122 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book m. 



the Dialogue with the common Greek proverbial faying, yjtkiTra ici 

 v:^.Xa. And, indeed, from what he has faid of it, one fhould think 

 that the defmition of it was not only difficult but impoffible. This 

 Dialogue, therefore, concludes, like another Dialogue of Plato's upon 

 a moll important fubjed, what fcitncc is; where he only difputes and 

 refutes, but determines nothing. 



In this manner the moft of the Dialogues of Plato conclude; 

 Whereas Ariftotle, though he propofes doubts upon every fubjed 

 that he treats, (which doubts, I think, illuftrate the fubjed: very 

 much, and lead to the decifion of it; and, therefore, he calls it xot- 

 Xoji a'xo^ri<r=^i ;) and, though he recites the opinions of the philofo- 

 phers that had gone before him on the fubjed, when they are dif- 

 ferent from his own, always decides the matter one way or ano- 

 ther. In this v/ay he has determined that moft important quef- 

 tion above mentioned, what fcience /j, in his great work upon Lo- 

 gic. It is therefore true what the fchool-men fay of thofe two phi- 

 lofophers, difputat Plato^ docet Arijloteks. It is the more furprifmg 

 that Plato has not informed us what Beauty is, as he has fpent fo 

 much time upon the fubjed, more, I think, than upon any other 

 that he has treated of in his Dialogues ; and particularly in the Con* 

 viviiim^ the longeft dialogue, I believe, that he has written, where- 

 of the fubjed is the praife of Beauty, of which he has given us an 

 eulogium from the mouth of feveral fpeakers, and of Socrates a- 

 mong others, who fays, " That to know perfedly what Beauty is, 

 " or the cLVTo TO KiXovy is the greateft wifdom, and the grcateft hap- 

 " pinefs of men*." Yet he has no where told us what the Beauti- 

 ful is ; nor indeed has he fo much as attempted to define it. 



In the manner I have mentioned, we form the idea of Beau- 

 ty in any coUedion of objeds, or in the fame objed confifting of 

 parts, in which we perceive any order or arrangement. But if, on 



the 

 * See the Convivium, p. 1199, Ficinif towards the end of the dialogue. 



