Aristotle
explained, and as it is usually understood by those that have no
particular theory to support--Aristotle takes up a position at once
distinct and instructive; a position (to use the phraseology of Kant)
not dogmatical, but critical. He constantly notices and reports the
affirmations of Common Sense; he speaks of it with respect, and
assigns to it a qualified value, partly as helping us to survey the
subject on all sides, partly as a happy confirmation, where it
coincides with what has been proved otherwise; but he does not appeal
to it as an authority in itself trustworthy or imperative.
Common Sense belongs to the region of Opinion. Now the distinction
between matters of Opinion on the one hand, and matters of Science or
Cognition on the other, is a marked and characteristic feature of
Aristotle's philosophy. He sets, in pointed antithesis,
Demonstration, or the method of Science--which divides itself into
special subjects, each having some special _principia_ of its own,
then proceeds by legitimate steps of deductive reasoning from such
_principia_, and arrives at conclusions sometimes universally true,
always true for the most part--against Rhetoric and Dialectic, which
deal with and discuss opinions upon all subjects, comparing opposite
arguments, and landing in results more or less probable. Contrasting
them as separate lines of intellectual procedure, Aristotle lays down
a theory of both. He recognizes the procedure of Rhetoric and
Dialectic as being to a great degree the common and spontaneous
growth of society; while Demonstration is from the beginning special,
not merely as to subject, but as to persons, implying teacher and
learner.
Rhetoric and Dialectic are treated by Aristotle as analogous
processes. Of the matter of opinion and belief, with which both of
them deal, he distinguishes three varieties: (1) Opinions or beliefs
entertained by all; (2) By the majority; (3) By a minority of
superior men, or by one man in respect to a science wherein he has
acquired renown. It is these opinions or beliefs that the rhetorician
and the dialectician attack and defend; bringing out all the
arguments available for or against each.
The Aristotelian treatise on Rhetoric opens with the following
words:--"Rhetoric is the counterpart of Dialectic; for both of them
deal with such matters as do not fall within any special science, but
belong in a certain way to the common knowledge of all. Hence every
individual has his share of both, greater or less; for every one can,
up to a certain point, both examine others and stand examination from
others; every one tries to defend himself and to accuse others."[13]
To the same purpose Aristotle speaks about Dialectic, in the
beginning of the Topica:--"The dialectical syllogism takes its
premisses from matters of opinion, that is, from matters that seem
good to (or are believed by) all, or the majority, or the
wise--either all the wise, or most of them, or the most celebrated."
Aristotle distinguishes these matters of common opinion or belief
from three distinct other matters:--(1) From matters that are not
really such, but only in appearance; in which the smallest attention
suffices to detect the false pretence of probability, while no one
except a contentious Sophist ever thinks of advancing them; on the
contrary, the real matters of common belief are never thus palpably
false, but have always something deeper than a superficial show; (2)
From the first truths or _principia_, upon which scientific
demonstration proceeds; (3) From the paralogisms, or fallacious
assumptions ([Greek: pseudographê/mata]), liable to occur in each
particular science.
Now what Aristotle here designates and defines as "matters of common
opinion and belief" ([Greek: ta\ e)/ndoxa]) includes all that is
usually meant, and properly meant, by Common Sense--what is believed
by all men or by most men. But Aristotle does not claim any warrant
or authority for the truth of these beliefs, on the ground of their
being deliverances of Common Sense, and accepted (by all or by the
majority) always as indisputable, often as self-evident. On the
contrary, he ranks them as mere probabilities, some in a greater,
some in a less degree; as matters whereon something may be said both
_pro_ and _con_, and whereon the full force of argument on both sides
ought to be brought out, notwithstanding the supposed self-evidence
in the minds of unscientific believers. Though, however, he
encourages this dialectical discussion on both sides as useful and
instructive, he never affirms that it can by itself lead to certain
scientific conclusions, or to anything more than strong probability
on a balance of the countervailing considerations. The language that
he uses in speaking of these deliverances of Common Sense is measured
and just. After distinguishing the real Common Opinion from the
fallacious simulations of Common Opinion set up (according to him) by
some pretenders, he declares that in all cases of Common Opinion
there is always something more than a mere superficial appearance of
truth. In other words, wherever any opinion is really held by a large
public, it always deserves the scrutiny of the philosopher to
ascertain how far it is erroneous, and, if it be erroneous, by what
appearances of reason it has been enabled so far to prevail.
[Footnote 13: Aristot. Rhetor. I. i. p. 1354, a. 1. Compare Sophist.
Elench. xi. p. 172, a. 30.]
Again, at the beginning of the Topica (in which he gives both a
theory and precepts of dialectical debate), Aristotle specifies four
different ends to be served by that treatise. It will be useful (he
says)--
1. For our own practice in the work of debate. If we acquire a method
and system, we shall find it easier to conduct a debate on any new
subject, whenever such debate may arise.
2. For our daily intercourse with the ordinary public. When we have
made for ourselves a full collection of the opinions held by the
many, we shall carry on our conversation with them out of their own
doctrines, and not out of doctrines foreign to their minds; we shall
thus be able to bring them round on any matter where we think them in
error.
3. For the sciences belonging to philosophy. By discussing the
difficulties on both sides, we shall more easily discriminate truth
and falsehood in each separate scientific question.
4. For the first and highest among the _principia_ of each particular
science. These, since they are the first and highest of all, cannot
be discussed out of _principia_ special and peculiar to any separate
science; but must be discussed through the opinions commonly received
on the subject-matter of each. This is the main province of
Dialectic; which, being essentially testing and critical, is
connected by some threads with the _principia_ of all the various
scientific researches.
We see thus that Aristotle's language about Common Opinion or Common
Sense is very guarded; that, instead of citing it as an authority, he
carefully discriminates it from Science, and places it decidedly on a
level lower than Science, in respect of evidence; yet that he
recognizes it as essential to be studied by the scientific man, with
full confrontation of all the reasonings both for and against every
opinion; not merely because such study will enable the scientific man
to study and converse intelligibly and efficaciously with the vulgar,
but also because it will sharpen his discernment for the truths of
his own science, and because it furnishes the only materials for
testing and limiting the first _principia_ of that science.
II. We will next advert to the judgment of Aristotle respecting these
_principia_ of science: how he supposes them to be acquired and
verified. He discriminates various special sciences (geometry,
arithmetic, astronomy, &c.), each of which has its own appropriate
matter, and special _principia_ from which it takes its departure.
But there are also certain _principia_ common to them all; and these
he considers to fall under the cognizance of one grand comprehensive
science, which includes all the rest; First Philosophy or
Ontology--the science of Ens in its most general sense, _quatenus_ Ens;
while each of the separate sciences confines itself to one exclusive
department of Ens. The geometer does not debate nor prove the first
_principia_ of his own science; neither those that it has in common
with other sciences, nor those peculiar to itself. He takes these for
granted, and demonstrates the consequences that logically follow from
them. It belongs to the First Philosopher to discuss the _principia_
of all. Accordingly, the province of the First Philosopher is
all-comprehensive, co-extensive with all the sciences. So also is the
province of the Dialectician alike all-comprehensive. Thus far the
two agree; but they differ as to method and purpose. The Dialectician
seeks to enforce, confront, and value all the different reasons _pro_
and _con_, consistent and inconsistent; the First Philosopher
performs this too, or supposes it to be performed by others, but
proceeds farther: namely, to determine certain Axioms that may be
trusted as sure grounds (along with certain other _principia_) for
demonstrative conclusions in science.
Aristotle describes in his Analytica the process of Demonstration,
and the conditions required to render it valid. But what is the point
of departure for this process? Aristotle declares that there cannot
be a regress without end, demonstrating one conclusion from certain
premisses, then demonstrating those premisses from others, and so on.
You must arrive ultimately at some premisses that are themselves
undemonstrable, but that may be trusted as ground from whence to
start in demonstrating conclusions. All demonstration is carried on
through a middle term, which links together the two terms of the
conclusion, though itself does not appear in the conclusion. Those
undemonstrable propositions, from which demonstration begins, must be
known without a middle term, that is, _immediately_ known; they must
be known in themselves, that is, not through any other propositions;
they must be better known than the conclusions derived from them;
they must be propositions first and most knowable. But these two last
epithets (Aristotle often repeats) have two meanings: first and most
knowable _by nature_ or _absolutely_, are the most universal
propositions; first and most knowable _to us_, are those propositions
declaring the particular facts of sense. These two meanings designate
truths correlative to each other, but at opposite ends of the
intellectual line of march.
Of these undemonstrable _principia_, indispensable as the grounds of
all Demonstration, some are peculiar to each separate science, others
are common to several or to all sciences. These common principles
were called Axioms, in mathematics, even in the time of Aristotle.
Sometimes, indeed, he designates them as Axioms, without any special
reference to mathematics; though he also uses the same name to denote
other propositions, not of the like fundamental character. Now, how
do we come to know these undemonstrable Axioms and other immediate
propositions or _principia_, since we do not knew them by
demonstration? This is the second question to be answered, in
appreciating Aristotle's views about the Philosophy of Common Sense.
He is very explicit in his way of answering this question. He
pronounces it absurd to suppose that these immediate _principia_ are
innate or congenital,--in other words, that we possess them from the
beginning, and yet that we remain for a long time without any
consciousness of possessing them; seeing that they are the most
accurate of all our cognitions. What we possess at the beginning
(Aristotle says) is only a mental power of inferior accuracy and