Alhassanain(p) Network for Heritage and Islamic Thought

CHAPTER IV. THE NEO-PLATONIC ARISTOTELIANS OF THE EAST

1. KINDI

[15]

1. Kindi is related in various ways to the Mutazilite Dialecticians and the Neo-Pythagorean Natural-Philosophers of his time, and we might therefore have dealt with him among the latter, even before Razi (v. III, 1, ? 5). But yet tradition with one accord represents him as the first Peripatetic in Islam. What justification exists for this traditionary view will be seen in what follows, so far as an inference can be drawn from the few and imperfectly­preserved writings of this philosopher which have come down to us.

Abu Yaqub ibn Ishaq al-Kindi (i. e. of the tribe of Kinda) was of Arabian origin, and therefore was called the “Arabian” philosopher, to distinguish him from the numerous non-Arab associates of his, who had taken to the study of secular wisdom. He traced his genealogy to the oldKinda princes, although whether he was entitled to do so we need not seek to decide. The South-Arabian tribe of Kinda was in any case farther advanced in outward civilization than other tribes. Many Kindite families too had for long been settlers in Iraq (Babylonia); and there, in the town of Kufa, of which his father was governor, our philosopher was born, probably in the beginning of the ninth century. He received his education, it would appear, partly in Basra, and thereafter in Bagdad, and therefore in the headquarters of the culture of his time. Here he came to put a higher value upon Persian civilization and Greek wisdom than upon old Arab virtue and the Muslim faith. He maintained even, - no doubt, following others -, that Kakhtan, the ancestor of the South-Arabians was a brother of Yaunan's, from whom the Greeks were descended. It was possible to make an observation of that kind in Bagdad at the Abbasid court, for there they knew of no nationality, and regarded the ancient Greeks with admiration.

It is not known how long Kindi remained at court, or what position he held there. He is mentioned as a translator of Greek works into Arabic, and is said to have revised and improved translations made by others, for example, in the case of the so-called “Theology of Aristotle”. Nume­rous servants and disciples, whose names have been handed down to us, were probably set to this work under his supervision. Farther, he may have rendered services to the court in the capacity of astrologer or physician, and perhaps even in the administration of the revenues. But in later years he was dismissed, when he with others was made to suffer from the restoration of orthodoxy under Mutawakkil (847-861); and his library was for a long time confiscated. As regards personal character, tradition reproaches him with having been niggardly, - a stigma, however, which appears to have rested upon many other literary men and lovers of books.

The year of Kindi's death is as little known as that of his birth. He appears thus to have been out of court­favour when he died, or at least to have been in a subor­dinate position. It is strange that Masudi (v. II, 4 ? 4), who had a great regard for him, is utterly silent on this point; but it seems in the highest degree probable from one of his astrological treatises that he was still alive subsequent to the year 870. The expiry of some petty astronomical cycle was imminent at that date, and this was being utilized by the Karmatites for the overthrow of the reigning family. In this matter, however, Kindi was loyal enough to make out the prolongation, for about 450 years, of the State's existence, menaced though it was by a planetary conjunction. His princely patron might well be satisfied; and history conformed to the time predicted, to within half a-century.[ 16]

2. Kindi was a man of extraordinary erudition, a Polyhistor: he had absorbed the whole learning and culture of his time. But although he may have set down and communicated observations of his own as a geographer, a historian of civilization and a physician, he was in no respect a creative genius. His theological views bear a Mutazilite stamp. He wrotespecially on Man's power of action, and the time of its appearance, i. e. whether it was before the act or whether it was synchronous with the act. The righteousness and the unity of God he expressly emphasized. In opposition to the theory, - known at that time as Indian or Brah­manic, - that Reason is the Sole and sufficient source of knowledge, he defended prophecy, while yet he sought to bring it into harmony with reason. His acquaintance with various systems of religion impelled him to compare them together, and he found as a common element in them all the belief that the world was the work of a First Cause, One and Eternal, for whom our knowledge furnishes us with no more precise designation. It is however the duty of the discerning to recognize this First Cause-as divine; and God himself has shewn them the way thereto, and has sent them ambassadors to bear witness for him, who are instructed to promise everlasting bliss to the obedient, and to threaten corresponding punishment to those who do not obey.

3. Kindi's actual philosophy, like that of his contempora­ries, consists, first and especially, of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, in which Neo-Platonism and Neo-Pythagoreanism merge into one another. According to him no one can be a philosopher without studying Mathematics. Fanciful play upon letters and numbers is frequently met with in his writings. Mathematics he also applied to Medicine in his theory of the compound remedies. In fact he based the efficacy of these remedies, like the effect of music, upon geometrical proportion. It is here a matter of the propor­tionality of the sensible qualities, warm, cold, dry and moist. If a remedy has to be warm in the first degree, it must possess double the warmth of the equable mixture, - in the second degree, four times as much, and so on. Kindi seems to have entrusted the decision of this point to Sense, particularly to the sense of Taste, so that in him we might have a hint of the proportional relation existing between stimulus and sensation. Yet that view, though quite original, was with him a mere piece of mathematical play. However, Cardan, a philosopher of the Renaissance, on the ground of this doctrine, reckoned him among the twelve most subtle-minded thinkers.

4. In Kindi's opinion, as has already been said, the world is a work of God, but His influence in its descent is transmitted through many intermediate agencies. All higher existence affects the lower, but that which is caused has no influence upon its cause, standing as this does above it in the scale ofBeing . In all the events of the world there is a pervading causality, which makes it possible for us, from our knowledge of the cause, to foretell the future, - for example, of the positions of the heavenly bodies. Farther, in any single existing thing, if it is thoroughly known, we possess a mirror, in which we may behold the entire scheme of things.

It is to the Spirit or Mind that the higher reality and all activity belong, and matter has to dispose itself in conformity with the desire of the Spirit. Midway between the Spirit of God and the material and bodily world stands the Soul, and it is the Soul which first called into being the world of the Spheres. From this Soul of the world the Human Soul is an emanation. In its nature, that is, in its operations, it is bound to the body with which it is united, but in its spiritual essence it is independent of the body; and thus the influences of the stars, which are limited to physical occurrences, do not affect it. Kindi goes on to say that our Soul is an uncompounded, imperishable substance, de­scended from the world of reason into that of the senses, but endowed with a recollection of its earlier condition. It does not feel at home here, for it has many needs, the satisfaction of which is denied to it, and which consequently are attended with painful emotions. Verily there is nothing constant in this world of coming and going, in which we may be deprived at any moment of what we love. Only in the world of reason is stability to be found. If then we desire to see our wishes fulfilled, and would not be deprived of what is dear to us, we must turn to the eternal blessings of reason, to the fear of God, to science, and to good works. But if we follow merely after material posses­sions in the belief that we can retain them, we are pursuing an object which does not really exist.

6. Kindi's theory of knowing corresponds to the ethical and metaphysical duality of the sensible and the spiritual. According to it our knowledge is either knowledge conveyed by the senses, or knowledge acquired by the reason: that which lies between, - the Fancyor Imagination, - is called a mediating faculty. The senses, then, apprehend the Particu­lar, or the material Form, but the reason conceives the Universal, - species and genera,- or the spiritual Form. And just as that which is perceived is one with Sense­Perception, so too that which is conceived by the reason is one with Reason itself.

Here then emerges for the first time the doctrine of the Reason or of the Spirit or Mind, (voec, 'aql) in a form in which, merely modified somewhat, it occupies a large space with the later Muslim philosophers. It con­tinued to be a characteristic feature of philosophy in Islam throughout its whole course. And just as in the controversy regarding Universals in the Christian Middle Ages an objective and scientific interest is made evident also, so in the phi­losophical discussions of the Muslims concerning the thinking Spirit, the subjective requirement of intellectual culture is brought conspicuously to the front.

Kindi has a fourfold division of the Spirit:[17] first the Spirit which is ever real, - the Cause and the Essence of all that is spiritual in the world, - thus without doubt God or the First Spirit produced; second, Spirit as the Reasoning capacity or Potentiality of the human soul; third, as the Habit or actual possession of the soul, which it can make use of at any moment, just as, for example, the writer can make use of his art; fourth and last, as Activity, by which a reality within the soul may be carried over to the reality that is without. The Activity last named appears, according to Kindi, to be the act of Man himself, while to the First Cause, - to the ever-existing Spirit, - he ascribes the, carrying of Potentiality into Habit, or the realisation of the Possible. The real Spirit or Mind we have thus received from above, and the third 'aql is therefore called 'all mustafad, (Lat. intellectus adeptue eive adquisi­tus). The fundamental view of antiquity, - that all our knowledge about things must come from a source outside of us -, runs, in the form of this doctrine of the 'all mustafad or Spirit which we receive from above, through the whole of Arabian Philosophy, and thence passes into Christian Philosophy. Unfortunately the theory is nearly cor­rect, as .far as this philosophy is itself concerned, for the `Active Spirit', which has created it, is in reality the Neo­Platonic Aristotle.

Man has always attributed to his God or Gods the highest of his own possessions. Muslim theologians directly attribute to the divine agency the moral actions of men. But in the opinion of the philosophers, Knowing is of more importance than Doing. The latter, having more to do with the lower world of the senses,may possibly be Man's own; but his highest knowledge, the pure Reason, comes from above, - from the Divine Essence.

It is clear that the doctrine of the Spirit, as it stands in Kindi, goes back to the 'Nous'-doctrine of Alexander of Aphrodisias in his second book “On the Soul”. But Alexander expressly maintained that according to Aristotle there isa threefold `Nous'. Kindi says on the contrary that he is representing the opinion of Plato and Aristotle. In this the Neo-Pythagorean and the Neo-Platonic views unite: for in everything the number `Four' must be pointed out, and Plato and Aristotle brought into agreement.

6. Let us now sum up: Kindi is a Mutazilite theologian and Neo-Platonic philosopher with Neo-Pythagorean addi­tions. Socrates, the martyr of Athenian heathenism, is his ideal: on him, his fate and his teaching he has composed several works; and he seeks to combine Plato and Aristotle in Neo-Platonic fashion.

Tradition nevertheless calls him the first who followed Aristotle in his writings; and assuredly this representation is not altogether unfounded. In the long list of his works Aristotle takes a prominent place. He was not satisfied with merely translating him, but he studied his translated works and endeavoured to improve and explain them. At all events the Aristotelian Physics, with the commentary of Alexander of Aphrodisias, had an important influence upon him. Such assertions as that the world is only poten­tially unending and not actually so, and that motion is continuous, and the like, point rather in that direction. The Natural-Philosophers of that day, as well as the Faithful Brethren, said for instance, that motion had as little con­tinuity as number. But farther, Kindi resolutely turned away from the marvel-mongering philosophy of the time, by declaring Alchemy an imposture. That which nature alone could produce, he held to be beyond the power of man. Whoever then gives himself up to alchemisticexperi­ments, is in his opinion deceiving either himself or others. The famous physician, Razi, attempted to controvert this view of Kindi's.

7. The influence of Kindi as a teacher and an author has operated mainly through his Mathematics, Astrology, Geography and Medicine. His most faithful and certainly his most notable disciplewas Akhmed ibn Mohammed al-Tayyib al-Sarakhsi (t 899), a government official and friend of the Caliph Mutadid, to whose negligence or caprice he fell a victim. He worked at Alchemy and Astrology, strove to gaina knowledge of the wisdom and might of the Creator from the wonders of creation, and prosecuted the study of Geography and History. Another disciple of Kindi's has become better known, - Abu Mashar (t 885), who, however, owes all his reputation to Astrology. He is said to have become, when 47 years of age, an admirer of Kindi?s , - though up till then he had been a fanatical opponent of philosophy, - having been attracted to the pursuit of Astrology, by a superficial study of Mathematics. Whether thisbe truth or fiction, such a course of education is at all events characteristic of that inquisitive grasping at half-understood knowledge, which peculiarly belongs to the first centuries of Arab Science.

The school of Kindi went in no way beyond the master. Of its literary activity hardly any sample has been pre­served to us beyond a stray quotation or two. It is of course possible that in the treatises of the Faithful Brethren, something of it may have been saved, but this cannot be determined, in the present state of our knowledge.

2. FARABI

1. In the tenth century the Logicians or Metaphysicians are distinguished from the Natural-Philosophers. The former follow a more rigorous method than the Dialecticians, and treat of other subjects than those which are dealt with by the Physical school. They have repudiated Pythagoras, to entrust themselves to the guidance of Aristotle, of course in Neo-Platonic guise.

We have here to do with two directions of scientific interest. The Natural-Philosophers are more or less con­cerned with the plenitude of the concrete phenomena of Nature, as in Geography and Ethnology. They investigate in all directions the effects of things, and think the essential nature of these is only to be discerned in such effect or working. When they do ascend beyond Nature, Soul and Spirit, to the Divine Essence, then the definition of it to which they confine themselves, or which they adopt by preference, is - `the First Cause', or, -'the wise Creator', whose goodness and wisdom appear from his works.

The Logicians proceed in a very different way. The occurrence of the Particular has only a subordinate value in their eyes, - the value, merely, of an illustration of its deducibility from the Universal. While the Physicists start from effects or operations, the Logicians seek to comprehend things from principles. Everywhere they enquire after the Idea or Essence of things, up to the highest. For them, - to make the contrast more intelligible by an example -, God is not, first of all, `the wise Creator', but first of all `the necessarily existing Being'.

In the order of time the Logicians come after the Physical school, just as the Mutazilite Dialectic on its part (v. II,3 ?? 4 and 5) brought within the scope of its consideration first God's Working, and then his Being.

We have already come to recognize Razi as the most important representative of the philosophical direction taken by the Physicists; and as for the Logical and Metaphysical efforts, -- for which Kindi and others had prepared the way, - they culminate with Razi's younger contemporary Abu Nasr ibn Mohammed ibn Tarkhan ibn Uziag al-Farabi.

2. We cannot say much with certainty about the course of Farabi's outward life and training. He was a quiet man, devoted to a life of philosophy and contemplation, sheltered by the powerful, and assuming at last the dress of a Sufi. His father is said to have been a Persian general, and he himself was born at Wasidj, a small fortified place in the district of Farab in Turkish Transoxiana. It was in Bagdad, and partly at the hands of a Christian preceptor Yohanna ibn Hailan, that he received his education. This embraced both literary and mathematical subjects, forming the equi­valent of the 'Trivium' and 'Quadrivium' of mediaeval Christendom. One or two of his writings, particularly on Music, give evidence still of his mathematical training. Legend credits him with ability to speak in all the languages of the world, seventy in number. That he understood Turkish and Persian, - an a priori probability, - is manifest from his works. Arabic he writes clearly, and with a certain grace, although now and then his fondness for synonyms and parallel clauses interferes with the precision of philoso­phical expression.

The philosophy in which Farabi was initiated sprung from the school of Merv; and perhaps its members had given greater attention to metaphysical questions than the men of Harran and Basra with their marked leaning to Natural Philosophy.

From Bagdad, where he had long lived and worked, he went to Haleb (Aleppo), in consequence doubtless of political disturbances, and there he settled at the brilliant court of Saif addaula; but he must have spent his closing years not at court but in retirement. He died at Damascus, while on a journey, in December, 950; and it is reported that his prince, attired as a Sufi, pronounced over him his funeral oration. We are told that he was eighty years of age, and it is otherwise probable that he was a very old man. His contemporary, and partner in study, Abu Bishr Matta died ten years before him, and his pupil Abu Zakariya Yakhya ibn Adi in the year 971, at the age of eighty-one.

3. The chronological order of the works of Farabi has not been determined. Shorter treatises in which he comes into touch with the Dialecticians and Natural-Philosophers, if these are at all genuine ip the form handed down to us, may have been popular or juvenile productions of his; but his mature powers were applied to the study of Aristotle's writings, for which reason the name given him by the East was 'the Second Teacher', that is, 'the Second Aristotle'.

Since his day the number and order of the works com­posed by Aristotle or at least attributed to him,which have been paraphrased and commented on after Farabi's example, remain upon the whole fixed. First come the eight Logical treatises, viz., the Categories; the Hermeneu­tics; the First Analytics; the Second Analytics; the Topics; the Sophistics; Rhetoric; and the Poetics: It is to these that the Isagoge of Porphyry is the introduction. Then follow the eight treatises which deal with Physical subjects, viz., Auscultatio Physica; De Coeloet Mundo; De Genera­tione et Corruptione; the Meteorology; the Psychology; De Sensu et Sensato; the Book of Plants; and the Book of Animals. Lastly come the Metaphysics, the Ethics,the Politics and so on.

The so-called “Theology of Aristotle” was still considered by Farabi to be a genuine work. In Neo-Platonic fashion, and with some attempt at adaptation to the Muslim faith, he seeks to demonstrate that Plato and Aristotle harmonize with one another. The need which he experiences is not for a discriminating criticism, but for a conclusive and com­prehensive view of the world; and the satisfaction of this need, - which is rather a religious than a scientific one, - induces him to overlook philosophic differences. Plato and Aristotle must differ from each other only in method, in phraseology, and in relation to practical life: their doctrine of wisdom is the same. They are the 'imams' or 'highest authorities' in philosophy; and seeing that they were two, independent, original minds, the authority which is constituted by their agreement has more validity in the eyes of Farabi than the faith of the whole Muslim community, who with blind confidence follow the guidance of one.

4. Farabi is counted among the physicians, but he seems not to have been in actual practice. He was entirely devoted to the spiritual healing art. Purity of Soul he denominated the condition and fruit of all philosophizing, and he demanded love of truth even though it should oppose Aristotle. Then the judgment has to be trained by means of Geometry and Logic for the study of physical and mental science. Farabi, however, pays but little heed to the separate bran­ches of study: his powers are concentrated on Logic, Metaphysics, and the principles of Physics. Philosophy for him is the science of all Being as such, in the acquisition of which science we come to resemble the Godhead. It is the one, all-embracing science, which pictures the world to us as a Universe. Farabi's charge against the Dialecti­cians is, that they employ as a basis for their demonstrations the deliverances of ordinary consciousness without testing them; and the Natural-Philosophers he blames for continually occupying themselves merely with the effect of things, and thus never getting beyond the contrasts of worldly phenomena by attaining to a unified conception of the All. He would confront the former by setting Thought on a proper foun­dation; and in opposition to the latter he would thoroughly investigate the subject of the One First Cause of all that exists. Consequently we shall be taking the best way to do justice to his historical and dogmatic position, if we endeavour to give some account, first of his Logic, next of his Metaphysics, and finally of his Physics and Practical Philosophy.

5. The Logic of Farabi is not a mere analysis of scientific thinking: it contains in addition many remarks on gram­mar, and discussions on the theory of knowledge. While grammar is limited to the language of one people, Logic, on the other hand, has to regulate the expression in language of the aggregate intelligence of mankind. From the simplest elements of speech it must advance to the most complex forms, - from the word to the sentence, and on to discourse.

Logic falls into two divisions, according as its subjects stand related to actuality; the first of these comprising the doctrine of Ideas and Definitions (tasawwur), and the second, the doctrine of Judgments, Inferences, and Proofs (tasdiq). Ideas, -- with which are classed Definitions, though in a mere loose, outward juxtaposition, - have in themselves no relation to actuality, that is to say, they are neither true nor false. Among `Ideas' Farabi recognizes here the simplest psychological forms, that is, both the representations of individual objects arising from Sense-Perception, and those ideas which have been stamped upon the mind from the first, such as the Necessary, the Actual, the Possible. Such representations and ideas are immediately certain. A man's mind may be directed to these, and his soul made observant of them, but they cannot be demonstrated to him, nor can they be explained by deriving them from what is known, seeing that they are already clear in them­selves, and that too with the highest degree of certitude.

By combining representations or ideas, judgments result, and these may be either true or false. To obtain a foun­dation for these judgments we have to go back through the processes of Inference and of Proof to certain propositions originally conveyed to the understanding, immediately obvious, and admitting of no farther confirmation. Such propositions, - the fundamental propositions or Axioms of all Science, - there must be for Mathematics, Meta­physics, and Ethics.

The doctrine of Proof, by which, starting from what is known and well-established, we arrive ata knowledge of something formerly unknown, is, according to Farabi, Logic properly so called. Acquaintance with the leading Concepts (the Categories), and with their synthesis in Judgment (Hermeneutics) and in Inference (First Analytics) furnishes only the introduction thereto. And in the Proof doctrine the chief point is to ascertain the Norms or principles of a universally valid and necessary Science, which Philosophy has to be. Here the Law of Contradiction is looked upon as the highest of these principles, by which law the truth or necessity of a proposition, and at the same time the untruth or impossibility of the contrary, become known in one single cognitive act. From this point of view the Platonic Dichotomy is to be preferred, as a scientific method, to the Aristotelian Polytomy. And Farabi is not content with the formal side of the doctrine of proof. That doctrine has to be more than a methodology which points out the right way to the truth: it must itself point out the truth; it must generate science. It not only deals with judgments as material for the syllogism, but it enquires also into the truth which they contain, with reference to the particular sciences concerned. It is not a mere implement; it is rather a constituent part of philosophy.

As we have seen, the theory of proof terminates in neces­sary knowledge, corresponding to necessary existence. But besides this there is the great province of the Possible, from which we can gain only a probable knowledge. The different degrees then of probability, or the modes in which we attain toa knowledge of the Possible, are discussed in the Topics, and with them are associated Sophistic, Rhetoric and Poetics. In other connections these last three subjects are mainly concerned with practical aims, but in Farabi's hands they are combined with the Topics intoa Dialectic of the Seeming. He proceeds to say that true science can be built up only on the necessary propositions of the Second Analytics, but that Probability shades off into the mere phantom of truth, from the topical or dialectic judgments down to the poetical. Thus Poetry stands at the very bottom of the scale, being in Farabi's opinion a lying and immoral absurdity.

'In the addendum to the Isagoge of Porphyry, our philo­sopher has also given expression to his views on the question of `Universals'. He finds the Particular not only in things and in sense-perception but also in thought. In like manner the Universal exists not merely as an `accident' in indivi­dual things, but also as a `substance' in mind. The mind of man abstracts the Universal from things, but it had an existence of its own before these. Virtually therefore the triple distinction of the `ante rem', 'in re' and 'pod rem' already occurs in Farabi.

Does mere 'being' also belong to the Universals? Is existence, in effect, a predicate? This question which caused so much mischief in philosophy was fully and correctly answered by Farabi. According to him, existence is a gram­matical or logical relation, but not a category of actuality which makes any assertion about things. The existence of a thing is nothing but the thing itself.

6. The trend of thought found in the Logic asserts itself also in the Metap laysics. Instead of the Changeable and the Everlasting, there emerge the ideas of the Possible.and the Necessary.

Everything in fact thatexists, is, in Farabi's view, either a necessary or a possible thing; there is no third kind of Being. Now since all which is possible presupposes for its realisation a Cause, while yet the chain of causes cannot be traced back without end, we see ourselves compelled to assume that there is a Being, existing of necessity, uncaused, possessing the highest degree of perfection and an eternal plenitude of reality, self sufficing, without any change, who as absolute Mind and pure goodness and thinking, - being the thinking and the thought in one nature, - loves the all-transcending goodness and beauty of that nature, which is his own. This Being cannot be proved to exist, because he himself is the proof and first cause of all things, inwhom truth and reality coincide. And it is involved in the very idea of such a Being, that he should be one, and one only, for if there were two first and absolute Beings, they would have to be partly alike and partly different, - in which case, however, the simplicity of each would be destroyed. A Being who is the most perfect of all, must be one alone.

This first Existence, one alone, and of a verity real, we call God; and since in him all things are one, without even difference in kind, no definition of his Being can be supplied. Yet man bestows upon him the noblest names, expressive of all that is most honoured and esteemed in life, because in the mystic impulse thereto, words lose their usual significance, transcending all discrepancy. Some names refer to his essential nature, others to his relation to the world, without prejudicing, however, the unity of his essence; but they are all to be understood metaphorically, and we can interpret them only according to feeble analogy. Of God, as the most perfect Being, we ought properly to have also the most complete idea. At least our mathema­tical notions are more perfect than our notions of physics, because the former refer to the more perfect objects. But with the most perfect object of all we fare as with the most brilliant light: by reason of the weakness of our eyes we cannot bear it. Thus the imperfections inherent in Matter cling to our understanding.

7. We are able to see God better in the regular gradation of Beings which proceed from him than in himself. From him, the Onealone, comes the All, for his knowledge is the highest power: In his cognizance of himself the world comes into being: The cause of all things is not the will of an almighty Creator, but the knowledge of the Necessary. From eternity the Forms or Types of things are inGod, and from him eternally proceeds also his own image, termed `the Second All' or `the first created Spirit', which moves the outermost celestial Sphere. In succession to this Spirit, come, one out of the other, the eight Spirits of the Spheres, all of which are unique in their several kinds and perfect, and these are the creators of the celestial bodies. These nine Spirits, called `Celestial Angels', together form the second grade ofBeing . In the third grade stands the Reason, active in Humanity, which is also termed the Holy Spirit and which unites heaven and earth. The Soul is in the fourth grade. These two, the Reason and the Soul, do not remain by themselves in their strict original One-ness, but multiply in accordance with the great number of human beings. Lastly appear Form and Matter, as Beings of the fifth aid sixth orders; and with them the series of Spiritual existences is closed. The first three grades, God, the Spirits of the Spheres, and the Active Reason, remain Spirit per se; but the three which follow, - Soul, Form and Matter, although incorporeal, yet enter into relation with Body.

The Corporeal, which is held to originate in the ima­gination of the Spirit, has also its six grades: Celestial Bodies, Human Bodies, Bodies of Lower Animals, Bodies of Plants, Minerals, and Elementary Bodies.

The influence of Farabi's Christian preceptor is probably still to be seen in these speculatiogs, following as they do the number Three. That number had the same significance in them that the number Four had with the Natural­Philosophers. The terminology also bears out this idea.

That, however, is merely external: It is Neo-Platonism that contributes the contents. Here the Creation, or Emana tion of the world, appears as an eternal, intellectual process. By the first created Spirit thinking of its Author, the second Sphere-spirit comes into being; while, by the same Spirit thinking of itself and thus realizing itself, there proceeds from it the first Body, or the uppermost celestial Sphere.And so the process goes on in necessary succession, down to the lowest Sphere, that of the Moon, in entire accordance with the Ptolemaic Sphere-system, - as it is known to every well-educated person at least from Dante's “Com­media”, - and in the Neo-Platonic manner of derivation. The Spheres together form an unbroken order, for all that exists is a Unity. The creation and preservation of the world are one and the same. And not only is the unity of the Divine Being portrayed in the world, but the Divine righteousness is also expressed in the beautiful order which there prevails. The logical order of the world is at the same time a moral order.

8. The sublunary world of this earth is, of course, wholly dependent on the world of the celestial spheres. Yet the influence from above bears in the first place, as we know a priori, upon the necessary order of the whole, although in the second place the individual thing also is made to happen, but only according to natural reciprocal action, and therefore by rules which experience teaches us. Astrology, which attributes everything that is contingent or extra­ordinary to the stars and their conjunctions, is combated by Farabi. There is no certain knowledge of the Contin­gent; and, - as Aristotle also has taught, - much of what happens on this earth possesses in a high degree the character of the Contingent or the Possible. The celestial world, on the other hand, has another and a more perfect nature, which operates according to necessary laws. It can bestow upon this earthly world only that which is good; and therefore it is a complete mistake to maintain that some stars bring good luck, and others ill luck. The nature of the heavens is one, and it is uniformly good. The con­clusion then at which Farabi arrives, by these reflections is this: Knowledge, capable of demonstration, and perfectly certain, is afforded by Mathematical Astronomy alone; the physical study of the heavens yields a probable knowledge; but the tenets and vaticinations of Astrology merit an exceedingly hesitating belief.

Over against the simplicity of the celestial world we have the sublunary kingdom of the four natures, - the kingdom of contrasts and of change. Even in this realm, in the midst of its plurality, we meet with the unity of an ascending series, from the Elements up to Man. Farabi is unable to advance much that is original on this subject. True to his logical standpoint, he gives himself very little concern about the Natural Sciences, among which, in reliance upon the original unity of matter, he seems without any hesitation to have counted Alchemy. We turn at once to his Doctrine of Man or of the Human Soul, which presents a measure of interest.

9. The powers or divisions of the Human Soul are, in Farabi's opinion, not of co-ordinate rank, but constitute an ascending series. The lower faculty is Material for the higher; and this again is the Form for the first, while the highest power of all, viz.Thinking , is non-material, and is Form for all the Forms which precede. The life of the Soul is raised from things of sense to thought, by means of the power of Representation; but in all the faculties there is involved Effort or Will. Every theory has its obverse side in practice; and Inclination and Disinclination are inseparable from the perceptions furnished by the senses. To the representations of these the soul takes up an attitude of assent or dissent, by affirming or denying. Finally, Thought passes judgment on Good andBad , gives to the Will its motives, and constructs Art and Science. All Per­ception, Representation or Thought is attended with a certain effort to reach the necessary consequence, just as warmth radiates from the substance of fire.

The Soul is that which gives completeness (Entelechia) to the existence of the body; but that which gives completeness to the existence of the Soul is the Mind, or the Spirit (`aql). The Spirit only is the real Man.

10. Accordingly the discusion turns mainly on the Mind or Spirit. In the human Spirit everything earthly is raised to a higher mode of existence, which is lifted out of the categories of the Corporeal. Now as a capability or poten­tiality, Mind or Spirit is present in the Soul of the Child; and it becomes actual Spirit in the course of its apprehension of bodily forms in experience by means of the Senses and the representative faculty. But this transition from pos­sibility to actuality, - the realisation thus of experience, - is not Man's own act, but is brought about by the Super­human Spirit, which has sprung from the last Sphere-Spirit, that of the Moon. In this way Man's knowledge is represented as being a contribution fromabove, and not a knowledge which has been acquired in mental struggle. In the light of the Spirit which stands above us, our understanding descries the Forms of the Corporeal; and thereby experience is amplified into rational knowledge. Experience, in fact, takes in only the Forms which have been abstracted from the world of Matter.But there are in existence also, - before and above material things, - Forms and general entities, in the pure Spirits of the Spheres. Man now receives information from these `detached Forms': it is only by means of their influence that his actual experience becomes explicable to him. From God down to the Spirit of Mankind, the higher Form affects only that which immediately succeeds it. Every intermediate Form stands in a relation of `receptive' activity to what is above it, and of confer­ring' activity to what is below it. In its relation to the Human Spirit, which is influenced from above ('aql ruala fad), the Superhuman Spirit, produced from the last Sphere-Spirit, is to be called `active' or `creative' (`aql fa” al). Yet it is not continually active, because its effectiveness is restrained by its material. But God is the completely-real, eternally­ active Spirit.

The Spirit in Man is threefold: according as it is (1) Possible, (2) Actual, and (3) Influenced from above. Now in the sense of Farabi, this means - that (1) the spiritual potentiality in Man is, by means of (2) realizing the knowledge which is gained by experience, (3) led to the knowledge of the Supersensible, which precedes all experi­ence, and itself induces the experience.

The grades of Spirit and its knowledge correspond to the grades of existence. The lower strives wistfully to reach thehigher, and the higher lifts the lower up to its own level. The Spirit which stands above us, and which has lent to all earthly things their Forms, seeks to bring these scattered Forms together that they may become one in love. First of all he collects them in Man. And indeed the possibility and truth of human knowledge depend on the fact that the sameSpirit who bestowed upon the Corporeal its figure, also gives Idea to Man. The scattered Forms of the earthly are found again in the Human Spirit, and thereby it comes to resemble the last of the Celestial Spirits. Unity with that Celestial Spirit, - and in this an approach to God, - is the aim and the blessedness of the Spirit of Man.

Now the question whether such a union is possible before Man's death is, in Farabi's opinion, either a doubtful one, or one which should be answered in the direct negative. The highest thing that can be attained in thislife, is rational knowledge. But separation from the body gives to the rational soul the complete freedom which belongs to spirit. But does it then continue to exist as an individual soul? Or is it merely a Moment of the higher World­ Intelligence? On this point Farabi expresses himself ambigu­ously, and with a lack of consistency, in his various writings. Men,- - so the expression runs, - disappear in death; one generation follows another; and like is joined to like, each in its own class. And forasmuch as rational souls are not bound to space, they multiply without end, just as thought is added to thought, and power to power. Every soul reflects on itself and all others that are like to it; and the more it so reflects, the more intense is its joy (Cf. infra, ? 13).

11. We come now to Farabi's practical philosophy. In his Ethics and Politics we are brought into a somewhat closer relation to the life and belief of the Muslims. One or two general points of view may be brought forward.

Just as Logic has to give an account of the principles of knowledge, so Ethics have to deal with the fundamental rules of conduct, although, in the latter, somewhat more value is attached to practice and experience than in the theory of knowledge. In the treatment of this subject Farabi agrees sometimes with Plato, and sometimes with Aristotle; but occasionally, in a mystic and ascetic fashion, he goes farther than either of them. In opposition to the Theologians, who recognize, no doubt,a knowledge gained by Reason, but not rules of conduct taught by Reason, Farabi frequently affirms with emphasis that Reason decides whether a thing is good or evil. Why should not that Reason, which has been imparted to us from above, decide upon conduct, seeing that the highest virtue certainly consists in knowing? In vigorously accentuated terms Farabi declares that if one man knew everything that stands in the writings of Aristotle, but did not act in accordance with his knowledge, while another man shaped his conduct in accordance with Aristotle's teaching, without being acquainted with it, the preference would have to be assigned to the former. Know­ledge takes a higher position than the moral act; otherwise it could not decide upon the act.

By its very nature the Soul desires. In so far as it perceives and represents, it has a will, just like the lower animals. But man alone possesses freedom of choice, seeing that this rests upon rational consideration. Pure thought is the sphere of freedom. Thus it is a freedom which depends upon motives furnished by thinking, - a freedom which is at the same time necessity, inasmuch as in the last resort it is determined by the rational nature of God. In this sense Farabi is a Determinist.

On account of the opposition offered by matter, the freedom of man, as thus conceived, can only imperfectly vindicate its lordship over the Sensible. It does not become perfect till the rational soul has been enfranchised from the bonds of matter and the wrappings of error, - in the life of the Spirit. But that is the highest blessedness which is striven after for its own sake, and consequently it is plainly the Good. Such good the Human Soul is seeking, when it turns to the Spirit above it, just as the Spirits of the heavens do, when they draw near to the Highest.

12. Even in the Ethics little regard is had to actual moral conditions; but in his Politics Farabi withdraws still farther from real life. In his oriental way of looking at things, the ideal Republic of Plato merges into `the Philosopher as Ruler'. Men, having been brought together by a natural want, submit themselves to the will of a single person, in whom the State, be it good or bad, is, so to speak, embodied. A State therefore is bad, if the head of it is, as regards the principles of the Good, either ignorant or in error, or quite depraved. On the other hand the good or excellent State has only one type, that namely in which the philosopher is ruler. And Farabi endows his `Prince' with all the virtues of humanity and philosophy he is Plato in the mantle of the Prophet Mohammed.

In the description of rulers representative of the ideal Prince, - for there may be more than one existingtogether, and Prince and minister may divide governing­ virtue and wisdom between them, - we come nearer the Muslim political theory of that day. But the expressions are wrapped in obscurity: the lineage, for example, which is proper for a Prince, and his duty of taking the lead in the holy war, - are not clearly signified.All indeed is left floating in philosophic mist.

13. Morality reaches perfection only in a State which at the same time forms a religious community. Not only does the condition of the State determine the temporal lot of its citizens, but also their future destiny. The souls of citizens in an “ignorant” State are devoid of reason, and return to the elements as sensible Forms, in order to be united anew with other beings, - men or lower animals. In States which are “in error”, and in those which are “depraved”, the leader alone is responsible, and punishment awaits him in the world beyond; but the souls which have been led into error share the fate of the ignorant. On the other hand, if the good and `knowing' souls only maintain their ground, they enter the world of pure Spirit; and the higher the stage of knowledge to which they have attained in this life, the higher will their position be after death, in the order of the All, and the more intense their bles­sed delight.

In all likelihood expressions of this kind are only the outer wrapping of a mystico-philosophical belief in the absorption of the Human Spirit into the World-Spirit and finally into God. For, - as Farabi teaches, - although the world, deductively considered (i. e. logically and meta­physically), is something different from God, yet inductively the present world is regarded by the soul as being identical with the next, because in everything, even in his Unity, God is himself the All.

14. If we now take a general survey of Farabi's system, it exhibits itself as a fairly consistent Spiritualism, or, - to be more precise, - Intellectualism. The Corporeal, - that which appeals to the Senses, - as it orginates in the imagination of the Spirit, might be designated “a confused presentation”. The only true existence is Spirit, although it assumes various degrees. God alone is entirely unmixed and pure Spirit, while those Spirits, which eternally proceed from him,already have in them the element of plurality. The number of primary Spirits has been determined by the Ptolemaic cosmology, and corresponds to the celestial hierarchy. The farther any one of them is removed from the first, so much the less part has it in the Being of the pure Spirit. From the last World-Spirit Man receives his essential nature, that is - Reason. There is no gap in all the system; the Universe is a beautiful and well­ ordered whole. The Evil and the Bad are the necessary consequence of finiteness in individual things; but the Good which characterizes the Universe is set thereby in bolder relief.

Can this fair order of the Universe, from all eternity emanating from God, ever be destroyed, or can it even flow back to God P A sustained streaming-back to the Godhead, there doubtless is. The longing of the Soul is directed to what is above; and advancing knowledge purifies it and leads it upwards.But how far? Neither philosophers nor prophets have been able to return a clear answer to this question. And the wisdom of both of these, - both philosophy and prophecy, - Farabi derives from the creative World-Spirit above us. Now and again be speaks of prophecy as if it represented the highest stage of human knowledge and action. But that cannot be his real view; - at least it is not the logical consequence of his theoretical philosophy. According to it everything prophetic, - in dream, vision, revelation and so on, - belongs to the sphere of the Imagination or Representation, and thus takes an intermediate position between Sense ­Perception and pure Rational Knowledge. Although, in his Ethics and Politics, he attaches a high educational im­portance to religion, it is always regarded as inferior in absolute worth to knowledge acquired through pure reason.

Farabi lived perpetually in the world of the Intellect. A king in the mental realm, a beggar in worldly possessions, he felt happy with his books, and with the birds and flowers of his garden. To his people, - the Muslim com­munity, - he could be only very little. In his political and ethical teaching there was no proper place for worldly matters or for the `holy war'. His philosophy did not satisfy any need appertaining to the senses, while it spoke against the life of imagination belonging both to the senses and the intellect, as that life gives special expression to itself in the creations of Art and in religious fancies. He was lost in the abstractions of pure Spirit. As a pious, holy man, he was an object of wonder to his contempo­raries, and by a few disciples he was honoured as the personification of wisdom; but by the genuine scholars of Islam he was always decried as a heretic. There was, of course, ground enough for this: just as Natural Philosophy easily led to Naturalism and Atheism, the Monotheism of the Logicians imperceptibly conducted to Pantheism.

15. Farabi had no great following of disciples: Abu Zakariya Yakhya ibn Adi, a Jacobite Christian, became known as a translator of Aristotelian works; but a pupil of Zakariya's came to be more spoken of, called Abu Sulaiman Mohammed ibn Tahir ibn Bahram al-Sidjistani, who gathered about him in Bagdad, in the second half of the tenth century, the learned men of his time. The con­versational discussions which they conducted, and the phi­losophical instructions which were imparted by the master, have been to some extent preserved, and we can clearly see the outcome of the school. Just as Natural Philo­sophy drifted into a secret lore, and the school of Kindi abandoned Philosophy for the separate branches of Mathe­matical and Physical Science, so the logical tendency of Farabi passed into a philosophy of words. Distinctions and definitions form the subject of these conferences. Indivi­dual points in the history of philosophy and in the several sciences are discussed also, without any systematic connection; but almost never does any positive interest in these subjects appear. The Human Soul occupies the foreground entirely, just as in the case of the Faithful Brethren, except that these last dealt rather with the marvellous operations of the Soul, while the Logicians pondered over its rational essence and its elevation to the Supra-rational. The Sidjis­tani Society trifled with words and concepts, instead of with numbers and letters after the fashion of the Brethren; but the end in both cases was - a mystical Sufism.

It is therefore no matter of astonishment that in the learned meetings of Abu Sulaiman, as reported by his pupil Tauhidi (f 1009), Empedocles, Socrates, Plato and others are oftener mentioned than Aristotle. A very mis­cellaneous society came together in those meetings. No question was asked as to the country from which any one came, or the religion to which he adhered. They lived in the conviction, - derived from Plato, that every opinion contained a measure of truth, just as all things shared in a common existence, and all sciences in an actual knowledge which was one and the same. On that assumption alone could they have conceived that every one might start with maintaining that his own opinion was the true one, and that the science which he cultivated was the science most to be preferred. And for that very reason there is no conflict between Religion and Philosophy, however vehement the assertions may be on these two sides. On the contrary Philosophy confirms the doctrines of Religion, just as the latter brings the results of Philosophy to per­fection. If Philosophical Knowledge is the essence and end of the Soul of man, Religious Belief is its life, or the way to that end; and as Reason is God's vicegerent on earth, it is impossible for Reason and Revelation to contradict each other.

It is not worth while to accentuate particular points in these conversational discussions, the tenor of which we have given. The appearance of Sidjistani and his circle is im­portant in the history of culture; but it has no significance as regards the development of Philosophy in Islam. What was to Farabi the very life of hisSpirit, becomes in this Society a subject merely of clever conversation.

3. IBN MASKAWAIH

1. We have arrived at the point of time when the tenth century is passing into the eleventh. Farabi's school has apparently died out; and Ibn Sina, - destined to awaken into fresh life the philosophy of his predecessor, - is still a youth. Here however we have to make mention of a man, more allied, it is true, to Kindi than to Farabi, but who yet agrees with the latter in essential points, by reason of employing the same sources with him. He affords an instance also of the fact that the most sagacious minds of his time were not disposed to follow Farabi into the region of Logico-Metaphysical speculation.

This man is Abu Ali ibn Maskawaih, physician, philo­logist and historian, who was the treasurer and friend of the Sultan Adudaddaula, and who died full of years in 1030. Amongst other things he has left us a philoso­phical system of Ethics which up to this day is valued in the East. It is a combination of material taken from Plato, Aristotle, Galen and the Muslim Religious Law, although Aristotle predominates in it. It commences with a treatise on the Essential Nature of the Soul.

2. The Soul of Man, as Ibn Maskawaih explains, is a simple, incorporeal substance, conscious of its own existence, knowledge and working. That it must be of a spiritual nature - follows from the very fact that it appropriates at one and the same time Forms the most opposed to each other, for example, the notions of white and black, while a body can only take up one of the two forms at a time. Farther, it apprehends both the forms of the Sensible and those of the Spiritual in the same spi­ritual manner, for Length is not `long' in the soul, nor does it become `longer' in the memory. Accordingly the knowledge and endeavour of the soul extend far beyond its own body: even the entire world of sense cannot satisfy it. Moreover it possesses an inborn rational knowledge, which cannot have been bestowed by the Senses, for it is by means of this knowledge that it determines the True and the False, in the course of comparing and distinguishing between the objects presented to it in Sense-Perception, - thus supervising and regulating the Senses. Finally, it is in Self Consciousness, or knowing of its own knowing, that the spiritual unity of the soul is most clearly shewn, - a unity, in which thinking, that which thinks, and that which is thought - all coincide.

The human soul is distinguished from the souls of the lower animals particularly by rational reflection as the principle of its conduct, directed towards the Good.

3. That by which a Being, possessed of will, attains the end or the perfection of his nature is, in general terms, `good'. A certain capability, therefore, or disposition, di­rected to an end is requisite, in order to be good. But as regards their capability men differ very essentially. Only a few, - Maskawaih thinks, - are by nature good, and never become bad, since what is by nature, does not change; while on the other band, many are by nature bad, and never become good. Others, however, who at first are neither good nor bad, are definitely turned either in the one direction or the other, through upbringing and social intercourse.

Now the Good is either a general good or a particular good. There is an absolute Good, which is identical with the highest Being and the highest knowledge; and all the good together strive to attain to it. But for every indi­vidual person a particular Good presents itself subjectively under the aspect of Happiness or Pleasure; and this con­sists in the full and active manifestation of his own essential nature, - in the complete realisation of his inmost being.

Speaking generally, - Man is good and happy, if he acts as Man: Virtue is human excellence. But since hu­manity is presented as occupying different levels in different individuals, Happiness or the Good is not the same for all. And because an individual man, if he were left to his own resources could not realize all the good things that might otherwise be obtained, it is necessary that many should live together. As a consequence of this condition, the first of duties, or the foundation of all the virtues, is a general love for humankind, without which no society is possible. It is only along with, and among other human beings that the individual man attains perfection; - so that Ethics must be Social Ethics. Friendship therefore is not, as Aristotle would have it, an expansion of Self love, but a limitation of it, or a kind of love of one's neighbour. And this, like virtue in general, can find a field of exer­cise only in society, or in citizenship, and not in the pious monk's renunciation of the world. The hermit, who thinks he is living temperately and righteously, is deceived as to the character of his actions: they may be religious, but moral they certainly are not; and therefore the con­sideration of them does not belong to Ethics.

Besides, in Ibn Maskawaih's opinion, the Religious Law when rightly apprehended, pre-eminently accords with an Ethics of Benevolence. Religion is a moral training for the people. Its prescriptions, with regard to the worship of God in common and the pilgrimage to Mecca for instance, have plainly in view the cultivation of the love of one's neighbour in the widest acceptation.

In certain special points Ibn Maskawaih has not been successful in combining harmoniously the ethical doctrines of the Greeks, - which he incorporates in his Scheme, - either with one another or with the Law of Islam. That however we pass over; and in any case we ought not only to praise in general terms his attempt to give a system of Ethics which should be free from the casuistry of the Moralists and the asceticism of the Sufis, but also to recognize in the execution of his design the good sense of a man of wide culture.

4. IBN SINA

1. Abu Ali al-Hosain ibn Abdallah ibn Sina (Avicenna) was born at Efshene in the neighbourhood of Bokhara, in the year 980, of a family connected with the public service. He received his secular and religious education at home, where Persian and anti-Muslim traditions were still full of life and vigour.Then the youth, precocious alike in body and in mind, studied philosophy and medicine in Bokhara. He was seventeen years old when he had the good fortune to cure the prince, Nukh ibn Mansur, and to obtain the privilege of access to his library. From that time forward he was his own teacher, in scientific research and in practice, and proved able to turn to account the life and culture of his time. He kept continually venturing his fortunes in the political working of the smaller States: Probably he could never have submitted to a great prince, any more than to a teacher in Science. He wandered on from court to court, at one time employed in State-Ad­ministration, at another as a teacher and author, until he became vizir of Shems Addaula in Hamadan. After the death of this prince he was consigned to prison by his son, for some months. He thenproceeded farther a field, to the court of Ala Addaula in Ispahan. And at last, having returned to Hamadan, which Ala Addaula had conquered, he died there in 1037, at the age of 57; and there his grave is pointed out to this day.

2. The notion that Ibn Sina pushed on beyond Farabi and reached a purerAristotelianism, is perhaps the greatest error which has found a footing in the history of Muslim Philosophy. What did this our man of the world in reality care for Aristotle? It was not his concern to commit himself wholly to the spirit of any system. He took what was to his liking, wherever he found it, but he had a preference for the shallow paraphrases of The­mistius. Thus he became the great philosopher of accomo­dation in the East, and the true forerunner of compendium­ writers for the whole world. He knew how to group with skill his material, collected as it was from every quarter, and to present it in an intelligible form, although not without sophistry. Every moment of his life was fully employed. In the daytime he attended to State affairs or gave instruction to his pupils: the evening was devoted to the social enjoyments of friendship and love; and many a night found him engaged in composition, pen in hand, and goblet within reach lest he should fall asleep. Time and circumstances determined the direction of this activity. If at the prince's court he had the requisite leisure, and a library at hand, he wrote his Canon of Medicine or the great Encyclopaedia of Philosophy. While travelling, he composed epitomes and smaller works. In prison he wrote poems and pious meditations, but always in a pleasing form; in fact his smaller mystical writings have a poetic charm about them. When commissioned to do so, he put even Science, Logic and Medicine into verse, - a practice which came more and more into vogue from the tenth century onwards. Add to this that he wrote Persian and Arabic atwill, and you get the picture of a most accom­plished man. His life was superabundantly rich both in work and in enjoyment. In geniality, of course he was inferior to his older compatriot, the poet Firdausi (940­1020), and in scientific talent to his contemporary Beruni (v.infra ? 9), men still of importance in our eyes. Ibn Sina, however, was the true expression of his time; and upon this fact have been founded his great influence and historic position. He did not, like Farabi, withdraw from common life to become immersed in the commentators of Aristotle, but he blended in himself Greek science and Oriental wisdom. Enough commentaries, he thought, had already been written on the ancient authors: it was now time for men to construct a philosophy of their own, - in other words, to give a modern form to the ancient doctrines.

3. In Medicine Ibn Sina gives diligent endeavour to produce a systematic account of that science, but here he proves by no means an exact logician. He assigns a large place, at least theoretically, to Experience, and describes in detail the conditions under which alone, for example, the efficacy of remedies can be ascertained. But the phi­losophical principles which are involved inMedicine, must be taken over in the form of lemmas from Philosophy itself.

Philosophy proper is divided into Logic, Physics and Metaphysics. In its entirety it embraces the science of all Existence as such, and of the principles of all the separate sciences, whereby, as far as is humanly possible, the Soul which is devoted tophilosophy, attains the highest perfection. Now Existence is either spiritual, when it is the subject of Metaphysics, or corporeal, when it is discussed in Physics, or intellectual, when it forms the theme of Logic. The subjects of Physics can neither exist, nor be thought of as existing, without Matter. The Metaphysical, however is quite devoid of Matter; while the Logical is an abstraction from the Material. The Logical has a certain likeness to the Mathematical, in so far as the subjects of Mathematics may also be abstractions from matter. But yet the Mathe­matical always remains capable of being represented and constructed, while on the other hand the Logical, as such, has its existence only in the intellect, as, for instance, Identity, Unity and Plurality, Universality and Particularity, Essentiality and Contingency, and so on. Consequently Logic is the Science of the Determinate Forms of Thought.

In the more detailed treatment of his subject lbn Sina conforms entirely to Farabi's Logic. This agreement would perhaps be more apparent to us, if the logical works of his predecessor were extant in a more complete form. He frequently lays stress on the defectiveness of the intellectual constitution in man, which is urgently in need of a logical rule. Just as the physiognomist infers from the external features the character of the nature within, so the logician is called upon to derive from known premises that which is unknown. How easy it is for the errors of appearance and desire to insinuate themselves into a process of that kindl A struggle with Sense is required in order that the life of representation may be elevated to the pure truth of the Reason, through which any knowledge of a necessary kind is gained. The divinely-inspired man, but he alone, can dispense with Logic, precisely as the Bedouin is indepen­dent of an Arabic Grammar.

The question of Universals is also treated in a manner similar to that which is adopted by Farabi. Prior to any plurality, every thing has an existence in the Mind of God and of the Angels (the Sphere-Spirits); then as mate­rial form it enters upon plurality, to be raised finally in the intellect of man to the universality of the Idea. Now just as Aristotle has distinguished between First Substance (Individual) and Second Substance (cogitable as a Uni­versal), so Ibn Sina similarly makes a distinction between First and Second Notion or Intention (Mdnd, intentio). The First is referred to the things themselves, the Second to the disposition of our own thought.

4. In Metaphysics and Physics Ibn Sina is differentiated from Farabi chiefly through the fact that, by not deriving Matter from God, he places the Spiritual at a higher elevation above all that is Material, and in consequence heightens the importance of the Soul as an intermediary between the Spiritual and the Corporeal.

From the conception of the Possible and the Necessary, the existence of a Necessary Being plainly follows. Accord­ing to Ibn Sina we should not seek to demonstrate the existence of a Creator from his works, but rather should deduce, from the possible character of all that is, and all that is thinkable in the world, the existence of a First and Necessary Being, whose essence and existence are one.

Not only is every sublunary thing of a `possible' nature, but even the heavens are, in themselves, merely 'possible'. Their existence becomes 'necessary' through another exis­tence which transcends all 'possibility' and therefore all plurality and mutability. The `absolutelyNecessary ' is an unbending Unity, from which nothing multiplex can proceed. This first One is the God of Ibn Sina, of whom many attributes may of course be predicated, such as thought &c., but only in the sense of negation or relation, and in such a way that they do not affect the Unity of his essence.

Out of the first One accordingly, - One only can proceed, viz., - the first World-Spirit. It is in this latter Spirit that Plurality has its origin. In fact by thinking of its own Cause, it generates a third Spirit, the governor of the outermost Sphere; when again, it thinks of itself, a Soul is produced, by means of which the Sphere-Spirit exer­cises its influence; and, in the third place, inasmuch as it is in itself a `possible' existence, there emerges from it a Body, viz., the outermost Sphere. And so the process goes on: Every Spirit, thus generated, except of course the last of the series, liberates from itself a trinity, - Spirit, Soul and Body; for, since the Spirit cannot move the Body directly, it needs the Soul to bring its effective­ness into operation. Finallycomes the Active Spirit (`aql fa??al), closing the series, and generating no farther pure (separate) Spirit, but producing and directing the material of what is earthly, as well as corporeal forms and human souls.

The whole of this process, - which is not to be repre­sented as occurring in time, takes place in a substratum, - that of Matter. Matter is the eternal and pure possibility of all that exists, and at the same time the limitation of the operation of the Spirit. It is the principle of all indi­viduality.

Now this teaching must certainly have presented a dread­ful appearance to believing Muslims. Mutazilite dialecticians had doubtless asserted that God can do nothing evil, and nothing irrational; but now Philosophy was maintaining that, God instead of being able to do all that is possible is only in a position toeffect that which is in its own nature possible, and that only the first World-Spirit pro­ceeds from him directly.

As for the rest Ibn Sina makes every endeavour to con­form to the popular belief. Everything exists, he says, through God's appointment, both the Good and the Evil, but it is only the former that meets with his glad approval. Evil is either a non-existent thing, or, - in so far as it proceeds from God, - an accidental thing. Suppose that He, to avoid the evils which of necessity cling to the world, had kept it from coming into being, - that would have been the greatest evil of all. The world could not be better or more beautiful than it actually is. The Divine Providence, administered as it is by the Souls of the Heavens, is found in the world's fair order. God and the pure Spirits know the Universal only, and therefore are unable to attend to the Particular; but the Souls of the celestial Spheres, to whose charge falls the representation of what is individual, and through whom Spirit acts upon Body, render it possible to admit a providential care for the individual thing and the individual person, and to account for revelation, and so on. Farther, the sudden rise and disappearance of substances (Creation and Annihilation), in contrast to the constant movement, - that is, the gradual passing of the Possible into the Actual, - seem to Ibn Sina to indicate nothing impossible. In general, there is a predominant want of clearness in his views regarding the relation of the forms of Existence, - Spirit and Body, Form and Matter, Substance and Accident. A place at all events is left for Miracle. In passionate forms of excitement in the Soul, which often generate in our­selves great heat or cold, we have, according to Ibn Sina, phenomena analogous to miraculous effects produced by the World-Soul, although it usually follows the course of Nature. Our philosopher himself, however, makes a very moderate use of any of these possibilities. Astrology and Alchemy he combated on quite rational grounds; and yet soon after his death astrological poems were attributed to him; and in Turkish Romance-Literature he appears as a magician, of course to represent an ancient Mystic.

Ibn Sina's theory of Physics rests entirely on the assumption that a body can cause nothing. That which causes, -.is in every case a Power, a Form, or a Soul, the Spirit operating through such instrumentality. In the realm of the Physical there are accordingly countless Powers, the chief grades of which, from the lower to the higher, are - the Forces of Nature, the Energies of Plants and Animals, Human Souls and World-Souls.

6. Farabi was above all things interested in pure Reason he loved Thinking for its own sake.lbn Sina, on the other hand, is concerned throughout with the Soul. In his Medicine it is man's Body which he looks to; and simi­larly, in his Philosophy his eyes are fixed on man's Soul. The very name of his great Philosophical Encyclopaedia is - `The Healing' (that is - of the Soul). His system centres in Psychology.

His theory of human nature is dualistic. Body and Soul have no essential connection with one another. All bodies are produced, under the influence of the stars, from the mingling of the Elements; and in this way the human body also is produced, but from a combination in which the finest proportion is observed. A spontaneous generation of the body, just like the extinction and restoration of the human race, is therefore possible. The Soul, however, is not to be explained from such mixture of the Elements. It is not the inseparable Form of the body, but is acci­dental to it. From the Giver of Forms, that is - from the Active Spirit over us, every Body receives its own Soul, which is adapted to it and to it alone. From its very beginning each Soul is an individualsubstance, and it developes increasing individuality throughout its life in the body. It must be admitted that this does not agree with the contention that Matter is the principle of indivi­duality. But the Soul is the “infant prodigy” of our phi­losopher. He is not a credulous man, and he often cautions us against too ready an acceptance of mysteries in the life of the Soul; but still he has the art himself of relating many things about the numerous wonderful powers and possible influences of the Soul, as it wanders along the highly intricate pathways of life, and crosses the abysses of Being and Not-Being.

The speculative faculties are the choicest of all the powers of the Soul. Acquaintance with the world is con­veyed to the rational soul by the External and Internal Senses. In particular a full account is given by Ibn Sina of his theory of the Internal Senses, or the sensuous­ spiritual faculties of representation, which have their seat in the brain.

Medical Philosophers commonly assumed three Internal Senses or stages of the representative process: 1. Gathering the several sense-perceptions into one collective image in the fore part of the brain; 2. Transforming or remodeling this representation of the general Sense, with the help of representations already existing, thus constituting apper­ception proper, in the middle region; 3. Storing up the `apperceived' representation in the Memory, which was held to reside in the hinder part of the brain. Ibn Sina, how­ever, carries the analysis somewhat farther. He distinguishes in the anterior portion of the brain the Memory of the Sensible, - or the treasure-house of the collective images, - from the General or Coordinating Sense. Farther, he makes out Apperception, - the function of the middle region of the brain, - to be in part brought about uncon­sciously, under the influence of the sensible and appetent life, as is the case also with the lower animals, and, on the other hand, to take place in part consciously, with the co-operation of the Reason. In the first case the repre­sentation preserves its reference to the individual thing, -­thus the sheep knows the hostility of the wolf, - but in the second case, the representation is extended to the Universal. Then, in the hinder part of the brain, the Repre­sentative Memory, or store-house of the representations formed by combined Sensuous Impression and Rational Reflection, follows as a fifth power. In this way five InternalSenses[ 18] correspond to the five External Senses, although with quite another reference than the five Internal Senses of the Faithful Brethren. The question which is raised - as to whether one should farther separate Recol­lection, as a special faculty, from Memory, - remains unanswered.

6. At the apex of the intellectual powers of the Soul stands the Reason. There is indeed a Practical Reason also, but in its action we have been only multiplying ourselves mediately: On the other hand, in Self Consciousness, or the pure recognition of our essential nature, the unity of our Reason is directly exhibited. But instead of keeping down the lower powers of the Soul, the Reason lifts them up, refining Sense-Perception, and generalizing Presentation. Reason, which at first is a mere capacity for Thought, becomes elaborated gradually, - in that Material which is conveyed to it by the external and internal senses, - into a finished readiness in Thought. Through exercise the capability becomes reality. This comes about through the instrumentality of experience, but under guidance and enlightenment from above, - from the 'Giver of the Forms', who as Active Spirit imparts the Ideas to the Reason. The Soul of man, however, does not possess any memory for the pure ideas of Reason, for memory always pre­supposes a corporeal substratum. As often then as the Rational Soul comes to know anything, that knowledge flows to it on each occasion from above; and thinking Souls do not differ in the range and contents of their knowledge, but in the readiness with which they put themselves in communication with the Spirit over us, in order to receive their knowledge.

The Rational Soul, which rules over that which is under it, and comes to know the higher by means of the en­lightenment given by the World-Spirit, is then the real Man, - brought into existence, but as unmixed essence, as individual substance, indestructible, immortal. On this point the clearness of Ibn Sina's teaching marks it off from that of Farabi; and, since his time, the assumption of the individual immortality of the human Souls, which have come into being, is regarded in the East as Aristotelian, and the opposite doctrine as Platonic. Thus a better under­standing prevails between his philosophy and the accepted religion. The human body and the whole world of sense furnish the Soul with a school for its training. But after the death of the body, which puts an end to this body for ever, the Soul continues to exist in a more or less close connection with the World-Spirit. In this union with the Spirit over us, - which is not to be conceived as a complete unification, - the blessedness of the good, 'knowing' souls consists. The lot of the others is eternal misery; for just as bodily defects lead to disease, so punishment is the necessary consequence of an evil condition of Soul. In the same way too, the rewards of Heaven are apportioned according to the degree of soundness or rationality which the Soul has attained in its life on earthThe pure Soul is comforted amidst the sufferings of Time by its prospect of Eternity.

The highest is of course, reached only by a few; for on the pinnacle of Truth there is no room for the many; but one presses forward after another, to reach the source of the knowledge of God, welling forth on its lonely height.

7. To express his view of the Human Reason, Ibn Sina employs and explains poetical traditions, - a favourite proceeding in the Persian literature. First and foremost our interest is awakened by the allegorical figure of Hai ibn Yaqzan. It represents the ascent of the Spirit out of the Elements, and through the realms of Nature, of the Souls, and of the Spirits, up to the throne of the Eternal One. Hai presents himself to the philosopher in the form of an old man with an air of youth about him, and offers his services as guide. The wanderer has been striving to reacha knowledge of Earth and Heaven, by means of his outer and inner senses. Two ways open out before him, one to the West, the way of the Material and the Evil, the other to the Rising Sun, the way of Spiritual and ever-pure Forms; and along that way Hai now conducts him. Together they reach the well of Divine wisdom, the fountain of everlasting youth, where beauty is the curtain of beauty, and light the veil of light, - the Eternal Mystery.

Hai ibn Yaqzan is thus the guide of individual, thinking Souls: he is the Eternal Spirit who is over mankind, and operates in them.

A similar meaning is found by our philosopher in the frequently remodelled late-Greek legend of the brothers Salaman and Absal. Salaman is the World-Man, whose wife (i. e., the World of the Senses) falls in love with Absal, and contrives by a stratagem to wile him into her arms. But before the decisive moment, a flash of lightning comes down from heaven, and reveals to Absal the wantonness of the action which he had nearly committed, and raises him from the world of sensual enjoyment to that of pure spiritual contemplation.

In another passage the soul of the philosopher is com­pared to a bird, which with great trouble escapes from the snares of the earth, traversing space in its flight, until the Angel of Death delivers it from the last of its fetters.

That is Ibn Sina's Mysticism. His soul has needs, for which his medicine-chest provides no resource, and which the life of a court cannot satisfy.

8 The theoretical development of Ethics and Politics may be left to the teachers of the `Iqh'. Our philosopher feels himself on the level ofa inspired person, exalted like a God above all human laws. Religious or Civil Law is binding only on the Many. Mohammed's object was, to civilize the Bedouins; and, in order to aid in accomplishing that object, he preached, among other doctrines, that of the Resurrection of the Body. They would never have under­stood the meaning of purely spiritual blessedness; and so he had to educate them by setting before them the prospect of bodily pleasure or pain. As for the Ascetics, - not­

withstanding their willingness to renounce entirely the world and the senses, - they chime in with this sensuous multitude (whose worship of God consists in the obser­vance of outward forms), in respect that they practise their works of piety with an eye to a reward also, even though it be a heavenly one. Higher than the many or the pious stand those who truly worship God in spiritual love, enter­taining neither hope nor fear. Their peculiar possession is Freedom of the Spirit.

But this secret should not be revealed to the multitude; and the philosopher confides it only to his favourite pupils.

9. In the course of his travels Ibn Sina met with many of the learned men of his time; but it would appear that these interviews did not give rise to any enduring inti­macies. Just as he feels indebted to Farabi alone, of all those who preceded him, so the only persons of his own day, whom he sees fit to thank, are the princes who pa­tronized him. He criticized unfavourably lbn Maskawaih (v. IV, 3), whom he met with still more frequently. With Beruni, his superior in research, he conducted a corres­pondence, but it was soon broken off.

Beruni (973-1048) deserves a shot notice here, to illustrate the character of the time, although Kindi and Masudi have a better claim to be called his wasters, than Farabi and the younger Ibn Sina. He was particularly occupied in the study of Mathematics, Astronomy, Geo­graphy and Ethnology; and he was a keen observer and a good critic. For many a solution of his difficulties, how­ever, he was indebted to Philosophy; and he continually bestowed attention upon it, as one of the phenomena of civilization.

Beruni brings into striking prominence the harmony which exists between the Pythagorean-Platonic philosophy, Indian wisdom, and many of the Sufi views. No less stri­king is his recognition of the superiority of Greek Science, when compared with the attempts and performances of the Arabs and the Indians. `India', he says, `not to mention Arabia, has produced no Socrates: there no logical method has expelled phantasy from science'. But yet he is ready to do justice to individual Indians, and he quotes with approval the following, as the teaching of the adherents of Aryabhata: “It is enough for us to know that which is lighted up by the sun's rays. Whatever lies beyond, though it should be of immeasurable extent, we cannot make use of; for what the sunbeam does not reach, the senses do not perceive, and what the senses do not perceive, we cannot know”.

From this we may gather what Beruni's philosophy was: Only sense-perceptions, knit together by a logical intelli­gence, yield sure knowledge; And for the uses of life we need a practical philosophy, which enables us to distin­guish friend from foe. He doubtless did not himself ima­gine that he had said all that could be said on the subject.

10. From the school of Ibn Sina, we have had more names handed down, than we have had writings preserved. Juzjani annexes to his Autobiography an account of the life of the master. And, farther, we have one or two short metaphysical treatises by Abu-l-Hasan Behmenyar ibn al­-Marzuban, which are nearly in complete agreement with the system of his teacher. But Matter appears to lose somewhat of its substantiality: as Possibility of Existence it becomes a relation of thought.

According to Behmenyar, God is the pure, uncaused Unity of Necessary Existence, - not the living, all-producing Creator. True enough, He is the cause of the world, but the effect is given necessarily and synchronously with the cause; otherwise the cause would not be perfect, being capable of change. Essentially, though not in point of time, the existence of God precedes that of the world. Three predi­cates thus pertain to the highest existence, viz, that it is (1) essentially first, (2) self sufficing, and (3) necessary. In other words God's essential nature is the Necessity of his Existence. All that can possibly be, - owes its existence to this Absolutely Necessary Being.

Now that is quite in harmony with the doctrines of Ibn Sina; and the same is the case with the disciple's scheme of the world and his doctrine of Souls. Whatever has once attained to full reality, - the various Sphere­ Spirits according to their kind, Primeval Matter, and the individually different Souls of Men, - all lasts for ever. Nothing that is completely real can pass away, inas­much as the completely real has nothing to do with mere possibility.

The characteristic of all that is spiritual is its know­ledge of its own essential nature. Will is nothing else, in Behmenyar's opinion, than the knowledge of that which is the necessary outcome of that nature. Farther, the life and the joy of rational souls consist in self-knowledge.

11. Ibn Sina achieved a far-reaching influence. His Canon of Medicine was highly esteemed even in theWest, from the 13th century to the 16th, and it is still the authority for medical treatment among the Persians of the present day. On Christian Scholasticism his influence was important. Dante placed him between Hippocrates and Galen; and Scaliger maintained that he was Galen's equal in Medicine, and much his superior in Philosophy.

For the East he stood and yet stands as the Prince of Philosophy. In that region Neo-Platonic Aristotelianism continues to be known under the form which was given it by Ibn Sina. Manuscripts of his works abound, - an evidence of his popularity, - while commentaries on his writings, and epitomes of them, are countless. He was studied by physicians and statesmen, and even by theologians: It was only a few who went farther back and consulted his sources.

From the very first, of course, he had many enemies, and they weremore noisy in their demonstrations than his friends. Poets cursed him: theologians either chimed in with him, or tried to refute him. And in Bagdad in the year 1150, the Caliph Mustanjid consigned to the flames lbn Sina's writings, as part of a certain judge's philosophical library.

5. IBN AL-HAITHAM

1. After the days of Ibn Sina and his school, little more attention was paid to the cultivation of Speculative Philosophy in the Eastern regions of the Muslim empire. In these lands Arabic was forced more and more to yield to Persian, both in life and in literature. That the Persian tongue is not so well adapted for abstract logical and metaphysical discussion - might be only of quite second­ary importance, in connection with this decline in specu­lation; but the conditions of civilization, and with them the subjects which interested men, were sadly changed.

Ethics and Politics came more to the front, although with­out assuming an actually new form. But in the later Persian literature the predominant place was unmistakably held by Poetry, partly of a free-thinking tendency, partly, and indeed preponderatingly, of a mystic kind, which satisfied the need for wisdom, experienced by people of culture.

From about the middle of the 10th century, the scien­tific movement which originated at Bagdad had in part turned westward. We have already found Farabi in Syria, and Masudi in Egypt: In the latter country Cairo was becoming a second Bagdad.

2. In Cairo, at the beginning of the 11th century, we come upon one of the most considerable mathematicians and physicists in all theMiddle Ages, Abu Ali Mohammed ibn al-Hasan ibn al-Haitham (Alkazen). He had formerly been a government-official in Basra, his native town. Confiding too much in the practical value of his mathematical know­ledge, he imagined that he could regulate the inundations of the Nile; but having been summoned on that account by the Caliph al-Hakim, he became aware, soon after his arrival, of the futility of his efforts. Thereupon he fell into disgrace as a public official, and went into hiding till the Caliph's death, in 1021. From that time he devoted him­self to literary and scientific work, up to his own death, in 1038.

His chief strength is shown in mathematics and its practical application; but he also devoted great attention to the writings of Galen and Aristotle, nor did he confine that attention to the physical treatises. By his own con­fession he had, in a spirit of doubt about everything, been engaged, from his youth up, in considering the various views and doctrines of men, until he came to recognize in all of them more or less successful attempts to approxi­mate to the truth. Moreover truth for him was only that which was presented as material for the faculties of sense­perception, and which received its form from the under­standing, being thus the logically-elaborated perception. To seek such truth was his aim in the study of philo­sophy. In his view philosophy should be the basis of all the sciences. He found it in the writings of Aristotle, in­asmuch as that sage had best understood how to knit sense-perception into a coherent whole with rational know­ledge. With eagerness therefore he studied and illustrated Aristotle's works, for the use and profit of mankind, as well as to exercise his own intellect and provide a treasure and consolation for his old age. Of these labours, however, nothing seems to have been preserved for us.

The most important of Ibn al-Haitham's writings is the “Optics”, which has come down to us in a Latin translation and redaction. In it he shows himself to be an acute mathematical thinker, always taking pains with the ana­lysis of hypotheses and of the actual examples. A Western, belonging to the 13th century (Vitello), was able to give a more methodical account of the whole subject; but yet in keenness of observation on specific points, Ibn al-Haitham may be reckoned his superior.

3. Ibn al-Haitham's thinking is expressed in quite a mathematical style. The Substance of a body consists, according to him, of the sum of its essential attributes, just as a whole is equal to the sum of its parts, and a concept to the sum of its marks.

In the “Optics” the psychological remarks onSeeing and on Sense-Perception in general - are of special interest for us. Her-, he exerts himself to separate the individual Moments of the Perception, and to give prominence to the condition of Time as characterizing the whole process.

Perception then is a compound process, arising out of (1) sensation, (2) comparison of several sensations or of the present sensation with the memory-image which has been gradually formed in the soul as a result of earlier sensations, and (3) recognition, in such fashion that we recognize the present percept as equivalent to the memory­image. Comparison and recognition are not activities of the Senses, which merely receive impressions passively, but they devolve upon the Understanding as the faculty of judgment. Ordinarily the- whole process goes forward unconsciously or semi-consciously, and it is only through reflection that it is brought within our consciousness, and that the apparently simplex is separated into its component parts

The process of Perception is gone through very quickly. The more practice a man has in this respect, and the oftener a perception is repeated, the more firmly is the memory-image stamped upon the soul, and the more ra­pidly is recognition or perception effected. The cause of this is that the new sensation is supplemented by the image which is already present in the soul. One might thus be disposed to think that Perception was an instan­taneous act, at least after long practice. That, however, would be erroneous, for not only is every sensation attended by a corresponding change localized in the sense-organ, which demands a certain time, but also, between the sti­mulation of the organ and the consciousness of the perception an interval of time must elapse, corresponding to the transmission of the stimulus for some distance along the nerves. That it needs time, for example, to perceive a colour, is proved by the rotating circle of colours, which shows us merely a mixed colour, because on account of the rapid movement we have no time to perceive the in­dividual colours.

Comparison and Recognition are, according to Ibn al­-Haitham, the significant Mental Moments of Perception. On the other hand Sensation 'tallies with the Material; and the Sense experiencing the sensation exhibits a pas­sive attitude. Properly all sensation is in itself a kind of discomfort, which ordinarily does not make itself felt, but which emerges into consciousness under very strong stimuli, for example, through too bright a light. A plea­surable character accrues only to the completedperception, that is to the recognition which lifts the material given in sensation, up to the mental form.

The comparison and recognition, which are put in operation in Perception, constitute an unconscious judg­ment and conclusion. The child is already drawing a con­clusion, when of two apples he chooses the finer one..& a often as we comprehend a connection, we are concluding. But, since judging and concluding are quickly settled, men are easily misled in this matter, and frequently they regard as an original concept that which is merely a judgment derived by a process of ratiocination. In the case of every­thing which is announced to us as an axiom, we should be on our guard and trace it up, to see whether it cannot be derived from somethingmore simple .

4. This appeal of our philosopher had little effect in the East. It is true that in Mathematics and Astronomy he created somewhat of a school; but his Aristotelian philo­sophy had comparatively few admirers. We know only one of his scholars whois counted among the Philosophers, Abu-1-Wafa Mubasshir ibn Fatik al-Qaid, an Egyptian emir, who in the year 1053 produced a work made up of pro­verbial wisdom, anecdotes in illustration of the history of philosophy, and so on. Hardly anything can be traced in it which is the result ofhis own thinking. It should have been pleasant reading. And the inhabitants of Cairo in after times found edification, - more even than in such a work, - in the tales of the Thousand and One Nights.

The East set the stigma of heresy upon Ibn al-Haitham and his works, and now it has almost completely forgotten him. A disciple of Maimonides, the Jewish philosopher, relates that he was in Bagdad on business, when the library of a certain philosopher, (who died in 1214) was burned there. The preacher, who conducted the execution of the sentence, threw into the flames, with his own hands, an astronomical work of Ibn al-Haitham, after he had pointed to a delineation therein given of the sphere of the earth, as an unhappy symbol of impious Atheism.