bly find it difficult not to impose his own prejudices on the material
he reports. He may even be writing the history for that very purpose.
2. Metrodorus and Anaxarchus
Aenesidemus might have appreciated this, if only because himself was
a practitioner of just such creative reporting. For there is every reason to
believe that the first section, on those alleged to deny that there is
any criterion (M vii 49-88), is the work of Aenesidemus himself. This
can be inferred especially from the treatments of Anacharsis and Gorgias,
both of whom are recast in the rigorously dilemmatic form of argument
characteristic of Aenesideman scepticismCalogero,Studi sull'Eleatismo, Roma 1932, Firenze 1972(2)) that the M.X.G. version of Gorgias’On not being is closer to the original than Sextus’. But one aspect which remains
constant in both versions is the concessive structure of the overall argument: p, and
even if not p, q, and even if not q, r. This device is a direct legacy of Gorgias
to Aenesideman scepticism, which uses it widely (I know of no serious philosophical
use of it between Gorgias and Aenesidemus, other than in Plato’s Charmides). Aenesi-
demus’ authorship of this section would thus help explain the massively dispro-
portionate space allotted to Gorgias in it (65-87).
which assimilates his relativism to the style and content of Aenesidemus’
own fourth ModeSext. Emp. PH i 100-13. I find this more believable than the suggestion
of J. Annas and J. Barnes, The Modes of Scepticism, Cambridge 1985, p. 85 that
the material is originally Protagorean and has been borrowed by the Pyrrhonists:
the ancient tradition on Protagoras’ theory of truth stems almost entirely from
Plato’s Theaetetus, and it would be remarkable if Sextus or his source had alone
had access to substantial textual material of independent origin. Cfr. the immediately
following account of Euthydemus and Dionysodorus (64), which recasts along similar
Pyrrhonist lines their portrayal in Plato’s Euthydemus.
forerunners of Pyrrhonism, like Xenophanes, Metrodorus of Chios, and
Anaxarchus, points the same wayM viii 325-6 (itself very
like vii 52), Diog. Laert. ix 72, etc. For Metrodorus and Anaxarchus, see Pyrrh.frr. 1 A, 23-7 Caizzi.
In theory, the same features would be compatible with the author’s
being not Aenesidemus but some follower of his, even Sextus him-
self
much less keen than Aenesidemus to acknowledge forerunners of Pyrrho as genuine
sceptics: PH i 210-25. Whether those who rejected all criteria could be Sceptics,
rather than negative dogmatists, was debatable. At PH ii 18 and M vii 443-4 Sextus
suggests not. But at Μ vii 26 and viii 1 he implies that they can: hence Mutschmann
may be unjustified in excising the Sceptics from the list of those who deny all criteria
at M vii 49
volvement that best explains the reliance on first-century sources in the
following sections, and, if so, it becomes more plausible as well as more
economical to imagine him as the compiler of the entire doxography.
The atomists Metrodorus and Anaxarchus earn just a brief mention
at the end, along with the Cynic Monimus (87-8): Metrodorus for saying
«We know nothing, and we do not even know this very thing, that we
know nothing», Anaxarchus and Monimus for comparing existing things
to a stage-painting and holding them to be the objects of delusion. I
do not want to dwell on this passage here
by Myles Burnyeat, too complex to summarise here.
words attributed to Metrodorus clearly correspond to the opening of his
book reported rather differently by Cicero (ac. ii 73): «I say that we
do not known whether we know something or nothing, nor do we know
that very thing, knowing or not knowing, nor in general whether any-
thing exists or nothing». Should we regard this, or the Sextan version,
as more authentic? Given Aenesidemus’ practice in the preceding chap-
ters, especially those on Gorgias, I have little doubt that it is he who
is guilty of adjusting Metrodorus’ wordsThe protagonists, in Doubt and Dogmatism, ed. by M. Schofield et al., Oxford 1980,
pp. 1-17, at p. 10, and The motivation of Greek skepticism, in The Skeptical Tradition,Burnyeat, Berkeley 1983, pp. 9-29, at p. 14.) Cicero’s Latin, ne id ipsumquidem, nescire aut scire, scire nos, is clumsy, but would work well in Greek, thanks
to the articular infinitive: οὐδὲ αὐτὸ τοῦτο, τὸ εἰδέναι ἢ μή, εἰδέναι ἡμᾶς. Eusebius’
version (praep. evang. 14.19.9), οὐδεὶς ἡμῶν οὐδὲν οἶδεν, οὐδ’ αὐτὸ τοῦτο, πότερον
οἴδαμεν ἢ οὐκ οἴδαμεν, could easily have arisen as an alternative attempt to simplify
the same original.
schematic, and more Pyrrhonian
Metrodorus’ relation to the supposed Socratic dictum «I know that I know nothing».
More Pyrrhonian: the doubts about the world’s existence, omitted in Sextus’ version,
are not part of the usual Pyrrhonist repertoire.
3. Democritus
I now turn to the long section (89-140) on the “natural philosophers”
(φυσικοί), who are said to place the criterion in logos. This has certain
recurrent features which distinguish it from the other two divisions. First,
while the other divisions discuss their respective lists of philosophers
in roughly chronological orderenargeia division may appear non-chronological at first glance, but I
shall try to show below that it in fact takes three separate traditions, each in chrono-
logical order.
so, but adopts the chaotic-looking sequence: Anaxagoras, the Pythagoreans,
Xenophanes, Parmenides, Empedocles, Heraclitus, Democritus. Here
only Democritus’ position at the end captures his chronological relation
to the others. Nevertheless, I believe that there is an overall rationale
to the order. Anaxagoras is placed first as the archetypal natural philo-
sopher (φυσικώτατος, 90). Thereafter each of those listed is presented
as selecting a different type of logos as criterionTarrant, Scepticism or Platonism? The Philosophy of the Fourth Academy,logos and divine/human logos — also surface in Middle Platonism (Alcin. Didaskalikos,4). I doubt if we know enough about the earlier history of these antitheses to help
us identify Sextus’ source. The former has obvious Platonic antecedents (cfr. Mvii 145-8), but it must be remembered that the doxa/episteme contrast is Stoic too.
Thus it cannot do much to strengthen Tarrant’s preference for Antiochus over Posi-
donius as source (see infra, note 72).
constructed as to maximise the contrast between each philosopher and
his neighbours in the list. Anaxagoras opted for logos “in general”, the
Pythagoreans for a specific type. The Pythagoreans’ use of mathematical
or scientific logos in turn contrasts with Xenophanes’ reliance on merely
“doxastic” logos, which is itself then counterposed to Parmenides’ “epis-
temonic” logos. Empedocles invokes orthos logos, but this is primarily
“human” logos, whereas Heraclitus’ logos is “divine”, as well as univer-
sal. After this series of careful antitheses, it is almost an anticlimax to
come at the end to Democritus, whose criterion is simply said to be logos,
with no further refinement.
One might try to read the series of antitheses as reflecting a sceptical
perspective, the chosen order being aimed at highlighting the conflict
(diaphonia) between the warring parties. Certainly that aspect of it will
been more than welcome to Aenesidemus and to Sextus, since they do
indeed call the entire catalogue of views on the criterion a case of diapho-nia (261). But it is hardly how the passage comes across when taken in
its own right. On the contrary, it repeatedly emphasises the continuity
between these thinkers (as I shall try to show shortly). A more accurate
reading would be that the series of antitheses is meant to bring out how
each of these Presocratics focused on a different aspect of logos. Then
Democritus, placed correctly at the end, may be viewed as standing above
the series of antitheses, and as combining in his notion of logos all the
aspects which his predecessors had isolatedlogos” which Her-
aclitus, according to 127-31, identified with air, may stretch credulity too far; but
it might have been argued on the basis of Democr. a 78, a 106 and b 30 D.-K.
passage’s structure, it was (at least in its original context) designed to
give Democritus an especially prominent place in the story.
A second distinguishing feature of this whole division is its extraor-
dinarily high content of verbatim quotations, including (quite unusually
for Sextus) substantial extracts of prose as well as verse. By contrast,
the other divisions of the passage on the criterion, much in keeping with
Sextus’ usage elsewhere, rely mainly on paraphrase.
This itself goes hand in hand with a third feature. The attribution
of the logos criterion to these thinkers is an undisguisedly creative piece
of interpretation. Only for Heraclitus does the author claim to find any
such doctrine expressly stated, and he distinguishes this case by telling
us that Heraclitus says so «quite explicitly» (134, ῥητότατα). His practi-
ce of regularly quoting the passages on which the interpretation is based
serves him as a safeguard, making sure that his readers are not misled
about its speculative status.
A fourth feature is the author’s special interest in the theme that
like is known by like, to which he recurs in the sections on the
Pythagoreans (92-3), on Empedocles (116-21), and on Heraclitus (130),
invoking the further support of Democritus (116-8) and Plato (119).
This kind of invocation — the establishment of alliances between dis-
parate thinkers — itself constitutes a fifth distinguishing feature of the
division as a wholepoetsto expound the thought of Heraclitus: 128.
are amplified by parallel remarks quoted from Asclepiades (91). On the
Pythagorean like-by-like principle, Empedocles and Plato are cited for
comparison (92-3), while for Empedocles’ use of the same principle Demo-
critus and Plato are invoked. And for the alternative interpretation of
Democritus, taken from a certain Diotimus, which he appends at 140,
parallel remarks are quoted from Anaxagoras and from Plato’s Phaedrus
reportedly already invoked Anaxagoras on the point. There is also the question
whether the parallels had already been added by Diotimus rather than deriving from
our principal author. Cfr. infra, note 63.
A sixth and final hallmark of this historian is his readiness to juxta-
pose alternative interpretations, without insisting on an exclusive choice
between them. His message is, again and again, that you can read these
philosophers as making logos the criterion, but that other readings are
available. Xenophanes can be read as rejecting all criteria (as already at
49-52, the “Aenesideman” section, so omitted here), but on another in-
terpretation (110, κατὰ τοὺς ὡς ἐτέρως αὐτὸν ἐξηγουμένους) he makes
doxastic logos the criterion. Empedocles, on what appears to be the more
straightforward interpretation (115, κατὰ μὲν τοὺς ἀπλούστερον δοκοῦν-
τας αὐτὸν ἐξηγεῖσθαι), has six criteria of truth, namely the four elements
plus Love and Strife, but according to others (122) he makes orthos logosthe criterion. Likewise Democritus can be seen as abolishing all cognition,
or as making logos alone the criterion (135-9), and there is also Diotimus’
interpretation of him, according to which there are three criteria (140).
In none of these cases is it insisted that the logos-only interpretation
is mandatory. The pluralistic style of history-writing makes an interesting
contrast with the monistic reporting in the other sections of the passage.
Then who is our historian? He cannot be dated before the late second
century B.C., since he quotes AsclepiadesRawson, The life and death of Asclepiades ofBithynia, «Classical Quarterly», xxxιι (1982) pp. 358-70.
first century B.C., if he was himself used as a source by Aenesidemus. His
readiness to create alliances between diverse philosophers is itself sugges-
tive of the syncretistic tendencies so characteristic of the early first century
B.C. And there is one outstanding candidate: the Stoic Posidonius. That
he may be the source of this entire passage (89-140) has been suggested be-
foreKidd, Posidonius, Cambridge
1988, ιι, p. 342, and as an unpalatable idea by H. Tarrant, Agreement and the self-evident in Philo of Larissa, «Dionysius», v (1981) pp. 66-97, at p. 80. Prior to them,
it seems to have occurred only in A. E. Taylor, A Commentary on Plato’s ‘Timaeus’,
1985 Cambridge seminar mentioned in note 1 above.
It is, at least, a matter of virtual consensus that he is the source
of the long Pythagorean part of the passage (92-109)W. Burkert, Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism,Mansfeld, The Pseudo-HippocraticTract. Περί ἐβδομάδων, Assen 1971, p. 156 note.
include the following: Posidonius’ interpretation of Plato’s Timaeus, as
relying on a like-by-like principle, is cited explicitly (93)
here? Presumably because the original said something like “On my interpretation
of the Timaeus...”.
includes a story (107-8), otherwise not recorded, about the Colossus of
Rhodes, the island where Posidonius lived and taught; and it uses Stoic
doctrine in expounding the PythagoreansS.V.F. ii 366-8,
and Μ ix 78 ff., a very Posidonian passage, where this conceptual scheme is the
basis for cosmic sumpatheia.
If that attribution is correct, it need not necessarily follow that the
rest of the passage is Posidonian
mus’ own mediation. The antithesis ἀνέξοιστον/ἐξοιστόν attributed to Empedocles at
122 might be thought to reflect Aenesidemus’ preoccupation with Gorgias (65 ff.).
But even here a likelier explanation is that it represents some dogmatists interpreter’s
attempt to synthesise Empedocles with his pupil Gorgias.
on Posidonius merely for the Pythagoreans. But any such possibility re-
cedes when we bear in mind the many distinguishing features which the
Pythagorean section shares with other parts of the passage, especially the
syncretistic tendency and the fascination with the like-by-like principle
bles on a beach (117) itself finds an echo in Posidon. fr. 229 E.-K.: see F. DeclevaCaizzi, art. cit., p. 398.
Moreover, Stoic doctrine surfaces occasionally elsewhere in the pas-
sageTimaeus (67 a-c) definition of sound as a blow caused
by air is rewritten in Stoic terms as ἀέρα πεπληγμένον (cfr. S.V.F. ii 139-41,
etc.). 129-30 also has a strong Stoic ring to it (cfr. S.V.F. i 141) — stronger, at any
rate, than the Aenesideman echoes which led Diels (Dox., pp. 209 ff.) to assign the
Heraclitus doxography to Aenesidemus himself. J. Mansfeld too, Doxography anddialectic: the Sitz im Leben of the “Placita” (“Aufstieg und Niedergang der röm.
Welt”, ii 36.4), Berlin 1990, pp. 3056-229, at pp. 3066-7, 3164, sees in it the Ae-
nesideman interpretation of Heraclitus recorded at Μ vii 349. But there is no need
to infer that Aenesidemus is the ultimate source of the Heraclitean section, rather
than its transmitter. As Mansfeld notes, Aenesidemus’ interpretation of Heraclitus
is already strongly mediated by a Stoic source, and the hypothesis that this whole
passage came to Aenesidemus from Posidonius may help unmask the latter as that
source — as was already argued by K. Reinhardt, Kosmos und Sympathie, München
1926, pp. 192 ff., and by U. Burkhardt, Das Angebliche Heraclit-Nachfolge des Skep-tikers Aenesidem, Bonn 1973, pp. 81 ff. One critic has pointed out, as an objection
to my thesis, that τὸ περιέχον (129-30), used of the atmosphere, looks Aristotelian
rather than Stoic. Maybe so, but it is certainly Posidonian: see frr. 49.71, 49.331,
169.92 E.-K.logos in Heraclitus as
divine universal logos — an interpretation of Heraclitus with no pre-Stoic
antecedents but for obvious doctrinal reasons beloved of the StoicsMarc. Aurel. iv 46 = 22 b 72 D.-K., ᾧ μάλιστα διηνεκῶς ὁμιλοῦσι [λόγῳ
τῷ τὰ ὅλα διοικουντι] τούτῳ διαφέρονται, where the bracketed words are now recognised
as Marcus’ gloss — see e.g. C. H. Kahn, The Art and Thought of Heraclitus, Cam-
bridge 1979, p. 30. For the thesis that the Heraclitean doctrine of logos as a govern-
ing cosmic principle is in its entirety a Stoic invention, see M. L. West, Early GreekPhilosophy and the Orient, Oxford 1971, pp. 124-9, endorsed by J. Barnes, ThePresocratic Philosophers, London 1979, i, p. 59. If that is right, as I believe it is,
our passage is the main source for transmission of the fiction to modern scholarship,
and Posidonius has much to answer for. For instance, without his testimony, who
would have thought of introducing logos into 22 b 50 D.-K. by way of emendation?
And that is not all. There is an even more distinctive Posidonian
fingerprint on the passage. For as it happens there is one case in which
we know something about the kind of motive which led Posidonius to
rewrite philosophical history. This concerns his decision to adopt Plato’s
tripartite psychology, even borrowing from the Phaedrus the comparison
of the soul’s two irrational parts to a pair of horses driven' by a human
charioteer
himself a Platonist. Rather, his ultimate authority was Pythagoras, and
he set out to show that it was from none other than Pythagoras that
the Platonic theory was itself derived. According to Galen, he did this
by tracing the theory back to the master via Pythagoras’ own pupilsPHP v 6.43. No doubt Plato’s Timaeus, with its supposedly Pythagorean
spokesman Timaeus, was one item of evidence he exploited.
How striking then that our passage, in commenting on Parmenides’
proem, interprets the horses drawing his chariot as representing «the
irrational impulses and desires of the soul»M vii 112.
regarded as a follower of PythagorasM vii 111), Par-
menides was said (Diog. Laert. ix 21) to have been more influenced by Ameinias
the Pythagorean. One tradition even made Xenophanes himself the pupil of a pupil
of Pythagoras (Diog. Laert. i 15).
conclusion that we have here caught Posidonius in the act (if only enpassant) of bolstering the Platonic theory’s Pythagorean pedigree by find-
ing it, in the form of the Phaedrus charioteer simile, already present in
Parmenides’ poetic imagery.
Cumulatively, these clues seem ample to confirm the hypothesis that
the original author was Posidonius. If so, what was the context? For-
tunately the old view of Schmekel, that the Pythagorean section, at least,
came from a commentary by Posidonius on Plato’s Timaeus, is now widely
rejected, and I need not repeat here the arguments of Mansfeld, Kidd
and othersSchmekel, Die Philosophie der mittleren Stoa in ihrem geschichtlichenZusammenhange dargestellt, Berlin 1892, pp. 405 ff., followed by Taylor (supra, note
21) and others. Contra, see Mansfeld, Kidd (supra, notes 21-2).
sidonius’ work On the criterion (Περὶ κριτηρίου). Not only is this the
most apposite possible title, but the conjecture sheds instant light on a
much puzzled-over sentence from Diogenes Laertius’ Stoic doxography:
«Some of the older Stoics allow orthos logos as criterion, as Posidonius
says in his On the criterion» (vii 74). This is so out of step with the
remaining doxography on Stoic criteria that modern interpreters have
been compelled either to ignore it or to let it substantially affect their
interpretation of Stoic epistemologyI. Kidd, “Orthos logos” as criterion in theStoa, in The Criterion of Truth, ed. by P. Huby, G. Neal, Liverpool 1989, pp. 137-50.. But if the Sextus passage derives
from the same work by Posidonius, we can see exactly what has hap-
pened. When Posidonius, as source of M vii 122-5, attributes to Empedo-
cles the criterion of orthos logos, there is no pretence that this is a straight
doxographical report: it is, quite openly, a speculative reinterpretation
of certain remarks made by Empedocles. It is surely in that same spirit,
and not by way of formal report, that Posidonius attributed orthos logosas a criterion to some of the early Stoics
list of formal doxographical reports was highly misleading. It can be safely discounted
as evidence. I thus arrive at a similar conclusion to Kidd’s (art. cit., previous note),
though by a different route.
We should note that our Posidonian section in Sextus is explicitly
limited to the early “physicists” (89, 140-1) — a standard designation
of the Presocratics. It must represent only one part of Posidonius’ origi-
nal work On the criterion, which clearly included similar analyses of his
forerunners in the Stoa and, we may be sure, of Plato, among others.
My own guess would be as follows. Posidonius’ contemporary An-
tiochus had published a work, the Canonica, which inter alia classed the
Stoics among those who make enargeia the criterion and deny logos any
independent criterial status (I shall supply the grounds for this supposi-
tion in section 4). Posidonius, I suggest, published his On the criterionas a reply to Antiochus, arguing that it was in fact common ground
between the founding Stoics and all their most illustrious forerunners,
right back to Pythagoras and HeraclitusTimaeus, Empedocles, the Pythagoreans and Parmenides, at
least, he no doubt wanted to trace the logos theory back to his ultimate authority,
Pythagoras. Xenophanes and Democritus could have been used for the same purpose
(cfr. Diog. Laert. i 15, ix 38). Heraclitus could not be regarded as a follower of
Pythagoras, but was revered by the Stoics in his own right. Of those on Posidonius’
list, only Anaxagoras seems hard to explain along these lines; conceivably he was,
on the strength of Plat. Phaed. 96-9, judged an ancestor of the “Socratic” and Stoic
doctrine of cosmic intelligence. (At M vii 89 the Presocratics are called oἱ ἀπὸ Θάλεω
φυσικοί; this is a standard designation, and need not imply the inclusion of Thales
himself in the list.)
status to some kind of logosorthos logos would be perfectly com-
patible with others, including even Zeno, having invoked other kinds of logos: cfr.
the diversity of logoi invoked in M vii 89-140. For the suggestion that Posidonius’On the criterion was an appeal to ancient authority, see already, I. Kidd, art. cit.However, I prefer to reserve judgement on his further hypothesis that Posidonius
had an anti-Chrysippean motive, and that the whole criterion doxography at Diog.Laert. vii 54 comes from him.
Having identified Posidonius as our source, we can now turn to his
account of Democritus (135-40). It may seem surprising that Posidonius,
a Stoic, should give Democritus the special prominence which, as already
noted, attaches to the final position in the list. It can hardly signify
special doctrinal authority. On the other hand, Posidonius was only too
likely to approve of Democritus’ exceptional intellectual range, so similar
to his own — including physics, mathematics, ethics, geography, astronomy,
meteorology, and that general concern for aetiology which is so strongly
associated with both philosophersb 118 D.-Κ., cfr. Posidon. t. 85, fr. 176 E.-K.
underlies Posidonius’ preferential treatment of Democritus.
I shall divide the passage into six parts, labelling the citations with
the letters a-i:
I. «Democritus at times (ὅτε μὲν Usener, ὅτι μὲν codd.) eliminates
sensory appearances, and says that none of these appears truly but only
in opinion (δόξα), and that the truth in the things that there are is that
atoms and void exist. For, he says, (a) “By convention sweet and by
convention bitter, by convention hot, by convention cold, by convention
colour. In reality atoms and void (νόμῳ γλυκὺ καὶ νόμῳ πικρόν, νόμῳ
θερμόν, νόμῳ ψυχρόν, νόμῳ χροίη· ἐτεῇ δὲ ἄτομα καὶ κενόν)”. That
is, perceptibles are objects of belief and opinion, and they do not exist
truly, but only atoms and void do» (135).
II. «In his Kratunteria, despite (b) having professed to ascribe command
over evidence to the senses ὑπεσχημένος ταῖς αἰσθήσεσι τὸ κράτος τῆς
πίστεως ἀναθεῖναι), he none the less is found condemning them. For he
says: (c) “We in reality have no reliable understanding, but one which
changes in accordance with the state of the body and of the things which
penetrate and collide with us (ἡμεῖς δὲ τῷ μὲν ἐόντι οὐδὲν ἀτρεκὲς συνί-
εμεν, μεταπῖπτον δὲ κατά τε σώματος διαθήκην καὶ τῶν ἐπεισιόντων
καὶ τῶν ἀντιστηριζόντων”». And again he says: (d) “That in reality we
do not understand what each thing is or is not like, has been shown
in many ways (ἐτεῇ μέν νυν ὅτι οἷον ἕκαστόν ἐστιν ἢ οὔκ ἐστιν οὐ
συνίεμεν, πολλαχῇ δεδήλωται)”» (136).
III. «And in his Peri ideon: (e) “Man must know by this yardstick: that
he is cut off from reality (γιγνώσκειν τε χρὴ ἄνθρωπον τῷδε τῷ κανόνι,
ὅτι ἐτεῆς ἀπήλλακται)”, and again (f) “This argument too shows that
in reality we know nothing about anything, but seeming for each of us
is an influx [or ‘reshaping’] (δηλοῖ μὲν δὴ καὶ οὗτος ὁ λόγος ὅτι ἐτεῇ
οὐδὲν ἴσμεν περὶ οὐδενός, ἀλλ’ ἐπιρυσμίη ἑκάστοισιν ἡ δόξις)”, and also
(g) “And yet it will be clear that to know in reality what each thing
is like is beyond us” (καίτοι δῆλον ἔσται ὅτι ἐτεῇ οἷον ἕκαστον γι-
γνώσκειν ἐν ἀπόρῳ ἐστι)”» (137).
IV. «Now in these [i.e. (c)-(g)?] he is virtually (σχεδόν) rejecting all
cognition, even though it is only the senses that he attacks specifically»
(137 fin.).
V. «But in his Canons he says that there are two kinds of knowledge
(γνώσεις), the one through the senses, the other through the mind. Of
these, he calls the one through the mind “genuine” (γνησίην), ascribing
to it reliability for judging the truth, while the one through the senses
he names “bastard” (σκοτίην), depriving it of infallibility for the discern-
ment of truth. His precise words are: (h) “Of knowing there are two
forms, the one genuine, the other bastard. And of the bastard kind this
is the complete list: sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch. The other is
genuine, but separated from this one (γνώμης δὲ δύο εἰσὶν ἰδέαι, ἡ
μὲν γνησίη, ἡ δὲ σκοτίη· καὶ σκοτίης μὲν τάδε σύμπαντα, ὄψις ἀκοὴ
ὀδμὴ γεῦσις ψαῦσις, ἡ δὲ γνησίη, ἀποκεκριμένη δὲ ταύτης)”. Then,
by way of judging the genuine one superior to the bastard one, he adds
these words (εἰτα προκρίνων τῆς σκοτίης τὴν γνησίην, ἐπιφέρει λέγων):
(i) “When the bastard one is no longer able either to see smaller, nor
to hear nor to smell nor to taste nor to sense by touch, but finer
(ὅταν ἡ σκοτίη μηκέτι δύνηται μήτε ὁρῆν ἐπ’ ἔλαττον μήτε ἀκούειν μήτε
ὀδμᾶσθαι μήτε γεύεσθαι μήτε ἐν τῇ ψαύσει αἰσθάνεσθαι, ἀλλ’ ἐπίλεπ-
τότερον)”. Therefore according to Democritus too reason is the criterion:
he calls it “genuine knowing” (γνησίη γνώμη)» (138-9).
VI. «Diotimus used to say that according to Democritus there are three
criteria. The criterion for the cognition of things non-evident is appear-
ances; for “Appearances are a sight of things non-evident”, in the words
of Anaxagoras, whom Democritus praises for this. That for inquiry is
the concept (τὴν ἔννοιαν); for “Concerning every topic, my boy, there
is but one starting-point, to know what the inquiry is about” [para-
phrasing Plato, Phaedr. 237 b]. And that for choice and avoidance is the
feelings; for what we have an affinity for is to be chosen, what we are
alienated from is to be avoided» (140).
Step I seeks to establish the significance of passage (a), Democritus’
best-known statement about the metaphysics of cognition. It is presented
as evidence, not for his acceptance of logos as a criterion, but for his
firm rejection of the senses. Sextus might be thought open to criticism
for failing to add b 125Kirk, J. E. Raven, The Presocratic Philosophers, Cambridge 1957,
p. 424, «It is odd that Sextus did not quote it», with the possible further implication
that this casts doubt on its authenticity.
Galen: «Poor mind, you get your evidence (πίστεις) from us, then you
demolish us. Our fall is your demolition». But it seems much more likely
that b 125 is the very remark that he is summarising as citation (b)
at the start of n. This is always translated as telling us that in hisKratunteria, despite having “promised” to ascribe τὸ κράτος τῆς πίστεως
to the senses, he none the less is found condemning them. I doubt if
this notion of an unfulfilled promise can be sustained by the Greek.
Ὑπισχνεῖσθαι plus future infinitive is “promise”, but that sense seems
virtually unattested with any other tense of the infinitives.v.; K.-G. i 195-7.
is observed elsewhere, incidentally, not only by Sextus, but also by
PosidoniusPH ii 148, M viii 283. “Promise” with
future infinitive: Posidon. fr. 60 E.-K.
“profess”, “claim”
the “profess” sense usually taking the present infinitive, since it describes a regular
or continuing action, as in Plat. Prot. 319 a, where Protagoras professes «to make
men good citizens ». The force of the aorist will be that Democritus’ claim to prove
(or to have proved) the point referred to a single completed act.Kratunteria, Democritus,claimed (not promised) to ascribe command
sion», vel sim., meaning “the power to persuade”. A T.L.G. search on the most
directly comparable prose authors — Herodotus, Thucydides and the Corpus Hip-pocraticum — has turned up no parallel for this construction after κράτος, with which
an accompanying genitive is usually objective (“power over...”: 11 occurrences), and,
failing that, subjective (“power exercised by...”: 2 occurrences).pistis to the senses, but
none the less condemned them. Surely this “claim” is the very one im-
plied in the reply of the senses (b 125): the mind depends on the senses
for its pisteis, so is in no position to condemn them. If that is rightH. Lan-gerbeck, ΔΟΞΙΣ ΕΠΙΡΥΣΜΙΗ, Berlin 1935, p. 117, although without discussion of
the meaning of ὑπεσχημένος. So too perhaps E. Asmis, Epicurus’ Scientific Method,Ithaca/London 1984, p. 345.
we can infer that the famous reply of the senses occurred in the Kratun-teria, and that Sextus, or rather Posidonius, has not after all suppressed
it, even if he has chosen not to quote it verbatim.
Moreover, although the expression τὸ κράτος τῆς πίστεως does not
occur in the reply of the senses itself, we can with reasonable confidence
attribute it to Democritus himself, not to Posidonius or Sextus. For
κράτος clearly picks up the theme of the Kratunteria, which seems to
have been a work devoted to adjudicating the struggle for “command”
between intellect and sensesDiog. Laert. ix 46-7.
used, along with its cognates, throughout M vii 89-140 for evidential
reliabilityM vii 89-90, 111, 124, 126, 131, 134, 138.
meaning “evidence” or “assurance”, without any obvious connotation
of ultimate reliability. In the power struggle, it seems, the senses arrogat-
ed evidential supremacy to themselves (b), but were then nevertheless
condemned as untrustworthy (c)-(g).
No contradiction need be involved: Democritus could quite consis-
tently hold both that the senses do indeed command the evidence availa-
ble to the mind, and that we know nothing for certain, because the senses
are themselves unreliable
by Myles Burnyeat.
contradicted himself within a single work (let alone that he broke a
promise), but that his remark about the priority of the senses was not,
in its context, an attempt to make perception an acceptable criterion.
Posidonius’ overall strategy in the passage is clear enough. In i he
quotes Democritus’ best-known condemnation of the senses. In v he will
go on to present him, in accordance with this, as elevating reason above
perception as a criterion. He could if he had wished have restricted him-
self to those two moves. But in between he chooses to mention a possible
obstacle: Democritus’ restoration to the senses of control over evidence
in his Kratunteria. To accommodate the obstacle, he points out, first, that
this restoration was not enough to prevent Democritus, in the very same
work (n), as well as elsewhere (m), from numerous pessimistic utterances
about the possibility of any knowledge (texts (c)-(g)). He thus succeeds
in showing that, even if Democritus in a way privileged perception over
reason, it was not as a criterion.
But the price of the achievement is to have drawn attention to pas-
sages (c)-(g), in which Democritus appeared to deny any route to know-
ledge, i.e. any criterion at all. How then is Posidonius to rescue the logoscriterion? In iv he concedes that passages (c)-(g) amount virtually
πάσαν alone (“nearly all”), the sentence would have more relevance to (a) than to(c)-(g).
complete denial of cognition — although, he adds significantly, Democri-
tus’ only specific attacks are on the senses. Clearly it is part of Posidonius’
damage-limitation exercise that (c)-(g) should be seen as primarily directed
at the senses, and not at the powers of reason as such. This in fact fits
(c) well, and is at least compatible with the general disavowals of
knowledge in (d), (e) and (g). The only serious doubt concerns (i), in which
the expression ἐπιρυσμίη ἑκάστοισιν ἡ δόξις can with some plausibility
be read as questioning the validity of all “belief”, on the ground that
it is nothing more than a mechanical realignment (ἐπιρυσμίη) of the soul
atomsBarnes, The Presocratic Philosophers, cit., ii, pp. 258-9.
perception («seeming for each person is an influx») has had more than
enough supporters over the years (starting with Hesychiuss.v. glosses ἐπιρυσμίη as ἐπιρρέον.
Posidonius’ assertion a perfectly defensible one.
Thus Posidonius insists, in support of his interpretation, that
Democritus’ primary attack is always on the senses. He concedes that
in some works the dependence of the mind on the senses allows it to
be dragged down with them. His final move, in v, is to draw attention
to an important exception: that in one work, the Canons, reason was
permitted to be independent of the senses, and was granted the status
of a criterion. Once more we are witnessing Posidonius’ pluralistic ap-
proach. He is quite happy to leave intact the “no criterion” interpreta-
tion of Democritus, which we know was current in his dayCic. ac. I 44), to whom I have already suggested
Posidionius may be reacting, and by the contemporary New Academy (ibid. n 73).
supplies us with the evidence for it. As with Empedocles, so too with
Democritus, what matters most is that somewhere in his writings the iden-
tification of logos as criterion can be found.
The crucial text from the Canons comes in two parts. The first, (h),
establishes Democritus’ separation of the two forms of knowledge. The
second, (i), supplies the further evidence needed to show that he prefers
“genuine” knowledge to “bastard” knowledge. Notoriously, (i) presents
a crux by apparently breaking off in mid sentence ἀλλ’ ἐπὶ λεπτότερον.
I shall not recount the numerous ingenious emendations that have been
proposed, but shall try instead a new approach.
We have already identified Posidonius as the source of the entire
passage, 89-140, and noted his predilection for verbatim quotation. What
can we learn from the rest of the passage about his methods of quotation?
Two points in particular. First, like many ancient collectors of quotations,
he is prepared to break up a continuous passage in order to interject
glosses of his own. A clear case is his citation of Empedocles at 123-4.
The two excerpts are metrically continuous, the interruption having oc-
curred in the middle of a line, and editors have no hesitation in reattach-
ing them. Posidonius interrupts merely in order to point out the lesson
to be learnt in the next bit. He introduces the first excerpt by saying
(123): «Concerning the fact that the discrimination of truth does not lie
in the senses, he says the following». Then comes the first excerpt, after
which he introduces the second by saying (124): «And concerning the fact
that the truth is not totally unattainable, but attainable as far as humanlogos can reach, he makes this clear by adding to the previous words (τοῖς
προκειμένοις ἐπιφέρων)» — whereupon the quotation continues.
Second, note that in the passage just quoted the regular verb for
“add” in citations, έπιψέρειν, is used to indicate a directly adjacent addi-
tion. When there is a gap, as between the two Heraclitean quotations
at 132-3, he scrupulously indicates this with the expression (133) ὀλίγαπροσδιελθὼν ἐπιφέρει, «a little later he adds»
tuation must be ἐπιφέρει διὸ δεῖ ἕπεσθαι τῷ κοινῷ (ξυνὸς γὰρ ὁ κοινός)· “τοὺ λόγου
δὲ ἐόντος ξυνοῦ: «he adds why one should follow the common logos (because the
common one is [what he calls] xunos): “Although the logos is xunos”».
If we apply these two lesson to the Canons quotations in v, we can
see that there is a strong prima facie case for reading the two excerpts
as continuous, since they are joined by a simple έπιφέρει, with no qualifi-
cation to indicate a gapAthen. 188 b, where two
directly adjacent portions of Homer are linked with εἶτα.
interjection signals not an interval in the text, but the need for a guiding
gloss. The first excerpt establishes the existence of the two forms of
knowledge, and pauses after ἀποκεκριμένη δὲ ταύτηςv. I. ἀποκεκρυμμένη, see Μ. M. Sassi, Le teoriedella percezione in Democrito, Firenze 1978, p. 214 note.
the firmest indication that the two forms are separate and independent.
He then glosses the following excerpt: «Then, by way of judging the
genuine one superior to the bastard one, he adds these words». And the
second excerpt, which ensues, does indeed imply something about the
superiority of γνησίη γνώμη to σκοτίη γνώμη, since it says that the
former takes over where the latter can no longer cope.
I propose, therefore, that we should try our hardest to follow these
clues, and read the two excerpts as continuousIbid., p. 213 does print them as continuous, although by placing a full stop
between them, and not translating, she leaves it unclear how the grammar could
work. I have not found other scholars committing themselves on the matter.
place nothing more than a comma between them. The sense at the join
(starting at ή δέ γνησίη in (h) can then run: «The one which is genuine,
but separate from this one, (is) when the bastard one is no longer able
either to see in the direction of greater smallness». The harsh ellipsis
of the verb does at least fit the overall style of the passage, which has
already suppressed it in the equally laconic μέν clause with the words
σκοτίης μὲν τάδε σύμπαντα
tinues in this way, we are forced to read ἡ δὲ γνησίη at the end of (h) as «The other
is genuine» — a rather lame repetition of what we have already been told. With
the text continuing, on the other hand, we can read it as resumptive, «The one
which is genuine», (b) We avoid the problem of why the second excerpt should,
in addition to breaking off in mid sentence (see below), also start in mid sentence.
That Posidonius’ gloss should thus interrupt the grammar does not
seem to me problematic. What I, like many others, do find incredible
is that in the second excerpt he should have broken off the quotation
half way through a subordinate clause, thus obliterating the grammar and
coherence of the sentence as a whole. Scholarly discomfort on the point
has given birth to many ingenious editorial supplements to the text of
Sextus to complete the sentence. But an easier solution, I suggest, would
be to leave the text intact, except for a tiny repunctuation and re-
accentuation near the end
authority, so that changing them is not, except in a trivial sense, emendation at all.
ma after αἰσθάνεσθαι, and accentuate the next word ἄλλ’, “other
things”. The whole saying could then read:
γνώμης δὲ δύο εἰσὶν ἰδέαι, ἡ μὲν γνησίη ἡ δὲ σκοτίη. καὶ σκοτίης μὲν
τάδε σύμπαντα, ὄψις ἀκοὴ ὀδμὴ γεῦσις ψαῦσις. ἡ δὲ γνησίη, ἀποκεκρι-
μένη δὲ ταύτης, ὅταν ἡ σκοτίη μηκέτι δύναται μήτε ὁρῆν ἐπ’ ἔλαττον,
μήτε ἀκούειν μήτε ὀδμᾶσθαι μήτε γεύεσθαι μήτε ἐν τῇ ψαύσει αἰσθά-
νεσθαι ἄλλ’ ἐπὶ λεπτότερον.
«Of knowing there are two forms, the one genuine, the other
bastard. And of the bastard kind this is the complete list: sight, hearing,
smell, taste, touch. The one which is genuine, but separate from this
one, is when the bastard one is no longer able either to see in the direc-
tion of greater smallness, nor to hear or smell or taste or sense by touch
other things in the direction of greater fineness».
On this reading, our incapacity to see ἐπ’ ἔλαττον in the first limb
is balanced in the second
μήτε, which are co-ordinate, and the subsequent ones, which are subordinate to the
second: “Neither a, nor b or c or d or e”. For Ionic prose use of this subordinate
μήτε, cfr. Hipp. epid. 5.1.14, v 214 L., οὔτε ἐφθέγγετο, οὔτε ᾐσθάνετο οὔτε ἔργου
οὔτε λόγου. Likewise at prorrh. 2.17, ix 42 L., and diaet. 9, ii 296 L.
things” (i.e. other sense objects than those of sight) ἐπί λεπτότερον. This
distinction between smallness and fineness embodies a perfectly reason-
able point about perceptual thresholds. For vision, the threshold below
which perception fails is standardly one of size: hence ἐπ’ ἔλαττον. For
the other senses, the relevant threshold is not that of size. Rather, certain
flavours, odours, sounds and textures are too “fine” or “subtle” to
detect: hence ἐπὶ λεπτότερον.
I do not claim that this is an immaculate specimen of Greek prose
style. But it is, I suggest, convincing enough to render emendation both
unnecessary and risky
The accusative after αἰσθάνεσθαι is acceptable (cfr. e.g. Critias 88 b 39 D.-K.). But
the fragment would nevertheless read better with ἄλλ’ deleted.
Encouraged, then, by confidence in our source Posidonius and in
his meticulous methods of textual citation, we can perhaps, along these
lines, see our way to vindicating the integrity of the text as he has
reported it.
It now remains only to consider vi, where Posidonius adds from
one Diotimus a quite different interpretation of Democritus. There is
an old debate as to whether this is the Democritean Diotimus of Tyre,
or the Stoic Diotimus. Of the Democritean, we know only that he had
his own distinctive formula for the ethical telosa 2 D.-K.. Of the Stoic, we
know that he was a detractor of Epicurus, on whom the Epicurean Zeno
of Sidon was said to have taken lethal revengeDiog. Laert. x 3; Athen. 611 b = Zeno of Sidon fr. 4 Angeli-Colaizzo
(«Cron. Erc.», ix (1979)). In the latter text, where the correction of “Theotimus”
to “Diotimus” has met with general acceptance, he was arrested at Zeno’s instiga-
tion, and condemned to death. It seems absurd to suppose that the actual charge
was defamation of Epicurus — what legal basis could that have had? The text permits
the less implausible guess that the defamation merely constituted the motive for
Zeno’s vendetta.
places him in the late second or early first century B.C.
Majority opinion has long favoured the Democritean Diotimus as
the source cited in our passageR. Hirzel, DerDemokriteer Diotimos, «Hermes», xvii (1882) pp. 326-8. Since then it has regularly
been presented as established fact, e.g. H. Langerbeck, op. cit., pp. 119-20. Most
recently, it has been amplified by M. Gigante, op. cit., pp. 82-5, bringing in evidence
from the Herculaneum Papyri. In favour of the Stoic, however, see E. Zeller-R.Mondolfo, La filosofia dei Greci nel suo sviluppo storico, i, 5a parte, Firenze 1969,
p. 318 note 86; P. Natorp, op. cit., p. 190 note; H. Tarrant, op. cit., p. 106.
propounded an interpretation of Democritus than a Democritean? But
the case for the Stoic is much strengthened by the identification of our
source as Posidonius. As a Stoic contemporary of this Diotimus, he is
almost bound to have known him personally. Moreover, in Diog. Laert.x 3-4 Posidonius is listed directly after Diotimus as a fellow detractor
of Epicurus. One of the charges brought by the detractors listed there
is that Epicurus plagiarised his doctines from, among others, Democritus.
And the interpretation of Democritus quoted from Diotimus itself be-
trays signs of a directly anti-Epicurean motive of just this kind. It looks
like an attempt, on the flimsiest evidence, to show that Epicurus’ three
criteria of truth — αἰσθήσεις, πρόλήψεις and πάθη — were not original
to him but anticipated by DemocritusP. Natorp, ibid.; F. Decleva Caizzi, art. cit., p. 405. The loose cita-
tion of Phaedr. 237 b as a gloss on the ἔvvoιαι criterion may be another characteristic
Posidonian invocation of a parallel, Phaedrus being one of Posidonius’ favourite two
Platonic dialogues (cfr. fr. 31.16-30 E.-K.). But if its author is Diotimus, it perhaps
represents an additional swipe: Plato too had hit on this criterion before Epicurus,
as Epicurus himself conceded (Cic. de fin. II 3-4).
same order as EpicurusCanon, see Diog. Laert. x 31. This in itself
casts doubt on Diotimus’ identification with the Democritean: we know of no
“Democriteans” late enough to have responded to Epicurus.
knew the novel interpretation of Democritus from his fellow anti-
EpicureanKidd, Posidonius, cit., ii,
pp. 977-8, with frr. 22, 46-7, 149, 160, 187.
mus «used to say». But that reading is not compulsory: ἔλεγε(ν) can be used in literary
citations too, possibly including, in the present passage, 92 on Philolaus.
for citing contemporary sources is one which we have already noted in
Aenesidemus, and which Posidonius shows himself to share when he
quotes an obscure parallel from Asclepiades in exegesis of Anaxagoras (91).
4. Epicurus
In dealing with the report of the Epicurean theory on the criterion,
I shall try to be brieferGigante, op. cit.,
pio di precisione storiografica». I am much indebted to Gigante’s observations, espe-
cially on the terminology of the passage, even though my own evaluation will be
more negative.vii 141-260 (see table supra, p. 22), which covers first the entire Academy
from Plato to Carneades, in chronological order, followed by the Cy-
renaics, Epicurus, the Peripatetics, and lastly the Stoics. Again, it has
certain recurrent features which distinguish it, as a whole, from the
preceding two divisions.
(1) Its author has a consuming interest in the notion of enargeia,
cussed
215-6. Peripatetics: 218-9. Stoics: 257.
the subsequent critical section of the book.
(2) There are practically no verbatim quotations. In common with
the Aenesideman section, and in contrast to the Posidonian section, the
author’s main resource is paraphrase. But he differs from the Aeneside-
man section too, in his very heavy reliance on technical terms as a key
to interpretation
but the feature is ubiquitous.
the fact that his philosophers are later in date and use a more obviously
technical vocabulary. But it is instructive to see him applying the same
method, quite inappropriately, even to Plato. In his sole verbatim quota-
tion (142), he cites Timaeus, 27 d in order to extract from it the word
περιληπτόν and to convert it, with little plausibility, into the technical
term περιληπτικόν, “comprehensive”, i.e. inclusive of both enargeia and
truth, which he then reconverts into the Stoic technical term καταληπ-
τικόν (144). This contrasts with Posidonius’ way of exploiting theTimaeus (93, 116, 119), as a source of ideas, not terminology.
(3) The author is far more addicted than either Aenesidemus or
Posidonius to illustrating a point by the use of examples
analogies
Who is it this time? There are strong reasons for suspecting our
source to be none other than Antiochus of Ascalon
(141-260). R. Hirzel, Untersuchungen zu Ciceros philosophischen Schriften, Leipzig
1883, iii, pp. 493-524, argued at length for Antiochus as source of most of it, though
not including the Cyrenaic or Epicurean parts. I have myself argued for Antiochus
as source of the Epicurean part (On signs, in Science and Speculation, ed. by J. Barnes,J. Brunschwig, Cambridge 1982, pp. 239-72, at pp. 263-72, summarised in A. A.Long and D. N. Sedley, The Hellenistic Philosophers, Cambridge 1987, section 18).
H. Tarrant, art. cit., developed in his Scepticism or Platonism? cit., defends An-
tiochus as source of the “entire” doxography 89-260. (My reasons for dissenting
from his view as regards 89-140 consist in the distinguishing features of the two
passages, which I have listed above, plus incredulity that the readings of Plato at
119 and 141-2 could have come from the same source.) J. Barnes, Antiochus of Asca-lon, in Philosophia Togata, Essays on Philosophy and Roman Society, ed. by M.Griffin, J. Barnes, Oxford 1989, pp. 51-96, at pp. 64-5, is sceptical about attribut-
ing any significant part of the passage to Antiochus.
contemporary of Aenesidemus. One initial clue is that Antiochus is twice
cited by name in the passage. At 162 it is for his elucidation of Carneades
on one particular point. At 201 Sextus quotes a cryptic passage from
book ii of Antiochus’ Canonica, about an unnamed doctor who placed
the criterion entirely in the senses, adding that Antiochus seems here
to be hinting at Asclepiades. If Antiochus is the source of the entire
passage 141-260, why should he be named just at these two pointsBarnes, ibid., I have already tried to antic-
ipate a similar objection about Posidonius in note 23 above.
In the first passage, it would be because he had explicitly presented the
elucidation of Carneades as his own addition. In the second, it looks
as if Aenesidemus, who was clearly exceptionally interested in his con-
temporary Asclepiades
sage of Asclepiades at 91, and more especially the frequent listing of Asclepiades’
doctrines elsewhere in Sextus — a rare honour to accord to a thinker of so late
a date, and barely matched in Sextus by the treatment of any other first-century
B.C. or later thinker (except Pyrrhonists and medical schools).
was mentioned briefly in passing, and hence cannot have had a formal place in the
book’s doxography.
tiochus’ book, and preserved it verbatim as evidence for his conjecture
that Asclepiades was meant. The two named citations may not prove the
hypothesis that Antiochus’ Canonica was the source throughout, but they
are fully consistent with itTarrant, op. cit., p. 95: «unless it is to be supposed that this un-
memorable passage of Antiochus [about Asclepiades] had for some reason stuck in
Sextus’ memory, there is little alternative to supposing that the Canonica is the work
he had been using, to a greater or lesser degree, in other parts of the doxography».
Although these mentions of Antiochus’ name are a useful clue, and
the title of his work, Canonica, is entirely apposite to a history of theories
on the criterion, the strongest reasons for identifying him as the source
are doctrinal. Enargeia (Latin perspicuitas) is a central notion in Antiochus’
epistemology as we know it from Cicero’s Academica (ii 11-62)H. Tarrant, art. cit., p. 81 note 50, and Scepticismor Platonism? cit., esp. pp. 89 ff.) the Canonica belonged to the phase in which
Antiochus still professed allegiance to Philo of Larissa’s fallibilism (see Cic. ac. ii 69),enargeia will already have been a central epistemological concept for him, as it was for
Philo (see Tarrant). But the association of Plato with κατάληψις convinces me that
Antiochus was already disloyal to Philo at the time, even if this predates their formal
schism in 87: Antiochus was already regarded as a virtual Stoic in the 90s (see my Theend of the Academy, «Phronesis», xxvi (1981) pp. 67-75, at p. 70). I cannot agree with
Tarrant, op. cit., pp. 53 ff., that Philo ever accepted κατάληψις.
Some facts, he holds, are self-evident or self-certifying, not in need of
rational proof — especially, though not exclusivelyCic. ac. ii 24.
the senses. Reason is derived from these self-evident cognitions. It can
in turn protect them from sceptical assault, but is assigned no indepen-
dent criterial status. Such is the position which Antiochus adopted as
the best available bulwark against the fallibilist epistemology from which
he was setting out to rescue the contemporary Academy.
It is only too easy to see how the passage at M vii 141-260 could
have been written to trace the historical evolution of just this concept
from Plato, with whom it opens, to the Stoics, with whom it closes —
a line of descent which Antiochus acknowledged as his own
gustine, Cic. ac. ii 15, tells us that he veterum physicorum [...] implorabat fidem. He
was no doubt rebutting the sceptical interpretation of them current in the Academy,
as Lucullus does at Cic. ac. ii 14, when he asserts that their sceptical pronouncements
are no more than occasional outbursts of frustration by committed dogmatists.
Plato offering a complex criterion, in which reason and perceptual enar-geia are interdependent. The Academy then develops this criterion inade-
quately. Plato’s early followers, Speusippus and Xenocrates, separate the
two criteria, even though they both acknowledge some kind of interaction
between them too. And his later followers Arcesilaus and Carneades try
to abolish criteria altogether (including an attack on enargeia, 160-3), but
significantly they too are in the end «virtually compelled» by the prac-
tical demands of life to accept one for themselvesCic. ac. ii 34, on
Academics who, convicio veritatis coacti, allow that some things are ἐναργῆ. For the
suggestion that the Carneadean arguments here served Antiochus in a more positive
role, see H. Tarrant, op. cit., pp. 89-94.
the Academy Plato’s philosophical relatives the Cyrenaics are defending
an over-condensed version of his position, in which enargeia is emphasised
at the expense of logos (201); and that tendency is further developed
by Epicurus. A third, and more respectable, line of development is then
added. The Peripatetics offer an enarges complex criterion, whereby both
perception and intellect directly grasp self-evident objects, emphasising
that logos, although dominant, is itself derivative from perception. This
third tendency is then seen through to its culmination by the Stoics,
with their doctrine of sensory phantasia kataleptike, which, once they
have finally resolved their internal quarrels about it, is recognised to beenarges to the point of irresistibility (257)Cic. ac. ii 38.
This is a typically Antiochean view of philosophical history. That
Plato’s own position had already gestured towards Stoic katalepsis is im-
plied, as we have seen, by interpreting his περιληπτόν as embodying the
Stoic concept of the καταληπτικόν. And despite the wrong directions
taken by his earlier followers within the Academy, the story seems to
continue, the Peripatetics and Stoics did find the right pathAcademi-ca, I: the early Academics put the criterion in the mind, not the senses (30-2); Zeno
“corrected” the system (35, 40-3), making κατάληψις the sole basis of know-
ledge.
eventually established a sound Platonist epistemology — very much like
the one Antiochus’ follower Lucullus is found defending in Cicero’sAcademicaac. ii 142-3 Cicero echoes a (presumably) Philonian attack on Antiochus:
regarding the criterion, Antiochus can hardly agree with Protagoras and the Cyrenaicsand Epicurus and Plato and Xenocrates and Aristotle; he in fact follows Chrysippus
alone. Apart from Protagoras, this list coincides entirely with M vii 141-260, and
gains added point if these were all authorities invoked by Antiochus as more or less
on the right side.
What will be thought surprising is his inclusion of the Cyrenaics
and Epicureans, who were never regarded as belonging to the Platonist
tradition. His wish to borrow them as honorary allies clearly arises not
from any general philosophical approval but from his conviction that
they had, if nothing else, recognised the supreme criterial power of enar-geia. In the case of the Cyrenaics we are explicitly offered the justifica-
tion that they are Plato’s close philosophical relatives, fellow disciples
of Socrates (190). In the case of the Epicureans, no such kinship could
be invoked. But the fact that Epicurean hedonism was seen by An-
tiochus, as by others, as a revised version of Cyrenaic hedonismCic. de fin. ii 35; Aristocles ap. Eus. praep. evang. xiv 18, 31 ( = Aristip.IV a 173 S.S.R.).
have been sufficient to justify the linking of the two schools here. And
it is instructive to note that virulent anti-Epicureanism is not an apparent
feature of Antiochus’ outlookLuck, Der Akademiker An-tiochos, Bern/Stuttgart 1953, and the supplemented collection by H. Mette, «Lus-
trum», xxviii-xxix (1986/7), offer no evidence of anti-Epicureanism half as strong
as Cicero’s or Plutarch’s.
Academics. In Cicero’s Academica his Antiochean spokesman not only
invokes the Cyrenaics as allies (ii 21), but also treats Epicurus with a
relative lack of hostility: Epicurus rightly required the wise man to
separate opinion from enargeia (n 45), even though he failed to see this
aim through to completion (ibid.), and went too far in insisting that allperceptions are true (ii 19, cfr. 101).
There is therefore no ground for doubt that even the Epicurean sec-
tion, 203-16, originates from Antiochus’ Canonica. There are, I believe,
no positive reasons to prefer Natorp’s derivation of it from the
Epicurean Demetrius of LaconiaOn signs, cit., p.
264 with note 60. Cfr. also infra note 91. But this does not preclude the possibility that
Antiochus himself drew information from Demetrius’ writings: see further, note 95.
grounds for holding that the source cannot possibly be an Epicurean at
all. Since I have argued this at length elsewheresupra note 72.
be brief.
In the closing paragraphs of the Epicurean section, we are offered
a summary of the twin Epicurean principles, epimarturesis and ouk an-timarturesis, the object no doubt being to show how even in scientific
discovery enargeia was the sole Epicurean criterion
this, the latter principle, which I translate “non-contestation”, and its
converse antimarturesis or “contestation”, are illustrated with the stan-
dard Epicurean example of the inference from motion to void. The
description includes the followingΜ vii 213-4.
«Non-contestation (ouk antimarturesis) is the following (akolouthia)from that which is apparent of the non-apparent thing posited and be-
lieved. For example, Epicurus, in saying that there is void, which is non-
apparent, confirms this through the self-evident fact of motion. For if
void does not exist there ought not to be motion either, since the moving
body would lack a place to pass into, as a result of everything’s being
full and solid. Therefore the non-apparent thing believed is uncontested
by that which is apparent, since there is motion. Contestation (antimartu-resis), on the other hand, is something which conflicts with non-
contestation. For it is the elimination (anaskeue) of that which is apparent
by the positing of the non-apparent thing. For example, the Stoic says
that void does not exist, judging something non-apparent, but once this
is posited about it, that which is apparent, namely motion, ought to be
coheliminated (sunanaskeuazesthai) with it. For if void does not exist,
necessarily motion does not occur either, according to the method already
demonstrated ».
It is well recognised that this anaskeue terminology does not go back
to Epicurus, but belongs to the debate between Epicureans and their
probably Stoic opponents reported in Philodemus, De signisP. and E. De Lacy, Philodemus, On Methodsof Inference, Napoli 1978(2); cfr. my discussion, in On signs, cit.; E. Asmis, Epicurus’Scientific Method, cit.; and most recently the outstanding study by J. Barnes,Epicurean Signs, «Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy», suppl. vi (1988) pp. 91-
134, and comments by A. A. Long, ibid., pp. 135-44.
debate datable to the late second and early first centuries B.C. In that
debate, most of the Epicureans accept that the “following” (akolouthia)
of something non-apparent from an apparent sign can be either byanaskeue or by “similarity”. “Similarity” sign-inferences rest on the sup-
posed resemblance between two items, whether direct, as in inferences
from the properties of human beings we know to human beings we do
not know, or analogical, as in inferences from the properties of
phenomenal bodies to those of atoms. But other purportedly cogent sign-
inferences, which do not rely on resemblances, are attributed to anaskeue.The inference passes the anaskeue test if it is found that to deny
(“eliminate”, anaskeuazein) the non-apparent thing signified is ipso factoto deny the existence of the sign. A standard example of anaskeue in
the De signis is the inference from the existence of motion to that of
voidde sign. xii 1-14. Since all the Epicureans reported in De signisuse this inference as an example, Natorp (op. cit.) was on weak ground in using
its occurrence in M vii 213-4 as evidence for Demetrius as source.
ity” between motion and void, but because of some kind of conceptual
or physical dependence.
In the Sextus passage that very same motion-void inference is used
twice, to illustrate first ouk antimarturesis and then antimarturesis. And
at the second occurrence it is explicitly presented as an anaskeue infer-
ence. So far so good. But unfortunately our author has completely missed
the point. The De signis Epicureans sayDe sign. viii 26-ix 8, Barnes’ translation, adapted.
«That if there is motion there is void we apprehend in no other
way than by the method of similarity, establishing that it cannot be that
motion is accomplished in the absence of void. Thus having surveyed
everything that accompanies moving objects in our experience, in the ab-
sence of which we see nothing moving, in this way we claim that every-
thing which moves in any way moves similarly, and by this method we
make a sign-inference that there cannot be motion without void. Hence
if this method has no probative force, the elimination (anaskeue) method,
which is wholly confirmed by and through it, has no cogency either».
Although the Epicureans are unable to call the motion-void inference one
by “similarity”, they insist here, as elsewhere, that the real work of “con-
firmation” is done in a separate stage, in which the similarity between
numerous observed cases of motion establishes that all motion requires
empty space. The anaskeue inference, «Since there is motion, there is
void», is a further purely formal step, applying the lessons learnt by the
similarity method, with no independent probative force.
Our author, the putative Antiochus, has made the mistake of placing
all the emphasis on the anaskeue inference itself, even saying that it is
this inference from motion to void which “confirms” the existence of
void. Philodemus’ Epicurean master Zeno of Sidon insists, on the con-
trary, that all the work of “confirmation” is done in the separate
“similarity” inference. And although other contemporary Epicureans
mentioned by Philodemus, including Demetrius of Laconia, differ among
themselves about how to regard anaskeue — some affirming, others deny-
ing, that it is any kind of sign-inference at all — they are all agreed
that it has no power to “confirm” anythingJ. Barnes, Epicurean Signs, cit., pp. 103, 133, for the evidence that some
Epicureans accept anaskeue as a sound form of semeiosis. But note that these texts
allow only that some things are “captured” (ἀλίσκεσθαι) by anaskeue: that term is
in the Epicureans’ usage contrasted with “locking up” (κατακλείειν, xxxιιι 8, cfr. xv
37), i.e. confirming, a task consistently assigned to the similarly method of inference.
As for ouk antimarturesis, although the term itself is barely visible
in the De signis, the concept of “no counterevidence” features prom-
inently there, and it is consistently presented as a way of confirming
inferences by “similarity”, not those by anaskeueviιι 1-13, xιιι 1-8, xxi 12-6, xxxii 24-7, xxxv 20-2, xxxvi 7-17.
The conclusion is irresistible that what we have in Sextus is the
product of a faulty reading of one of the Epicurean works whose contents
are reflected in Philodemus, De signis
metrius of Laconia. Sextus’ citations of Demetrius show that the latter was an ac-
knowledged source for Epicurean doctrine, and since his account of the Epicurean-
Stoic debate on signs was very condensed (Philodem. de sign. xxviii 13-14) it could
all the more easily have misled Antiochus. Philodemus’ De signis (even supposing
it to have been a published work) was itself written well after Antiochus’ death in
68-7 B.C. probably in the early 30s B.C. (A.A. Long-D.N. Sedley, op. cit., ii,
p. 263). As for Zeno of Sidon, his discussion was apparently an oral one, recon-
structed by his pupils Philodemus and Bromius (Philodem. de sign. xix 4 ff.).
rus has a scientific principle of ouk antimarturesis, and in order to find
out about it he has followed a procedure which should by now be becom-
ing familiar: he has turned not to the writings of Epicurus, but to a
contemporary Epicurean textbook. Failing to find in it the actual termouk antimarturesis, he has mistakenly identified it with the anaskeuemethod, exemplified by the inference from motion to void.
Since our source turns out to be a non-Epicurean observer of this
late second-century B.C. Epicurean theory of signs, the hypothesis that
he is Antiochus is much strengthened. His explanation of ouk antimartu-resis is the only formal one that we have, but, sadly, it must be discounted
as almost completely wrong. Does this mean that we must also disregard
the earlier part of his report, 203-10, on the truth of sense-impressions?
Not necessarily. But we must at least treat it with all due caution, pre-
pared to find not only misunderstandings, such as we have witnessed,
but also distortions due to Antiochus’ own quasi-historical purposes. One
likely case of this is his failure to mention the Epicurean criterion prolep-sis — just as he subsequently omits any mention of prolepsis as a Stoic
criterion. For anyone attuned to Stoic thought as Antiochus was, prolep-seis will imply logos, which according to the Stoic definition is composed
of themAetius iv 11, 4 ( = S.V.F. ii 83), and, for Antiochus himself, cfr. Cic.ac. ii 30.
tention to their criterial status for either Epicurus or Chrysippus reflects
his determination to discount logos as an independent criterion.
One worrying passage is the opening of the Epicurean section, 203-
5. In outline, the argument attributed to the school is:
(1) All pathe are true; e.g. what causes pleasure in us eo ipso really
is pleasant.
(2) Phantasiai are themselves pathe.
(3) Therefore what causes a phantasia (the phantaston) must really
be such as it appearsGigante, op. cit., p. 122. However, I feel the transmitted reading (retaining ὑπάρχον
for ὑπάρχειν, with most mss.) can be tolerated: «what is productive of each of them
[the phantiasiai] is completely a phantaston, which, being a phantaston, cannot be
productive of a phantasia without being in reality such it appears».
(4) This result conforms to the definition of a true phantasia as one
ἀπὸ ὑπάρχοντος and κατ’ αὐτὸ τὸ ὑπάρχον.
The terminology of (4) is directly taken from the Stoic definition
of phantasia kataleptike, suggesting that Antiochus is setting out to
present Epicurean enargeia as pointing towards the Stoic criterion to
which we know that he himself adheredvii 248 for the Stoic definition. Since (4) is attributed to “the
Epicureans”, it might be suspected that these Epicureans are merely adding to Epicu-
rus’ argument the observation that his account obeys Stoic requirements too. But
the Stoicising tendency is being attributed to Epicurus himself too, since the same
Stoic terminology is already built into (1) as well: 203, ἀπὸ ποιητικῶν τινῶν καὶ
κατ’ αὐτὰ τὰ ποητικά.
leads on to a further worry. Do steps (l)-(3) really contain an authentic
Epicurean argument? Their inference is from (1) the objective truth ofpathe, to (3) the objective truth of phantasiai, by way of (2) the premise
that phantasiai are themselves a kind of pathe. As Gigante has pointed
outOp. cit., p. 126.Pathe are an in-
dependent criterion (another fundamental tenet altogether omitted by
Antiochus!), with sensory phantasiai ranked alongside them, not sub-
sumed under themDiog. Laert. χ 31, Epicur. ep. Her. 63, R.S. xxiv, for αἰσθήσεις and
πάθη as coordinate criteria. There is, of course, also a more intimate link than that
between them: all πάθη are generically pleasure or pain (attributed to Epicurus not
only in our present passage but also by Demetrius of Laconia quoted at Μ x 225);
pleasure and pain are identical to good and bad respectively; and all good and bad
are found in αἰσθησις (ep. Men. 124). It follows that all πάθος is found “in” αἴσθησις.
But this in no way entails either that the two are identical or that one is a species
of the other, just that all πάθος accompanies perception. It would be hard to maintain
that the representational properties of φαντασίαι are varieties of pleasure and pain.
by emendation
of phantasiai, since these are pathe belonging to us». M. Gigante, op. cit., pp. 122-
126, proposes to read καὶ ἐπὶ τῶν φαντασιῶν <τῶν> παθῶν περὶ ἡμᾶς οὐσῶν, «per
quanto attiene alle rappresentazioni delle interne affezioni», which is syntactically
unlikely and syllogistically weaker without even being any more orthodox doctrinally.
Cfr. D. Fowler’s review, Sceptics and Epicureans, «Oxford Studies in Ancient
Philosophy», ii (1984) pp. 237-67, at 247-8.phanta-sia as a kind of pathos is an item of Stoic doctrineiv 12,1-6 = S.V.F. ii 54. Another Stoic intrusion into the passage is
the term φανταστόν: cfr. M. Gigante, op. cit., p. 127.
Antiochus is supplying the premise himself.
What would Antiochus’ motive be? It is not hard to guessGigante, op. cit., pp. 127-8, the insight
that this part of the Epicurean doxography is drawing on Cyrenaic themes. Note
especially how, in (2), περὶ ἡμᾶς πάθη echoes 194 on the Cyrenaics.
Cyrenaics, as presented in the preceding text, had got as far as recognis-
ing that pathe are enarge in themselves, but had denied them any cognitive
hold on external fact. To make the Cyrenaics into worthwhile allies, An-
tiochus needs someone to continue that process, first giving pathe cogni-
tive access to the external world, then going on to attach the same objec-
tive enargeia to sensory phantasiai, thus pointing the way towards Stoicphantasia kataleptike. The Epicureans, it seems, were chosen for the job.
There seem to be grounds for pessimism. The Epicurean section
starts with what may well be pure historical fabrication on Antiochus’
part, designed to suggest steady progress towards the truth as he con-
ceives it. And it ends with a well-intentioned but hopelessly bungled at-
tempt to explain Epicurean scientific principles of inference. Can we sal-
vage anything? Miraculously, we can. The central section of the passage
(206-10) is a brilliant, albeit incompleteLucr. iv
486-96, Diog. Laert. x 31-2, PHerc. 19/698; see further, A. A. Long-D.N. Sedley,op. cit., section 16).
dictum that all sense-impressions are true. While its accuracy cannot be
directly proved, it appears to contain no blunders, anachronisms or wilful
misrepresentations. On the contrary, the terminology, the concepts and
the examples are all authentically Epicurean
ous part of the passage been called by the Stoic name τὸ ὑπάρχον: see M. Gigante,op. cit., pp. 130-7, for a careful survey of this and other authentic Epicurean details.
did not always invent history or misread his sources.
5. Closing remarks
There are numerous further passages in which both Democritus and
Epicurus are cited and criticised by Sextus. An adequate investigation
would need to examine individual passages, themes and contexts in detail
comparable to that in which I have treated the long survey of views on
the criterion. And that would require not a single paper, but a book.
I have little notion of what the results of such an investigation would
be. Much would depend on general conclusions about the Pyrrhonists’
handling of philosophical history when compiling diaphoniai and other
refutations. But I am prepared to wager that in any such study the con-
temporaries and near-contemporaries of Aenesidemus will continue to
loom as large as they have done already. It is, for example, well known
that, apart from Epicurus himself, the one named Epicurean spokesman
to whom Sextus pays attention is Demetrius of Laconia, yet again Ae-
nesidemus’ near-contemporary.
I am also conscious that I have said very little about Sextus himself.
Of course, I do not mean to reduce him to a mere copyist of Aeneside-
mus. There is plenty of post-Aenesideman Pyrrhonism in his works, and
much of the medical input could well be his own
analogy at M vii 179, and certainly the reference to his own work Ἰατρικὰ ὑπο-
μνήματα at 202.
cerns the reporting of doctrine, outside the medical and Pyrrhonist tradi-
tions the latest named thinkers and sources in Sextus’ works are again
and again writers of the first century B.C.M viii
258, who may be identical with the teacher of Marcus Aurelius.
Clitomachus, Antiochus, Philo of Larissa, Asclepiades, Charmadas, Ae-
nesidemus himself, and Demetrius of LaconiaM vi, as maintained by M. Gigante,op. cit., pp. 215-21, or in M ii, as argued by F. Longo Auricchio, Epicureismo escetticismo sulla retorica, in Atti del XVII Congresso Internazionale di Papirologia
(Napoli, 19-26 maggio 1983), Napoli 1984, pp. 453-72, that too would surely be
through his contemporary Aenesidemus.
history of atomism in Sextus, these are the people through whose eyes
we must expect to be viewing it.