CHAPTER I 



THE HELLENIC PERIOD 



(from 650 to 300 b.c.) 



THE beginnings of this period are marked by 

 an intimate mingling of scientific, cosmogoni- 

 cal and philosophical considerations . If Hegel 

 is to be believed, these considerations would have 

 manifested themselves in the form of a thesis, anti- 

 thesis and synthesis on the problem of existence. But 

 the historic reality does not correspond to this brilliant 

 conception. In fact, from its first appearance, Greek 

 philosophical thought betrayed diverse tendencies more 

 or less opposed, which often ignored one another. It 

 was not with one single problem that it was occupied, 

 but rather with a number of questions more or less 

 disconnected, concerning the origin and the purpose 

 of the Universe. From the first there can be clearly 

 perceived three tendencies, which persisted through 

 the centuries unto our own times. The school called 

 Ionian applied itself to external phenomena, and en- 

 deavoured to find in them the final explanation of 

 reality. At almost the same period, the Pythagorean 

 school, in the south of It&ly, sought, on the contrary, 

 this explanation in number, an abstract principle which 

 is not directly provided by the senses. Heraclitus, 

 indeed, considered that the unstable " becoming " was 

 the very substance of reality, and that, in order to 

 know it, recourse must be had, not to intelligence, 

 but to intuition. 



In spite of these divergences, there is, however, 



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