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same, seeing that all parts were in a continuous flux. Knowledge based only on sense
was therefore mere opinion (31). Real knowledge only came through the reasonings
of the mind, hence they defined everything about which they argued, and also used
verbal explanations, from which they drew proofs. In these two processes consisted
their dialectic, to which they added persuasive rhetoric (32).
§30. Quae erat: the Platonic ??, = was, as we said. In ratione et disserendo: an instance of
Cicero's fondness for tautology, cf. D.F. I. 22 quaerendi ac disserendi. Quamquam oriretur: the
sentence is inexact, it is knowledge which takes its rise in the senses, not the criterion of truth,
which is the mind itself; cf. however II. 30 and n. Iudicium: the constant translation of ???t?????,
a word foreign to the older philosophy. Mentem volebant rerum esse iudicem: Halm with his pet
MS. writes esse rerum, thus giving an almost perfect iambic, strongly stopped off before and
after, so that there is no possibility of avoiding it in reading. I venture to say that no real parallel
can be found to this in Cic., it stands in glaring contradiction to his own rules about admitting
metre in prose, Orator 194 sq., De Or. III. 182 sq. Solam censebant ... tale quale esset: probably
from Plato's Tim. 35 A thus translated by Cic., Tim. c. 7 ex ea materia quae individua est et unius
modi (ae? ?ata ta?ta e???s?? cf. 28 A. t? ?ata ta?ta e???) et sui simile, cf. also T.D. I. 58 id
solum esse quod semper tale sit quale sit, quam ?dea? appellat ille, nos speciem, and Ac. II. 129.
Illi ?dea?, etc.: there is more than one difficulty here. The words iam a Platone ita nom seem to
exclude Plato from the supposed old Academico-Peripatetic school. This may be an oversight,
but to say first that the school (illi, cf. sic tractabatur ab utrisque) which included Aristotle held
the doctrine of ?dea?, and next, in 33, that Aristotle crushed the same doctrine, appears very
absurd. We may reflect, however, that the difference between Plato's ?dea? and Aristotle's ta ?a?
a??? would naturally seem microscopic to Antiochus. Both theories were practically as dead in
his time as those of Thales or Anaxagoras. The confusion must not be laid at Cicero's door, for
Antiochus in reconciling his own dialectics with Plato's must have been driven to desperate
shifts. Cicero's very knowledge of Plato has, however, probably led him to intensify what
inconsistency there was in Antiochus, who would have glided over Plato's opinions with a much
more cautious step.
§31. Sensus omnis hebetes: this stands in contradiction to the whole Antiochean view as given in
II. 12—64, cf. esp. 19 sensibus quorum ita clara et certa iudicia sunt, etc.: Antiochus would
probably defend his agreement with Plato by asserting that though sense is naturally dull, reason
may sift out the certain from the uncertain. Res eas ... quae essent aut ita: Halm by following his
pet MS. without regard to the meaning of Cic. has greatly increased the difficulty of the passage.
He reads res ullas ... quod aut ita essent; thus making Antiochus assert that no true information
can be got from sensation, whereas, as we shall see in the Lucullus, he really divided sensations
into true and false. I believe that we have a mixture here of Antiochus' real view with Cicero's
reminiscences of the Theaetetus and of Xenocrates; see below. Nec percipere: for this see
Lucullus passim. Christ's conj. percipi, quod perceptio sit mentis non sensuum, which Halm
seems to approve, is a wanton corruption of the text, cf. II. 101 neget rem ullam percipi posse
sensibus, so 21, 119 (just like ratione percipi 91), also I. 41 sensu comprehensum. Subiectae
sensibus: cf. II. 74 and Sext. Emp. Adv. Math. VIII. 9, ta ??p?p?pt??ta t? a?s??se?. Aut ita
mobiles, etc.: this strongly reminds one of the Theaetetus, esp. 160 D sq. For constans cf. est???
?, which so often occurs there and in the Sophistes. Ne idem: Manut. for MSS. eidem. In the
Theaetetus, Heraclitus' theory of flux is carried to such an extent as to destroy the self-identity of
things; even the word eµe is stated to be an absurdity, since it implies a permanent subject,
whereas the subject is changing from moment to moment; the expression therefore ought to be t?
?? eµe. Continenter: ???e???; cf. Simplicius quoted in Grote's Plato, I. p. 37, about Heraclitus,
e? µetaß??? ?a? s??e?e? ta ??ta. Laberentur et fluerent: cf. the phrases ????, pa?ta ??e?, ?????
??e?µata ???e?s?a? ta pa?ta, etc., which are scattered thickly over the Theaet. and the ancient
texts about Heraclitus; also a very similar passage in Orator 10. Opinabilem: d??ast??, so
opinabile = d??ast?? in Cic. Tim ch. II. The term was largely used by Xenocrates (R. and P. 243
—247), Arist. too distinguishes between the d??ast?? and the ep?st?t??, e.g Analyt. Post. I. 33
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