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.7.9a.2–II.7.9b

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Book II Chapter 7 · II.7.9a.2–II.7.9b

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Ancient Greek

p. 278

Αἵρεσις βούλησις καὶ θέλησις

II.7.9a.2

Αἵρεσιν δὲ βούλησιν ἐξ ἀναλογισμοῦ· προαίρεσιν δὲ αἵρεσιν πρὸ αἱρέσεως· βούλησιν δὲ εὔλογον ὄρεξιν· θέλησιν δὲ ἑκούσιον βούλησιν.

Συγκατάθεσις καὶ κατηγορήματα

II.7.9b

Πάσας δὲ τὰς ὁρμὰς συγκαταθέσεις εἶναι, τὰς δὲ πρακτικὰς καὶ τὸ κινητικὸν περιέχειν. Ἤδη δὲ ἄλλῳ μὲν εἶναι συγκαταθέσεις, ἐπ’ ἄλλο δὲ ὁρμάς· καὶ συγκαταθέσεις μὲν ἀξιώμασί τισιν, ὁρμὰς δὲ ἐπὶ κατηγορήματα, τὰ περιεχόμενά πως ἐν τοῖς ἀξιώμασιν, οἷς συγκατατίθεσθαι. Ἐπεὶ δ’ ἐν εἴδει τὸ πάθος τῆς ὁρμῆς ἐστι, λέγωμεν ἑξῆς περὶ παθῶν.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 7

p. 279

Choice Wish and Willingness

II.7.9a.2

Choice is wish arising from reflection; choice in advance is choice before a choice; wish is reasonable desire; willingness is voluntary wish.³⁵⁴

Assent and Predicates

II.7.9b

All impulses are assents, but practical impulses also contain the element that moves to action. Assents are directed to one thing, impulses toward another: assents to certain propositions, impulses toward predicates somehow contained in the propositions to which assent is given.³⁵⁵ Since passion is a species of impulse, let us next speak about passions.³⁵⁶

354.Βούλησις is “wish,” defined here by εὔλογος ὄρεξις, “reasonable desire”; compare Diogenes Laertius VII.116. Θέλησις adds voluntariness, and προαίρεσις adds the explicit relation of one choice preceding another. The definitions are not collapsed into a single modern term such as will or decision.

355.Ἀξίωμα is a proposition here, distinct from “standing” in II.7.7f.3. Κατηγόρημα is a predicate, the practical content toward which impulse moves. As an illustrative paraphrase, assenting to “it is appropriate for me to walk” differs in object from an impulse toward “to walk.” The example explains the distinction and is not added to the translated source.

356.The closing first-person exhortation belongs to the exposition. It marks the transition to the account of passions in II.7.10. The classification of passion as a species of impulse is retained without anticipating its fuller definition.

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.