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THE GREEK PHILOSOPHY.409that dark Necessity58 which rises behind the figuresof gods and men in Greek poetry. It is » indeedthe work of the divine reason to come " down uponthis shapeless mass and its inborn mover, and outof them to construct the world-soul, with whichand with his own reason he forms and maintainsand vivifies the ordered universe. As he is by thisoperation the Father of the universe, so this FirstMatter is " the Mother of all generation," the conditionof the existence of corporeal things. But inthis original matter lies the origin of evil, which,erpetuated in the corporeal structure of man, canindeed be tamed and schooled, and in a certaindegree O subdued, * but never can be exterminatedby the divine reason. The power, the wisdom, andthe providence of Plato's God are encountered bythis check, which stands eternally over against theDemiurgos in his world - forming activity, whichlimits his freedom, and impairs his personality,while it excludes the whole idea of creation.Students of this philosophy59 attempt to associatetogether his highest Idea, that of the Good, withthe supreme God, of whom he speaks withsonal attributes, as the just, the wise, the true, thegood, but admit that Plato has not attempted tove the problem how the Idea, which by his hypothesisas it is the highest is also the most general,is at the same time the most individual, the one58 Dollinger, p. 293.59 See Zeller, vol. ii. part 1, pp. 448-457