The question of Thales—Water the beginning of things—Soul in all things—Mystery
in science—Abstraction and reality—Theory of development—Air
the beginning of things—All things pass—The eternal and the temporary—The
weeping philosopher
I - THALES
For several centuries prior to the great
Persian invasions of Greece, perhaps the very greatest and wealthiest
city of the Greek world was Miletus. Situate about the centre of the Ionian
coasts of
Asia
Minor, with four magnificent harbours and a strongly defensible
position, it gathered to itself much of the great overland trade, which has
flowed for thousands of years eastward and westward between India and the
Mediterranean; while by its great fleets it created a new world of its own
along the Black Sea coast. Its colonies there were so numerous that Miletus
was named ‘Mother of Eighty Cities.’
From Abydus on the Bosphorus,
past Sinope, and so onward to the Crimea and the Don, and thence round to
Thrace, a busy community of colonies, mining, manufacturing, ship-building,
corn-raising, owned Miletus for their mother-city. Its marts must therefore
have been crowded with merchants of every country from India to Spain, from
Arabia to Russia; the riches and the wonders of every clime must have become
familiar to its inhabitants. And fitly enough, therefore, in this city was
born the first notable Greek geographer, the first constructor of a map, the
first observer of natural and other curiosities, the first recorder of
varieties of custom among various communities, the first speculator on the
causes of strange phenomena,—Hecataeus.[1] His work is in great part lost, but we know a good deal about it from
the frequent references to him and it in the work of his rival and follower,
Herodotus.
Elpenor's note :
[1]Not convincing. Philosophy is not caused by such
circumstances, present also in other epochs and countries without
the same results.
A History of Greek Philosophy /
THE SCHOOL OF MILETUS /
THALES
