he
influence of Aristotle, who discountenanced the theory, and insisted
that the earth is the centre of the universe. But in the end the
Pythagorean view won the day. We know that Copernicus derived the
suggestion of his heliocentric hypothesis from the Pythagoreans.

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The Pythagoreans also taught "The Great Year," probably a period of
10,000 years, in which the world comes into being and passes away,
going in each such period through the same evolution down to the
smallest details.

There is little to be said by way of criticism of the Pythagorean
system. It is entirely crude philosophy. The application of the number
theory issues in a barren and futile arithmetical mysticism. Hegel's
words in this connection are instructive:--

"We may certainly," he says, "feel ourselves prompted to associate the
most general characteristics of thought with the first numbers: saying
one is the simple and immediate, two is difference and mediation, and
three the unity of both these. Such associations however are purely
external; there is nothing in the mere numbers to make them express
these definite thoughts. With every step in this method, the more
arbitrary grows the association of definite numbers with definite
thoughts ... To attach, as do some secret societies of modern times,
importance to all sorts of numbers and figures is, to some extent an
innocent amusement, but it is also a sign of deficiency of
intellectual resource. These numbers, it is said, conceal a profound
meaning, and suggest a deal to think about. But the point in
philosophy is not what you may think but what you do think; and the
genuine air of thought is to be sought in thought itself and not in
arbitrarily selected symbols." [Footnote 3]

[Footnote 3: Hegel's _Smaller Logic_, translated by Wallace, second
edition, page 198.]

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CHAPTER IV

THE ELEATICS

The Eleatics are so called because the seat of their school was at
Elea, a town in South Italy, and Parmenides and Zeno, the two chief
representatives of the school, were both citizens of Elea. So far we
have been dealing with crude systems of thought in which only the
germs of philosophic thinking can be dimly discerned. Now, however,
with the Eleatics we step out definitely for the first time upon the
platform of philosophy. Eleaticism is the first true philosophy. In it
there emerges the first factor of the truth, however poor, meagre, and
inadequate. For philosophy is not, as many