Sextus Empiricus: Logic 347
- What has now been said is sufficient, by way of a summary,
regarding the criterion 'according to which,' as it was said, matters are
to be judged. It must be understood that we are not proposing to make
a pronouncement that the criterion of the truth does not exist; for this
[would be] a dogmatic claim. But since the dogmatists seem to establish
persuasively that there is some criterion of truth, we ourselves have
countered them with apparently persuasive arguments, not that we are
committing ourselves to their truth, nor that our arguments are more
persuasive than the opposites, but, because of the apparent equal persua-
siveness of the arguments, when set besides those of the dogmatists, the
conclusion [reached] is suspension of judgement.
Sextus PH 2.80-96 [III-39]
Ch. viii Concerning the True [or: that which is true] and Truth
- Even if we should grant hypothetically that there is some criterion
of the truth, it is discovered to be useless and pointless, if we suggest
that, as far as concerns what the dogmatists say, the truth is non-existent
and the true is non-substantial. 81. We suggest the following. The true
is said to differ from the truth in three ways: in substance, in composition,
and in power; in substance, since the true is incorporeal (for it is a
proposition and a thing said [lekton]), whereas truth is a body (for it is
knowledge capable of revealing all true things and knowledge is the
leading part of the soul in a certain state, just as the hand in a certain
state is a fist), and the leading part of the soul is a body, for according
to them it is pneuma); 82. in composition, since the true is simple, for
example, 'I converse' whereas truth is composed of many true cognitions;
- in power, since truth depends on knowledge but the true does not
altogether do so. Therefore, they say that the truth exists only in the
virtuous man, whereas the true exists even in the base man, for it is
possible for the base man to say something true.
- These are the things the dogmatists say. But we, with an eye
towards our intention in writing this outline, shall now produce arguments
regarding only the true, since the truth is included in this refutation,
being said to be a complex system of cognitions of true things. Again,
since some of our arguments are more general, by means of which we
attack the very substantiality of that which is true, whereas some are
specific, by means of which we show that the true is not in an utterance
or in a meaning or in a thing said [lekton] or in a motion of the intellect,
we believe that setting out the more general arguments alone is adequate
for the present. For just as a wall and superstructure collapse when the
foundation is demolished, so when the substantiality of that which is
