The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers Diogenes Laërtius (first ebook reader .TXT) 📖

as Antipater says, in the second book of his treatise on Substance; and Apollodorus, in his Natural Philosophy, agrees with him. It is also subject to change, as we learn from the same author; for if it were immutable, then the things which have been produced out of it would not have been produced; on which account he also says that it is infinitely divisible: but Chrysippus denies that it is infinite; for that nothing is infinite, which is divisible at all.

He admits, however, that it is infinitely divisible, and that its concretions take place over the whole of it, as he explains in the third book of his Physics, and not according to any circumference or juxtaposition; for a little wine when thrown into the sea will keep its distinctness for a brief period, but after that will be lost.

They also say that there are some Daemons who have a sympathy with mankind, being surveyors of all human affairs; and that there are heroes, which are the souls of virtuous men which have left their bodies.

Of the things which take place in the air, they say that winter is the effect of the air above the earth being cooled, on account of the retirement of the sun to a greater distance than before; that spring is a good temperature of the air, according to the sun’s approach towards us; that summer is the effect of the air above the earth being warmed by the approach of the sun towards the north; that autumn is caused by the retreat of the sun from us⁠ ⁠… to those places from which they flow.92

And the cause of the production of the winds is the sun, which evaporates the clouds. Moreover, the rainbow is the reflection of the sun’s rays from the moist clouds, or, as Posidonius explains it in his Meteorology, a manifestation of a section of the sun or moon, in a cloud suffused with dew; being hollow and continuous to the sight; so that it is reflected as in a mirror, under the appearance of a circle. And that comets, and bearded stars, and meteors, are fires which have an existence when the density of the air is borne upwards to the regions of the aether.

That a ray of light is a kindling of sudden fire, borne through the air with great rapidity, and displaying an appearance of length; that rain proceeds from the clouds, being a transformation of them into water, whenever the moisture which is caught up from the earth or from the sea by the sun is not able to be otherwise disposed of; for when it is solidified, it is then called hoar frost. And hail is a cloud congealed, and subsequently dispersed by the wind. Snow is moisture from a congealed cloud, as Posidonius tells us in the eighth book of his discourse on Natural Philosophy. Lightning is a kindling of the clouds from their being rubbed together, or else broken asunder by the wind, as Zeno tells us in his treatise on the Universe; and thunder is the noise made by them on the occasion of their being rubbed together or broken asunder; and the thunderbolt is a sudden kindling which falls with great violence on the earth, from the clouds being rubbed together or broken asunder, or as others say, it is a conversion of fiery air violently brought down to the earth. A typhon is a vast thunderbolt, violent and full of wind, or a smoky breath of a cloud broken asunder. A πρηστὴς is a cloud rent by fire, with wind93⁠ ⁠… into the hollows of the earth, or when the wind is pent up in the earth, as Posidonius says in his eighth book; and that some of them are shakings, others rendings, others emissions of fire, and others, instances of violent fermentation.

They also think that the general arrangement of the world is in this fashion: that the earth is in the middle, occupying the place of the center; next to which comes the water, of a spherical form, and having the same center as the earth, so that the earth is in the water; and next to the water comes the air, which has also a spherical form.

And that there are five circles in the heaven: of which the first is the arctic circle, which is always visible; the second is the tropical summer circle; the third is the equinoctial circle; the fourth, the winter tropical circle; and the fifth the antarctic, which is not visible. And they are called parallel, because they do not incline to one another; they are drawn however around the same center. But the zodiac is oblique, cutting the parallel circles. There are also five zones on the earth: the first is the northern one, placed under the arctic circle, uninhabitable by reason of the cold; the second is temperate; the third is uninhabitable because of the heat, and is called the torrid zone; the fourth is a temperate zone, on the other side of the torrid zone; the fifth is the southern zone, being also uninhabitable by reason of the cold.94

Another of their doctrines is that nature is an artificial fire tending by a regular road to production, which is a fiery kind of breath proceeding according to art. Also, that the soul is sensible, and that it is a spirit which is born with us; consequently it is a body and continues to exist after death; that nevertheless it is perishable. But that the soul of the universe is imperishable, and that the souls which exist in animals are only parts of that of the universe. But Zeno of Citium, and Antipater, in their treatise concerning the Soul, and Posidonius also, all say that the soul is a warm spirit; for that by it we have our breath, and by it we are moved. Cleanthes, accordingly, asserts that all souls