2°* S. NO 31., Aug. 2. '56.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



81 



LONDON, SATURDAY, AUGUST 2, 1856. ] 

 MEANS OF BEADING THE LOGIC OF ABISTOTLE. 



Some years ago it would have been difficult to 

 find the Greek text of the Organon (as the mo- 

 derns call it) in a separate form. Beginners, who 

 have not acquired the profligate habits of book 

 collectors, would never think of buying the five 

 volumes of Buhle (Strasburg, 1791, &c., 8vo.), or 

 the four volumes of Bekker (Berlin, 1831, &c., 

 4to.), or even the large single volume of Weise 

 (Leipsic, 1843, 4to.), for the Organon only. In 

 our day the best plan would be to get the ^}~st 

 volume of Didot's Aristotle (Paris, 1848, large 

 octavo), which is sold separately, and contains the 

 Organon, the Rhetoric, the Poetics, and the Po- 

 litics. The Latin runs by the side of the Greek, 

 and the type is beautiful. The greatest defect is 

 that the Rhetoric begins on the over leaf — or verso, 

 as the learned say — of the end of the Organon ; 

 so that any one who would like to have a separate 

 interleaved copy of the first, must spoil the se- 

 cond. It is a pity that publishers do not think of 

 such things. But it must be owned that it is not 

 uncommon to find a case the rhetoric of which 

 would never have a beginning if its logic were 

 but allowed to go on to its proper end. 



For those who would rather not read the Or- 

 ganon in Greek or Latin, but would nevertheless 

 like to get a taste of the Greek, whether for use 

 or show, there is the small work of F. A. Trende- 

 lenberg, Elementa Logices Aristotelicce, Berlin, 

 1842, 8vo., 2nd edition. This work contains (Gr. 

 Lat. with notes) such selected passages as give an 

 outline of the system, and especially of its phrase- 

 ology. These passages, translated into English, 

 form the article " Organon " in the Supplement of 

 the Penny Cyclopadia. 



I am not aware of any Latin Organon, without 

 Greek, which can be easily got at. But never 

 having met with any Latin translations of Greek 

 philosophy which were intelligible without the 

 Greek to explain them, I should probably not 

 venture to recommend such a thing, if I had found 

 it. 



In French there are two works of the highest 

 character : both by M. Barthelemy St. Hilaire. 

 The first, La Logique (TAristote, Paris, 1838, two 

 vols. 8vo., containing a complete account and 

 analysis of the Organon, with all the Greek terms 

 added, as they occur, in parentheses. The second, 

 Logique (TAristote, a complete translation, Paris, 

 1844, 1839, 1842, 1843, four vols. 8vo., with the 

 plan of each book prefixed. This is the first 

 French translation. 



The first English translation of .the Organon 

 was made by Thomas Taylor, called tlie Platonist, 

 a very remarkable man, of whom the fullest ac- 



count is in the Penny Cyclopcedia. He spent his 

 life in reviving Greek philosophy, and it is said 

 that, by his enthusiasm, he induced patrons who 

 had money to print his translations to the amount 

 of ten thousand pounds. The Organon was trans- 

 lated by Taylor for a wealthy retired tradesman, 

 named Meredith, who had read Plato in Taylor's 

 translation, and desired to read Aristotle. Taylor 

 undertook the task, on condition that Meredith 

 should print it ; but the number of copies was very 

 small. It was published in quarto, in 1807, with 

 the title. The Organon, or Logical Treatises of 

 Aristotle . . . with copious Elucidations from 

 the Commentaries of Ammonius and Simplicius. I 

 suppose this very volume afterwards formed part 

 of Taylor's complete translation of Aristotle, pub- 

 lished in nine volumes quarto, in 1812. 



Taylor's curious Platonism, and his desire to 

 revive even the very mythology of the Greeks, in 

 some sense or other, caused him to be regarded as 

 a kind of madman ; and this opinion has been pre- 

 judicial to a fair judgment of his works. His 

 translations are difficult, because they are so • 

 Greek ; but they have a merit which begins to be 

 acknowledged. Mr. Owen, presently mentioned, 

 calls him " my solitary predecessor in this labo- 

 rious undertaking, whose strict integrity in en- 

 deavouring to give the meaning of the text de- 

 serves the highest commendation." But the work 

 is so very scarce that it is needless to discuss it as 

 a means by which any one who chooses may know 

 Aristotle. I suspect that what a distinguished 

 living writer said of Cousin, " The reader must be 

 mindful to judge of Plato by M. Cousin's trans- 

 lations of the dialogues, and not by M. Cousin's 

 prefaces to them," will also apply to Taylor. 

 Still, the opinion of the man who lived and moved 

 and had his being in Greek philosophy must 

 always be worthy of attention. 



The second, and as yet the best, English trans- 

 lation of the Organon is published in Bohn's 

 Classical Library : The Organon, or JjOgical Trea- 

 tises of Aristotle, London, 1853, two vols, small 

 8vo,, translated by the Rev. O. F. Owen. This 

 translation has copious notes, and is a very great 

 boon to the student. Not that it is easy : in fact, 

 a translation of Aristotle, to be easy, must be, 

 not Aristotle, but only a presentation of the trans- 

 lator's idea of Aristotle. Taylor and Owen do 

 not read like English, nor does Barthelemy St. 

 Hilaire read like French ; there is a certain 

 Greekishness about them all. Had it been other- 

 wise, we should have had less of a translation, and 

 more of a paraphrase. 



A small portion of the Organon, the " Posterior 

 Analytics," has been translated by E. Poste, A.M., 

 of Oriel College, under the name of the Logic of 

 Science, Oxford, 1850, 8vo., with notes and an 

 introductory sketch of the Organon. This is 

 more English, and therefore more intelligible, than 



