To modern criticism this may
seem to be little better than verbiage, having, perhaps, some possibilities
of poetic treatment, but certainly very unsatisfactory if regarded as
science. But to this we have to reply that one is not called upon to regard
it as science. Behind science, as much to-day when our knowledge of the
details of phenomena is so enormously increased, as in the times when
science had hardly begun, there lies a world of mystery which we cannot
pierce, and yet which we are compelled to assume. No scientific treatise can
begin without assuming Matter and Force as data, and however much we may
have learned about the relations of forces and the affinities of
things, Matter and Force as such remain very much the same dim
infinities, that the originative ‘Infinite’ was to Anaximander.
It is to be noted, however,
that while modern science assumes necessarily two correlative data or
originative principles,—Force, namely, as well as Matter,—Anaximander seems
to have been content with the formulation of but one; and perhaps it is just
here that a kinship still remains between him and Thales and other
philosophers of the school. He, no more than they, seems to have definitely
raised the question, How are we to account for, or formulate, the principle
of difference or change? What is it that causes things to come into
being out of, or recalls them back from being into, the infinite void?
A History of Greek Philosophy /
THE SCHOOL OF MILETUS /
ANAXIMANDER
