ITS TECHNICAL FORMS. 61 



We must now say a few words on the technical 

 terms which others of the Greek philosophical sects 

 introduced. 



2. Technical Forms of the Platonists. The 

 other sects of the Greek philosophy, as well as the 

 Aristotelians, invented and adopted technical terms, 

 and thus gave fixity to their tenets and consist- 

 ency to their traditionary systems ; of these I will 

 mention a few. 



A technical expression of a contemporary school 

 has acquired perhaps greater celebrity than any of 

 the terms of Aristotle. I mean the Ideas of Plato. 

 The account which Aristotle gives of the origin of 

 these will serve to explain their nature 21 . " Plato," 

 says he, " who, in his youth, was in habits of com- 

 munication first with Cratylus and the Heraclitean 

 opinions, which represent all the objects of sense 

 as being in a perpetual flux, so that concerning 

 these no science nor certain knowledge can exist, 

 entertained the same opinions at a later period also. 

 When, afterwards, Socrates treated of moral sub- 

 jects, and gave no attention to physics, but in the 

 subjects which he did discuss, arrived at univer- 

 sal truths, and before any other man, turned his 

 thoughts to definitions, Plato adopted similar doc- 

 trines on this subject also ; and construed them in 

 this way, that these truths and definitions must be 

 applicable to something else, and not to sensible 



24 Arist. Metaph. i. 6. The same account is repeated, and 

 the subject discussed, Metaph. xii. 4. 



