pass, and it was not without
reason that intelligent men looked on Pythagoras almost as a divinity
upon earth when he pointed out to them a path of escape; when he bid
them reflect on what it was that had thus taught them the fallibility of
sense. For what is it but reason that has been thus warning us, and, in
the midst of delusions, has guided us to the truth--reason, which has
objects of her own, a world of her own? Though the visible and audible
may deceive, we may nevertheless find absolute truth in things
altogether separate from material nature, particularly in the relations
of numbers and properties of geometrical forms. There is no illusion in
this, that two added to two make four; or in this, that any two sides of
a triangle taken together are greater than the third. If, then, we are
living in a region of deceptions, we may rest assured that it is
surrounded by a world of truth.

[Sidenote: Influence of the Eleatic school and the Sophists.]

From the material basis speculative philosophy gradually disengaged
itself through the labours of the Eleatic school, the controversy as to
the primary element receding into insignificance, and being replaced by
investigations as to Time, Motion, Space, Thought, Being, God. The
general result of these inquiries brought into prominence the suspicion
of the untrustworthiness of the senses, the tendency of the whole period
being manifested in the hypothesis at last attained, that atoms and
space alone exist; and, since the former are mere centres of force,
matter is necessarily a phantasm. When, therefore, the Athenians
themselves commenced the cultivation of philosophy, it was with full
participation in the doubt and uncertainty thus overspreading the whole
subject. As Sophists, their action closed this speculative period, for,
by a comparison of all the partial sciences thus far known, they arrived
at the conclusion that there is no conscience, no good or evil, no
philosophy, no religion, no law, no criterion of truth.

[Sidenote: Age of faith--its solutions.]

[Sidenote: Its continuation by Plato, and its end by the Sceptics.]

But man cannot live without some guiding rule. If his speculations in
Nature will yield him nothing on which he may rely, he will seek some
other aid. If there be no criterion of truth for him in philosophy, he
will lean on implicit, unquestioning faith. If he cannot prove by
physical arguments the existence of God, he will, with Socrates, accep