From the book
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Empedocles of Acragas · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordPlato’s plural Muses are figurative voices of philosophical traditions.
- In this workIn A29 Plato contrasts Ionian and later Sicilian Muses who combine the one and many.
- In this editionThe identification of the unnamed voices is interpretative.
- A place to readUses the contrast of strenuous and gentler Muses to characterize perpetual versus alternating one-and-many accounts.
Meaning
Plato’s plural Muses are figurative voices of philosophical traditions. The Sicilian ones are gentler or softer; the more strenuous ones supply the contrasting account. These are characterizations within a dialogue, not named divine principles in Empedocles’ own system.
Use in the book
In A29 Plato contrasts Ionian and later Sicilian Muses who combine the one and many. The strenuous voice says differing is always brought together; the gentler voice relaxes that perpetual conjunction and makes the All one and friendly under Aphrodite at one time, many and hostile through Strife at another. The edition identifies the Sicilian allusion with Empedocles and the Ionian with Heraclitus, neither of whom is named in the excerpt.
The figurative framing performs critical work. It presents cosmological accounts as stories told to children and describes their doctrinal divergence through differences of tension or softness. “Gentler” does not mean intellectually inferior by a neutral measure, nor does it report Empedocles’ personal temperament. It points locally to the relaxation from perpetual coexistence to alternation.
This is therefore an early interpretative portrait of the cycle as well as a literary image. Keeping it separate from the technical Cycle entry makes the speaker and rhetorical frame visible.
Places to read
- A 29 (reception)Plato, Sophist 242c-d. Uses the contrast of strenuous and gentler Muses to characterize perpetual versus alternating one-and-many accounts.
Translation in this edition
The identification of the unnamed voices is interpretative. Plato’s words are not to be printed as a direct fragment of Empedocles merely because his position is recognizable.