Stobaeus, Volume I

Name: Stobaeus, Volume I
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek with an independent English translation.

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Stobaeus, Volume IBook I Chapter 45 · I.45.heading–I.45.2

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Book I Chapter 45 · I.45.heading–I.45.2

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Ancient Greek

p. 900

Κεφάλαιον ΜΕʹ

I.45.heading

Πῶς ηὐξήθη τὰ φυτὰ καὶ εἰ ζῷα.

1 · Πλάτων Θαλῆς

I.45.1

Πλάτων Θαλῆς καὶ τὰ φυτὰ ἔμψυχα ζῷα. Φανερὸν δὲ καὶ ἀπὸ τοῦ σαλεύεσθαι καὶ ἐντεταμένους ἔχειν τοὺς κλάδους καὶ ταῖς ἐπαγωγαῖς εἴκειν καὶ πάλιν σφοδρῶς ἀναχαλᾶσθαι, ὥστε καὶ συνανέλκειν βάρη.

2 · Ἀριστοτέλης

I.45.2

Ἀριστοτέλης ἔμψυχα μέν, οὐ μὴν ζῷα. Τὰ γὰρ ζῷα ὁρμητικὰ εἶναι καὶ αἰσθητικά, ἔνια δὲ καὶ λογικά.

Stobaeus, Volume I: Book I Chapter 45

p. 901

Chapter 45: Plants and living creatures

I.45.heading

How plants grew, and whether they are living creatures.¹¹⁶⁰

1 · Plato and Thales: plants as ensouled creatures

I.45.1

Plato and Thales hold that plants too are ensouled living creatures. This is evident also from their swaying, from their holding their branches under tension, and from their yielding to applied loads and then springing back so forcefully that they lift weights along with them.¹¹⁶¹

2 · Aristotle: soul without animal life

I.45.2

Aristotle holds that they are ensouled, but are not animals. For animals possess impulse and perception, and some also possess reason.¹¹⁶²

1160.Wachsmuth supplies the source attribution Aëtius V.26.1-2 (Diels, p. 438). Related material is also transmitted after chapter 41; the present edition follows his printed arrangement. The two reports below use different criteria for what counts as a zōion.

1161.The movements of branches supply the evidence adduced for life and soul. “Applied loads” renders epagōgai in light of the concluding reference to weights. The report treats elastic movement as a sign of animation; it does not distinguish the mechanisms in modern botanical terms.

1162.Here zōia has the narrower force “animals,” contrasted with plants. Having soul does not by itself satisfy the additional criteria of impulse and perception. The printed aisthētika, “capable of perception,” is corrected from aisthēta in F and P with the aid of the parallel Placita passage. Compare I.42.1 and the heading of chapter 43.

About This Reading Edition

Stobaeus gathered Greek philosophy and poetry for his son Septimius. Volume I presents the dedication testimony, On Arithmetic, Book I through chapter 60, and the ancient contents of all four books. This complete bilingual edition includes an introduction and 2,117 explanatory notes.

Historical Text and Translation

The Greek follows Curt Wachsmuth’s 1884 Volume I, checked against the supplied scan. Gaps, lost-chapter headings, and uncertain attributions remain visible. Chapter 2 includes a labeled proposed reconstruction. The appendix outlines Books I–IV; the full texts of Books II–IV are outside this volume. Reader pages preserve the companion PDF’s numbering.

About Diotimos Editions

Diotimos Editions prepared this independent English translation directly from the Greek. Prose and verse retain their distinct forms, with mixed passages preserving their quoted verse. Every passage is paired with its Greek and identified by the edition’s reference number. All 2,117 notes remain linked to their passages, with continuous numbering across the introduction and text.

Rights

Stobaeus’s ancient Greek work and Wachsmuth’s 1884 printing are in the public domain. The independent English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes are © 2026 Diotimos Editions. The complete supplied edition is available as PDF, EPUB, Word, and Markdown. The PDF retains the fixed page locations used by the companion lexicon.