Читать книгу A Beginner's History of Philosophy, Vol. 1: Ancient and Mediæval Philosophy онлайн

39 страница из 54

2. The Pythagorean Dualistic World.13

There is a system in the Pythagorean theory not to be found in the teaching of the other reconcilers. Although all the numbers, and with them all the world, are divided into two opposing classes, these are, nevertheless, united in a harmony. The harmony of a dualism reminds us of Heracleitus’ harmony of antitheses. All series of numbers have their unity and harmony in the odd-even number, One. To the Pythagorean the opposites of life—the good and the bad, the limited and unlimited, the perfect and imperfect, the odd and even—exist in an harmonious whole.

As the Pythagorean school grew in years, the realms to which it applied its theory increased. While we have stated its metaphysical theory first in order to give it prominence, the school came to the formulation of its theory through its investigations in mathematics, music, and astronomy. Then it applied the theory to geometrical structures and to other fields with a procedure that was arbitrary and unmethodical. Yet so universal was the application of the theory that it lived to have superstitious authority for the human mind in the Middle Ages.