From the book
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Empedocles of Acragas · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordThe phrase “inner light” names the light within a seeing animal, contrasted with light outside it.
- In this workThe reported explanation of daytime acuity says that outside light brings deficient inner light up to level.
- In this edition“Brought level” renders ἐπανισοῦσθαι, while several surrounding clauses are editorially supplied.
- A place to readDescribes compensation and excess produced by external light.
Meaning
The phrase “inner light” names the light within a seeing animal, contrasted with light outside it. “Its own fire” in §18 is Theophrastus's expression in his proposed alternative explanation. Light and fire are closely associated in this dossier without becoming interchangeable in every sentence.
Use in the book
The reported explanation of daytime acuity says that outside light brings deficient inner light up to level. But too much fire is harmful: increased by daylight it spreads across water-passages and blocks their operation. An eye's ability is consequently not a simple function of the amount of fire it contains.
The critic contests both versions of the relation. If greater fire destroys lesser fire, daylight should damage precisely those eyes it is said to assist. If instead like increases like, the consequences for seeing white and black ought to be general, rather than restricted to the reported kinds of eye. Theophrastus later allows that exceptional night-seeing animals may have an effective fire of their own. That is his explanatory suggestion within the refutation, not necessarily a further piece of Empedoclean doctrine.
Places to read
- A 86 §§ 7–8 (testimony)2Theophrastus, On the Senses 8. Describes compensation and excess produced by external light.
- A 86 §§ 18–19 (polemical)Theophrastus, On the Senses 18. Tests rival consequences of greater and lesser fire and offers his own account of exceptional animals.
Translation in this edition
“Brought level” renders ἐπανισοῦσθαι, while several surrounding clauses are editorially supplied. The compensation story should be stated as the printed report, not a wholly secure recovery of every original clause.