Abstract

The author proposes an interpretation of the theory and practise of paradeigma, developed in conjunction with the method of diairesis in the Sophist, Politicus and Philebus. The conclusions reached are then balanced against the evidence of Plato's views on knowledge and language in the Cratylus, and compared to the logos of Heraclitus, in order to explain the conception designated as the "metaphorical structure of reality". It is then suggested that the degradation and reevaluation of this structure in Modern and Contemporary thought was due to the attention paid, or not paid, to Aristotle's consideration of metaphor as a purely linguistic fact.