Aristotle
an earlier time, was believed by all readers to contain the authentic
works of Plato and none others; an assemblage of dialogues, some
unfinished, but each undivided and unbroken. The only exception to
unanimity in regard to the Platonic Canon, applies to ten dialogues,
which were received by some (we do not know by how many, or by whom)
as Platonic, but which, as Diogenes informs us, were rejected by
agreement of the most known and competent critics. This is as near to
unanimity as can be expected. The doubts, now so multiplied,
respecting the authenticity of various dialogues included in the
Canon of Thrasyllus, have all originated with modern scholars since
the beginning of the present century, or at least since the earlier
compositions of Wyttenbach. It was my task to appreciate the value of
those doubts; and, in declining to be guided by them, I was at least
able to consider myself as adhering to the views of all known ancient
critics.
Very different is the case when we attempt to frame an Aristotelian
Canon, comprising all the works of Aristotle and none others. We find
the problem far more complicated, and the matters of evidence at once
more defective, more uncertain, and more contradictory.
The different works now remaining, and published in the Berlin
edition of Aristotle, are forty-six in number. But, among these,
several were disallowed or suspected even by some ancient critics,
while modern critics have extended the like judgment yet farther. Of
several others again, the component sections (either the _books_, in
our present phraseology, or portions thereof) appear to have existed
once as detached rolls, to have become disjointed or even to have
parted company, and to have been re-arranged or put together into
aggregates, according to the judgment of critics and librarians.
Examples of such doubtful aggregates, or doubtful arrangements, will
appear when we review the separate Aristotelian compositions (the
Metaphysica, Politica, &c.). It is, however, by one or more of these
forty-six titles that Aristotle is known to modern students, and was
known to mediæval students.
But the case was very different with ancient _literati_, such as
Eratosthenes, Polybius, Cicero, Strabo, Plutarch, &c., down to the
time of Alexander of Aphrodisias, Athenæus, Diogenes Laertius, &c.,
towards the close of the second century after the Christian era. It
is certain that these ancients perused many works of Aristotle, or
generally recognized as his, which we do not now possess; and among
those which we do now possess, there are many which it is not certain
that they perused, or even knew.
Diogenes Laertius, after affirming generally that Aristotle had
composed a prodigious number of books ([Greek: pa/mpleista bi/blia]),
proceeds to say, that, in consequence of the excellence of the author
in every variety of composition, he thinks it proper to indicate them
briefly.[1] He then enumerates one hundred and forty-six distinct
titles of works, with the number of books or sections contained in
each work. The subjects are exceedingly heterogeneous, and the form
of composition likewise very different; those which come first in the
list being Dialogues,[2] while those which come last are Epistles,
Hexameters, and Elegies. At the close of the list we read: "All of
them together are 445,270 lines, and this is the number of books
(works) composed by Aristotle."[3] A little farther on, Diogenes
adds, as an evidence of the extraordinary diligence and inventive
force of Aristotle, that the books (works) enumerated in the
preceding list were nearly four hundred in number, and that these
were not contested by any one; but that there were many other
writings, and _dicta_ besides, ascribed to Aristotle--ascribed (we
must understand him to mean) erroneously, or at least so as to leave
much doubt.[4]
[Footnote 1: Diog. La. v. 21. [Greek: Sune/grapse de\ pa/mpleista
bi/blia, a(/per a)ko/louthon ê(gêsa/mên u(pogra/psai, dia\ tê\n peri\
pa/ntas lo/gous ta)ndro\s a)retê/n.]]
[Footnote 2: Bernays has pointed out (in his valuable treatise, Die
Dialoge des Aristoteles, p. 133) that the first in order, nineteen in
number, among the titles enumerated by Diogenes, designate Dialogues.
The longest of them, those which included more than one book or
section, are enumerated first of all. Some of the dialogues appear to
have coincided, either in title or in subject, with some of the
Platonic:--[Greek: Peri\ Dikaiosu/nês], in four books (comparable
with Plato's Republic); [Greek: Politikou=], in two books; [Greek:
Sophistê\s, Mene/xenos, Sumpo/sion], each in one book; all similar in
title to works of Plato; perhaps also another, [Greek: Peri\
r(êtorikê=s ê)\ Gru/llos], the analogue of Plato's Gorgias.]
[Footnote 3: Diog. La. v. 27. [Greek: gi/gnontai ai( pa=sai muria/des
sti/chôn te/ttares kai\ tettara/konta pro\s toi=s pentakischili/ois
kai\ diakosi/ois e(bdomê/konta. Kai\ tosau=ta me\n au)tô=|
pepragma/teutai bi/blia.]]
[Footnote 4: Diog. La. v. 34. Heitz (Die Verlorenen Schriften des
Aristoteles, p. 17) notices, as a fact invalidating the
trustworthiness of the catalogue given by Diogenes, that Diogenes, in
other places, alludes to Aristotelian compositions which are not
mentioned in his own catalogue. For example, though Diogenes, in the
catalogue, allows only five books to the Ethica, yet he himself
alludes (v. 21) to the seventh book of the Ethica. But this example
can hardly be relied upon, because [Greek: e)n tô=| e(bdo/mô| tô=n
ê)thikô=n] is only a conjecture of H. Stephens or Ménage. The only
case which Heitz really finds to sustain his remark, is the passage
of the Prooemium (i. 8), where Diogenes cites Aristotle [Greek: e)n
tô=| Magikô=|], that work not being named in his catalogue. But there
is another case (not noticed by Heitz) which appears to me still
stronger. Diogenes cites at length the Hymn or Pæan composed by
Aristotle in honour of Hermeias. Now there is no general head of his
catalogue under which this hymn could fall. Here Anonymus (to be
presently mentioned) has a superiority over Diogenes; for he
introduces, towards the close of his catalogue, one general
head--[Greek: e)gkô/mia ê)\ u(/mnous], which is not to be found in
Diogenes.]
We have another distinct enumeration of the titles of Aristotle's
works, prepared by an anonymous biographer cited in the notes of
Ménage to Diogenes Laertius.[5] This anonymous list contains only one
hundred and twenty-seven titles, being nineteen less than the list in
Diogenes. The greater number of titles are the same in both; but
Anonymus has eight titles which are not found in Diogenes, while
Diogenes has twenty-seven titles which are not given by Anonymus.
There are therefore thirty-five titles which rest on the evidence of
one alone out of the two lists. Anonymus does not specify any total
number of lines; nevertheless he gives the total number of _books_
composed by Aristotle as being nearly four hundred--the same as
Diogenes. This total number cannot be elicited out of the items
enumerated by Anonymus; but it may be made to coincide pretty nearly
with the items in Diogenes,[6] provided we understand by _books_,
sections or subdivisions of one and the same title or work.
[Footnote 5: Ménage ad Diog. tom. ii. p. 201. See the very
instructive treatise of Professor Heitz, Die Verlorenen Schriften des
Aristoteles, p. 15 (Leipzig, 1865).]
[Footnote 6: Heitz, Die Verl. Schrift. des Aristot. p. 51. Such
coincidence assumes that we reckon the [Greek: Politei=ai] and the
Epistles each as one book.
I think it unnecessary to transcribe these catalogues of the titles
of works mostly lost. The reader will find them clearly printed in
the learned work of Val. Rose, Aristoteles Pseudepigraphus, pp.
12-20.]
The two catalogues just mentioned, agreeing as they do in the total
number of books and in the greater part of the items, may probably be
considered not as original and copy, but as inaccurate transcripts
from the same original authority. Yet neither of the two transcribers
tells us what that original authority was. We may, however, be
certain that each of them considered his catalogue to comprehend all
that Aristotle could be affirmed on good authority to have published;
Diogenes plainly signifies thus much, when he gives not only the
total number of books, but the total number of lines. Such being the
case, we expect to find in it, of course, the titles of the forty-six
works composing the Berlin edition of Aristotle now before us. But
this expectation is disappointed. The far greater number of the
Aristotelian works which we now peruse are not specified either in
the list of Diogenes, or in that of Anonymus.[7] Moreover, the lists
also fail to specify the titles of various works which are not now
extant, but which we know from Aristotle himself that he really
composed.[8]
[Footnote 7: Heitz, Verl. Schr. Aristot. p. 18, remarks that "In
diesem Verzeichnisse (that of Diogenes) die bei weitem grösste Zahl
derjenigen Schriften fehlt, welche wir heute noch besitzen, und die
wir als den eigentlichen Kern der aristotelischen Lehre enthaltend zu
betrachten gewohnt sind." Cf. p. 32. Brandis expresses himself
substantially to the same effect (Aristoteles, Berlin, 1853, pp. 77,
78, 96); and Zeller also (Gesch. der Phil. 2nd ed. Aristot.
Schriften, p. 43).]
[Footnote 8: Heitz, Verl. Schr. des Aristoteles, p. 56, seq.]
The last-mentioned fact is in itself sufficiently strange and
difficult to explain, and our difficulty becomes aggravated when we
combine it with another fact hardly less surprising. Both Cicero, and
other writers of the century subsequent to him (Dionysius Hal.,
Quintilian, &c.), make reference to Aristotle, and especially to his
dialogues, of which none have been preserved, though the titles of
several are given in the two catalogues mentioned above. These
writers bestow much encomium on the style of Aristotle; but what is
remarkable is, that they ascribe to it attributes which even his
warmest admirers will hardly find in the Aristotelian works now
remaining. Cicero extols the sweetness, the abundance, the variety,
the rhetorical force which he discovered in Aristotle's writings: he
even goes so far as to employ the phrase "flumen orationis aureum" (a
golden stream of speech), in characterizing the Aristotelian
style.[9] Such predicates may have been correct, indeed were
doubtless correct, in regard to the dialogues, and perhaps other lost
works of Aristotle; but they describe exactly the opposite[10] of
what we find in all the works preserved. With most of these (except
the History of Animals) Cicero manifests no acquaintance; and some of
the best modern critics declare him to have been ignorant of
them.[11] Nor do other ancient authors, Plutarch, Athenæus, Diogenes
Laertius, &c., give evidence of having been acquainted with the
principal works of Aristotle known to us. They make reference only to
works enumerated in the Catalogue of Diogenes Laertius.[12]
[Footnote 9: Cicero, Acad. Prior. ii. 38, 119: "Quum enim tuus iste
Stoicus sapiens syllabatim tibi ista dixerit, veniet flumen orationis
aureum fundens Aristoteles, qui illum desipere dicat." Also Topica,
i. 3. "Quibus (_i.e._ those who were ignorant of Aristotle) eo minus
ignoscendum est, quod non modo rebus iis, quæ ab illo dictæ et
inventæ sunt, adlici debuerunt, sed dicendi quoque incredibili quâdam
quum copiâ, tum suavitate." Also De Oratore, i. 11, 49; Brutus, 31,
121; De Nat. Deor. ii. 37; De Inventione, ii. 2; De Finibus, i. 5,
14; Epistol. ad Atticum, ii. 1, where he speaks of the "Aristotelia
pigmenta," along with the [Greek: murothê/kion] of Isokrates.
Dionysius Hal. recommends the style of Aristotle in equal terms of