The Cave and the Light: Plato Versus Aristotle, and the Struggle for the Soul of Western Civilization

Plato and Aristotle differed in several fundamental respects, but their work is inarguably fundamental to the intellectual history of the Western world. Herman, a Pulitzer finalist for Gandhi & Churchill: The Epic Rivalry That Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our Age, traces the differences in their approaches and philosophy, both in their contemporary settings as well as in their reception and use in the following millennia. Plato (and more precisely the Neoplatonists) is the key to later spirituality and darker fascistic impulses; Aristotle is the basis for more practical and scientific systems. Herman's method to history is somewhat conservative in its focus on the work of well-known intellectual figures, but this makes for a good story with a dramatic and engaging narrative style. The sharp distinctions he tends to draw between Platonists and Aristotelians are more persuasive for the later Roman Empire and the Middle Ages when looking at texts that would have been available that make the influences clearer. By the 19th and 20th centuries, the record of influences is much less easy to disentangle. Ultimately, Herman concludes that we need the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle in concert to build a rational and great civilization.