of vision: Colour. € senses. The organs of hearing and sound need no third1 thing in order that the former may hear and the latter be heard; nothing, the absence of which would prevent the one from hearing and the other from being heard. The other senses also are exempt from any such need. But the faculty of seeing and the object of this have need of such third thing. For the power of seeing may be in the eye, and the man who possesses it may strive to exercise it, also colour may be present in the object; but if a third thing called light be not present, the eye can see nothing; the .colour must remain invisible. Light is the precious medium by the intervention of which the object and the organ of vision are brought into conjunction for the exercise of this faculty. The visual organ is not the sun, though the most sunlike (ἡλιωδέστατον . . . ὀργάνων) of the sensory organs ; but it receives from the sun, when the latter illuminates the sphere of vision, all the visual power which it possesses. Light wells forth from the sun as from a fountain.' The object § 29. The object of vision is colour. If the eye sees, what it primarily sees is this 3. The visual agency according to Plato consists of fire. Its visible object too is of the same nature. The body of the created world is tangible and visible: that it should be tangible it must consist, in part, of earth: that it should be visible it must have an ingredient of fire"? 'Colour, therefore, he regards as a sort of flame from bodies, having its parts symmetrical with 6 It is strange that Plato should here reason as if only this one faculty of sense required a medium-light-between object and organ: as if no medium were required for hearing or smelling. ? Cf. Goethe, Farbenlehre, Introduction : 'Wär' nicht das Auge sonnenhaft, Wie könnten wir das Licht erblicken ? Lebt nicht in uns des Gottes eigne Kraft, * In Charmid. 167 C χρῶμα μὲν ὁρᾷ οὐδὲν ὄψις οὖσα is given as an absurdity. 4 Theophr. de Sens. § 5. 5 χωρισθὲν δὲ πυρὸς οὐδὲν ἄν ποτε ὁρατὸν γένοιτο, Tim. 31 B. • Theophr. l. c. We are here (as Th. remarks) reminded of Empedocles, who required ovμμerpía between the ảπóppoiaι and the pores of the organs. those of the visual current; so that (since 'an emanation 2 takes place from the objects seen, and this emanation and the visual fire must harmonize with one another) the visual agency, going forth to a certain point, forms a union with: the emanation from the body, and thus we see. Hence Plato's visual theory would stand midway between that of those who merely say that the visual current impinges upon the objects, and that of those who teach merely that something is conveyed to the eye from the objects seen.' 'Plato's theory of colour approximates to that of Empedocles, since the symmetry which Plato requires between the parts of the colour and the visual current is like the harmonious fitting (εναρμόττειν) of the ἀπορροαί into the pores required by Empedocles. . . . It is strange that Plato should simply define colour as a flame; for, though the particular colour white may be like this, yet black would seem to be the very reverse". We have seen that Plato seems to approve of the definition quoted in the Menon from Empedocles". Black and white are recognized by Plato as opposite colours. Hence, too, colours admit of gradation, not quantitative, in the sphere of péya or moλú, but qualitative, i. e. in point of кaðaρóτηs o. 1 τῇ ὄψει=τῷ τῆς ὄψεως ῥεύματι. 2 ὡς ἀπορροῆς τε γιγνομένης κτέ. This, if Theophrastus expresses Plato's doctrine correctly, brings the latter into closer relationship with Empedocles than Mr. Archer-Hind (Plato, Tim. p. 156) is inclined to admit. Theophr. de Sens. § 91 περὶ δὲ χρωμάτων σχεδὸν ὁμοίως Εμπει δοκλεῖ λέγει. τὸ γὰρ σύμμετρα ἔχειν μόρια τῇ ὄψει τῷ τοῖς πόροις ἐναρμόττειν ἐστὶν [ἴσον ?]. "Who are meant? Probably Alcmaeon and the Pythagoreans. Probably those who held with Democritus the theory of visual δείκελα, οι εἴδωλα. Theophr. de Sens. § 91. * Menon 76D ἔστι γὰρ χρόα ἀπορροὴ σχημάτων ὄψει σύμμετρος καὶ αἰσθητός. Prant (who, objecting to Theophrastus' comparison of Plato's colour theory with that of Empedocles, says that das Ganze bei Platon mehr dynamisch betrachtet wird) would have us believe that the Empedoclean definition of colour is only accepted in a spirit of Socratic irony. Vide his Arist. Farbenlehre, p. 57. Phileb. 12 E, Protag. 331 D. Phileb. 53 B. 830. A fourth department of sensibles yet remains whose many varieties we have to distinguish. These as a class we call colours, being a flame 3 streaming off from bodies each and all, having parts symmetrical with those of the visual current, so as to be capable of being perceived. We have already, in what precedes, set forth the causes which explain the origin of vision. Here, then, it is most natural and fitting to discuss the probable theory of colours, showing how the particles which are borne from external things, and impinge upon the visual organ, are some smaller, some larger than and some equal to the parts of this visual organ itself that, moreover, those of equal size are unperceived, and are accordingly called transparent, whereas the larger and smaller, the former contracting the visual current and the latter dilating it, are analogous respectively to things cold and hot in application to the flesh, and to things which, in their effects on the tongue (sc. the organ of taste), are astringent, or from their heating effect on it are called pungents. These are the colours black and white: affections of the parts of the visual current which are, as has been said, identical in principle with those of temperature and taste but in a different sense-modality, 1 Reading alonτóv. The three preceding departments were those of Taste, Odour, Sound. Plato, Tim. 67 C-68 E. 3 Prantl (Пepi Xpwμ., p. 75) blames Theophr. § 86 for inaccuracy in giving, as Plato's definition of χρῶμα, φλόγα ἀπὸ τῶν σωμάτων σύμμετρα μόρια ἔχουσαν τῇ ὄψει, and says that Plato would not have used φλόξ thus. But in fact Theophrastus is merely repeating the words of Tim. 67 C. ''Lit. with a view to perception,' πpòs aïooŋov. 5 By 'organ' for Plato here has to be understood not the eye, but the ὄψεως ῥεῦμα. The 'diacritic' effect of white, and the 'syncritic' effect of black on the visual current would seem to have their psychological meaning in the power of visual discrimination which light gives, and the confusion, or loss of discrimination, between colour diapopai which results from darkness. 7 i. e. in reference to the organ of touch which for Plato was the σáps. " He does not pursue the parallelism of white to hot and black to cold into the modality of taste, so that e. g. white should be to sweet as black to bitter, nor could he do so consistently with his own account of sweet and bitter, Tim. 65 D, 66 E. ἐν ἄλλῳ γένει. .I 9 and presenting themselves to the mind as specifically different on account of the above-mentioned causes!! Thus, then, we must characterize them. That which dilates the visual current is white; the opposite is black 2. When a more rapid motion (than that of white), belonging to a different kind of fire, impinging on and dilating the visual current_right_up to the eyes, forcibly distends and dissolves the very pores of the eyes, causing a combined mass of fire and water—that which we call a tear-to flow from them, and being itself fire meeting the other fire right opposite: then, while the one fire leaps forth as from a lightning-flash, and the other enters in and becomes extinguished in the moisture, colours of all varieties are generated in the encounter between them, and we feel what we call a dazzling sensation, to the external stimulus of which we apply the terms bright and glittering. 1 I cannot refer ἐκείνων (Ε, 1. 3) to anything but τοῖς τῆς ὄψεως μέρεσιν above. Stallbaum takes it of Depμà xaì vvxpá; Mr. Archer-Hind of rà συγκρίνοντα καὶ διακρίνοντα. The μόρια of the φλόξ from objects stand in a relation of size to the parts of the õews peûμa :"if they are equal to the latter, they, or rather the objects, are transparent, and have no xpôμa; if they are greater, they cause it to contract, and the colour seen is black; if they are smaller, they expand or dilate it, and the colour white is seen. These conditions of sensation are fulfilled at the moment of coalescence, we must suppose, between the peûμa ovews and the μópia from objects. But how are we to conceive this coalescence in accordance with the description? If the μópia when equal to the parts of the peûμa öews cause no appreciable disturbance, how is it that they do so when smaller? There seems to be here a confused repetition of the 'pore' theory of Empedocles, who taught that ảπóppoiɑi must actually fit the pores to cause sensation; that if too small they pass through without any appreciable effect: if too large they do not pass in at all. This is fairly intelligible as regards actual 'pores' in the organ; but when applied to the peûμa in a free medium is not so easy to envisage to the imagination. 2 Cf. Arist. 119a 30, 1057b8-11. See also Phileb. 12 E, Protag. 331 D. That which is merely diakpitikòv tŷs õ√ews is, as we are here told, white: but we learn further on that if it διακρίνει τὴν ὄψιν μέχρι τῶν ὀμμάτων it is sparkling bright—λaμñрóv. 3 διακρίνουσαν τὴν ὄψιν μέχρι τῶν ὀμμάτων. The meaning is plain from Tim. 45, where os is shown to consist of the amalgamated fires from the eye and from the object, what Prantl (Arist. Пepì Xpwμ.) calls 'die Doppelbewegung der ȧroppoaí zwischen Object und Subject.' 4 οἷον ἀπ ̓ ἀστραπῆς. 5 μαρμαρυγὰς τὸ πάθος προσείπομεν. A kind of fire, again, midway between these two (viz. that producing λevkov and that producing orλBov), when it reaches the humour of the eyes, and is blended with it, but does not glitter, produces a sanguine colour when its fire mingles with the brightness in the moisture of the eyes, and to this colour we give the name red (épv@póv) 3. The remaining colours are compounded of these four-white, black, bright, and red. Bright, when mixed with red and white, becomes golden-yellow (Favoóv). What the proportion of parts in the several possible mixtures is, one should not say even if one knew; since there is no necessary law -no plausible account-which one could set forth with even moderate probability respecting them. Red, blended with black and white, gives violet (àλovpyóv). If these (sc. the red, black, and white which form violet) are mixed and burnt, and black has been thus added in greater amount, the result is a dark-violet (õppvvov). Auburn (TUрpóy) is produced by the mixture of golden-yellow and grey. Grey, again, is formed by the mixture of white and black. Yellow (wxpóv) by that of white with goldenyellow. When white meets bright and is immersed in intense black, a deep-blue (kvavoûv xpôμa) is produced. When this deep-blue is mixed with white, the glaucous tint-greyish blue-(yλavkós) results. When auburn is mixed with black the product is leek-green. It is clear, from what precedes, to what combinations the remaining colours are to be reduced, so as to preserve the verisimilitude of our fanciful account (μvlov). If, however, one should endeavour to investigate and test our theories by practical experiment, he would show himself ignorant of the difference between the human and 1 χρῶμα ἔναιμον. In 80 E red is named τῆς τοῦ πυρὸς τομῆς τε καὶ ¿§oμópέews év vypą puois, the colour of blood being due, as Archer-Hind says, to the commingling of fire and moisture. 2 i. e. is not quenched in it, as in the preceding case. In this attempt to discover the origin of red, the first of the properly so-called colours, Plato becomes more in earnest with this subject than Aristotle anywhere does. It is not easy to find English names exactly suitable for these terms. Thus palós here is rendered 'grey.' So Mr. Archer-Hind renders it. xpós he translates 'pale-buff.' |