ABSTRACT
The phrase ‘Know Thyself’ (gnothi seauton), inscribed on the temple wall at Delphi, and repeated as a slogan of some of the Seven Sages, had been one of the Leitmotifs of Greek thought, ever since the Apollinian religion of Delphi had spread among the Greeks, even among some non-Greeks, infusing ethical elements into life and myth. The true meaning of the saying, as we have seen, was ‘know thyself as a human being, and follow the god’. It implied the pious contrast which played such an important part in Greek ethics, the contrast and conflict between wisdom and moderation (sophrosyne), on the one hand, and presumption and arrogance (hubris), on the other. It was an idea close to the heart and mind of Pindar as well as of the Athenian tragedians. In the fifth century, however, it was given a new meaning, the knowledge by man of himself.1 Heraclitus had said, ‘I have searched myself,’ and ‘character (ethos) is man’s daemon’. Words such as these heralded a new era in which man, even individual man, became the object of investigation, and human reason the decisive factor over and against divine guidance. We have mentioned before some evidence for this development, but it is desirable to describe it independently, and to see it as a whole. This is not easy, because it was never a straightforward, clear-cut movement. Rational and irrational elements frequently intermingled, and even the great agnostic minds acknowledged forces and primary causes of a mythical, or at least non-rational, nature. Still, the general trend is clear. The problems of cosmogony and cosmology gradually lost their preponderance, and man moved into the centre of thought.2 That might be any individual man, but increasingly the idea of mankind and its unity gained force. The discussion that follows is an integral part of the story as told so far.
