Philosophy and the Muses

This chapter establishes the connection of philosophy and poetry. It argues that poetry and rhetoric are intertwined as components required for the presentation of philosophical ideas. It also introduces the Muses — the Greek deities of poetry, literature, music, and dance. Later on, the Muses became associated with astronomy, philosophy, and all intellectual pursuits. The chapter thus considers who the Muses are and what connection they have to philosophy and to philosophizing. Here, the philosopher seeks the knowledge of the Muses — of what was, is, and is to come — but the philosopher, unlike the poet, seeks this order not simply as a temporal “before and after” but as the Daughters of Necessity would have it, as an unvarying or necessary sequence whereby the whole of things is determined and the causes of all are known.