

PLATT 4703 



it, and his view accords with twentieth century 

 thought: 



Platonism appears as the most Greek of all 

 philosophies, since it does not, like the Ionian and 

 Eleatic doctrines that preceded it, reflect merely 

 a single peculiarity of a single stock, but has in- 

 cluded within itself all previous philosophy and 

 reflects the Greek spirit as a whole. 



It falls naturally into three classes: dialectics 

 (or logic), physics and ethics. It became an 

 idealistic, rather than a realistic, theory of 

 things. He accepted Socrates' doctrine of vir- 

 tue, that virtue is dependent on knowledge, and 

 that truth and the good exist inseparably. 

 From a study of the particular virtues, he rose 

 to a conception of virtue in general. The moral 

 ideal becomes the one, the good, the true. In- 

 dividual things are fleeting; the general idea 

 alone is^ permanent. The tree, the man, the 

 flower pass away and change; the general con- 

 cept tree, man, flower however, remains un- 

 changed. The general concept, or Idea, there- 

 fore alone has true being. 



Reasoning thus, he formulated his. celebrated 

 doctrine of Ideas. Just as there is a material 

 world known through our senses, so there must 

 be another, or "other," world of our ideas, of 

 which we cannot gain any knowledge through 

 our perceptions. Thus are the claims for an 

 ' immaterial reality" consciously and fully ex- 

 pressed, and a doctrine of Idealism expounded 

 that became one of the most fruitful and force- 

 ful processes of all European thought. And 

 through it all run the two persistent threads: 

 "Reason guiding will is the supreme factor," 

 and "There is identity between the true ami 

 the good." 



With Plato all of Greek thinking reached 



the very height of its development. With him 



for the first time philosophy had its realixa- 



tion. and the whole natural and .spiritual world 



reconstructed scientifically in accordance 



uith philoM.phir.-d principles. His influence on 



Aristotle (his immediate successor), the Stoics 



(see STOICISM), Plutarch, the Christian fat! 



tin writers of the Renaissance and the whole 



< .,1, TII thought has been permanent and 



aching. M.A.II 



The student of Plato will do well to read in 

 imne such articles on philosophy aa CON- 

 CEIT. PERCEPTION. REASON. Consult, also, Shorey'n 

 rnitv of Plato's Thought; Pater's Plato >,<! 

 Pfo ton torn. 



PLATT, THOMAS COLUEB (1833-1910), an 

 I >i| n K -al loader, long a prominent fig- 

 publican party. He was born 

 Owego, N. Y., was educated at Yale, and be- 



PLATTDEUTSCH 



fore he entered political life was a druggisi ana 

 president of the Tioga National Bank. li> 

 political career began with his election in 1859 

 as clerk of Tioga County ; in 1872, after he had 

 become the political friend and ally of Roscoe 

 Conkling (which see), he was elected to Con- 

 gress. In 1881 Platt was elected United States 

 Senator, but shortly afterwards both he and his 

 colleague, Senator Conkling, resigned, because 

 President Garfield would not follow their w 

 in making appointments. The New York 1 

 lature failed to reelect them, but Platt. who 

 had gained control of the New York Repub- 

 lican organization, regained his seat in the Sen- 

 ate in 1897 and was reflected. 



PLATTDEUTSCH, plat'doich, LOW GER- 

 MAN, or more correctly, LOW SAXON, is the 

 language spoken in the lowlands of Northern 

 Germany. This territory reaches from the 

 boundary of Holland eastward to that of Rus- 

 sian Poland, and comprises about one-third of 

 the German Empire. Plattdeutsch differs from 

 High German less in its inflections than in its 

 consonant sounds, and the use of ik in Low 

 German in the place of the High German ich 

 (I) is so distinctive a feature that the general 

 boundary between High German and Low Ger- 

 man territory is often spoken of as the ich-litn-. 

 Plattdeutsch is more like the Dutch of th. 

 Netherlands and like English than is the High 

 German. 



Previous to the beginning of the seventeenth 

 century Low German was the literary language 

 as well as the vernacular, or common tongue, 

 of Northern Germany. Kpic*. ballads, and 

 many religious treatises and hymns wen writ- 

 ten in it, and a Low German Bible e\M.-d be- 

 fore the first translation into High German was 

 begun. Gradually the language of the southern 

 German states became dominant, owing larp 1\ 

 to the immense popularity of Luther's version 

 of the Bible, and Plattdeutsch became merely 

 the everyday language of the people. The la-t 

 Low German Bible was printed in 1621. 



To-day High German is the language of the 

 .M-hMi,k the government, ami in the mam oi 

 i h< classes. Among the people ot" 



'. Cermany as a whole. IMattdeutM-h ; 

 sists, but words and com nhut ions MI. CO n- 

 Mantly being borrowed from the High (Jerman, 

 M th it the character of the common speech i- 

 gradually chaimmjr. Interest in Low (i. 

 mriraMiig among scholars, a* it affords \ 

 lent means of investigating the IIM..IV ,f the 



i an language. 

 See PHILOLOGY; GERMAN l.\\. 



