The Philosophy of Individualism: An Interpretation of Thucydides

The Philosophy of Individualism: An Interpretation of Thucydides HARRY NEUMANN Only in the physical sense of physical bodies that to the senses are separate is individuality an original datum. Individuality in a social and moral sense is something to be wrought out. J. Dewey, Reconstruction in Philosophy t So far as man's conduct is determined by what may be called his animal nature, his impulses and appetite.s, it is non-historical; the process of these activities is a natural process. R. G. Collingwood, The Idea o] History 2 Was ich als geistiges Wt~n bin, das bin ich im Wesentlichen flir reich allein und in v~lliger Unabh~ngigkeit: diese Oberzeugung durchherrscht das moderne Denken, und sic hat zur Folge, dass der 'Geist' die Einheit mit dem I2ib . . . nicht als wesentlich erkennen kann. G. Krfiger, Einxicht und Leidenschaft 3 THUCYDIDES IS RARELY REGARDED aS a philosopher today. Even aS a historian, he is generally found deficient in concern for past and future and for cultural and economic history. His aSsertion that there is an essentially immutable human nature is also rejected. Alleged shortcomings of this sort are usually traced to his inability to transcend the "climate of opinion" molding his creative efforts. No thinker, it is claimed, can wholly liberate himself from the prejudices imposed by the political, social, and economic conditions of his time and station. 4 Thus even This study is a revision of "Che cosa ~ la Storia? Interpretazione di Tucidide," 11 Pensiero, X (1965), 153-170. It was assisted by a grant from Scripps College and the Ford Foundation. a (New York, 1951), p. 152. (Oxford, 1946), p. 216. a (2rid ed.; Frankfurt am Main, 1948), p. 174. 9 Collingwood, pp. 25-31, 42-43, 108, 217-249; K. L6with, "Mensch und Geschichte," Gesammelte Abhandlungen (Stuttgart, 1960), pp. 152-178; S. Rosen, "Philosophy and Ideology: Reflections on Heidegger," Social Research. XXXV (1968), 260-285; P. Geyl, The Use and Abuse of History (New Haven, 1955), pp. 29, 32, 51-53, 61-64, 70: "history is an argument without end"; L. Strauss, The City and Man (Chicago, 1964), pp. 9-12, 141-145, 153-154, 218; and Nietzsche, Jenseits yon Gut und B~se, 45, 295; Die Fr6hliche Wissenschaft, 1,249, 337, 344, 357; G6tzend~nmerung, V, 6; VI, 8; IX, 32-34; Der Wille zur Macht, 408, 412, 556, 1029-1033, 1041, 1065, 1067. [237] 238 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY if man's action were based on an unchanging human nature, operative in every historical situation, that absolute would be beyond human comprehension. Thucydides' rejection of this view permits him virtually to ignore past and future, and instead concentrate on one contemporary event, the Peloponnesian War, since that conflict, in his opinion, provided the most revealing approach to the truth inherent in all human activity. He therefore regards it as the greatest war of all time fl 1,1, 21.2, 22.4). This paper attempts to show why Thucydides would have classed modern historians and philosophers, critical of his orientation, with the poets censured by him early in his work (I 21.1, 9.1-3). It contrasts his concept of history with the notion of philosophy expounded by Socrates in Plato's Republic. For the state governed by philosopher-kings constitutes a Utopian effort to "convert" or educate passions regarded as naturally incorrigible by Thucydides.s In the case of many modern thinkers, the same drives are found subject to the given historical condit .ions. Thus these modern theorists and Socrates' philosopher-kings, however great their differences, both clash with Thucydides on the ultimate efficacy of any attempt to control or educate man. Thucydides' standpoint is perhaps best revealed in his criticism of the poetic account of the Trojan War. For he there finds fault with a description of events to which he had no direct access as he did to those of the Peloponnesian War (I 9). Thus the motives ascribed by him to Agamemnon and his lieutenants must have arisen solely from his own conception of human behavior. It is important to note that his dispute with the poets is not over facts as such, but over the values or attitudes shaping...