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that we might proffer would probably be disputed by philosophers, and we do not here have space to defend our choices. Nevertheless, we could mention the controlling idea of Plato that conversation about philosophical subjects is perhaps the most important of all human activities. Now this idea is seldom explicitly stated in the dialogues, although Socrates may be saying it when, in the Apology, he asserts that the unexamined life is not worth living, and Plato mentions it in the Seventh Letter. The point is that Plato expresses this view in a number of other places, though not in so many words-for example, in the Protagoras, where the audience is shown as disapproving of Protagoras' unwillingness to continue talking to Socrates. Another example is that of Cephalus, in Book I of the Republic, who happens to have other business to attend to and so departs. Plato seems to be saying here, though not ex-How to Read Philosophy 287

plicitly, that it is a betrayal of man's deepest nature to refuse to join, for whatever reason, in the search for truth. But, as we have noted, this is not ordinarily cited as one of Plato's

"ideas," because it is seldom explicitly discussed in his works.

We can find other examples in Aristotle. In the first place, it is always important to recognize, in reading any Aristotelean work, that things said in other works are relevant to the dis: cussion. Thus the basic principles of logic, expounded in the Organon, are assumed in the Physics. In the second place, owing partly to the fact that the treatises are not finished works of art, their controlling principles are not always stated with satisfactory clarity. The Ethics is about many things: happiness, habit, virtue, pleasure, and so forth-the list could be very long. But the controlling insight is discovered only by the very careful reader. This is the insight that happiness is the whole of the good, not the highest good, for in that case it would be only one good among others. Recognizing this, we see that happiness does not consist in self-pedection, or the goods of self-improvement, even though these constitute the highest among partial goods. Happiness, as Aristotle says, is the quality of a whole life, and he means "whole" not only in a temporal sense but also in terms of all the aspects from which a life can be viewed. The happy man is one, as we might say nowadays, who puts it all together-and keeps it there throughout his life. This insight is controlling in the sense that it affects almost all of the other ideas and insights in the Ethics, but it is not stated nearly as explicitly as it might be.

One more example. Kant's mature thought is often known as critical philosophy. He himself contrasted "criticism" to

"dogmatism," which he imputed to many previous philosophers. By "dogmatism" he meant the presumption that the human intellect can arrive at the most important truths by pure thinking, without being aware of its own limitations. What is first required, according to Kant, is a critical survey and assessment of the mind's resources and powers. Thus, the limitation of the mind is a controlling principle in Kant in a way that it 288 HOW TO READ A BOOK

is not in any philosopher who precedes him in time. But while this is pedectly clear because explicitly stated in the Critique of Pure Reason, it is not stated, because it is assumed, in the Critique of Judgment, Kant's major work in esthetics. Nevertheless, it is controlling there as well.

This is all we can say about finding the controlling principles in a philosophical book, because we are not sure that we can tell you how to discover them. Sometimes it takes years to do this, and many readings and rereadings. Nevertheless, it is the ideal goal of a good and thorough reading, and you should keep in mind that it is ultimately what you must try to do if you are to understand your author. Despite the difculty of discovering these controlling principles, however, we do not recommend that you take the shortcut of reading books about the philosophers, their lives and opinions. The discovery