Evening star., 1927-11-27
The Gods and the Philosophers.

| No wonder they rebelled. Gradu.
ally, as science and philosophy grew
among the Greeks, the educated strata
| of -Athenian society ceased to believe
in these multitudinous gods. We have
seen elsewhere. and need not tell
again, how Thales, Anaximander, An.
aXimenes, Pythagoras. Empedocles,
| Heraclitus and AnaXagoras broke
away from superna tural conceptions
and attempted the first naturalis: in.
depreciation of the world; how Pfota-
soras. Gorgias. Hippias and other
'sophists" subjected the ancient faith
to criticism and ridicule; how Leucip-
pus and Democritus went to the eX-
treme Of reducing man and the world
to the level of machines: how Socrates
was put to death for believing in only
one god, and how Plato had to wander
for l. years before venturng to return
TO intolerant Athens. The philoso-
pliers nearly lost their lives and near.
ly won their case. BY the time of
Plato" says Gilbert Murray. "the orig
inal religion Of the Greeks was bank
rupt"
During the rule of Pericles skepti-
cism spread so swiftly that a moral in.
terregnum set in, remarkably parallel
in nature and cause to that which
characteriZes our own age. The decay
of the old faith was not replaced by
any sounder basis for cooperation, re-
sponsibility and decency, and a reck.
less individualism flourished in morals
and politics and even in the imperial
policy of the state. Moral conserva.
tives pointed TO the career of Alcibia.
des as typical of the unscrupulous
selfishness that seemed to come as a
corollary with unbelief. Here was one
nd hrill
of Socrates and his most scandalous
lover He had been born with every
advan+aSe of wealth and ancestry, he
had received every aid of education
and opportunity, yet he fomented war
with Spartc. recklessly: he deliberately
deceived their ambassadors by shame
less lying; he Joined in every manner
of debauchery and impious revelry; he
sold himself to the enemies of his
county and died prematurely land vet
not too soon) in welter of treachery.
What was to come of nation that
had no other god than self and no
other virtue than a calculating intel.
lect?
The dramatists struggled to keen
the old deities alive, if only as gods
from the machine. conveniences in
the disenta nglement of a tale. or the
rounding of a period In their ma.
Jestic trilogies the gods were re.
nodded in finer image than before;
Ieus became greater and nobler when
he had been passed through the
merry imagination Of Aeschylus, and
had been clothed with the serene
wisdom of Sophocles But in Euripides
even the dramatic survival of the
gods became precarious: it was not
for nothing that Protag goras had read
IN the home OF Euripides his book
On the Gods" whose first words
had been. Whether there are gods
or not we cannot know: and the
reckless dramatist had an entire au.
nience to its feet in protest when
he opened play with the insolent
line.
20 Zeus-if there be Zeus-for
| know of him only by report" Even
In the theater of Dionysus the philos-
ophers had won,
1t was among the artists that the
new conception Of the world as the
realm at once Of life and law reached
a synthesis Of form and vitality in
which rebel and conservative alike
might find unity and peace. Re.
lision had helped to generate the arts
architecture in temples. sculpture
in sacred monuments. music in ritual
and the arts Cancelled their debt by
lifting religion to heights unrealized
before In the hands of Pheidias Zeus
became the embodiment Of power and
justice. Of creative vision and
strength: and Athene seemed to be
wisdom itself after Pheidias had
carved her in her calm and majesty
When Phryne posed to Praxiteles for
the Cnidian Aphrodite, and some
handsome youth became a new
llermes under the sculptor's hand a
new religion was born. worship Of
reason and beauty: and the gods Of
Greece became worthy of her geniuses.
The common mind had made fero.
cious and ridiculous detes Of whose
morals the philosophers had forgiva.
bly, complained: hut the artists slowly
chiseled pantheon in which philoso
ply Joined with poetry to give form
and symbol tn all ideal perfections
! 1t was not her statesmen that lifted
Greece on her high plane. not her
merch4nts nor her generals: ii was
! her philosophers, her poets and her
/ artists. Let us turn TO them
fCopyrizht 1927. by Will Durantl
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