Thus it created Philosophy, its last and greatest gift to humanity. In
so doing it freed itself from the trammels even of Science, which thus
became its servant and not its master--at the same time finally
liberating itself from the narrowing and blinding influences of passion
and imagination and all the shackles of merely practical needs and
disabilities. Here too it fixed the idea or the ideal. 'Life without
reflection upon life, without self-examination and self-study and
self-knowledge, is a life not worth living by man.' In doing so it
revealed a self deeper than the physical being of man and an environment
wider and more real--more stable and permanent--than the physical
cosmos, finding in the one and the other something more enduring,
substantial, and precious than shows itself either to Science or the
economic and political prudence, yet which alone gives meaning and worth
to the one and the other. Thus for the first time arose before the mind
of man the conception of a life not sunk in nature and practice, but
superior to them and the end or meaning of their existence--a life of
intense activity, of unfailing interest, of inexhaustible and eternal
value.

This life was throughout the duration of Greek thought too narrowly
conceived. It was frequently thought and spoken of as the life of a
spectator or bystander or onlooker, as a life withdrawn or isolated, cut
off from what we should call ordinary human business and concerns, a
life into which we, or at least a few of us, could escape or be
transported at rare intervals and under exceptionally favourable
circumstances. Yet in principle it was open to all, and certainly not
confined to those privileged by birth or wealth or social position. It
was not the reward of magical favour or ascetic exercises, it was
reached by the beaten path of the loyal citizen and the resolute
student. There was about it no esoteric mystery or other-worldliness.