Stobaeus, Volume II

Name: Stobaeus, Volume II
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.

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Stobaeus, Volume IIBook II Chapter 7 · II.7.13.23–II.7.13.24

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Ancient Greek Page · Branch 207 of 516

Book II Chapter 7 · II.7.13.23–II.7.13.24

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Ancient Greek

p. 410

Ψυχῆς ὑγίεια καὶ ἰσχύς

II.7.13.23

Οὐ μὴν ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν προεφωδευμένων τοῦτ’ ἄν τις ἐπιλογίσαιτο. Εἰ γὰρ ἡ τοῦ σώματος ὑγίεια αἱρετὴ δι’ αὑτήν, καὶ πολὺ μᾶλλον ἡ τῆς ψυχῆς· ⟨ὑγίεια δὲ ψυχῆς⟩ σωφροσύνη τῆς σφοδρότητος ἀπολύουσα τῶν παθῶν ἡμᾶς. Καὶ εἰ ἡ ἰσχὺς ἡ σωματικὴ τῶν ἀγαθῶν ἐστι, πολὺ μᾶλλον ἡ ψυχικὴ δι’ αὑτὴν ἂν εἴη αἱρετὴ καὶ ἀγαθόν· ψυχῆς δέ ἐστιν ἰσχὺς ἀνδρεία καὶ καρτερία, εὐρώστους τὰς ψυχὰς κατασκευάζουσα· διόπερ ἂν εἴη καὶ ἡ ἀνδρεία δι’ αὑτὴν αἱρετὴ καὶ ἡ καρτερία.

Κάλλος ψυχῆς καὶ δικαιοσύνη

II.7.13.24

Κατὰ τὸ ἀνάλογον εἰ τὸ κάλλος τὸ σωματικὸν δι’ αὑτὸ αἱρετόν, καὶ τὸ τῆς ψυχῆς κάλλος εἴη ἂν δι’ αὑτὸ αἱρετόν, κάλλος δὲ ψυχῆς ἐστιν ἡ δικαιοσύνη· τὸ γὰρ

μηθὲν ἀδικεῖν καὶ καλοὺς ἡμᾶς ποιεῖ.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 7

p. 411

Health and Strength of Soul

II.7.13.23

One could also infer this from the ground already covered. For if bodily health is choiceworthy for its own sake, health of the soul is so by far the more. ⟨Health of the soul is⟩ self-control, which releases us from the violence of the passions.⁵⁴⁵ And if bodily strength is among the goods, strength of soul would be far more choiceworthy for its own sake and good. Strength of soul is courage and endurance, making souls robust. Hence courage and endurance too would be choiceworthy for their own sakes.⁵⁴⁶

Beauty of Soul and Justice

II.7.13.24

By analogy, if bodily beauty is choiceworthy for its own sake, beauty of soul would also be choiceworthy for its own sake. Beauty of soul is justice, for

Doing no injustice makes us beautiful as well.⁵⁴⁷

545.Wachsmuth supplies ὑγίεια δὲ ψυχῆς, “health of the soul,” completing the equation with self-control; the English equivalent is bracketed, with “is” supplied by English grammar. Σωφροσύνη retains “self-control,” as elsewhere in the edition. The qualification concerns release from the σφοδρότης, violence or vehemence, of the passions, rather than an express assertion that all feeling is abolished.

546.Ἀνδρεία and καρτερία are courage and endurance. The comparison treats them as strength of soul and expressly calls them choiceworthy for their own sakes. The singular participle κατασκευάζουσα follows the combined expression for courage and endurance as strength. Wachsmuth compares this paragraph with the further analogies on printed p. 125.

547.The source quotes a line attributed to Menander, from an unidentified play: fragmenta fabularum incertarum 34, in the older collection cited as Comici IV, p. 244. Its argument turns from bodily to moral beauty. Wachsmuth brackets no omission here and does not supply an additional prose conclusion; his apparatus records a suggestion that a statement about justice’s intrinsic worth may have dropped out. The translation follows the printed text and adds no conjectured sentence. This completes section II.7.13; section II.7.14 continues the Peripatetic account with analogies among bodily, psychic, and external goods.

About This Reading Edition

The complete surviving text of Stobaeus’s second book, through II.46.22, in Ancient Greek and English, with an introduction and 1,541 explanatory notes. All forty-six chapter headings remain, including the notices for chapters whose texts are missing.

Historical Text and Translation

Greek: Curt Wachsmuth, Ioannis Stobaei Anthologii libri duo priores, volumen II (Berlin: Weidmann, 1884), printed p. 1 and pp. 3–264. The supplied edition preserves consequential editorial signs, reconstructed joins, qualified attributions, and missing-text notices. English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes: Diotimos Editions, 2026.

About Diotimos Editions

This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.

Rights

Stobaeus’s ancient Greek work and Wachsmuth’s 1884 edition are in the public domain. The supplied English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes are published with the site owner’s authorization.