the most beautiful; and of all plane figures, the circle. That old age and all diminution were similar, and also increase and youth were identical. That health was the permanence of form, and disease the destruction of it. Of salt his opinion was, that it ought to be set before people as a reminder of justice; for salt preserves everything which it touches, and it is composed of the purest particles of water and sea.
These are the doctrines which Alexander asserts that he discovered in the Pythagorean treatises; and Aristotle gives a similar account of them.
XV. Timon, in his Silli, has not left unnoticed the dignified appearance of Pythagoras, when he attacks him on other points. And his words are these:— Pythagoras, who often teaches Precepts of magic, and with speeches Of long high-sounding diction draws, From gaping crowds, a vain applause.
And respecting his having been different people at different times, Xenophanes adds his evidence in an elegiac poem which commences thus:— Now I will on another subject touch, And lead the way.
And the passage in which he mentions Pythagoras is as follows:— They say that once, as passing by he saw A dog severely beaten, he did pity him, And spoke as follows to the man who beat him:— “Stop now, and beat him not; since in his body, Abides the soul of a dear friend of mine, Whose voice I recognized as he was crying.”
These are the words of Xenophanes.
Cratinus also ridiculed him in his Pythagorean Woman; but in his Tarentines, he speaks thus:— They are accustomed, if by chance they see A private individual abroad, To try what powers of argument he has, How he can speak and reason: and they bother him With strange antithesis and forced conclusions, Errors, comparisons, and magnitudes, Till they have filled and quite perplex’d his mind.
And Mnesimachus says in his Alcmæon:— As we do sacrifice to the Phœbus whom Pythagoras worships, never eating aught Which has the breath of life.
Aristophon says in his Pythagorean:— _A._ He said that when he did descend below Among the shades in Hell, he there beheld All men who e’er had died; and there he saw, That the Pythagoreans differ’d much From all the rest; for that with them alone Did Pluto deign to eat, much honouring Their pious habits.
If he likes eating with such dirty fellows.
And again, in the same play he says:— They eat Nothing but herbs and vegetables, and drink Pure water only. But their lice are such, Their cloaks so dirty, and their unwash’d scent So rank, that no one of our younger men Will for a moment bear them.
XXI. Pythagoras died in this manner. When he was sitting with some of his companions in Milo’s house, some one of those whom he did not think worthy of admission into it, was excited by envy to set fire to it. But some say that the people of Crotona themselves did this, being afraid lest he might aspire to the tyranny. And that Pythagoras was caught as he was trying to escape; and coming to a place full of beans, he stopped there, saying that it was better to be caught than to trample on the beans, and better to be slain than to speak; and so he was murdered by those who were pursuing him. And in this way, also, most of his companions were slain; being in number about forty; but that a very few did escape, among whom were Archippus, of Tarentum, and Lysis, whom I have mentioned before.
But Dicæarchus relates that Pythagoras died afterwards, having escaped as far as the temple of the Muses, at Metapontum, and that he died there of starvation, having abstained from food for forty days. And Heraclides says, in his abridgment of the life of Satyrus, that after he had buried Pherecydes in Delos, he returned to Italy, and finding there a superb banquet prepared at the house of Milo, of Crotona, he left Crotona, and went to Metapontum, and there put an end to his life by starvation, not wishing to live any longer. But Hermippus says, that when there was war between the people of Agrigentum and the Syracusans, Pythagoras went out with his usual companions, and took the part of the Agrigentines; and as they were put to flight, he ran all round a field of beans, instead of crossing it, and so was slain by the Syracusans; and that the rest, being about five-and-thirty in number, were burnt at Tarentum, when they were trying to excite a sedition in the state against the principal magistrates.
Hermippus also relates another story about Pythagoras. For he says that when he was in Italy, he made a subterraneous apartment, and charged his mother to write an account of everything that took place, marking the time of each on a tablet, and then to send them down to him, until he came up again; and that his mother did so; and that Pythagoras came up again after a certain time, lean, and reduced to a skeleton; and that he came into the public assembly, and said that he had arrived from the shades below, and then he recited to them all that had happened during his absence. And they, being charmed by what he told them, wept and lamented, and believed that Pythagoras was a divine being; so that they even entrusted their wives to him, as likely to learn some good from him; and that they too were called Pythagoreans. And this is the story of Hermippus.
XXII. And Pythagoras had a wife, whose name was Theano; the daughter of Brontinus, of Crotona. But some say that she was the wife of Brontinus, and only a pupil of Pythagoras. And he had a daughter named Damo, as Lysis mentions in his letter to Hipparchus; where he speaks thus of Pythagoras: “And many say that you philosophize in public, as Pythagoras also used to do; who, when he had entrusted his Commentaries to Damo, his daughter, charged her to divulge them to no person out of the house.
And she, though she might have sold his discourses for much money, would not abandon them, for she thought poverty and obedience to her father’s injunctions more valuable than gold; and that too, though she was a woman.”
He had also a son, named Telauges, who was the successor of his father in his school, and who, according to some authors, was the teacher of Empedocles. At least Hippobotus relates that Empedocles said:— “Telauges, noble youth, whom in due time, Theano bore to wise Pythagoras.”
But there is no book extant, which is the work of Telauges, though there are some extant, which are attributed to his mother Theano. And they tell a story of her, that once, when she was asked how long a woman ought to be absent from her husband to be pure, she said, the moment she leaves her own husband, she is pure; but she is never pure at all, after she leaves any one else. And she recommended a woman, who was going to her husband, to put off her modesty with her clothes, and when she left him, to resume it again with her clothes; and when she was asked, “What clothes?” she said, “Those which cause you to be called a woman.”
XXIII. Now Pythagoras, as Heraclides, the son of Sarapion, relates, died when he was eighty years of age; according to his own account of his age, but according to the common account, he was more than ninety. And we have written a sportive epigram on him, which is couched in the following terms:— You’re not the only man who has abstained From living food, for so likewise have we; And who, I’d like to know did ever taste Food while alive, most sage Pythagoras?
When meat is boil’d, or roasted well and salted, I don’t think it can well be called living.
Which, therefore, without scruple then we eat it, And call it no more living flesh, but meat.
And another, which runs thus:— Pythagoras was so wise a man, that he Never eat meat himself, and called it sin.
And yet he gave good joints of beef to others.
So that I marvel at his principles; Who others wronged, by teaching them to do What he believed unholy for himself.
And another, as follows:— Should you Pythagoras’ doctrine wish to know, Look on the centre of Euphorbus’ shield.
For he asserts there lived a man of old, And when he had no longer an existence, He still could say that he had been alive, Or else he would not still be living now.
And this one too: Alas! alas! why did Pythagoras hold Beans in such wondrous honour? Why, besides, Did he thus die among his choice companions?
There was a field of beans; and so the sage, Died in the common road of Agrigentum, Rather than trample down his favourite beans.
XXIV. And he flourished about the sixtieth olympiad; and his system lasted for nine or ten generations. And the last of the Pythagoreans, whom Aristoxenus knew, were Xenophilus, the Chalcidean, from Thrace; and Phanton, the Phliasian, and Echecrates, and Diodes, and Polymnestus, who were also Phliasians, and they were disciples of Philolaus and Eurytus, of Tarentum.
XXV. And there were four men of the name of Pythagoras, about the same time, at no great distance from one another. One was a native of Crotona, a man who attained tyrannical power; the second was a Phliasian, a trainer of wrestlers, as some say; the third was a native of Zacynthus; the fourth was this our philosopher, to whom they say the mysteries of philosophy belong, in whose time that proverbial phrase, “Ipse dixit,” was introduced into ordinary life. Some also affirm, that there was another man of the name of Pythagoras, a statuary of Rhodes; who is believed to have been the first discoverer of rhythm and proportion; and another was a Samian statuary; and another an orator, of no reputation; and another was a physician, who wrote a treatise on Squills; and also some essays on Homer; and another was a man, who wrote a history of the affairs of the Dorians, as we are told by Dionysius.
But Eratosthenes says, as Phavorinus quotes him, in the eighth book of his Universal History, that this philosopher, of whom we are speaking, was the first man who ever practised boxing in a scientific manner, in the forty-eighth olympiad, having his hair long, and being clothed in a purple robe; and that he was rejected from the competition among boys, and being ridiculed for his application, he immediately entered among the men, and came off victorious. And this statement is confirmed among other things, by the epigram which Theætetus composed:— Stranger, if e’er you knew Pythagoras, Pythagoras, the man with flowing hair, The celebrated boxer, erst of Samos; I am Pythagoras. And if you ask A citizen of Elis of my deeds, You’ll surely think he is relating fables.
Phavorinus says, that he employed definitions, on account of the mathematical subjects to which he applied himself. And that Socrates and those who were his pupils, did so still more; and that they were subsequently followed in this by Aristotle and the Stoics.
He too, was the first person, who ever gave the name of κόσμος to the universe, and the first who called the earth round; though Theophrastus attributes this to Parmenides, and Zeno to Hesiod. They say too, that Cylon used to be a constant adversary of his, as Antidicus was of Socrates. And this epigram also used to be repeated, concerning Pythagoras the athlete:— Pythagoras of Samos, son of Crates, Came while a child to the Olympic games, Eager to battle for the prize in boxing.
XXVI. There is a letter of this philosopher extant, which is couched in the following terms:— PYTHAGORAS TO ANAXIMENES.
“You too, my most excellent friend, if you were not superior to Pythagoras, in birth and reputation, would have migrated from Miletus and gone elsewhere. But now the reputation of your father keeps you back, which perhaps would have restrained me too, if I had been like Anaximenes. But if you, who are the most eminent man, abandon the cities, all their ornaments will be taken from them, and the Median power will be more dangerous to them. Nor is it always seasonable to be studying astronomy, but it is more honourable to exhibit a regard for one’s country. And I myself am not always occupied about speculations of my own fancy, but I am busied also with the wars which the Italians are waging against one another.”
But since we have now finished our account of Pythagoras, we must also speak of the most eminent of the Pythagoreans. After whom, we must mention those who are spoken of more promiscuously in connection with no particular school; and then we will connect the whole series of philosophers worth speaking of, till we arrive at Epicurus, as we have already promised.
Now Telauges and Theano we have mentioned; and we must now speak of Empedocles, in the first place, for, according to some accounts, he was a pupil of Pythagoras.
LIFE OF EMPEDOCLES.
I. Empedocles, as Hippobotus relates, was the son of Meton, the son of Empedocles, and a citizen of Agrigentum. And Timæus, in the fifteenth book of his Histories, gives the same account, adding that Empedocles, the grandfather of the poet, was also a most eminent man. And Hermippus tells the same story as Timæus; and in the same spirit Heraclides, in his treatise on Diseases, relates that he was of an illustrious family, since his father bred a fine stud of horses. Erastothenes, in his List of the Conquerors at the Olympic Games, says, that the father of Meton gained the victory in the seventy-first olympiad, quoting Aristotle as his authority for the assertion.
But Apollodorus, the grammarian, in his Chronicles, says that he was the son of Meton; and Glaucus says that he came to Thurii when the city was only just completed. And then proceeding a little further, he adds:— And some relate that he did flee from thence, And came to Syracuse, and on their side Did fight in horrid war against th’ Athenians; But those men seem to me completely wrong— For by this time he must have been deceased, Or very old, which is not much believed; For Aristotle, and Heraclides too, Say that he died at sixty years of age.
But certainly the person who got the victory with a single horse in the seventy-first olympiad was a namesake of this man, and that it is which deceived Apollodorus as to the age of this philosopher.
But Satyrus, in his Lives, asserts, that Empedocles was the son of Exænetus, and that he also left a son who was named Exænetus. And that in the same Olympiad, he himself gained the victory with the single horse; and his son, in wrestling, or, as Heraclides says in his Abridgment, in running. But I have found in the Commentaries of Phavorinus, that Empedocles sacrificed, and gave as a feast to the spectators of the games, an ox made of honey and flour, and that he had a brother named Callicratidas.
But Telauges, the son of Pythagoras, in his letters to Philolaus, says that Empedocles was the son of Archinomus; and that he was a citizen of Agrigentum, he himself asserts at the beginning of his Purifications.
Friends, who the mighty citadel inhabit, Which crowns the golden waves of Acragas.
And this is enough to say about his family.
II. Timæus, in his ninth book, relates that he was a pupil of Pythagoras, saying that he was afterwards convicted of having divulged his doctrines, in the same way as Plato was, and therefore that he was forbidden from thenceforth to attend his school. And they say that Pythagoras himself mentions him when he says:— And in that band there was a learned man Of wondrous wisdom; one, who of all men Had the profoundest wealth of intellect.
But some say that when the philosopher says this, he is referring to Parmenides.
Neanthes relates, that till the time of Philolaus and Empedocles, the Pythagoreans used to admit all persons indiscriminately into their school; but when Empedocles made their doctrines public by means of his poems, then they made a law to admit no Epic poet. And they say that the same thing happened to Plato; for that he too was excluded from the school. But who was the teacher of the Pythagorean school that Empedocles was a pupil of, they do not say; for, as for the letter of Telauges, in which he is stated to have been a pupil of Hippasus and Brontinus, that is not worthy of belief. But Theophrastus says that he was an imitator and a rival of Parmenides, in his poems, for that he too had delivered his opinions on natural philosophy in epic verse.
Hermippus, however, says that he was an imitator, not of Parmenides, but of Xenophanes with whom he lived; and that he imitated his epic style, and that it was at a later period that he fell in with the Pythagoreans. But Alcidamas, in his Natural Philosophy, says, that Zeno and Empedocles were pupils of Parmenides, about the same time; and that they subsequently seceded from him; and that Zeno adopted a philosophical system peculiar to himself; but that Empedocles became a pupil of Anaxagoras and Pythagoras, and that he imitated the pompous demeanour, and way of life, and gestures of the one, and the system of Natural Philosophy of the other.
III. And Aristotle, in his Sophist, says that Empedocles was the first person who invented rhetoric, and Zeno the first person who invented dialectics. And in his book on Poetry, he says, that Empedocles was a man of Homeric genius, and endowed with great power of language, and a great master of metaphor, and a man who employed all the successful artifices of poetry, and also that when he had written several poems, and among them one on the passage of the Hellespont, by Xerxes, and also the proœmium of a hymn to Apollo, his daughter subsequently burnt them, or, as Hieronymus says, his sister, burning the proœmium unintentionally, but the Persian poem on purpose, because it was incomplete. And speaking generally, he says that he wrote tragedies and political treatises.
But Heraclides, the son of Sarapion, says that the tragedies were the work of some other Empedocles; and Hieronymus says that he had met with forty-three. Neanthes, too, affirms that when he was a young man, he wrote tragedies, and that he himself had subsequently met with them; and Satyrus, in his Lives, states that he was a physician, and also a most excellent orator. And accordingly, that Gorgias, of Leontini, was his pupil, a man of the greatest eminence as a rhetorician, and one who left behind him a treatise containing a complete system of the art; and who, as we are told by Apollodorus, in his Chronicles, lived to the age of a hundred and nine years.
IV. Satyrus tells us that he used to say that he had been present when Empedocles was practising magic; and that he professes this science, and many others too in his poems when he says:— And all the drugs which can relieve disease, Or soften the approach of age, shall be Revealed to your inquiries; I do know them, And I to you alone will them disclose.
You shall restrain the fierce unbridled winds, Which, rushing o’er the earth, bow down the corn, And crush the farmer’s hopes. And when you will, You shall recall them back to sweep the land: Then you shall learn to dry the rainy clouds, And bid warm summer cheer the heart of men.
Again, at your behest, the drought shall yield To wholesome show’rs: when you give the word Hell shall restore its dead.
V. And Timæus, in his eighteenth book, says, that this man was held in great esteem on many accounts; for that once, when the etesian gales were blowing violently, so as to injure the crops, he ordered some asses to be flayed, and some bladders to be made of their hides, and these he placed on the hills and high places to catch the wind. And so, when the wind ceased, he was called wind-forbidder (κωλυσανέμας). And Heraclides, in his treatise on Diseases, says that he dictated to Pausanias the statement which he made about the dead woman. Now Pausanias, as both Aristippus and Satyrus agree, was much attached to him; and he dedicated to him the works which he wrote on Natural Philosophy, in the following terms:— Hear, O Pausanias, son of wise Anchites.
He also wrote an epigram upon him:— Gela, his native land, does boast the birth Of wise Anchites’ son, that great physician, So fitly named Pausanias,[115] from his skill; A genuine son of Æsculapius, Who has stopped many men whom fell disease Marked for its own, from treading those dark paths Which lead to Proserpine’s infernal realms.
VI. The case of the dead woman above mentioned, Heraclides says, was something of this sort; that he kept her corpse for thirty days dead, and yet free from corruption; on which account he has called himself a physician and a prophet, taking it also from these verses:— Friends who the mighty citadel inhabit, Which crowns the golden waves of Acragas Votaries of noble actions, Hail to ye; I, an immortal God, no longer mortal, Now live among you well revered by all, As is my due, crowned with holy fillets And rosy garlands. And whene’er I come To wealthy cities, then from men and women Due honours meets me; and crowds follow me, Seeking the way which leads to gainful glory.
Some ask for oracles, and some entreat, For remedies against all kinds of sickness.
VII. And he says that Agrigentum was a very large city, since it had eight hundred thousand inhabitants; on which account Empedocles, seeing the people immersed in luxury, said, “The men of Agrigentum devote themselves wholly to luxury as if they were to die to-morrow, but they furnish their houses as if they were to live for ever.”
VIII. It is said that Cleomenes, the rhapsodist, sung this very poem, called the Purifications, at Olympia; at least this is the account given by Phavorinus, in his Commentaries.
IX. And Aristotle says, that he was a most liberal man, and far removed from anything like a domineering spirit; since he constantly refused the sovereign power when it was offered to him, as Xanthus assures us in his account of him, showing plainly that he preferred a simple style of living. And Timæus tells the same story, giving at the same time the reason why he was so very popular. For he says that when on one occasion, he was invited to a banquet by one of the magistrates, the wine was carried about, but the supper was not served up. And as every one else kept silence, he, disapproving of what he saw, bade the servants bring in the supper; but the person who had invited him said that he was waiting for the secretary of the council. And when he came he was appointed master of the feast, at the instigation of the giver of it, and then he gave a plain intimation of his tyrannical inclinations, for he ordered all the guests to drink, and those who did not drink were to have the wine poured over their heads. Empedocles said nothing at the moment, but the next day he summoned them before the court, and procured the execution of both the entertainer and the master of the feast.
And this was the beginning of his political career. And at another time, when Acron, the physician, asked of the council a place where he might erect a monument to his father, on account of his eminence as a physician, Empedocles came forward and opposed any such grant, adducing many arguments on the ground of equality, and also putting the following question:—“And what elegy shall we inscribe upon it? Shall we say:— “Ἄκρον ἰητρὸν Ἄκρων’ Ἀκραγαντῖνον πατρὸς ἄκρου κρύπτει κρημνὸς ἄκρος πατρίδος ἀκροτάτης.”[116] But some give the second line thus:— Ἀκροτάτης κορυφῆς τύμβος ἄκρος κατέχει.
And others assert that it is the composition of Simonides.
But afterwards Empedocles abolished the assembly of a thousand, and established a council in which the magistrates were to hold office for three years, on such a footing that it should consist not only of rich men, but of those who were favourers of the interests of the people.
Timæus, however, in his first and second book (for he often mentions him), says that he appeared to entertain opinions adverse to a republic.
And, as far as his poetry goes, any one may see that he was arrogant and self-satisfied. Accordingly, he says:— Hail to ye, I, an immortal God, no longer mortal, Now live among you: And so on.
But when he went to the olympic games he was considered a worthy object of general attention; so that there was no mention made of any one else in comparison of Empedocles.
X. Afterwards, indeed, when Agrigentum was settled, the descendants of his enemies opposed his return; on which account he retired to Peloponnesus, where he died. And Timon has not let even Empedocles escape, but satirises him in this style, saying:— And then Empedocles, the honeyed speaker Of soft forensic speeches; he did take As many offices as he was able, Creating magistrates who wanted helpers.
But there are two accounts of the manner of his death.
XI. For Heraclides, relating the story about the dead woman, how Empedocles got great glory from sending away a dead woman restored to life, says that he celebrated a sacrifice in the field of Pisianax, and that some of his friends were invited, among whom was Pausanias. And then, after the banquet, they lay down, some going a little way off, and some lying under the trees close by in the field, and some wherever they happened to choose. But Empedocles himself remained in the place where he had been sitting. But when day broke, and they arose, he alone was not found. And when he was sought for, and the servants were examined and said that they did not know, one of them said, that at midnight he had heard a loud voice calling Empedocles; and that then he himself rose up and saw a great light from heaven, but nothing else. And as they were all amazed at what had taken place, Pausanias descended and sent some people to look for him; but afterwards he was commanded not to busy himself about the matter, as he was informed that what had happened was deserving of thankfulness, and that they behoved to sacrifice to Empedocles as to one who had become a God.
Hermippus says also, that a woman of the name of Panthea, a native of Agrigentum, who had been given over by the physicians, was cured by him, and that it was on this account that he celebrated a sacrifice; and that the guests invited were about eighty in number. But Hippobotus says that he rose up and went away as if he were going to mount Ætna; and that when he arrived at the crater of fire he leaped in, and disappeared, wishing to establish a belief that he had become a God. But afterwards the truth was detected by one of his slippers having been dropped. For he used to wear slippers with brazen soles. Pausanias, however, contradicts this statement.[117] But Diodorus, of Ephesus, writing about Anaximander, says that Empedocles imitated him; indulging in a tragic sort of pride, and wearing magnificent apparel. And when a pestilence attacked the people of Selinus, by reason of the bad smells arising from the adjacent river, so that the men died and the women bore dead children, Empedocles contrived a plan, and brought into the same channel two other rivers at his own expense; and so, by mixing their waters with that of the other river, he sweetened the stream. And as the pestilence was removed in this way, when the people of Selinus were on one occasion holding a festival on the bank of the river, Empedocles appeared among them; and they rising up, offered him adoration, and prayed to him as to a God. And he, wishing to confirm this idea which they had adopted of him, leaped into the fire.
But Timæus contradicts all these stories; saying expressly, that he departed into Peloponnesus, and never returned at all, on which account the manner of his death is uncertain. And he especially denies the tale of Heraclides in his fourth book; for he says that Pisianax was a Syracusan, and had no field in the district of Agrigentum; but that Pausanias erected a monument in honour of his friend, since such a report had got about concerning him; and, as he was a rich man, made it a statue and little chapel, as one might erect to a God. “How then,” adds Timæus, “could he have leaped into a crater, of which, though they were in the neighbourhood, he had never made any mention? He died then in Peloponnesus; and there is nothing extraordinary in there being no tomb of his to be seen; for there are many other men who have no tomb visible.” These are the words of Timæus; and he adds further, “But Heraclides is altogether a man fond of strange stories, and one who would assert that a man had fallen from the moon.”
Hippobotus says, that there was a clothed statue of Empedocles which lay formerly in Agrigentum, but which was afterwards placed in front of the Senate House of the Romans divested of its clothing, as the Romans had carried it off and erected it there. And there are traces of some inscriptions or reliefs still discernible on it.
Neanthes of Cyzicus, who also wrote about the Pythagoreans, says, that when Meton was dead, the seeds of tyrannical power began to appear; and that then Empedocles persuaded the Agrigentines to desist from their factious disputes, and to establish political equality. And besides, as there were many of the female citizens destitute of dowry, he portioned them out of his own private fortune. And relying on these actions of his, he assumed a purple robe and wore a golden circlet on his hand, as Phavorinus relates in the first book of his Commentaries. He also wore slippers with brazen soles, and a Delphian garland. His hair was let grow very long, and he had boys to follow him; and he himself always preserved a solemn countenance, and a uniformly grave deportment. And he marched about in such style, that he seemed to all the citizens, who met him and who admired his deportment, to exhibit a sort of likeness to kingly power. And afterwards, it happened that as on the occasion of some festival he was going in a chariot to Messene, he was upset and broke his thigh; and he was taken ill in consequence, and so died, at the age of seventy-seven. And his tomb is in Megara.
But as to his age, Aristotle differs from this account of Neanthes; for he asserts that he died at sixty years of age; others again say, that he was a hundred and nine when he died. He flourished about the eighty-fourth olympiad. Demetrius, of Trœzen, in his book against the Sophists, reports that, as the lines of Homer say:— He now, self-murdered, from a beam depends, And his mad soul to blackest hell descends.[118] But in the letter of Telauges, which has been mentioned before, it is said that he slipped down through old age, and fell into the sea, and so died.
And this is enough to say about his death.
There is also a jesting epigram of ours upon him, in our collection of Poems in all Metres, which runs thus:— You too, Empedocles, essayed to purge Your body in the rapid flames, and drank The liquid fire from the restless crater; I say not that you threw yourself at once Into the stream of Ætna’s fiery flood.
But seeking to conceal yourself you fell, And so you met with unintended death.
And another:— ’Tis said the wise Empedocles did fall Out of his chariot, and so broke his thigh: But if he leapt into the flames of Ætna, How could his tomb be shown in Megara?
XII. The following were some of his doctrines. He used to assert that there were four elements, fire, water, earth, and air. And that that is friendship by which they are united, and discord by which they are separated. And he speaks thus on this subject:— Bright Jove, life-giving Juno, Pluto dark, And Nestis, who fills mortal eyes with tears.
Meaning by Jove fire, by Juno the earth, by Pluto the air, and by Nestis water. And these things, says he, never cease alternating with one another; inasmuch as this arrangement is perpetual. Accordingly, he says subsequently:— Sometimes in friendship bound they coalesce, Sometimes they’re parted by fell discord’s hate.
And he asserts that the sun is a vast assemblage of fire, and that it is larger than the moon. And the moon is disk-shaped; and that the heaven itself is like crystal; and that the soul inhabits every kind of form of animals and plants. Accordingly, he thus expresses himself.
For once I was a boy, and once a girl.
A bush, a bird, a fish who swims the sea, XIII. His writings on Natural Philosophy and his Purifications extend to five thousand verses; and his Medical Poem to six hundred; and his Tragedies we have spoken of previously.
LIFE OF EPICHARMUS.
I. Epicharmus was a native of Cos, the son of Helothales; he also was a pupil of Pythagoras. When he was three months old he was brought to Megara, in Sicily, and from thence he came to Syracuse, as he himself tells us in his writings. And on his statue there is the following inscription.
As the bright sun excels the other stars, As the sea far exceeds the river streams: So does sage Epicharmus men surpass, Whom hospitable Syracuse has crowned.
II. He has left behind him Commentaries in which he treats of natural philosophy, and delivers apophthegms, and discusses medicine. He has also added brief notes to many of his commentaries, in which he declares plainly that he is the author of the works.
III. He died at the age of ninety years.
LIFE OF ARCHYTAS.
I. Archytas was a native of Tarentum, and the son of Mnesagoras; or, as Aristoxenus relates, of Histiæus.
II. He also was a Pythagorean; and he it was who saved Plato’s life by means of a letter, when he was in danger of being put to death by Dionysius.
III. He was a man held in very general esteem on account of his universal virtue; and he was seven times appointed general of his countrymen, when no one else had ever held the office for more than one year, as the law forbade it to be held for a longer period.
IV. Plato wrote his letters to him; as he had begun the correspondence by writing himself to Plato, which he did in the following manner:— ARCHYTAS TO PLATO, GREETING.
“I am very glad that you have recovered from your delicate state of health; for you yourself have sent me word of your recovery, and Lamiscus gives the same account. I have been much occupied with some commentaries, and have been among the Lucanians, and have met with the descendants of Ocellus. I have now in my possession, and I send to you the treatises on Law, and Kingly Power, and Piety, and the Creation of the Universe. As for the rest, I have not been able to find them, but whenever I do find any, I will send them to you.”
Thus wrote Archytas. And Plato sent him an answer in the following terms:— PLATO TO ARCHYTAS, GREETING.
“I was exceedingly glad to receive the Commentaries which came from you, and I have admired their author in the greatest possible degree; and he seems to us to be a man worthy of his ancient ancestors. For they are said to have been originally natives of Myra; and to have been among the Trojans, whom Laomedon took with him, gallant men, as the story handed down by tradition attests. As for my Commentaries which you ask me for, they are not yet completed, but such as they are I send them to you. And on the propriety of taking care of such things we are both agreed, so