Diotimos Library · Greek Antiquity Collection · Bilingual Edition
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Facing Pages · Branch 440 of 879
Book I Chapter 41 · I.41.8.5–I.41.9.1
Ancient Greek
p. 8768.5
Μεγίστην δὲ νόει, τέκνον, τοῦ ὕπνου τὴν ἐνέργειαν, ἐναντίαν τῇ τῆς ψυχῆς, οὐκ ἐλάττω ⟨δ᾽⟩ ἐκείνης. Καθάπερ γὰρ ἡ ψυχὴ κινήσεώς ἐστιν ἐνέργεια, τὸν αὐτὸν τρόπον καὶ τὰ σώματα ζῆν οὐ δύναται χωρὶς τοῦ ὕπνου. Ἄνεσις γὰρ καὶ ἄφεσίς ἐστι τῶν συνδέτων μελῶν καὶ ἔσωθεν ἐνεργεῖ σωματοποιῶν τὴν ἐπεισελθοῦσαν ὕλην, ἑκάστῳ τὸ οἰκεῖον διαστέλλων· τὸ μὲν ὕδωρ τῷ αἵματι, τὴν δὲ γῆν ⟨τοῖς⟩ ὀστέοις καὶ μυελοῖς, τὸν δὲ ἀέρα τοῖς νεύροις καὶ φλεψί, τὸ δὲ πῦρ τῇ ὁράσει. Διόπερ καὶ ἥδεται ἄκρως τὸ σῶμα τοῦ ὕπνου ταύτην ἐνεργοῦντος τὴν ἡδονήν.
9.1
Πλάτωνος ἐκ τοῦ Κρατύλου.
Τὸ σῶμα λέγεις; Πολλαχῇ μοι δοκεῖ τοῦτό γε· ἂν μὲν καὶ σμικρόν τις παρακλίνῃ, καὶ πάνυ· καὶ γὰρ σῆμά τινές φασιν αὐτὸ εἶναι τῆς ψυχῆς, ὡς τεθαμμένης ἐν τῷ νῦν παρόντι· καὶ διότι αὖ τούτῳ σημαίνει ἃ ἂν σημαίνῃ ἡ ψυχή, καὶ ταύτῃ σῆμα ὀρθῶς καλεῖσθαι.
Stobaeus, Volume I: Book I Chapter 41
p. 8778.5 · Sleep as an activity
Understand, my child, that the activity of sleep is very great, opposed to the soul’s activity ⟨but⟩ no less than it. For just as the soul is an activity of motion, so bodies cannot live without sleep. Sleep is a relaxation and release of the joined limbs; it acts from within, turning incoming matter into body and allocating to each part what belongs to it: water to blood, earth to ⟨the⟩ bones and marrow, air to sinews and veins, and fire to sight. That is why the body takes such great pleasure when sleep produces this pleasure.1127
9.1 · Plato: body as tomb and sign
From Plato’s Cratylus.
Do you mean “body”? It seems to me that this can be explained in many ways; with even a small alteration, very readily indeed. Some say that it is the soul’s “tomb,” as though the soul were buried in its present condition. Again, because the soul uses it to signify whatever it signifies, on this account too it is rightly called a “sign.”1128
Socrates
Reading Stobaeus, Volume I · Book I Chapter 41 · I.41.8.5–I.41.9.1
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Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.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.
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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.