The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers by Diogenes Laërtius (best free ebook reader txt) 📕

and the cause. And he defines matter as something without shape and without limitation, and says that from it all concretions arise. He affirms also that as it was moving about at random, it was brought by God into one settled place, as God thought order better than disorder; and that this nature is divided into four elements⁠—fire, water, air, and earth⁠—of which the world itself and everything in it was made. But he says that the earth is the only thing that is unchangeable, as he considers the cause to be the difference of the figures of which it is composed; for he says that the figures of the others are homogeneous, for that they are all composed equally of scalene triangles. The figure of the earth, however, is peculiar to itself; for the element of fire is a pyramid; of air, an octagon; of water, an eicosagon; and of the earth, a cube; owing to which these things cannot be changed into earth, nor earth into them. He teaches also that these elements are not separated so as to occupy each a peculiar and distinct place; for the spherical motion collects and compresses all the small things towards the center, and the small things separate the great ones, on which account the species, as they change, do also change their positions.

Moreover he asserts that the world is one, and has been produced, since it has been made by God, in such a manner as to be an object of sensation. And he considers it endowed with life, because that which is so endowed is superior to that which is not, and it must be the production of the most excellent producer. It is also one and illimitable, because the model after which it was made was one; and it is spherical, because its creator was of that form; for it also contains all other animals, and God who made it comprises all forms. And it is smooth, and has no instruments whatever all round it, because it has no need of any. But the whole world remains imperishable, because it cannot be resolved into God; and God is the cause of universal production, because it is the nature of the good to be productive of good; and the best is the cause of the production of the heaven, for the best of all productions can have no other cause than the best of all intelligible existences. And since God is of that character, and since heaven resembles the best, inasmuch as it is at least the most beautiful of all things, it cannot be like anything else that is produced, except God.

He also teaches that the world consists of fire, water, air, and earth: of fire, in order that it may be visible; of earth, in order that it may be firm; of water and air, that it may not be destitute of proportion; for two middle terms are indispensable to keep the solid bodies in due proportion to one another, and to realize the unity of the whole. In short, the world is formed of all the elements together, in order that it may be perfect and imperishable.

Again, time is the image of eternity; eternity subsists forever, but the motion of the heaven is time; for day, and night, and the months, and all such divisions, are parts of time, on which account there could be no such thing as time apart from the nature of the world; for time existed contemporaneously and simultaneously with the world. And it was with reference to time that the sun, and the moon, and the planets were made; and it was in order that the number of the seasons might be manifest, and that the animals might partake of number, that God kindled the light of the sun; and that the moon was above the circle of the earth, and that the sun was next to it, and in the still higher circles were the planets. And that the universe was animated, because it was altogether bound up in animated motion, and that the race of all other animals was produced in order that the world might be made perfect, and resembling an animal such as could be comprehended by intellect. Since then God had life, the heaven also must have life; and the Gods are to a great extent composed of fire. And there are three other races of animals: those which fly in the air, those which live in the water, those which walk in the earth. The oldest of all the deities in heaven is the Earth; she was formed in order to be the dispenser of night and day; and as she is placed in the center, she is constantly in motion around the center.

And since there are two efficient causes, some things must, he says, be affirmed to exist in consequence of intellect, and some from some necessary cause. Now necessary causes are the air, fire, earth, and water, these not being real elements, but rather receptacles; and they too are formed of triangles in combination, and are resolvable into triangles; and their elements are the scalene triangle and the isosceles. These two before-mentioned elements are the principles and causes of things, of which the models are God and matter, which last must necessarily be destitute of form, as is the case of other receptacles. And that the cause of these things was a necessary cause, which, receiving the ideas, produced the substances, and was moved by the dissimilarity of its own power, and again by its motion compelled those things which were moved by it to move other things in their turn.

But all these things were formerly moved without any reason or order; but after they began to form the world by their combination, they then received symmetry and regularity from God, according to the principles applicable to them; for the efficient causes, even before the creation of the heaven, were two in number.