P Y R 



P Y II 



PYRRHOCORAX, in Ornithology, a fpecies of Corvus 

 (which fee), the Alpine crow of Lalliam, and the Choucas 

 des Alpes of Buflon. — Alfo, the Moiiedula, Coracias of 

 Aldrovand, &c., Cornifh cliough, red-legged crow of 

 Pennant and Latham, and Coiivus Graculus, which fee. 



PYRRHONIANS, Pvhrhoneans, or Fyrrhoni//s, a 

 fe£l of ancient piiilofophers, fo called from their founder 

 Pyrrho, a Greek philofopher, born at Elea, in Pelopon- 

 Hefus, who in early life ftudied painting, but afpiring to phi- 

 lofophical purfuits he became a difciple of Anaxarchus, and 

 accompanied him as far as India. In this journey he fol- 

 lowed Alexander the Great ; and hence we may know in 

 what time he flourifhed. In India he converfed with the 

 Brachmans and Gymnofophifts, imbibing from their doc- 

 trine whatever might feem favourable to his natural difpo- 

 fition towards doubting ; a difpofition which was cherifhed 

 by his mafler, who had formerly been a difciple of a fcep- 

 tical philofopher, Metrodorus of Chios. As he was in- 

 volved in frefii uncertainty by every advance he made in the 

 ftudy of philofophy, he left the fchool of the Dograatifts, 

 who profelfed to be podefTed of certain knowledge, and 

 eftabhfhed a new fchool, in which he taught, that every ob- 

 jeft of human inquiry is involved in uncertainty, fo that it 

 is impofhble ever to arrive at the knowledge of truth. 



The dilUnguifhing charafter of this philofopher was, 

 that he profefTed to doubt of every thing, maintaining that 

 men only judge of truth and falfehood from appearances, 

 which deceive. Oil this principle he kept himfelf in con- 

 tinual fufpenfion of mind, never determining on any thing ; 

 to avoid the inconveniencies of error and falle judgments. 



He found ni all things (fays Bayle) reafons to affirm and 

 to deny ; and therefore he fufpended his ali'ent after he had 

 •well examined the arguments pre and ran, and reduced all his 

 conclufions to a iion liquet, let the matter be farther enquired 

 into. Hence it is (fays he) that he fought truth as long 

 as he lived, but he fo contrived the matter, as never to 

 grant that he had found it. Though he is not the inven- 

 tor of that method of philofophizing, yet it goes by his 

 name. The art of difputing about every thing, without 

 doing any thing elfe but fufpending one's judgment, is 

 called Pyrrhonifm, or Scepticifm. 



Some have faid, that this philofopher adled upon his 

 own principles, and carried his fcepticifm to an extreme lo 

 ridiculous, that his friends were obliged to accoinpany him 

 wherever he went, that he might not be run over by car- 

 riages, or fall down precipices. Thefe reports, however, are 

 inconfiftent with the refpeft that is paid to him by ancient 

 writers, and with the general hiftory of his life, and are 

 charged, as calumnies, upon the Dogmatifts, whom he op- 

 pofed. A great part of his life was fpent in folitude ; and 

 he always preferved a fettled compofure of countenance, 

 undifturbed by fear, or joy, or grief. He endured bodily 

 pain with great fortitude ; and in the midft of dangers he 

 manifefted no figns of apprehenfion. As a difputant, he 

 was celebrated for the iubtlety of his arguments, and the 

 perfpicuity of his language. So highly was Pyrrho efteemed 

 by his countrymen, that they honoured him with the office 

 of chief prieft, and from refpeft to him, paffed a decree by 

 which all philofophers were indulged with an exemption 

 from pubhc taxes. Of the poets, and particularly of 

 Homer, he was a great adn»irer ; and frequently repeated 

 paflages from his poems. He flourifhed about the iioth 

 olympiad, and died about the 90th year of his age, pro- 

 bably in the 123d olympiad, B.C. 288. After his death, 

 the Athenians honoured his memory with a ftatue ; and a 

 monument, as Laertius informs us, was erefted to him in 

 his own country. His fcepticifm may in a great raeafure 



be afcribed to his early acquaintance with the fyRern of 

 Democritus. Having learned from this philofopher t& 

 deny the real cxiftence of all qualities in bodies, except 

 Jiofc that are effential to primary atoms, and to refer every 

 thing file to the perceptions of the mind produced by ex- 

 ternal objefts, tiiat is, to appearance and opinion, he con- 

 cluded, that all knowledge depended upon the fallacious re- 

 port of the fenfes, and confequeiitly, that there can be no 

 fuch thing as certainty. In this notion he was encouraged 

 by the geuiral fpirit of the Eleatic fchool, in which he was 

 educated, which was unfavourable to fci^'nce. But his fcep. 

 ticifni was more coniirmed by the fubtleties of the Dialedtic 

 fchool, in which he was inftruCted by Bryfon, the fon of 

 Stilpo. Regarding mental tranquillity as the great end of 

 all philofophy, and obferving that nothing contributed fo 

 much to diiturb it, as the diiienfions which agitated the 

 fchools of the Dogmatills, and alfo inferring from their 

 endlefs difputes the uncertainty of the quellions which they 

 debated, he had recourfc to the doctrine of univerfal un- 

 certainty ; and thus it happened in his cafe, as in that of 

 many others, that controverly became the parent of fcep- 

 ticifm. 



Pyrrho had feveral difciples, but none who merit parti- 

 cular notice except Timon, the Phliafian, who lived to the 

 age of 90 years, and flourifhed in the time of Ptolemy Phi- 

 ladelphus. The public fucceiTicri of profeffors in the Pyr- 

 rhonic fchool terminated with Timon, and in Cicero's time 

 this fchool was cxtinft. The difciples of Timon chofe to fcreen 

 their fcepticifm under the authority of the Academy ; and 

 after fome interval, the fchool itfelf was revived by Ptolemjeus, 

 a Cyrcnian, and continued at Alexandria by CEncfidemus, 

 a contemporary with Cicero : the latter wrote a treatife 

 " On the Principles of the Pyrrhonian Philofophy," the 

 heads of which are preferved by Pliotius. From his time it 

 wastranfmitted, through a feries of preceptors little known, 

 to Sextus Empiricus, who has given a fummary of the fcep. 

 lical doftrine ; for an account of which, fee Sceptics. 

 As for Pyrrho and his followers, they rather endeavoured 

 to demolifti every other philofophical flruAure, than to 

 ereft one of their own... They aflerted nothing ; but pro- 

 pofed pofitions merely in the way of enunciation, without 

 attempting to determine on which fide, in any difputed 

 queftion, the truth lay, or even prefuming to affert, that 

 one propofition was more probable than another. 



Thofe now diftinguiflied by the name of Pyrrhonians, or 

 Sceptics, are pei-fons who, from the great number of things 

 that are dark and obfcure, and from the averfion they bear 

 to popular credulity, maintain, that there is nothing cer- 

 tain in the world. 



The truth is, Pyrrhonifm has fome foundation in nature : 

 we do not judge of things, from their real eflences, but 

 from their relations to ourfelves. Moft of our ideas we 

 receive by means of our fenfes ; but our fenfes are not given 

 us to judge of the effences, but of the relations of things 

 to themfelves ; i. e. how they may afFeft us fo as to do us 

 good or harm. 



Thus, e. gr. our eyes do not give us the real magnitudes 

 of objefts, but their relative ones only. 



The Academics differed from the Pyrrhonians, in that 

 they owned there were fome things more like or more near 

 akin to truth than others, which the Pyrrhonians peremp- 

 torily denied. On account of the fimilarity of the opinions 

 of this feft and thofe of the Platonic fchool in the Middle 

 and New Academy, it happened, that many of the real 

 followers of Pyrrho chofe to fcreen themfelves from the 

 reproach of univerfal fcepticifm, by calling themfelves 

 Academics (which fee) ; and hence the appellation of Pyr- 



rhoniits 



