Words · Meanings · Passages
Lexicon
Terms from the books in the Diotimos library, with definitions, translation notes, and links to their passages.
4,297 entries across 21 collectionsTerms beginning with B
37–72 of 128
Beloved
Erōmenos means beloved; the person who is loved erotically.
Lysis · Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Benefaction
Euergesia is a benefaction or good deed, and can also denote the benefit conferred.
Stobaeus, Volume I
Benefactor and beneficence
A benefactor confers a benefit; beneficence names doing good to another.
Centuries of Meditations
Benefit
Ὠφελεῖν is to help or do good to someone, and ὠφέλιμος is whatever does so; the opposite is harming, and the harmful is βλαβερός.
Charmides · Alcibiades I+6 books
Benevolence
Bienveillance is a favorable disposition toward others whose breadth must not make particular people disappear.
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volumes I–II
Bernard of Treviso
Bernard is the Count and truth-speaking Trevisan of Khunrath's citations.
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Bernardin de Saint-Pierre
The author invoked through nature writing, Virginie’s speech, and Paul’s mourning.
The Green Notebook
Best natures and the formation of learners
Physis can name nature, a constitution, or the inborn disposition of a particular being.
Epinomis
Better and best
Βέλτιον and ἄμεινον are two forms used for “better”; βέλτιστος and ἄριστος supply forms of “best.”
Alcibiades I · Alcibiades II
Biblical and macrocosmic theology
The p. 151 margin joins the knowledge of biblical and macrocosmic theology and speaks of doctors of both: two ways in which theology is divinely written and delivered.
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Biblical figures and scriptural echoes
Biblical names serve different purposes in the edition: some belong to the author’s explanation of his chosen plot, some to René’s poetic comparisons, and others to editorial identifications of unnamed allusions.
René
Biblical journeys
Biblical places and movements provide figures for leaving religious shelter, enduring exile, and being carried beyond one’s control.
The Green Notebook
Biblical quotations
Scriptural wording enters the notebook as an utterance to be repeated, translated, or placed beside an experience.
The Green Notebook
Bile
Cholē is bile.
Stobaeus, Volume I · The Anatomy of Melancholy
Bird
Birds are observed makers and movers, furnishing images for innate skill, circling thought, and the limits of perception.
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volumes I–II · The Green Notebook+1 book
Bird and song
Judging the bird by its song means evaluating what a practitioner can say intelligibly about the Art, rather than trusting a displayed result alone.
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Birds and beasts of controversy
Birds and beasts give Khunrath an unusually varied language for intellectual and moral disagreement.
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Birdsong
The bird vocabulary ranges from singing to whistling, chirping, and the special verb rossignoler.
The Green Notebook
Birth
Birth marks entry into human life.
Centuries of Meditations · Empedocles’ Complete Fragments, Volume I+1 book
Birth and ascent
Ascent names hereditary advancement in social rank, measured by sides or, below the equilateral threshold, by the size of an angle.
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Birth-caul
Ἀμνίον survives as a single anatomical word, rendered “birth-caul.”
Empedocles’ Complete Fragments, Volume I
Bismuth
Bismuth opens the list of materials that other claimants identify with Magnesia on page 34.
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Bitter
Pikros is bitter.
Stobaeus, Volume I
Black
Melas denotes black or darkness, depending on what is being described.
Stobaeus, Volume I · Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Blackness and shadow
B94 is printed in Latin rather than Greek.
Empedocles’ Complete Fragments, Volume I
Bladder
Kustis is a bladder or sac.
Stobaeus, Volume I
Blasphemy
Blasphemy is both a charge Khunrath anticipates against himself and one he turns against contemptuous opponents.
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Blessed
Μακάριος congratulates someone on an enviable lot; μάκαρ, the word it is formed from, is in Homer a standing epithet of the gods. The vocative ὦ μακάριε is a friendly address, "my dear fellow".
Charmides · Lysis+3 books
Blessed experience
Eupatheia is a good or happy experience.
Stobaeus, Volume I
Blessing
A blessing can be a bestowed good, the happiness attending it, or a good conferred through a person.
Centuries of Meditations
Blindness
Blindness is the absence of sight.
Centuries of Meditations
Blindness and the spectacled owl
Blindness is not a single condition throughout the book.
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum
Blond hair
Xanthos means fair; blond, here of hair.
Lysis
Blood
Haima names blood.
Stobaeus, Volume I · The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volumes I–II+4 books
Blood movement
The participles describe blood travelling and running back again.
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Blood-rich liver
B150 consists of a noun and its adjective: the liver is “blood-rich.”
Empedocles’ Complete Fragments, Volume I
Books in the Lexicon
October 2026
Plato’s Alcibiades I Lexicon
Alcibiades I · Plato
176 entries · 701 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Alcibiades II Lexicon
Alcibiades II · Plato
94 entries · 290 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Traherne Lexicon
Centuries of Meditations · Thomas Traherne
471 entries · 0 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Charmides Lexicon
Charmides · Plato
173 entries · 777 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Empedocles Lexicon
Empedocles, Volumes I–II · Empedocles of Acragas
490 entries · 0 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Epinomis Lexicon
Epinomis · Plato
77 entries · 1,061 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Flatland Literary Lexicon
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions · Edwin A. Abbott
85 entries · 476 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Khunrath Lexicon
Heinrich Khunrath’s Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum · Heinrich Khunrath
326 entries · 0 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Hipparchus Lexicon
Hipparchus · Plato
90 entries · 291 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Baudelaire Literary Lexicon
Intimate Journals · Charles Baudelaire
80 entries · 323 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Lysis Lexicon
Lysis · Plato
239 entries · 0 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I Lexicon
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I · Marsilio Ficino
231 entries · 1,313 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume II Lexicon
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume II · Marsilio Ficino
148 entries · 1,398 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Minos Lexicon
Minos · Plato
54 entries · 506 subsidiary terms
October 2026
René Literary Lexicon
René · François-René de Chateaubriand
81 entries · 275 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Stobaeus Lexicon
Stobaeus, Volume I · John Stobaeus
610 entries · 85 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy Lexicon
The Anatomy of Melancholy · Robert Burton
103 entries · 3,864 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Guérin Lexicon
The Green Notebook · Maurice de Guérin
165 entries · 0 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Lovers Lexicon
The Lovers · Plato
83 entries · 361 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Joubert Lexicon
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert, Volumes I–II · Joseph Joubert
459 entries · 110 subsidiary terms
October 2026
Plato’s Theages Lexicon
Theages · Plato
62 entries · 510 subsidiary terms