"l . . From different starting
.
.
.
llointN, tipxai he strikes off into different lines of thought and u h im111uly rc:11chcN inconNistc:nt 1m1>wcrN. Tllkc 011 example his discussion
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of the soul . . . in each case the answer is the consequence of the manner in which he posits the problem. In short, it is possible to explain this type of inconsistencies as natural results of the method he applies. 170
In the Aristotelian method of "different starting-points," we can recognize the method Aristophanes attributed to Socrates, and we have seen to what extent all antiquity remained faithful to this method. 171 For this reason, During's description can in fact apply, mutatis mutandis, to almost all the philosophers of antiquity. Such a method, consisting not in setting forth a system, but in giving precise responses to precisely limited questions, is the heritage - lasting throughout antiquity - of the dialectical method; that is to say, of the dialectical exercise.
To return to Aristotle: there is a profound truth in the fact that he himself used to call his courses metlwdoi. 172 On this point, moreover, the Aristotelian spirit corresponds to the spirit of the Platonic Academy, which was, above all, a school which formed its pupils for an eventual political role, and a research institute where investigations were carried out in a spirit of free discussion. 173
It may be of interest to compare Aristotle's methodology with that of Plotinus. We learn from Porphyry that Plotinus took the themes for his writings from the problems which came up in the course of his teaching. m Plotinus' various logoi, situated as they are within a highly specific problematic, are responses to precise questions. They are adapted to the needs of his disciples, and are an attempt to bring about in them a specific psychagogic effect. We must not make the mistake of imagining that they are the successive chapters of a vast, systematic exposition of Plotinus' thought. In each of these logoi, we encounter the spiritual method particular to Plotinus, but there is no lack of incoherence and contradictions on points of detail when we compare the doctrinal content of the respective treatises. 175
When we first approach the Neoplatonic commentaries on Plato and Aristotle, we have the impression that their form and content are dictated exclusively by doctrinal and exegetical considerations. Upon closer examination, however, we realize that, in ·each commentary, the exegetical method and doctrinal content arc functions of the spiritual level of the audience to which the commentary is addressed. The reason for this is that there existed a cursus of philosophical instruction, based on spiritual progress. One did not read the same texts to beginners, to those in progress, and to those already having achieved perfection, and the concepts appearing in the commentaries are also functions of the spiritual capacities of their addressees. Consequently, doctrinal content can vary considerably from one commentary to another, even when written by the same author. This docs not mean that the commentator changed his doctrines, but that the needs of his disciples were differcnt.176 In the literary genre of parene.fis, used for exhorting beginners, one could, in order to bring about 11 specific effect in the interlncutor'N Nnul, utilize
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1 07
the arguments of a rival school. For example, a Stoic might say, "even if pleasure is the good of the soul (as the Epicureans would ha1ve it), nevertheless we must purify ourselves of passion." m Marcus Aurelius exhorted himself in the same manner. If, he writes, the world is a mere aggregate of atoms, as the Epicureans would have it, then death is not to be feared.178
Moreover, we ought not to forget that many a philosophical demonstration derives its evidential force not so much from abstract reasoning as from an experience which is at the same time a spiritual exercise. We have seen that this was the case for the Plotinian demonstration of the immortality of the soul. Let the soul practice virtue, he said, and it will understand that it is immortal.179 We find an analogous example in the Christian writer Augustine.
In his On the Trinity, Augustine presents a series of psychological images of the Trinity which do not form a coherent system, and which have consequently been the source of a great deal of trouble for his commentators. In fact, however, Augustine is not trying to present a systematic theory of trinitarian analogies. Rather, by making the soul turn inward upon itself, he wants to make it experience the fact that it is an image of the Trinity. In his words: "These trinities occur within us and are within us, when we recall, look at, and wish for such things." 180 Ultimately, it is in the triple act of remembering God, knowing God, and loving God that the soul discovers itself to be the image of the Trinity.
From the preceding examples, we may get some idea of the change in perspective that may occur in our reading and interpretation of the philosophical works of antiquity when we consider them from the point of view of the practice of spiritual exercises. Philosophy then appears in its original aspect: not as a theoretical construct, but as a method for training people to live and to look at the world in a new way. It is an attempt to transform mankind.
Contemporary historians of philosophy are today scarcely inclined to pay attention to this aspect, although it is an essential one. The reason for this is that, in conformity with a tradition inherited from the Middle Ages and from the modern era, they consider philosophy to be a purely abstract-theoretical activity. Let us briefly recall how this conception came into existence.
It seems to be the result of the absorption of philosophia by Christianity .
Since its inception, Christianity has presented itself as a philosophia, insofar as it assimilated into itself the traditional practices of spiritual exercises. We see this occurring in Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Augustine, and monastici:im.1"1 With the advent of medieval Scholasticism, however, we find a clear distinction being drawn between theologia and philosophia. Theology became conscious of its autonomy qua supreme science, while philosophy was emptied of its spiritual exercises which, from now on, were relegated to Christian mysticism nnd ethics. Reduced to the rank of a "handmaid of theology,"
philmmphy'N role waN henceforth to furnish theology with conceptual - and ht•ncc purely t hcoret ie.:nl
mnterinl . When, in the modern age, philosophy
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regained its autonomy, it still retained many features inherited from this medieval conception. In particular, it maintained its purely theoretical character, which even evolved in the direction of a more and more thorough systematization.182 Not until Nietzsche, Bergson, and existentialism does philosophy consciously return to being a concrete attitude, a way of life and of seeing the world. For their part, however, contemporary historians of ancient thought have, as a general rule, remained prisoners of the old, purely theoretical conception of philosophy. Contemporary structuralist tendencies do not, moreover, incline them to correct this misconception, since spiritual exercises introduce into consideration a subjective, mutable, and dynamic component, which does not fit comfortably into the structuralists' models of explanation.