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Diotimos Library · Greek Antiquity Collection · Bilingual Edition

John Stobaeus

Stobaeus, Volume II

Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.

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Stobaeus, Volume IIBook II Chapter 7 · II.7.3e

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Facing Pages · Branch 76 of 516

Book II Chapter 7 · II.7.3e

Ancient Greek

p. 148

Περὶ τέλους · Ὅμηρος

II.7.3e

Λέγωμεν οὖν περὶ τῶν πρώτων εὐθύς, ὁποῖοι ἦσαν οἱ ἀπὸ τῶν ψυχικῶν ἀναγόμενοι. Ὅμηρος, δεδόσθω γὰρ τῇ ἀρχαιότητι προνομία, ψυχικὸν ἀπεφήνατο τὸ τῆς εὐδαιμονίας τέλος, καὶ ταῦτα διὰ τοῦ παρεισαγομένου προσώπου σοφωτάτου παρ’ αὐτῷ· πεποίηται γὰρ Ὀδυσσεὺς ἀναφωνῶν·

Οὐ γὰρ ἔγωγέ τι φημὶ τέλος χαριέστερον εἶναι ἢ ὅταν εὐφροσύνη μὲν ἔχῃ κατὰ δῆμον ἅπαντα.

Ἡ δ’ εὐφροσύνη ψυχική τίς ἐστι διάθεσις, ἣν ἄν τις ἐξηγήσαιτο καλὴν φρόνησιν, τοῦτο δ’ ἂν ἐκδέξαιτο τὴν ἐπὶ τοῖς καλοῖς φρόνησιν. Ὁμήρῳ μὲν ἀρκέσει προμετρηθὲν τὸ τῆς τιμῆς διὰ τὴν ἀρχαιότητα, ἐπὶ δὲ τοὺς φιλοσόφους ἰτέον.

148

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 7

p. 149

On the End · Homer

II.7.3e

Let us speak at once of the first group, those whose starting point was the goods of the soul. Homer, for let antiquity be given precedence, declared the end of happiness to belong to the soul, and did so through the character he presents as the wisest: for Odysseus is made to exclaim:

For I say there is no more delightful end than when gladness possesses the whole people.

Gladness is a certain disposition of the soul, which one might explain as noble understanding, taking this to mean understanding directed toward noble things. Let the honor already allotted to Homer for his antiquity suffice; we must proceed to the philosophers.167

149

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.