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.7.24.7–II.7.24.8

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Facing Pages · Branch 256 of 516

Book II Chapter 7 · II.7.24.7–II.7.24.8

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Ancient Greek

p. 508

Πολιτικὸς βίος προηγουμένως

II.7.24.7

Πολιτεύεσθαί τε τὸν σπουδαῖον προηγουμένως, μὴ κατὰ περίστασιν· τὸν γὰρ πρακτικὸν βίον τὸν αὐτὸν εἶναι τῷ πολιτικῷ.

Κράτιστος καὶ δεύτερος βίος

II.7.24.8

Βίον δὲ κράτιστον μὲν τὸν κατ’ ἀρετὴν ἐν τοῖς κατὰ φύσιν· δεύτερον δὲ τὸν κατὰ τὴν μέσην ἕξιν, τὰ πλεῖστα καὶ κυριώτατα τῶν κατὰ φύσιν ἔχοντα· τούτους μὲν οὖν αἱρετούς, φευκτὸν δὲ τὸν κατὰ κακίαν.

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 7

p. 509

Public Life as a Primary Choice

II.7.24.7

The virtuous person will participate in public life as a primary choice, not merely as circumstances dictate; for the practical life is the same as the political life.⁶⁹⁰

The Best and the Second Life

II.7.24.8

The best life is that in accordance with virtue amid things in accordance with nature; second is the life in accordance with the intermediate state, possessing most and the most important of the things in accordance with nature.⁶⁹¹ These lives, then, are choiceworthy; the life in accordance with vice is to be avoided.⁶⁹²

690.Προηγουμένως contrasts a primary choice with what is done κατὰ περίστασιν, in response to circumstances. Wachsmuth notes the Stoic terminology in this Peripatetic account. The assertion remains alongside the preference for contemplation in II.7.24.3 and 24.6; the text does not resolve that tension by retracting either statement. It also expressly identifies practical and political life.

691.The best life combines virtue with things in accordance with nature. The second combines an intermediate state, μέση ἕξις, with most and the most important of those natural things; both qualifications remain. This intermediate state is distinct from ethical virtue itself as a mean. The passage does not call the second life fully virtuous.

692.The plural τούτους makes both of the preceding lives choiceworthy, despite their different rank. The life according to vice is separately rejected. The following account distinguishes happiness from nobility, clarifying why the presence or absence of natural conditions matters.

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.