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The Probable Date of Aristotle's Lost Dialogue On Philosophy ANTON HERMANN CHROUST IN HIS I~ECENT WORK, Aristotele: Della Filohofia, ~ Mario Untersteiner accepts, without further discussion, W. Jaeger's thesis that Aristotle's On Philosophy" was composed during his stay in Assos (347-345/44 B.c.), that is, after the death of Plato, which occurred in 348/47 B.c. Jaeger maintains that the On Philosophy M. Untersteiner, Aristotele: Della Filosofia (Rome: 1963), pp. xvii ft. See also Untersteiner, "Aristotele Phys. I. 8-9: Frammenti del 1-I~pl~tkoo-o~pla~," Rivista di Filologia e d'Istruzione Classica, LXXXVII (1959), 1 ft.; and "I1 I1r (~tXo(rocta~," ibid., LXXXVIII (1960), 337 ft.; and ibid., LXXXIX (1961), 121 ft. In these earlier works, Untersteiner maintains that the On Philosophy manifests not only a marked independence of Plat(), but also a remarkable agreement with the basic content of book N of the Metaphysics. s That Aristotle composed a dialogue, entitled On Philosophy, is attested by several ancient authors. See Diogenes Laertius V. 22 (no. 3); Vita Hesychii (no. 3); Ptolemy-el-Garib (no. 1). Ptolemy combined and probably confused the Aristotelian On Philosophy and the Aristotelian Protrepticus when he lists a "book in which he [scil., Aristotle] exhorts to philosophy, in Greek entitled [lpo'rpe~rrtJr r See also l)iogenes Laertius I. 8; Syrianus, Comment. in Arist. Metaphysica, in Comment. in Arist. Graeca (hereinafter cited as CIAG), VI, Part 1 (ed. W. Kroll, 1902), 159, 1.55; Philoponus, De Pietate 7 b 4-8; Simplicius, Comment. in Arist. De Caelo, CIAG, VII (ed. J. L. Heiberg, 1894), 289, 1.2;Philoponus, Comment. in Arist. De Anima, CIAG, XV (ed. M. Hayduck, 1897), 75, 1. 34, and ibid., 186, 1. 25; Alexander Aphrodisias, Comment. in Arist. Metaphysica, CIAG, I (ed. M. lIayduck, 1891), 117, 1. 24; Simplicius, Comment. in Arist. De Anima, CIAG, XI (ed. M. llayduck, 1892), 28, 1. 7; Asclepius, Comment. in Arist. Metaphysica, CIAG, VI, Part 2 (ed. M. Hayduck, 1888), 112, I. 19; Pseudo-Alexander Aphrodisias , Comment. in Arist. Metaphysica, p. 777, ll. 19-20; Philoponus, Comment. in Nicomachi Math. Isagogen I. 1; Priscini Lydi Quae Supersunt, in Supplementum Aristotelicum, I, Part 2 (ed. I. Bywater, 1886), 41, ll. 41 ft.; Cicero, De Natura Deorum I. 13.33; Philoponus, On Happiness (ed. Th. Gomperz), p. 72; Stobaeus, Florilegium III. 21, 26. Aristotle himself refers twice to his On Philosophy--namely, in De Anima 404 b 19, and in Physics 194 a 36. See also A.-H. Chroust, "A Cosmoh)gical Proof for the Existence of God in Aristotle's Lost Dialogue On Philosophy," The New Scholasticism (forthcoming). W. IIaase, "Ein Vermeintliches Aristotelesfragment bet Johannes Philoponos," Synusia (Pfullingen, 1965), pp. 323-354, has attempted, not entirely unsuccessfully, t(, show that the first part of Philoponus' Comment. in Nicomachi Math. Isagogen I. 1 (frag. 13, Rose; frag. 8, Walzer; frag. 8, Ross; frag. 1, Untersteiner) is in no way related to Aristotle's On Philosophy, but must be considered primarily an attempt on the part of Philoponus in a characteristically Neo-Platonic fashion to reconcile the teachings of Plato and those of Aristotle. A similarly critical and, perhaps, hypercritical attitude toward the reconstruction of Aristotle's Protrepticus has recently been taken by H. Flashar, "Platon und Aristoteles," Archiv fiir Geschichte der Philosophic, XLVII (1965), 53-79; W. G. Rabinowitz, Aristotle's Protrepticus and the Sources of Its Reconstruction (Berkeley: Univ. of Calif. Publications in Class. Philol. XVI. 1, 1957), passim. The fragment from Philoponus, Comment. in Nicomachi Math. Isagogen I. 1 (which some scholars have ascribed to Aristotle's On Philosophy, others to Aristotle's Protrepticus) has been credited to the On Philosophy by K. Gaiser, Platon's Ungeschriebene Lehre (Stuttgart: 1963), pp. 236 ft.; M. Untersteiner, Aristotele: Della Filosofia (Rome: 1963), pp. 121 ft.; E. Berti, La Filosofia del Primo Aristotele (Padua: 1962), p. 327; R. Mondolfo, La Comprensione del Soggetto Umano nell' A ntichitd Classica (Forence: 1958), p. 675; P. Wilpert, "Die Aristotelische Schrift ~ber die Philosophie," Autour d'Aristote (Louvain: 1955), pp. 99 ft., and ibid., pp. 113 ft.; H. l). Saffrey, "Le Hepl ~btko(rocla~ d'Aristote et la Thdorie Platonicienne des Iddes...

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