Diotimos Reading Desk

Tap the page, move to the top or bottom edge, swipe down, or press Tab to reveal reading controls. Use the arrow keys or swipe sideways to turn pages.

← ExitStobaeus, Volume I

Reading language

Book I Chapter 49

58.6 · A willing soul and a resistant soul

“The orderly and wise soul follows and understands its present circumstances. But the soul that desires the body, as I said earlier, remains for a long time in a flutter around it and around the visible region. After resisting in other ways and suffering much, it is led away by force and with difficulty by the appointed daimon.”¹⁷¹⁰

58.7 · The polluted soul is shunned

“When it arrives where the other souls are, everyone flees and hides from the impure soul that has done some such deed: either it has engaged in unjust killings, or it has committed other acts of that sort, akin to these and the works of kindred souls. No one is willing to become its fellow traveler or guide.”¹⁷¹¹

58.8 · Wandering and fitting destinations

“It wanders by itself, gripped by complete helplessness, until certain periods of time have elapsed. When they have passed, it is carried by necessity to the dwelling fitting for it. But the soul that has passed through life purely and moderately, and has obtained gods as fellow travelers and guides, came to dwell in the place appropriate to each such soul.”¹⁷¹²

58.9 · Simmias asks about the earth

“There are many marvelous places in the earth. The earth itself is neither of the kind nor of the size supposed by those accustomed to speak about it, as I have been persuaded by [but] someone.”

And Simmias said, “What do you mean by this, Socrates? I too have heard a great deal about the earth, though not the things that convince you. So I ⟨would⟩ gladly hear them.”¹⁷¹³

58.10 · Telling the account and proving it true

“Yet, Simmias, to relate what these things are does not seem to me to require Glaucus’s skill. But to show that they are true seems to me beyond even Glaucus’s skill. For one thing, perhaps I would not be capable of it; for another, even if I knew how, my own life, Simmias, would not, I think, suffice for its length. Still, nothing prevents me from describing the form of the earth as I am convinced it is, and its regions.”

“That will suffice,” Simmias said.¹⁷¹⁴

58.11 · The earth at the center

“Well then,” he said, “I am convinced, first, that the earth is round and lies in the center of the heavens. It has no need of air to keep it from falling, nor of any other such constraint. The uniformity of the heavens with themselves in every direction, together with the earth’s own ⟨equilibrium⟩, is sufficient to hold it in place.”¹⁷¹⁵

58.12 · Equal balance prevents a fall

“For an evenly balanced thing placed in the center of something uniform will have no greater or lesser tendency to incline in any direction. Being equally situated, it remains without tilting. This,” he said, “is my first conviction.”

“And rightly so,” Simmias said.¹⁷¹⁶

58.13 · Like ants or frogs at a pond

“Furthermore,” he said, “it is something immensely large. We who live from the Phasis as far as the Pillars of Heracles inhabit only a small part, dwelling around the sea like ants or frogs at a pond; and many other people live elsewhere in many such places.”¹⁷¹⁷

58.14 · Hollows below the pure earth

“For everywhere around the earth there are many hollows, of every sort in shape and size, into which water, mist, and air have flowed together. But the earth itself lies pure in the pure heaven where the stars are, which most people accustomed to discuss these matters call aether. These other things are its sediment and continually flow together into the earth’s hollows.”¹⁷¹⁸

58.15 · The imagined inhabitant of the seabed

“We live in its hollows without realizing it, and think that we live above, on the earth. It is as if someone living deep on the seabed thought he lived on the sea’s surface and, seeing the sun and the other stars through the water, supposed the sea to be heaven. Through sluggishness and weakness he had never reached the sea’s upper limit; he had never emerged and lifted his head out of the sea into our region to see how much purer and more beautiful it is than his own, nor had he heard of it from anyone else who had seen it.”¹⁷¹⁹

58.16 · Our own mistaken position

“This very same thing has happened to us. Living in a hollow of the earth, we think that we live upon its upper surface, and we call the air heaven, supposing that the stars travel through it as through heaven. The reality is the same: through weakness and sluggishness we are unable to pass through to the outermost air.”¹⁷²⁰

58.17 · Rising to see the true earth

“For if someone reached its upper limit or grew wings and flew up, he would lift his head and look out. Just as [the] fish here lift their heads out of the sea and see what is here, so someone would see what is there. And if his constitution were strong enough to endure the sight, he would recognize that there are the true heaven, the true light, and the earth in truth.”¹⁷²¹

58.18 · Our region is worn and corroded

“For this earth, its stones, and the whole region here are spoiled and eaten away, as things in the sea are eaten away by brine. Nothing worth speaking of grows in the sea, and practically nothing is perfect there; there are caverns, sand, endless clay, and mud wherever there is earth. And beside the things in our region, ⟨they are not at all worthy of comparison in beauty; while those things above, in turn, beside the things in our region,⟩ would appear finer by a still far greater degree.”¹⁷²²

1710.The earlier description of bodily attachment is included in excerpt 57. Eptoēmenē conveys agitated attachment or excitement, rendered “in a flutter.” The supplied edition prints alla, “other things,” before “resisting,” rather than the polla, “much,” of the parallel Plato passage. “In other ways” is a provisional rendering of this difficult wording, not a correction of the Greek.

1711.The participial construction beginning “when it arrives” is brought into ordinary English sentence order. “Hides” follows the printed hypokryptetai. The repeated language of kinship concerns likeness in wrongdoing and in the character of souls; it does not describe biological relatives. The absence of companions intensifies the isolation described next.

1712.Aporia is literally a lack of a way through, fitting the imagery of a journey as well as the soul’s helpless condition. The passage contrasts enforced movement with divine companionship. The printed aorist ōikēse, “came to dwell,” is retained in the report. Both destinations are described as corresponding to the soul’s character.

1713.The rejected de remains as the bracketed “but”; its awkward position reflects the rejected Greek wording. Removing it leaves the sentence straightforward. The person who persuaded Socrates is not named. Simmias’s supplied an is marked as “would.” This exchange introduces the account of the earth’s character, size, and inhabited regions.

1714.The contrast itself makes “Glaucus’s skill” an expression for exceptional expertise; the extract gives no account of Glaucus. The Greek “that they are true” is elliptical, and English supplies “to show.” The printed ha te estin is retained. Socrates distinguishes describing his conviction from establishing its truth, and limits what he can undertake in his remaining life.

1715.The supplied isorropia, “equilibrium” or equal balance, remains marked. The printed gē estin states the earth’s central position directly; the apparatus records a conditional reading in the parallel Plato text. This is the physical model offered within Socrates’ account: central balance makes an external support unnecessary.

1716.The argument explains why the earth, in the model just described, has no privileged direction in which to fall. English expands “will have no more or less to incline” into “no greater or lesser tendency” to make the compressed construction readable. Simmias’s assent belongs to the dialogue, not to an independent verification of the model.

1717.The named limits frame the speaker’s inhabited region; the comparison then reduces that region to the scale of a pond beside the much larger earth. The supplied edition’s epi telma is retained as “at a pond,” rather than replacing it with the parallel Plato wording. The many other inhabited places are asserted within the account, without being individually located.

1718.Aithēr, “aether,” is distinguished from the aēr, “air,” collected in the hollows. Hypostathmē is sediment or dregs. The account places our familiar water, mist, and air below a purer region; the next analogy explains why inhabitants of the hollows might mistake their own level for the earth’s upper surface.

1719.The imagined underwater observer mistakes the medium through which he sees the stars for heaven itself. His limitation is both bodily and informational: he has neither ascended nor heard an eyewitness. The analogy concerns the relation between levels of habitation, rather than denying that he really sees the sun and stars.

1720.The printed to de einai tauton is retained as “the reality is the same,” understood provisionally as returning to the situation in the preceding analogy. The construction is compressed. The participle describing the stars’ movement is rendered as a finite clause in English. Neither difficulty is silently repaired in the Greek.

1721.The rejected first hoi is represented by a bracketed article; Greek retains a second article in its fuller construction. The comparison imagines a viewer emerging from air as a fish emerges from water. Physis here is the viewer’s constitution or natural capacity to endure the vision, and the account expressly makes that capacity a condition.

1722.The substantial supplement restores the two stages of comparison: our region surpasses the seabed, and the upper region surpasses ours still more. Its scope is marked in both languages, with English word order adjusted. Sēranges is rendered “caverns.” The statements about the sea’s impoverished condition belong to this illustrative account, including its qualification “practically.”