Melissus
24 Melissus, son of Ithaegenes, was a native of Samos. He was a student of Parmenides but he also conversed with Heraclitus,42 on which occasion he introduced the philosopher to the Ephesians, who were unacquainted with him, just as Hippocrates introduced Democritus to the people of Abdera.43 He also took part in politics and was thought worthy of his fellow citizens’ favor; hence when appointed admiral he won even more admiration for his personal courage.
He believed the universe is unlimited, unchangeable, immovable, and one, homogeneous and complete; and that motion is not real but merely apparent. He also said we should not offer opinions about the gods since it is not possible to have knowledge of them.
Apollodorus says he flourished in the eighty-fourth Olympiad.44
Zeno
25 Zeno was a native of Elea.45 Apollodorus, in his Chronology, says that by birth he was the son of Teleutagoras, but by adoption of Parmenides (Parmenides being the son of Pyres).46
Zeno’s Square, by Piero Passacantando, 2010.
Timon speaks as follows about Zeno and Melissus:
I praise the great strength, which never failed,
Of double-tongued Zeno, the censurer of everyone,
And Melissus, who dispelled many vain imaginings,
And was himself deluded by few.
Zeno was the student of Parmenides, and became his beloved. He was tall, as Plato says in the Parmenides; Plato also mentions him in the Sophist and calls him the Palamades of Elea.47 Aristotle says that Zeno was the inventor of dialectic, as Empedocles48 was of rhetoric.
26 Zeno was a man of great nobility, both in philosophy and in politics; his extant books, at any rate, are full of intelligence. Hoping to overpower the tyrant Nearchus (though some say it was Diomedon),49 he was arrested, as Heraclides says in his Epitome of Satyrus. And when interrogated about his confederates and about the weapons he was transporting to Lipara,50 he informed against all of the tyrant’s friends, hoping to leave him bereft of supporters. Then, saying that he had to whisper something about certain persons, he sank his teeth into the tyrant’s ear and did not let go until he had been run through, meeting the same fate as Aristogeiton the tyrannicide.51
27 Demetrius, in his Men of the Same Name, says that Zeno bit the tyrant’s nostril. Antisthenes,52 in his Successions, says that after Zeno had informed on the tyrant’s friends he was asked whether there was any other conspirator; to this Zeno replied, “Yes, you, the scourge of the city!” And to those standing nearby he said, “I am surprised at your cowardice, if in fear of what I am now enduring you could be the tyrant’s slaves.” And finally, biting off his own tongue, he spat it at him. And his fellow citizens were so provoked that they stoned the tyrant to death. Most writers give almost the same account of Zeno’s end. Hermippus, however, says that Zeno was cast into a mortar53 and beaten to death.
28 My own verses about him run as follows:
You desired, Zeno, and your desire was noble,
To slay the tyrant and deliver Elea from slavery.
But you were defeated; for the tyrant caught you and beat you in a mortar.
But what am I saying? It was your body that he beat, and not you.
Zeno proved noble in all other respects, particularly in his contempt for the powerful, which equaled that of Heraclitus. In fact, that colony of the Phocaeans (originally called Hyele, later Elea), which was his native place—a modest city, good only for rearing brave men—he preferred to the arrogance of Athens, hardly ever visiting that city and spending his whole life at home.
29 He was also the first to use the Achilles argument54 (though Favorinus says that Parmenides used it first) and a number of others. He favored the following views. There is a world, but there is no void. The nature of all things arose from hot and cold and dry and moist, which change into one another. Human beings are generated from earth, and the soul is a mixture of the above-mentioned elements, no one of them predominating.
They say that once, when rebuked, he lost his temper; and when blamed for this he said, “If when reproached I pretend that I have not been, then I’ll be unaware of it when I’m praised.”
That there have been eight men named Zeno we have mentioned in our account of Zeno of Citium. Our present subject flourished in the seventy-ninth Olympiad.55
Leucippus
30 Leucippus was a native of Elea, though some say he was born in Abdera,56 others in Melos. He was a student of Zeno.
He held that the totality of things is infinite and that they all change into one another. The whole is at the same time empty and full of bodies. The worlds come into being when bodies fall into the void and are intertwined with one another; and it is their motion as their bulk increases that gives rise to the substance of the stars. The sun revolves in an orbit larger than that of the moon. The earth stays in place, revolving around the center; its shape is that of a drum. Leucippus was the first to posit atoms as first principles. Such are his views in general; in detail, his account is as follows.
31 He says that the whole is infinite, as has been mentioned; but that part of it is full and part empty, and it is these parts that he calls elements. From these elements arise an unlimited number of worlds, and into them they are dissolved. The worlds are formed in the following way. Detaching themselves from the unlimited, a large number of bodies of various shapes flow into a great void. As they collect they form a single vortex in which they collide with one another and, circling in all sorts of ways, are separated off, those of a given kind joining others of the same kind. And when, by reason of their numbers, they can no longer revolve in equilibrium, the light bodies pass into the outer void, as if through a sieve, while the rest keep together; and because they are intertwined, they remain in motion together and form a primary spherical system.
32 This stretches out like a membrane and encloses many sorts of bodies. And as the vortex containing these bodies spins around a tightening center, the surrounding membrane thins out, while the adjacent bodies inside it constantly flow together as they graze the vortex. And thus the earth is formed, as the bodies carried to the center remain together. Meanwhile, the enveloping membrane grows larger with the influx of bodies from outside; and as it is carried around in the vortex it adds to itself whatever bodies it touches. Some of these are intertwined and form a mass, at first moist and muddy; but when they have dried and are revolving with the entire vortex, they eventually catch fire and produce the substance of the stars.
33 The orbit of the sun is the outermost, that of the moon the nearest to the earth; those of all the other celestial bodies lie between the two. All the stars catch fire by the speed of their motion; the sun is also kindled by the stars, whereas the moon is kindled only slightly. The sun and the moon are eclipsed <…> the tilting of the earth to the south. The regions of the north are always blanketed with snow and are extremely cold and frozen. Eclipses of the sun are rare, those of the moon very frequent by reason of the inequality of their orbits. And just as the world is born, so it grows and decays and perishes in accordance with some necessity, the nature of which he does
Democritus
34,35 Democritus was the son of Hegesistratus, though some say his father was Athenocritus, others Danasippus. He was a native of Abdera, or, as some say, of Miletus.57 He studied with certain Magi and Chaldaeans.58 For when King Xerxes was entertained by Democritus’ father, he left instructors behind, as Herodotus recounts.59 From these men Democritus learned about theology and astronomy when still a boy. Later he met Leucippus and, according to some, Anaxagoras,60 though he was forty years younger than the latter. Favorinus, in his Miscellaneous History, reports that Democritus declared that Anaxagoras’s views about the sun and moon61 were not his own, but were ancient, and that Anaxagoras had appropriated them. And he pulled to pieces Anaxagoras’s views about the world’s orderly arrangement and about Mind, his hostility toward him stemming from the fact that Anaxagoras had rebuffed him.62 But then how could he
have been his student, as some maintain?
36 Demetrius in his Men of the Same Name and Antisthenes63 in his Successions say that Democritus went abroad to Egypt to study geometry with the priests, and to Persia and to the Red Sea. And some say he associated with the Naked Sages64 in India and went to Ethiopia. Being the third brother, he divided the family property. And most say that he chose the smaller portion, which was in money, because he needed it for his travels, a choice his brothers had shrewdly anticipated. Demetrius says Democritus’ portion amounted to more than one hundred talents,65 all of which he spent. He says Democritus was so industrious that he took over a little house in a part of his garden and shut himself in. And once, when his father was leading an ox to sacrifice and tied it there, Democritus was unaware of it for a considerable time, until his father roused him for the sacrifice and told him about the ox. “It seems that he also went to Athens,” says Demetrius, “and was not eager to be recognized, since he despised fame, and that though he knew of Socrates, he was not known to him; for he says, ‘I came to Athens and nobody knew me.’”
37 “If the Rivals in Love is the work of Plato,” says Thrasyllus, “then Democritus would be the unnamed character, different from Oenopides and from Anaxagoras, who takes part in the discussion with Socrates about philosophy, and to whom Socrates says that the philosopher is like the pentathlete.66 For Democritus was truly a pentathlete in philosophy, since
Democritus among the Abderitans, by François-André Vincent, c. 1790
38 It is also clear from his writings what sort of man he was. “He is thought,” says Thrasyllus, “to have been an admirer of the Pythagoreans. And he himself mentions Pythagoras, expressing his admiration in his work entitled Pythagoras. He seemed to have taken all his ideas from him, and might even, if chronology did not stand in the way, be thought to have been his student.” According to Glaucus of Rhegium, his contemporary, Democritus certainly studied with one of the Pythagoreans. And Apollodorus of Cyzicus says that Democritus studied with Philolaus.69
39,40 According to Antisthenes he used to train himself in a great variety of ways to test his sense impressions, sometimes living in solitude and spending time in tombs. Antisthenes says that when Democritus returned from his travels he lived very humbly, since he had spent his entire fortune, and was supported in his poverty by his brother Damasus. But after he had foretold various future events he won renown, and ended by acquiring among most men the reputation of a god-inspired man. There was a law, says Antisthenes, that prevented anyone who had squandered his patrimony from being buried in his native city. Aware of this, Democritus, who feared that he might be liable in the eyes of certain envious men or public informers, gave a public reading of his Great Cosmology, the finest of his works, and was rewarded with five hundred talents; and not only with this sum, but with bronze statues as well. And when he died he was given a public funeral, having lived for more than a hundred years. Demetrius, however, says that it was Democritus’ relatives who read the Great Cosmology, and that the reward was only one hundred talents. Hippobotus says the same.
Aristoxenus, in his Historical Commentaries, says that Plato wanted to burn all the copies he could collect of Democritus’ works, and that the Pythagoreans Amyclas and Clinias70 prevented him, arguing that it would do no good, since by then his books had been widely circulated. And Plato’s attitude is obvious: for whereas he mentions almost all the ancient authors, he never once alludes to Democritus,71 not even where it would be necessary to refute him, since he clearly realized that the contest would be between him and the best of the philosophers, whom even Timon praises in the following terms:
Such is the wise Democritus, shepherd of myths,
Versatile debater, among the best I ever read.
41,42 As regards chronology, he was, as he himself says in the Lesser Cosmology, a young man when Anaxagoras was elderly, Democritus being forty years his junior. He says the Lesser Cosmology was compiled 730 years after the capture of Troy.72 As Apollodorus says in his Chronology, Democritus would have been born in the eightieth Olympiad.73 But according to Thrasyllus, in his work entitled Introduction to the Reading of the Books of Democritus, he was born in the third year of the seventy-seventh Olympiad,74 which makes him, says Thrasyllus, a year older than Socrates. In that case he would have been a contemporary of Archelaus, the student of Anaxagoras, and of Oenopides and his circle.75 And in fact he mentions Oenopides. He also mentions the doctrine of the One held by Parmenides and Zeno,76 since these two were his most renowned contemporaries; he also cites Protagoras of Abdera,77 who, it is agreed, was a contemporary of Socrates.
Athenodorus, in the eighth book of his Discourses, says that when Hippocrates came to see him, Democritus ordered milk to be brought, and on inspecting the milk said it was from a black goat that had borne her first kid. Hippocrates was duly astonished at Democritus’ perspicacity. And what is more, Hippocrates had brought along a serving girl; and on the first day Democritus greeted her with “Good morning, my girl”; but on the next day with “Good morning, woman.” And it was true that the girl had been deflowered during the night.
Hippocrates Visiting Democritus (detail), by Nicolaes Moeyaert, 1636.
43 Hermippus says that Democritus died in the following way. He had become quite elderly and was nearing his end. And when his sister was grieved that he was likely to die during the festival of Thesmophoria78 and she would therefore be unable to perform her duties to the goddess, he told her to take courage and ordered warm loaves to be brought to him every day. Applying these to his nostrils, he managed to outlast the festival. And when the days had elapsed, of which there were three, he gave up his life quite painlessly, as Hipparchus says, having lived for 109 years. My own verses about him in the Pammetros79 run as follows:
Facial Recognition Halo—Democritus, by Paul Stephenson, 2014. Follower of Ubaldo Gandolfi. Oil and ink on canvas, 50 × 40 cm.
And who was so wise, who performed a deed
So great as the all-knowing Democritus?
When Death drew near, the man kept him in his house for three days,
Regaling him with the steam of hot loaves.
Such was the life of our philosopher.
44 He held the following views. The first principles of the universe are atoms and void; everything else is merely thought to exist. The worlds are unlimited in number; they come into being and they perish. Nothing can come into being from that which does not exist, nor be destroyed into that which does not exist. Atoms are unlimited in size and number; they move about in the entire universe in a vortex and thereby generate all composite things—fire, water, air, and earth; for these things are in fact aggregates of various atoms. And because of their solidity these atoms are impassive and unchangeable. The sun and moon are composed of masses of this kind, smooth and spherical, and so is the soul, which is identical with intellect. We see by virtue of the impact of images on our eyes.
45 All things happen by necessity, the vortex being the cause of the creation of all things; this is what he means by “necessity.” The goal is tranquillity, which is not identical to pleasure, as some have mistakenly understood it to be, but a state in which the soul proceeds calmly and steadily, untroubled by any fear or superstition or any other emotion. This he calls well-being and gives it many other names. The qualities of things exist by convention; atoms and void exist by nature. These are his views.
Thrasyllus has drawn up a list of his books, arranging them in tetralogies, as he also arranged Plato’s works.
46 His ethical works include the following:
Pythagoras
On the Disposition of the Wise Man
On Those in Hades
Tritogeneia80 (so called because three things, on which all human life depends, come from her)
On Manly Excellence or On Virtue
Amaltheia’s Horn
On Contentment
Ethical Commentaries
47 These are his works on ethics.
His works on nature include:
The Great Cosmology (which Theophrastus and his circle attribute to Leucippus)
The Lesser Cosmology
Description of the Universe
On the Planets
On Nature, first book
On the Nature of Man (or On Flesh), second book
On Mind
On the Senses (some group these works under the title On the Soul)
On Flavors
On Colors
On the Different Shapes
On Changes of Shape
Confirmations (which are critical justifications of the above-mentioned works)
On Images or On Foresight
On Logic or Canon, three books
Problems
These are his works on nature.
His unclassified works include the following:
Causes of Celestial Phenomena
Causes of Phenomena in the Air
Causes of Phenomena on the Earth’s Surface
Causes Concerned with Fire and the Things in Fire
Causes Concerned with Sounds
Causes Concerned with Seeds, Plants, and Fruits
Causes Concerned with Animals, three books
Miscellaneous Causes
Lives of the Eminent Philosophers Page 54
