Well, to begin with, you see that it is absurd to call the figure seen in the moon an affection of vision in its feebleness giving way to brilliance, a condition which we call [bedazzlement]. Anyone who asserts thisIf Plutarch has a definite person in mind, I have not been able to identify him. Adler ( x, p. 127) thinks that ὁ λέγων refers to a physicist whose name Plutarch himself probably did not know, and Raingeard that it refers to esprits cultivÈs in general. does not observe that this phenomenon should rather have occurred in relation to the sun, since the sun lights upon us keen and violent (as EmpedoclesFrag. 40 (i, p. 329. 11 [Diels-Kranz]). too somewhere not infelicitously renders the difference of the two: The sun keen-shafted and the gentle moon, referring in this way to her allurement and cheerfulness and harmlessness), and moreover does [not] explain why dull and weak eyes discern no distinction of shape in the moon but her orb for them has an even and full light, whereas those of keen and robust vision make out more precisely and distinctly the pattern of facial features and more clearly perceive the variations. In fact the contrary, I think, should have been the case if the image resulted from an affection of the eye when it is overpowered: the weaker the subject affected, [the clearer] should be the appearance of the image. The unevenness also entirely refutes the hypothesis, for the shadow that one sees is not continuous and confused but is not badly depicted by the words of AgesianaxSchmid (Christ-Schmid-Stählin, , ii. 1, p. 164, n. 5) assumes that the verses here quoted are from the astronomical poem of Hegesianax; so also Susemihl (, ii, p. 33, n. 19), Schaefer ( i. 795), and Stähelin ( vii. 2603. 59 ff.). Powell (, p. 8) prints the verses as fragment 1 of the Phaenomena of Hegesianax but observes that Cod. A Catalogi Interpretum Arati gives Ἀγησιάναξ.: She gleams with fire encircled, but within Bluer than lapis show a maiden’s eye And dainty brow, a visage manifest. In truth, the dark patches submerge beneath the bright ones which they encompass and confine them, being confined and curtailed by them in turn; and they are thoroughly intertwined with each other [so as to] make the [delineation] of the figure resemble a painting. [This], Aristotle, seemedi.e. in the earlier discussion which Lamprias is now relating for Sulla’s benefit. to be a point not without cogency against your ClearchusClearchus of Soli, pupil of Aristotle; Wehrli, , Heft III: , frag. 97 (cf. lxx [1949], pp. 417-418). also. For the man is yours, since he was an associate of the ancient Aristotle, although he did pervert many doctrines of the School.For ὁ Περίπατος, the Promenade, used to designate the school of Aristotle, cf. , 1131 F, and the Peripatetics in , 1115 A - B, and , xxvi (468 B).

Apollonides broke in and inquired what the opinion of Clearchus was. You are the last person, I said, who has any right not to know a theory of which geometry is, as it were, the very hearth and home. The man, you see, asserts that what is called the face consists of mirrored likenesses, that is images of the great ocean reflected in the moon,Similar theories are referred to by Aëtius, ii. 30. 1 (, p. 361 B 10-13) = Stobaeus, , i. 26. 4; Lucian, , § 20; Simplicius, , p. 457. 15-16. Such a theory is recorded and refuted by Ibn Al-Haitham, the Arabic astronomer of the tenth and eleventh centuries (cf, Schoy’s translation, pp. 1-2 and 5-6). Emperor Rudolph II believed the spots on the moon to be the reflection of Italy and the large Italian islands (cf. Kepler, , ii, p. 491 cited by Pixis, p. 102); and A. von Humboldt (, iii, p. 544 [Stuttgart, 1850]) tells of a Persian from Ispahan who assured him that what we see in the moon is the map of our earth (cf. Ebner, , p. 13, n. 3). for the visual ray when reflected naturally reaches from many points objects which are not directly visible and the full moon is itself in uniformity and lustrei.e. in the evenness and polish of its surface. the finest and clearest of all mirrors. Just as you think, then, that the reflection of the visual ray to the sun accounts for the appearance of the (rainbow) in a cloud where the moisture has become somewhat smooth and (condensed),For the rainbow as a reflection of the sun in the cloud cf. , 358 F, Amatorius, 765 E - F (where there is a strong verbal similarity to the present passage), , 894 C - F (= Aëtius, iii. 5, 3-10 and 11 [, pp. 372-373]). According to Aëtius, iii. 5. 11 ( = , 894 F) the theory was held by Anaxagoras (cf. frag. B 19 = ii, p. 41. 8-11 [Diels-Kranz]). It is developed by Aristotle in , iii. 4, 373 A 32 375 B 15 (cf. Areius Didymus’s , frag. 14 = , p. 455.14 ff., and Seneca, i. 3). Diogenes Laertius, vii. 152 cites Posidonius for the definition ἶριν δ’ εἶναι ὡς Ποσειδώνιός φησιν ἔμφασιν ἡλίου τμήματος ἣ ἐν νέφει δεδροσιμένῳ, κοίλῳ καὶ συνεχεῖ πρὸς φαντασίαν, ὡς ἐν κατόpτρῳ φανταζομένην κατὰ κύκλου περιφέρειαν (cf. Seneca, i. 5. 13); and Adler ( x, pp. 128-129) contends that Posidonius was Plutarch’s source for the formulation of the theory. Plutarch’s oἴεσθ’ ὑμεῖς, however, addressed to Apollonides must be intended to ascribe the theory generally to you mathematicians; and this is confirmed by the passage of cited above, which reads: καἰ καθάπερ οἱ μαθηματικοὶ τὴν ἶριν λέγουσι On the difference between the theories of Aristotle and Posidonius cf. O. Gilbert, , pp. 614-616. so Clearchus thought that the outer ocean is seen in the moon, not in the place where it is but in the place whence the visual ray has been deflected to the ocean and the reflection of the ocean to us. So Agesianax again has somewhere said: Or swell of ocean surging opposite Be mirrored in a looking-glass of flame. Powell (, p. 9) prints these lines as fragment 2 of the of Hegesianax; see note a on p. 39 supra.

Apollonides was delighted. What an original and absolutely novel contrivance the hypothesis is, he said, the work of a man of daring and culture; but how did you proceed to bring your counterargument against it? In the first place, I said, in that, although the outer ocean is a single thing, a confluent and continuous sea,cf. Strabo, i. 1. 8 (i, p. 6. 4-7 [Meineke]). the dark spots in the moon do not appear as one but as having something like isthmuses between them, the brilliance dividing and delimiting the shadow. Hence, since each part is separated and has its own boundary, the layers of light upon shadow,The language is that of painting; cf. Lucian, , 5: τῶν χρωμάτων ἀκριβῆ τὴν κρᾶσιν καὶ εὔνκαφον τὴν ἐπιβολὴν ποιήσασθαι. assuming the semblance of height and depth, have produced a very close likeness of eyes and lips. Therefore, one must assume the existence of several outer oceans separated by isthmuses and mainlands, which is absurd and false; or, if the ocean is single, it is not plausible that its reflected image be thus discontinuous. Tell me whether for in your presence it is safer to put this as a question than as an assertion whether it is possible, though the inhabited world has length and breadth, that every visual ray when reflected from the moon should in like manner reach the ocean, even the visual rays of those who are sailing in the great ocean itself, yes and who dwell in it as the Britons do, and that too even though the earth, as you say,i.e. you mathematicians; see oἴεσθ’ ὑμεῖς in 921 A supra. The reference is to the eccentrics of Hipparchus’s theory of the motion of the moon. For defence of the text and a detailed interpretation of this sentence cf. xlvi (1951), pp. 137-138. does not have the relation of centre to the orbit of the moon. Well, this, I said, it is your business to consider; but the reflection of vision either in respect to the moon or (in general) is beyond your province and that of Hipparchus too.Because Hipparchus was a mathematician and not a physicist (φυσιολόγος); on the difference cf. Geminus in Simplicius, pp. 291. 23-292. 29, and the phrase, διὰ τὸ μὴ ἐφωδιάσθαι ἀπὸ φυσιολογίας, which Theon of Smyrna (p. 188. 19-20) uses of Hipparchus. Although Hipparchus was industrious, still many find him unsatisfactory in his explanation of the nature of vision itself, (which) is more likely to involve a sympathetic compound and fusionPlato’s theory; cf. , 45 C and , 901 B- C = Aëtius, iv. 13. 11 (, p. 404). than any impacts and rebounds such as those of the atoms that Epicurus invented.cf., 1112 C and , 901 A - B = Aëtius, iv. 13. 1 (, p. 403. 2-4). The present passage seems to imply that Hipparchus’s explanation of vision resembled that of Epicurus. In , 901 B = Aëtius, iv. 13. 9 (, p. 404) a theory of vision is attributed to Hipparchus, however, which does not at all resemble that of the atomists; but the name Hipparchus there is probably a mistake, cf. xlvi (1951), p. 154, n. 6. Moreover, Clearchus, I think, would refuse to assume with us that the moon is a body of weight and solidity instead of an ethereal and luminiferous star as you sayLamprias addresses Apollonides and Aristotle, for that the moon is an ethereal and luminiferous star is the Peripatetic theory (cf. the statement of Aristotle at 928 E s.v. and the references in the note there) and that is why it is ascribed to Clearchus. Obviously then ὑμῖν of the MSS. must be an error and should be changed to ἡμῖν, for that the moon is a body with weight and solidity is the opinion of the Academy, i.e. of Lamprias, Lucius, and their circle (cf. 926 C, 928 C, 931 B - C s.v.).; (and) such a moon ought to shatter and divert the visual ray so that reflection would be out of the question. But if anyone dismisses our objections, we shall ask how it is that the reflection of the ocean exists as a face only in the moon and is seen in none of all the many other stars, although reason requires that all or none of them should affect the visual ray in this fashion. But [let us have done with this; and do you]], I said with a glance at Lucius, recall to me what part of our position was stated first.

Whereat Lucius said: Nay, lest we give the impression of flatly insulting Pharnaces by thus passing over the Stoic opinion unnoticed, do now by all means address some remark to the gentleman who, supposing the moon to be a mixture of air and gentle fire, then says that what appears to be a figure is the result of the blackening of the air as when in a calm water there runs a ripple under the surface. Von Arnim ( ii, p. 198) prints this and some of the subsequent sentences as frag. 673 among the Physical Fragments of Chrysippus. For the Stoic doctrine that the moon is a mixture of air and fire cf. , 891 B and 892 B ( = Aëtius, ii. 25. 5 [, p. 356] and ii. 30. 5 [, p. 361]), and ii, p. 136. 32. The gentle fire here mentioned is the πῦρ τεχνικόν as distinguished from destructive fire (cf. i, p. 34. 22-27 and ii, p. 200. 14-16). For the Stoic explanation of the face in the moon cf. ii, p. 199. 3-5 ( = Philo Judaeus, , i, § 145); and for the simile of the ripple cf. , vii. 63-64. You are [very] nice, Lucius, I said, to dress up the absurdity in respectable language. Not so our comradeSee 929 B and 929 F s.v.. This comrade was the leader of the earlier discussion, which is here being recapitulated, and is probably to be identified with Plutarch himself (so Hirzel, , ii, p. 184, n. 2, and Hartman, , p. 557); cf. , 122 F for a similar situation and Quaest. Conviv. 643 C, where Hagias addresses Plutarch as comrade. ; but he said what is true, that they blacken the Moon’s eye defiling her with blemishes and bruises, at one and the same time addressing her as Artemiscf. ii, p. 212. 38-39 (Chrysippus), iii, p. 217. 12-13 (Diogenes of Babylon); in general 658 F 659 A, and Roscher, , p. 116. and Athenacf. 938 B s.v.. In , 354 C Isis, who later is identified with the moon (372 D), is identified with Athena (cf. 376 A). cf. Roscher, Op. cit. pp. 123 f. (on the supposed fragment of Aristotle there cited see V. Rose, , pp. 616 [no. 4] and 617). and making her a mass compounded of murky air and smouldering fire neither kindling nor shining of herself, an indiscriminate kind of body, forever charred and smoking like the thunderbolts that are darkling and by the poets called lurid.cf., xxiii. 330 and xxiv. 539; Hesiod, , 515; Pindar, , x. 71; Aristotle, , 371 A 17-24. Yet a smouldering fire, such as they suppose that of the moon to be, cannot persist or subsist at all unless it get solid fuel that shelters and at the same time nourishes itSee 934 B - C s.v..; this some philosophers, I believe, see less clearly than do those who say in jest that Hephaestus is said to be lame because fire without wood, like the lame without a stick, makes no progress.cf. Cornutus, chap. 18 (p. 33. 18-22 Lang); , § 26 (p. 41. 2-6 Oelmann). If the moon really is fire, whence came so much air in it? For the region that we see revolving above us is the place not of air but of a superior substance, the nature of which is to rarefy all things and set them afire; and, if air did come to be there, why has it not been etherealized by the firecf. ii, p. 184. 2-5: ἑξαιθερoῦσθαι πάντα εἰς πῦρ αἰθερῶδες ἀναλυομένων πάντων. The ether here is Stoic ether, i.e. a kind of fire (cf. , 951 c-d and note d on 928 D s.v.), not Aristotle’s fifth essence, which does not enter into the process of the alteration of simple bodies. and in this transformation disappeared but instead has been preserved as a housemate of fire this long time, as if nails had fixed it forever to the same spots and riveted it together? Air is tenuous and without configuration, and so it naturally slips and does not stay in place; and it cannot have become solidified if it is commingled with fire and partakes neither of moisture nor of earth by which alone air can be solidified.cf., 951 D, 952 B, 953 D 954 A: but the Stoic opinion given in 949 B ( = ii, p. 142. 6-10) was that solidification (φῦξις) is a state produced in water by air, and Galen reports ( ii, p. 145. 8-11) that according to the Stoics the hardness and resistance of earth are caused by fire and air. Moreover, velocity ignites the air in stones and in cold lead, not to speak of the air enclosed in fire that is whirling about with such great speed.cf.Aristotle, , 289 A 19-32, , 341 A 17-19; Ideler, , i, pp. 359-360. Why, they are vexed by Empedocles because he represents the moon to be a hail-like congelation of air encompassed by the sphere of fireEmpedocles, A 60 (i, p. 294. 24-31 [Diels-Kranz]); cf. [Plutarch], § 10 = , p. 582. 12-15 = i, p. 288. 30-32 (Diels-Kranz); and C. E. Millard, , pp. 65-68.; but they themselves say that the moon is a sphere of fire containing air dispersed about it here and there, and a sphere moreover that has neither clefts nor depths and hollows, such as are allowed by those who make it an earthy body, but has the air evidently resting upon its convex surface. That it should so remain is both contrary to reason and impossible to square with what is observed when the moon is full. On that assumption there should have been no distinction of dark and shadowy air; but all the air should become dark when occulted, or when the moon is caught by the sun it should all shine out with an even light. For with us too, while the air in the depths and hollows of the earth, wherever the suns rays do not penetrate, remains shadowy and unlit, that which suffuses the earth outside takes on brilliance and a luminous colour. The reason is that air, because of its subtility, is delicately attuned to every quality and influence; and, especially if it touches light or, to use your phrase, merely is tangent to it, it is altered through and through and entirely illuminated.Chrysippus, frag. 570 ( ii, p. 178. 20-22), cf. , 952 F. With the words ὥς φατε Lamprias addresses Pharnaces as representative of the Stoics, for whose doctrine of the instantaneous alteration of air by light see 930 F s.v. and the references there; cf. especially κατὰ νύξιν ἣ ψαῦσιν there with ἂν ἐριψαύσῃ μόνον, ὥς φατε, here. Aristotle originated the doctrine that the transparent medium is altered instantaneously throughout its whole extent by the mere presence of light at any point (cf. , 446 B 27 447 A 10 and , 418 B 9 ff.). So this same point seems right handsomely to re-enforce those who pack the air on the moon into depths of some kind and chasms, even as it utterly refutes you who make her globe an unintelligible mixture or compound of air and fire for it is not possiblei.e. on the Stoic theory. that a shadow remain upon the surface when the sun casts his light upon all of the moon that is within the compass of our vision.

Even while I was still speaking Pharnaces spoke: Here we are faced again with that stock manoeuvre of the AcademyThe word τὸ περίακτον occurs in , iii, 476 E, where it seems to mean the old saw, though it may refer to a proverbial state of inside out and wrong side to. In , 348 E Plutarch mentions μηχανὰς ἀπὸ σκηνῆς περιάκτους, but that rather tells against taking τὸ περίακτον as the name of this stage-machine. He uses περιαγωγή in , 588 D in the sense of distraction and in , 819 A in the sense of a trick of diversion, a sense which certainly suits τὸ περίακτον in the present context. The complaint of Pharnaces is frequently made by the interlocutors of Socrates; cf. Xenophon, , iv, 4. 9; Plato, , 336 C; Aristotle, 183 B 6-8. : on each occasion that they engage in discourse with others they will not offer any accounting of their own assertions but must keep their interlocutors on the defensive lest they become the prosecutors. Well, me you will not to-day entice into defending the Stoics against your charges until I have called you people to account for turning the universe upside down. Thereupon Lucius laughed and said: Oh, sir, just don’t bring suit against us for impiety as Cleanthes thought that the Greeks ought to lay an action for impiety against Aristarchus the Samian on the ground that he was disturbing the hearth of the universe because he sought to save (the) phenomena by assuming that the heaven is at rest while the earth is revolving along the ecliptic and at the same time is rotating about its own axis.= i, p. 112, frag. 500; the title, Against Aristarchus, appears in the list of Cleanthes writings given by Diogenes Laertius, vii. 174. For the theory of Aristarchus cf. Plutarch, 1006 c; 891 A = Aëtius, ii. 24. 8 (, p. 355); Archimedes, , i. 1.4-7 (, ii, p. 218 Heiberg); Sextus Empiricus, x. 174; T. L. Heath, , pp. 301 ff. Wei.e. we Academics, the party which did in fact maintain that the moon is an earthy body. express no opinion of our own now; but those who suppose that the moon is earth, why do they, my dear sir, turn things upside down any more than youi.e. you Stoics; cf. Achilles, Isagogê, 4 = ii, frag. 555, p. 175. 36 ff. do who station the earth here suspended in the air? Yet the earth is a great deal larger than the moonThis would not have been admitted by most of the Stoics, who thought that the moon is larger than the earth; but in this Posidonius and possibly others disagreed with the earlier members of the school; cf. Aëtius, ii. 26. 1 (, p. 357 and p. 68, n. 1), and M. Adler, x (1910), p. 155. according to the mathematicians who during the occurrences of eclipses and the transits of the moon through the shadow calculate her magnitude by the length of time that she is obscured.cf. Cleomedes, ii. 1, § 80 (p. 146. 18 ff. Ziegler); Simplicius, , p. 471. 6-11. For the shadow of the earth grows smaller the further it extends, because the body that casts the light is larger than the earthcf. Cleomedes, ii. 2. §§ 93-94 (p. 170. 11 ff. Ziegler); Theon of Smyrna, p. 197. 1 ff. (Hiller); Pliny, ii. 11 (8), 51.; and that the upper part of the shadow itself is taper and narrow was recognized, as they say, even by Homer, who called night nimble because of the sharpness of the shadow.cf., 410 D. Homer uses the phrase θοὴ νύξ frequently (e.g. Iliad, x. 394 [cf. Leaf’s note ad loc.], Odyssey, xii. 284). Another θοός, supposedly meaning pointed, sharp and cognate with ἐθόωσα in Odyssey, ix. 327, is used of certain islands in Odyssey, xv. 299 (cf. Strabo, viii. 350-351; Pseudo-Plutarch, , B, 21 [vii, p. 347. 19 ff. Bernardakis]). The latter passage so understood was used to support the hypothesis that θοὴ νυξ referred to the sharpness of the earth’s shadow: cf. , §§ 45-46 (p. 67. 13 ff. Oelmann). Eustathius (, 814. 15 ff.) mentions besides this another astronomical interpretation of the phrase by Crates of Mallos. Yet captured by this part in eclipsesFor this temporal dative without ἐν cf. Theon of Smyrna, p. 194. 1-3 (Hiller). the moon barely escapes from it in a space thrice her own magnitude. Consider then how many times as large as the moon the earth is, if the earth casts a shadow which at its narrowest is thrice as broad as the moon.cf., 1028 D where Plutarch ascribes to geometers the approximate calculation of three to one as the ratio of the earth’s diameter to that of the moon and of twelve to one as the ratio of the sun’s diameter to that of the earth, figures which agree roughly with those of Hipparchus (t: 1: s = 1 . 1/3 . 12 1/3; cf. Heath, Aristarchus of Samos, pp. 342 and 350 after Hultsch). Hipparchus, however, considered the breadth of the shadow at the moon’s mean distance from the earth in eclipses to be lunar diameters (Ptolemy, Syntaxis, iv. 9 [i, p. 327. 1-4 Heiberg]), while Aristarchus, whose calculations of the moon’s diameter Plutarch quotes at 932 B s.v., declared the shadow to be 2 lunar diameters in breadth (cf. Aristarchus, Hypothesis 5 [Heath, Op. cit. p. 352. 13]; Pappus, , ii, p. 554. 17-18 and p. 556. 14-17 [Hultsch]), the figure given by Cleomedes as well (pp. 146. 18-19 and 178. 8-13 [Ziegler]; cf. Geminus, , ed. Manitius, p. 272). Plutarch may here simply have assumed that the ratio of the lunar diameter to the breadth of the shadow would be the same as the Hipparchean ratio of the lunar diameter to the diameter of the earth; but he may also have erroneously supposed that the time taken by the moon to enter the shadow, the time of complete obscuration, and the time taken to leave the shadow equal three diameters instead of two (cf. Cleomedes, p. 146. 21-25 [Ziegler] and M. Adler, x [1910], p. 156, n. 2). All the same, you fear for the moon lest it fall; whereas concerning the earth perhaps Aeschylus has persuaded you that Atlas Stands, staying on his back the prop of earth And sky no tender burden to embrace.Aeschylus, 351-352 (Smyth). Or, while under the moon there stretches air unsubstantial and incapable of supporting a solid mass, the earth, as Pindar says, is encompassed by steel-shod pillarsPindar, frag. 88 (Bergk) = 79 (Bowra).; and therefore Pharnaces is himself without any fear that the earth may fall but is sorry for the Ethiopians or Taprobanians,i.e. the Sinhalese; cf. Strabo, ii. 1. 14, chap. 72 and xv. 1. 14, chap. 690; Pliny, vi. 22 (24). who are situated under the circuit of the moon, lest such a great weight fall upon them. Yet the moon is saved from falling by its very motion and the rapidity of its revolution, just as missiles placed in slings are kept from falling by being whirled around in a circle.cf. Aristotle, , 284 A 24-26 and 295 A 16-21 (on Empedocles [Cherniss, , p. 204, n. 234]). Plutarch himself in , xii. 3-4 (439 D) ascribes to Anaxagoras the notion that the heavenly bodies are kept from falling by the speed of their circular motion. For each thing is governed by its natural motion unless it be diverted by something else. That is why the moon is not governed by its weight: the weight has its influence frustrated by the rotatory motion. Nay, there would be more reason perhaps to wonder if she were absolutely unmoved and stationary like the earth. As it is, while [the] moon has good cause for not moving in this direction, the influence of weight alone might reasonably move the earth, since it has no part in any other motion; and the earth is heavier than the moon not merely in proportion to its greater size but still more, inasmuch as the moon has, of course, become light through the action of heat and fire.Here Lucius assumes the Stoic theory of the composition of the moon in order to rebut the Stoic objections. In short, your own statements seem to make the moon, if it is fire, stand in greater need of earth, that is of matter to serve it as a foundation, as something to which to adhere, as something to lend it coherence, and as something that can be ignited by it, for it is impossible to imagine fire being maintained without fuel,cf.Seneca, vii. 1. 7: magni fuere viri, qui sidera crediderunt ex duro concreta et ignem alienum pascentia. nam per se, inquiunt, flamma diffugeret, nisi aliquid haberet, quod teneret et a quo teneretur, conglobatamque nec stabili inditam corpori, profecto iam mundus turbine suo dissipasset. but you people say that earth does abide without root or foundation. cf. Aristotle’s remark (, 353 A 34 - B 5) about the ancient θεολόγοι who assumed ῥίζαι γῆς καὶ θαλάττης and see Hesiod, , 728; Aeschylus, 1046-1047; and the Orphic lines quoted by Proclus, , 211 C (ii, p. 231. 27-28 [Diehl]) = Kern, , 168. 29-30 (p. 202). The phrase ῥίζα καὶ βάσις is applied to the earth itself in a different sense by Timaeus Locrus (97 E). For the ascription to Xenophanes of the notion that the earth ἐπ’ ἄπειρον ἐρρίζωται cf. Xenophanes, frag. A 47 (i, pp. 125-126 [Diels-Kranz]). Certainly it does, said Pharnaces, in occupying the proper and natural place that belongs to it, the middle, for this is the place about which all weights in their natural inclination press against one another and towards which they move and converge from every direction, whereas all the upper space, even if it receive something earthy which has been forcibly hurled up into it, straightway extrudes it into our region or rather lets it go where its proper inclination causes it naturally to descend. = ii, p. 195, frag. 646. This is the doctrine of proper place and natural motion, originally Aristotelian and ascribed to Aristotle in , 424 B but adopted also by the Stoics (cf ii, p. 162. 14-19; p. 169. 8-11; p. 175. 16-35; p. 178. 12-15); it should not be confused, however, as Raingeard confuses it, with the Stoic doctrine that the universe itself is in the middle of the void (, 425 D - E, , 1054 C - D).

At this — for I wished Lucius to have time to collect his thoughts — I called to Theon. Which of the tragic poets was it, Theon, I asked, who said that physicians With bitter drugs the bitter bile purge? Theon replied that it was Sophocles.Sophocles, frag. 770 (Nauck²). The verse is quoted with variations at , 463 F, and , 468 B. Yes, I said, and we have of necessity to allow them this procedure; but to philosophers one should not listen if they desire to repulse paradoxes with paradoxes and in struggling against opinions that are amazing fabricate others that are more amazing and outlandish,cf. Aristotle’s remark, , 294 A 20-21: τὸ δὲ τὰs περὶ τούτου λύσεις μὴ μᾶλλον ἀτόπους εἶναι δοκεῖη τῆς ἀπορίας, θαυμάσειεν ἆνa τις. as these people do in introducing their motion to the centre. What paradox is not involved in this doctrine? Not the one that the earth is a sphere although it contains such great depths and heights and irregularities?This objection to the Peripatetic and Stoic theory that the sphericity of the earth is a necessary consequence of the natural motion of earth downwards to the centre of the universe (Aristotle, , 297 A 8 - b 23; Strabo, i. 1. 20, chap. 11; Adrastus in Theon of Smyrna, p. 122. 1-16 [Hiller]) was often answered (cf. Dicaearchus in Pliny, ii. 65. 162; Adrastus in Theon of Smyrna, pp. 124. 7-127, 23, using arguments from Archimedes, Eratosthenes, and Dicaearchus; Cleomedes, i. 56 [p. 102. 9-20 Ziegler]; Alexander in Simplicius, , p. 546. 15-23; Alexander, , p. 237. 5-15 [Bruns]). Plutarch, who defends Plato for constructing the spherical earth of molecules that are cubes on the ground that no material object can be a perfect sphere ( 1004 B - C), probably did not intend this or the subsequent paradoxes to be taken too seriously. Lamprias is simply riding Pharnaces as hard as he can, using any argument, good or bad, to make him appear ridiculous. Not that people live on the opposite hemisphere clinging to the earth like wood-worms or geckos turned bottomside up?cf. Lucretius, i. 1052-1067 in his argument against the Stoic motion to the centre. Plutarch mentions the antipodes in connection with the Stoics in , 1050 B. In , 869 C it is said that some say that there are antipodes. — and that we ourselves in standing remain not at right angles to the earth but at an oblique angle, leaning from the perpendicular like drunken men?cf. Aristotle, , 296 B 18 - 21 and 297 B 17 - 21: the courses of bodies falling to the earth form equal angles with the horizontal plane at the point of contact and are not parallel. So, Lamprias argues, men standing upright on the earth would not be parallel to one another but all in converging on the centre would deviate from the absolute perpendicular. Not that incandescent masses of forty tonsProbably not aeroliths, as Raingeard supposes, but incandescent boulders such as are thrown up by volcanoes; for μύδροι in this sense cf. [Aristotle], , 395 B 22-23; Strabo, vi. 2. 8, chap. 274; vi. 2. 10, chap. 275; xiii. 4. 11, chap. 628. For the falling of great boulders within the earth cf. Lucretius, vi. 536-550, and Seneca, vi. 22. 2; but Plutarch probably had in mind a subterranean geography such as that of , 111 D ff., of which the next sentence but one contains an explicit reminiscence. falling through the depth of the earth stop when they arrive at the centre, though nothing encounter or support them; and, if in their downward motion the impetus should carry them past the centre, they swing back again and return of themselves? Not that pieces of meteors burnt out on either side of the earth do not move downwards continually but falling upon the surface of the earth force their way into it from the outside and conceal themselves about the centre?For the text and interpretation of this sentence cf. xlvi (1951), pp. 139-140. Not that a turbulent stream of water, if in flowing downwards it should reach the middle point, which they themselves call incorporeal,cf. 926 B s.v.. According to the Stoics the limits of bodies are incorporeal and therefore in the strict sense nonexistent (, 1080 e; cf. 1081 B and ii, p. 159, frag. 488), since only the corporeal exists ( ii, p. 115, frag. 320 and p. 117, frag. 329). Only corporeal existence, moreover, can produce an effect or be affected (, 1073 E, cf. ii, p. 118, frag. 336 and p. 123, frag. 363). How then can the incorporeal centre have any effect upon corporeal entities? stops suspended [or] moves round about it, oscillating in an incessant and perpetual see-saw?cf.Plato, , 111 E 112 E, which is certainly the source of Plutarch’s figure, and Aristotle’s criticism of Plato’s account in , 355 B 32 356 A 19. Some of these a man could not even mistakenly force himself to conceive as possible. For this amounts to upside down and all things topsy-turvy, everything as far as the centre being down and everything under the centre in turn being up.cf., 112 E 1-3. By introducing the conventional phrase ὑπὸ τὸ μέσον, which really begs the question, Lamprias makes the notion appear to be a ridiculous self-contradiction. The result is that, if a man should so coalesce with the earthThat συμπαθείᾳ τῆς γῆς, which has given rise to many conjectures, need mean no more than this is proved by , p. 317 B 14-16: τῆς τε τῶν ὄντων συμαθείας καὶ τῆς τῶν σωμάτων ἀλληλουχίας. For the figure used here cf. Aristotle, , 285 A 27-b 5, and Simplicius, , p. 389. 8-24 and p. 391. 33 ff. The most famous later parallel is the position of Lucifer in Dante’s Inferno, xxxiv. 76-120. that its centre is at his navel, the same person at the same time has his head up and his feet up too. Moreover, if he dig through the further side, his [bottom] in emerging is [up], and the man digging himself up is pulling himself down from above i.e. his feet emerge first; and they, his bottom part, are up. In digging himself up relatively to the surface through which he emerges, he is with reference to himself pulling himself not up to a position above his head but down to a position below his feet. The paradox rests upon the assumption that head and feet are respectively absolute up and absolute down for man (cf. Aristotle, 705 A 26 706 B 16, and 468 A 1-12).; and, if someone should then be imagined to have gone in the opposite direction to this man, the feet of both of them at the same time turn out to be up and are so called.

Nevertheless, though of tall tales of such a kind and number they have shouldered and lugged in not a wallet-full, by heaven, but some juggler’s pack and hotchpotch, still they say= ii, p. 195, frag. 646. that others are playing the buffoon by placing the moon, though it is earth, on high and not where the centre is. Yet if all heavy body converges to the same point and is compressed in all its parts upon its own centre,Lamprias refers directly to the words of Pharnaces at 923 E - F supra. cf. , 1055 A: εἰ γὰρ αὐτός γε νεύειν ἐπὶ τὸ αυτοῦ μέσον ἀεὶ πέφυκε καὶ τὰ μέρη πρὸς τοῦτο κατατείνειν πανταχόθεν it is no more as centre of the sum of things than as a whole that the earth would appropriate to herself the heavy bodies that are parts of herself; and [the downward tendency] of falling bodiesThat τῶν ῥερόντων can stand alone in this sense, pace Adler ( x, p. 96), is proved by Aristotle, , 312 B 24. proves not that the [earth] is in the centre of the cosmos but that those bodies which when thrust away from the earth fall back to her again have some affinity and cohesion with her.Aristotle (, 296 B 9-25) asserted that heavy, i.e. earthy, objects move to the centre of the universe and so only accidentally to the centre of the earth. The Stoics distinguished the cosmos as ὅλον from τὸ πᾶν, which is the cosmos plus the infinite void encompassing it ( ii, p. 167, frags. 522-524), putting the cosmos in the centre of the πᾶν and explaining this as the result of the motion of all things to the centre of the latter ( ii, pp. 174-175, frags. 552-554; cf. note d on 923 F supra) but stating that within the cosmos those things that have weight, i.e. water and earth, move naturally down, i.e. to the centre ( ii, p. 175. 16-35, frag. 555). Nevertheless, Chrysippus’s own words could be used to show that the natural motion to the centre must belong to the parts of the universe qua parts of the whole and not because of their own nature (cf. , 1054 E 1055 C); and with the very word οἰκειώσεται Lamprias turns against the Stoics their own doctrine of οἰκείωσις (cf. , 1038 B = ii, p. 43, frag. 179). For as the sun attracts to itself the parts of which it consistsAccording to Reinhardt (, pp. 173-177) the source of Plutarch’s argument must be Posidonius; but none of the passages cited contains any parallel to this statement concerning the sun, for references to the attractive power of the sun over the other planets (Reinhardt, Op. cit. p. 58, n. 2; cf. R. M. Jones, xxvii [1932], pp. 122 ff.) are irrelevant. There may rather have been a connection between this notion and the doctrine of Cleanthes referred to in , 1075 D = i, p. 114, frag. 510. so the earth too accepts as [her] own the stoneThis is not a reference to aeroliths as Raingeard and Kronenberg suppose nor to the imaginary stone in intercosmic space (, 425 C) as Adler believes, but to any γεῶδές τι ὑπὸ βίας ἀναρριφέν, in the words of Pharnaces (923 F supra); cf. Aristotle’s use of ὁ λίθος in the statement of his principle of natural motion ( 1103 A 19-22). that has properly a downward tendency, and consequently every such thing ultimately unites and coheres with her. If there is a body, however, that was not originally allotted to the earth or detached from it but has somewhere independently a constitution and nature of its own, as those menThe men referred to in 924 D, ἑτέρους ἄνω τὴν σελήνην, gῆν οὖσαν, ἐνιδρύοντας, whom the Stoics attack and among whom are Lamprias and Lucius themselves and our comrade (921 F). would say of the moon, what is to hinder it from being permanently separate in its own place, compressed and bound together by its own parts? For it has not been proved that the earth is the centre of the sum of things,i.e. even if it is the centre of our cosmos; cf. , 425 A - E, where concerning the possibility of a multiplicity of universes in τὸ πᾶν Plutarch points out that even on the hypothesis of natural motion and proper place up, down, and centre would apply separately within each cosmos, there could be no centre of τὸ πᾶν, and the laws of motion in any one universe could not affect objects in any other or hypothetical objects in intercosmic space. and the way in which things in our region press together and concentrate upon the earth suggests how in all probability things in that region converge upon the moon and remain there. The man who drives together into a single region all earthy and heavy things and makes them part of a single body — I do not see for what reason he does not apply the same compulsion to light objects in their turn but allows so many separate concentrations of fire and, since he does not collect all the stars together, clearly does not think that there must also be a body common to all things that are fiery and have an upward tendency.

Now, said I, my dear Apollonides, you mathematiciansThis is implied by the second person plural addressed to Apollonides, cf. 925 B s.v. and 920 F, 921 C supra. say that the sun is an immense distance from the upper circumference and that above the sun Venus and Mercury and the other planetsFor the order of the planets cf. Dreyer, , pp. 168-170, and Boyancè, , pp. 59-65; the order here given is not the one adopted by most of the astronomers of Plutarch’s time, by the later Stoics, or in all probability by Posidonius. revolve lower than the fixed stars and at great intervals from one another; but you think that in the cosmos there is provided no scope and extension for heavy and earthy objects. You see that it is ridiculous for us to deny that the moon is earth because she stands apart from the nether region and yet to call her a star although we see her removed so many thousands of miles from the upper circumference as if plunged [into] a pit. So far beneath the stars is she that the distance cannot be expressed, but you mathematicians in trying to calculate it run short of numbers; she practically grazes the earth and revolving close to it Whirls like a chariot’s axle-box about, Empedocles says,Empedocles, frag. B 46 (i, p. 331 [Diels-Kranz]).That skims [the post in passing].

Frequently she does not even surmount the earth’s shadow, though it extends but a little way because the illuminating body is very large; but she seems to revolve so close, almost within arm’s reach of the earth, as to be screened by it from the sun unless she rises above this shadowy, terrestrial, and nocturnal place which is earth’s estate. Therefore we must boldly declare, I think, that the moon is within the confines of [the] earth inasmuch as she is occulted by its extremities.

Dismiss the fixed stars and the other planets and consider the demonstrations of Aristarchus in his treatise, , that the distance of the sun is more than 18 times and less than 20 times the distance of the moon, that is its distance from us.This is Proposition 7 of Aristarchus’s treatise, the full title of which is . The treatise is edited and translated by Sir Thomas Heath in his , pp. 352 ff. According to the highest estimate, however, the moon’s distance from us is said to be 56 times the radius of the earth.This was not the highest estimate hitherto given, nor have I been able to identify its author. cf. on this matter and the subsequent calculations in this passage xlvi (1951), pp. 140-141. No attempt is made to give equivalents for stades in calculations, for it is uncertain what stade is meant in any one place. Schiaparelli assumes everywhere the Olympic stade of 185 metres (, i, p. 333, n. 3 and p. 342, n. 1); Heath argues that Eratosthenes used a stade of 157.5 metres and Ptolemy the royal stade of 210 metres (, pp. 339 and 346); and Raingeard (p. 83 on 925 D 6) assumes without argument that Plutarch used the Attic stade of 177.6 metres. Even according to the mean calculations this radius is 40,000 stades; and, if we reckon from this, the sun is more than 40,300,000 stades distant from the moon. She has migrated so far from the sun on account of her weight and has moved so close to the earth that, if propertiesThere is a play on the meaning of τὰs οὐσίας, substances, as property or estates and as the real nature of things. are to be determined by locations, the lot, I mean the position, of earth lays an action against the moon and she is legally assignable by right of propinquity and kinship to the chattels real and personal of earth. We do not err at all, I think, if granting such altitude and extension to the things called upper we leave what is down below also some room to move about in and so much latitude as there is from earth to moon. For as he is immoderate who calls only the outermost surface of the heaven up and all else down, so is he intolerable who restricts down to the earth or rather to the centre; but both there and here some extension must be granted since the magnitude of the universe permits it. The claim that everything away from the earth is ipso facto up and on high answered by a counter-claim that what is away from the circuit of the fixed stars is ipso facto down.

After all, in what sense is earth situated in the middle and in the middle of what? The sum of things is infinite; and the infinite, having neither beginning nor limit, cannot properly have a middle, for the middle is a kind of limit too but infinity is a negation of limits. He who asserts that the earth is in the middle not of the sum of things but of the cosmos is naive if he supposes that the cosmos itself is not also involved in the very same difficulties.cf., 424 D, where καθ’ ὅυς δ’ ἔστιν (scil, τὸ κενόν) refers to the Stoics (for whose distinction between the pa=n and the κόσμος see note c on 924 E supra), and , 1054 B - D, where as here Plutarch uses against the Stoics a weapon taken from their own arsenal. In fact, in the sum of things no middle has been left for the cosmos either, but it is without hearth and habitation,cf., ix. 5. 828 D: ἄοικοι καὶ ἀνίδρυτοι. moving in infinite void to nothing of its own; [or], if it has come to rest because it has found some other reason for abiding, not because of the nature of its location,cf. ii, pp. 174-175, frags. 552 and 553; , 1054 F 1055 B. similar inferences are permissible in the cases of both earth and moon, that the former is stationary here and the latter is in motion there by reason of a different soul or nature rather [than] a difference [of location]. Besides this, consider whether theyThe Stoics. have not overlooked an important point. If anything in any way at all off the centre of the earth is up, no part of the cosmos is down; but it turns out that the earth and the things on the earth and absolutely all body surrounding or enclosing the centre are up and only one thing is down, that incorporeal pointcf. ii, p. 169. 9-11, frag. 527: τῆς γῆς περὶ τὸ μέσον σημεῖον τoῦ κόσμου κειμένης, ὅ δὴ τοῦ παντός ἐστι κάτω, ἄνω δὲ τὸ ἀπ’ αὐτοῦ εἰς τὸ κύκλῳ πάντῃ. which must be in opposition to the entire nature of the cosmos, if in fact down and up are natural opposites.cf. ii, p. 176, frag. 556: τὸ ἄνω καὶ τὸ κάτω οὐ κατὰ σχέσιν φύσει γὰρ διάφορα ταῦτα. This, moreover, does not exhaust the absurdity. The cause of the descent of heavy objects and of their motion to this region is also abolished, for there is no body that is down towards which they are in motion and it is neither likely nor in accordance with the intention of these men that the incorporeal should have so much influence as to attract all these objects and keep them together around itself.See note d on 924 B supra, and cf. , 424 E against Aristotle. On the contrary, it proves to be entirely unreasonable and inconsistent with the facts for the whole cosmos to be up and nothing but an incorporeal and unextended limit to be down; but that statement of ours is reasonable, that ample space and broad has been divided between up and down.

All the same, let us assume, if you please, that the motions of earthy objects in the heaven are contrary to nature; and then let us calmly observe without any histrionics and quite dispassionately that this indicates not that the moon is not earth but that she is earth in an unnatural location. For the fire of Aetna too is below earth unnaturally, but it is fire; and the air confined in skins,cf. 928 B s.v.. Plutarch probably has in mind inflated skins used for floats; cf. Aristotle, , 217 A 2 - 3, 255 B 26, , 311 B 9 - 13. though by nature it is light and has an upward tendency, has been constrained to occupy an unnatural location. As to the soul herself, I said, by Zeus, is her confinement in the body not contrary to nature, swift as she is and fiery, as you say,cf. ii, p. 217, frag. 773: οἱ μὲν γὰρ Στωϊκοὶ πνεῦμα λέγουσιν αὐτὴν ἔνθερμον καὶ διάπυρον. and invisible in a sluggish, cold, and sensible vehicle? Shall we then on this account deny that there is soul in body or that mind, a divine thing, though it traverses instantaneously in its flight all heaven and earth and sea,For this commonplace of the flight of the mind through the universe cf. R. M. Jones, xxi (1926), pp. 97-113. has passed into flesh and wines and marrow under the influence of weight and density and countless qualities that attend liquefaction?This is a reference to the Stoic notion that the embodiment of soul was a process of condensation or liquefaction. cf. , 1053 B - C ( = ii, frag. 605) and for the qualities that would attend liquefaction ii, p. 155. 34: γῆς τε καὶ ὕδατος, παχνμερῶν καὶ βαρέων καὶ ἀτόνων ὅντων. This Zeus of yours too, is it not true that, while in his own nature he is single, a great and continuous fire, at present he is slackened and subdued and transformed, having become and continuing to become everything in the course of his mutations?= ii, p. 308, frag. 1045. Zeus in his own nature is the state of the universe in the ecpyrosis, while at present he is the universe in the state of diacosmesis; cf. , 881 F 882 A (= Aëtius, i. 7. 33 = ii, frag. 1027), Diogenes Laertius, vii. 137 ( = ii, frag. 526), , 1052 C ( = ii, frags. 1068 and 604), 1075 A - C ( = ii, frag. 1049), and ii, frags. 1052, 1053, and 1056. So look out and reflect, good sir, lest in rearranging and removing each thing to its natural location you contrive a dissolution of the cosmos and bring upon things the Strife of Empedocles — or rather lest you arouse against nature the ancient Titans and GiantsThe Strife of Empedocles is connected with the mythical war of the Giants by Proclus, p. 849, 13-15 (ed. Cousin, Paris, 1864) = p. 659 (ed. Stallbaum). and long to look upon that legendary and dreadful disorder and discord [when you have separated] all that is heavy and [all] that is light. The suns bright aspect is not there descried, No, nor the shaggy might of earth, nor sea as Empedocles says.Empedocles, frag. B 27 (i, pp. 323. 11-324. 4 [DielsKranz]), where the ὠκέα γυῖα given by Simplicius is adopted instead of Plutarch’s ἀγλαὸν εἶδος. Bignone, however, who prints the lines given by Plutarch as frag. 26 a and those given by Simplicius as frag. 27, is probably right in taking this to be one of the lines which were repeated with a different ending in two different parts of the poem (, pp. 220 ff., 421, 599 ff.). Certainly Plutarch represents his quotation as describing the period when Strife has completely separated the four roots, whereas Simplicius says that his comes from the description of the Sphere, when all were thoroughly intermingled. Earth had no part in heat, water no part in air; there was not anything heavy above or anything light below; but the principles of all thingsi.e. the four roots, earth, air, fire, and water, for the separation of which by Strife cf. Empedocles, frags. B 17. 8-10 and B 26. 6-9 (i, p. 316. 2-4 and p. 323. 4-7 [DielsKranz]). were untempered and unamiableFrom this Mullach manufactured for Empedocles the verse that he numbered 174 ( i, p. 5). Stein took only ἄκρατοι καὶ ἄστοργοι to be a quotation. The word ἄστοργος appears nowhere in the fragments of Empedocles (though στοργή does in frag. B 109 [i, p. 351. 22, DielsKranz]), whereas Plutarch uses it several times in other connections (, 750 F, 917 D, , 970 B). and solitary, not accepting combination or association with one another, but avoiding and shunning one another and moving with their own peculiar and arbitrary motionscf. Clara Millerd, , p. 54, and Cherniss, , p. 175, n. 130. Plutarch’s circumstantial account of the motion of the four roots during the complete dominance of Strife is coloured by the passage of Plato to which he refers. they were in the state in which, according to Plato,, 53 B; cf., 430 D, and , 1016 F. everything is from which God is absent, that is to say in which bodies are when mind or soul is wanting. So they were until desire came over nature providentially, for Affection arose or Aphrodite or Eros, as Empedocles says and Parmenides and Hesiod,cf., 756 D - F, where Empedocles, frag. B 17. 20-21 (i, p. 317. 1-2 [Diels-Kranz]), and Parmenides, frag. B 13 (i, p. 243. 16 [Diels-Kranz]) are quoted, and Hesiod, , 120 is referred to; and cf. Aristotle, , 984 B 23 985 A 10. With Plutarchs εκ προνοιάς contrast Aristotles criticism of Empedocles (, 1000 B 1217) and cf. Empedocles, frags. B 17. 29 and B 30 (i, p. 317. 10 and p. 325. 10-12 [Diels-Kranz]). By εκ προνοιάς here Plutarch prepares the way for his use in the next paragraph of the Stoic doctrine of providence against the Stoic doctrine of natural place. in order that by changing position and interchanging functions and by being constrained some to motion and some to rest and compelled to give way and shift from the natural to the better [the bodies] might produce a universal concord and community.

If not a single one of the parts of the cosmos ever got into an unnatural condition but each one is naturally situated, requiring no transposition or rearrangement and having required none in the beginning either, I cannot make out what use there is of providenceOn the importance of providence in Stoic doctrine and its ubiquity in Stoic writings cf. , 1050 A - B ( = ii, frag. 937), 1051 E ( = ii, frag. 1115); , 1075 E ( = ii, frag. 1126), 1077 D - E ( = ii, frag. 1064); Cicero, , iii. 92 ( = ii, frag. 1107); Diogenes Laertius, vii. 138-139 ( = ii, frag. 634). or of what Zeus, the master-craftsmanPlutarch ascribes to Pindar this epithet of Zeus in 618 B, , 550 A, , 1065 E, and in , 807 C uses it of the statesman; cf. Pindar, frag. 48, Bowra = 57, Bergk and Schroeder = 66, Turyn. is maker and father-creator.This terminology is more Platonic than Stoic: cf. 720 B - C, , 1017 A; cf. , 28 C and contrast ii, frag. 323 a. In an army, certainly, tacticians are useless if each one of the soldiers should know of himself his post and position and the moment when he must take and keep them. Gardeners and builders are useless too if here water all of itself naturally moves to the things that require it and irrigates them with its stream, and there bricks and timbers and stones by following their natural inclinations and tendencies assume of themselves their appropriate position and arrangement. If, however, this notion eliminates providence forthwith and if the arrangement of existing things pertains to God and [the] distributing of them too,cf.Aristotle, , 1075 A 11-15, and Diogenes Laertius, vii. 137 ( = ii, frag. 526): (θεός) δημιουργὸς ὣν τῆς διακοσμήσεως. what wonder is there that nature has been so marshalled and disposed that here in our region there is fire but the stars are yonder and again that earth is here but the moon is established on high, held fast by the bonds of reason which are firmer than the bonds of nature?Wyttenbach’s correction is assured by , 41 B 4-6, of which this is meant to be an echo. For, if all things really must follow their natural inclinations and move with their natural motions, you must order the sun not to revolve and Venus too and every other star as well, for light and fiery bodies move naturally upwards and not in a circle.The Stoics held that the heavenly bodies consist of fire, which, though they call it αἰθήρ, is not a fifth essence like Aristotle’s (cf. Diogenes Laertius, vii. 137 = ii, frag. 580; ii, frag. 682). In , 1053 E Plutarch quotes Chrysippus to the effect that τὸ πῦρ ἀβαρὲς ὂν ἀνωφερς εἶναι ( = ii, frag. 434). In accordance with this, he here argues, the Stoics are not justified in explaining the circular motion of the heavenly bodies as natural in the way that Aristotle did. If, however, nature includes such variation in accordance with location that fire, though it is seen to move upwards here, as soon as it has reached the heavens revolves along with their rotation, what wonder is there that the same thing has happened to heavy and earthy bodies that have got there and that they too have been reduced by the environment to a different kind of motion? For it certainly cannot be that heaven naturally deprives light objects of their upward motion but is unable to master objects that are heavy and have a downward inclination; on the contrary, by [whatever] influence it rearranged the former it rearranged the latter too and employed the nature of both of them for the better.

What is more, if we are finally to throw off the habits [and] opinions that have held our minds in thrall and fearlessly to say what really appears to be the case, no part of a whole all by itself seems to have any order, position, or motion of its own which could be called unconditionally natural. cf. Plutarch, frag. vii. 15 (Bernardakis, vol. vii, p. 31. 6 ff. = Olympiodorus, , p. 157. 22-25 [Norvin]). On the contrary, each and every such part, whenever its motion is usefully and properly accommodated to that for the sake of which the part has come to be and which is the purpose of its growth or production, and whenever it acts or is affected or disposed so that it contributes to the preservation or beauty or function of that thing, then, I believe, it has its natural position and motion and disposition. In man, at any rate, who is the result of natural process if any being is, the heavy and earthy parts are above, chiefly in the region of the head, and the hot and fiery parts are in the middle regions; some of the teeth grow from above and some from below, and neither set is contrary to nature; and it cannot be said that the fire which flashes in the eyes above is natural whereas that in the bowels and heart is contrary to nature, but each has been assigned its proper and useful station. Observe, as Empedocles says, The two lines here quoted and the line that preceded them are quoted together in support of the same contention in 618 B = Empedocles, frag. B 76 (i, p. 339. 9-11 [Diels-Kranz]). the nature of Tritons and tortoises with hides of stone and of all testaceans, Thoult see earth there established over flesh; and the stony matter does not oppress or crush the constitutionFor ἕξις = the bodily constitution cf. 625 A - B, 680 D, 681 E; , 764 C. on which it is superimposed, nor on the other hand does the heat by reason of lightness fly off to the upper region and escape, but they have been somehow intermingled and organically combined in accordance with the nature of each.

Such is probably the case with the cosmos too, if it really is a living beingIn , 1115 B Strato’s denial of this is cited as an example of his opposition to Plato; and in , 1014 C - D Plutarch, speaking of the creation of the world by the Platonic demiurge, says τὸ κάλλιστον ἀπεργασάμενος καὶ τελειότατον ζῳον, thereby referring to such passages as , 30 B - D, 32 C - D, 68 E, 69 B - C. Still, Platonic though it is, this assumption is one which his Stoic adversaries would grant (cf. Diogenes Laertius, vii. 139 and 142-143 [= ii, frags. 634 and 633]); and Plutarch believes that in granting it they are committed to the implication that the moon despite its location can consist of earth.: in many places it has earth and in many fire and water and breath as the result not of forcible expulsioncf.Aristotle, , 277 B 1-2: ουδὲ βίᾳ (scil. φέρεται αὐτῦν τὸ μὲν ἄνω τὸ δὲ κάτω) ὥσοερ τινές φασι τῇ ἐκθλίξει, and Cherniss, , p. 191, n. 196. but of rational arrangement. After all, the eye has its present position in the body not because it was extruded thither as a result of its lightness, and the heart is in the chest not because its heaviness has caused it to slip and fall thither but because it was better that each of them should be so located. Let us not then believe with regard to the parts of the cosmos either that earth is situated here because its weight has caused it to subside or that the sun, as Metrodorus of ChiosFor this Atomist, who is not to be confused with the Epicurean, Metrodorus of Lampsacus, or with the Anaxagorean, cf. Diels-Kranz, ii, pp. 231-234; the present passage should be added to that collection, from which it is missing. According to , 889 B ( = Aëtius, ii. 15. 6 [, p. 345 A 7-12]) Metrodorus considered the sun to be farthest from the earth, the moon below it, and lower than the moon the planets and fixed stars. For the explanation of the suns position here ascribed to Metrodorus see note a supra and cf. Simplicius, De Caelo, p. 712. 27-29. once thought, was extruded into the upper region like an inflated skin by reason of its lightness or that the other stars got into their present positions because they tipped the balance, as it were, at different weights. On the contrary, the rational principle is in control; and that is why the stars revolve fixed like radiant eyes In , 98 B the phrase is quoted as Plato’s; it comes from , 45 B (τῶν δὲ ὀργάνων πρῶτον μὲν φωσφόρα συνευεκτήναντο ὄμματα, τοιᾷδε ἐνδήσαντες αἰτίᾳ), and Plutarch’s τῷ προσὠποῳ τοῦ παντὸς ἐνδεδεμένοι was suggested by this in conjunction with the preceding lines (45 a: . . . ὑποθέντες αὐτ aυτόσε τὸ πρόσωπον, ὄργανα ἐνέδησαν τούτῳ), though Plato is there speaking of the human face and eyes. in the countenance of the universe, the sun in the hearts capacity transmits and disperses out of himself heat and light as it were blood and breath, and earth and sea naturally serve the cosmos to the ends that bowels and bladder do an animal. The moon, situate between sun and earth as the liver or another of the soft viscerai.e. the spleen. For the purpose of liver and spleen cf. Aristotle, 670 A 20-29, 670 B 4-17, 673 B 25-28; and for the close connection of liver and spleen 669 B 15 670 A 2. is between heart and bowels, transmits hither the warmth from above and sends upwards the exhalations from our region, refining them in herself by a kind of concoction and purification.Eustathius, , 695. 12 ff. says that according to the Stoics the golden rope of , viii. 19 is ὁ ἥλιος εἰς ὃν κάτωθεν ὥσττερ εἰς καρδίαν ἀποχεῖται ἀναδιομένη ἡ τῶν ὑγρῶν ἀναθυμίασις. Starting from this K. Reinhardt (, pp. 332 ff.) argued that Posidonius was Plutarch’s source for the analogy between the parts of the cosmos and the organs of the body; but Reinhardt’s contention is refuted by R. M. Jones, xxvii (1932), pp. 121-128. Passages which equate sun and heart are fairly frequent, e.g. Theon of Smyrna, pp. 187. 13-188. 7 (Hiller); Proclus, , 171 C - D (ii, p. 104. 20-21 and 28-29, Diehl); Macrobius, i. 20. 6-7 (pp. 564-565, Eyssenhardt); Chalcidius, , § 100 (p. 170, Wrobel); Anon. Christ., , pp. 17.15-18.11 (Kroll-Viereck) with astrological ascriptions of different bodily organs to the seven planets. An entirely different analogy between the various human faculties and the seven planets is mentioned by Proclus, , 348 A - B (iii, p. 355. 7-18, Diehl), and Numenius in Macrobius, i. 12. 14-15 (p. 533, Eyssenhardt); and I know no parallel to Plutarch’s further analogy of earth and moon with bowels and liver or spleen. In the pseudo-Hippocratic the moon because of its central position in the cosmos appears to have been equated with the diaphragm (cf. Roscher, , p. 5. 45 ff., pp. 10-11, p. 123). In the section of Porphyry’s Introduction to Ptolemys Apotelesmatica published by F. Cumont in , i, pp. 155-156, the source of which Cumont contends must have been Antiochus of Athens, the moon is said to have the spleen as its special province, while the heart is assigned to the sun; but there the liver is the province of Jupiter. It is not clear to us whether her earthiness and solidity have any use suitable to other ends also. Nevertheless, in everything the better has control of the necessary.cf. Plato, Timaeus, 48 A: noῦ δὲ ἀνάγκης ἄρχοντος τῷ πείθειν αὐτὴν τῶν γιγομένων τὰ πλεῖστα ἐπι τὸ βέλτιστον ἄγρειν κτλ. For the term τὸ κατηναγκασμένον cf. ii, frag. 916. Well, what probability can we thus conceive in the statements of the Stoics? They say that the luminous and tenuous part of the ether by reason of its subtility became sky and the part which was condensed or compressed became stars, and that of these the most sluggish and turbid is the moon.= ii, frag. 668; cf. Cleomedes, ii. 3. 99 (pp. 178. 26-180. 8, Ziegler) and contrast ii. 4. 100 (p. 182. 8-10). On the Stoic ether cf. Diogenes Laertius, vii. 137 (= ii, frag. 580) and note g on 922 B supra. Yet all the same anyone can see that the moon has not been separated from the ether but that there is still a large amount of it about her in which she moves and much of it beneath her in which [they themselves assert that the bearded stars] and comets whirl. So it is not the inclinations consequent upon weight and lightness that have circumscribed the precinctsThe lexica give weigh balance as the meaning of σεσήλωται, but the logic of the passage here shows that the word must be connected with σηκός, not with σήκωμα (cf. Hesychius: ἀποσηκώσας and σάκωσε). Amyot’s situez et colloquez and Keplers quasi obvallata sunt render the sense correctly. of each of the bodies, but their arrangement is the result of a different principle.

With these remarks I was about to yield the floor to Lucius,It was ostensibly in order to give Lucius time to collect his thoughts that Lamprias began the remarks which he has just concluded after ten paragraphs (see 923 F supra). since the proofs of our position were next in order; but Aristotle smiled and said: The company is my witness that you have directed your entire refutation against those who suppose that the moon is for her part semi-igneous and yet assert of all bodies in common that of themselves they incline either upwards or downwards. Whether there is anyone, however, who saysThis is Aristotle, of course: , 269 A 2-18, 270 A 12-35; cf. [Aristotle], , 392 A 5-9 and , 887 D = Aëtius, ii. 7. 5 (, p. 336). that the stars move naturally in a circle and are of a substance far superior to the four substances hereI have added this word in the translation in order to make it clear that the four are the four sublunar substances, earth, water, air, and fire. did not even accidentally come to your notice, so that I at any rate have been spared trouble. And Lucius [broke in and] said: good friend, probably one would not for the moment quarrel with you and your friends, despite the countless difficulties involved, when you ascribe to the other stars and the whole heaven a nature pure and undefiled and free from qualitative change and moving in a circle whereby [it is possible to have the nature] of endless revolution too; but let this doctrine descend and touch the moon, and in her it no longer preserves the impassivity and beauty of that body. Not to mention her other irregularities and divergencies, this very face which she displays is the result of some alteration of her substance or of the admixture somehow of another substance.cf. Aëtius, ii. 30. 6 (, p. 362 B 1-4): Ἀριστοτέλης μὴ εἶναι αὐτῆs (scil. σελήνης) ἀκήρατον τὸ σύγκριμα διὰ τὰ πρόσγεια ἀερώματα τoῦ αἰθέρος, ὃν προσαγορεύει σῶμα πέμπτον. In fact in 761 B 22 Aristotle does say that the moon shares in the fourth body, i.e. fire. That which is subjected to mixture, however, is the subject of some affection too, for it loses its purity, since it is perforce infected by what is inferior to it. The moon’s sluggishness and slackness of speed and the feebleness and faintness of her heat [which], in the words of Ion, ripes not the grape to duskiness,At 658 C Plutarch quotes the whole line, Ion, frag. 57 (Nauck²). to what shall we ascribe them except to her weakness and alteration, [if] an eternal and celestialFor the epithet ὀλύμπιος used of the moon cf. 935 C s.v. and , 416 E: οἱ δ’ ὀλυμπίαν γῆν (scil. σελήνην) προσεῖπον, and for the meaning attached to it cf. the etymology in the pseudo-Plutarchian , B, 95 [vii, p. 380. 17-20, Bernardakis]; Pseudo-Plutarch in Stobaeus, , i. 22 (i, p. 198. 10 ff., Wachsmuth); [Aristotle], , 400 A 6-9; Eustathius, , 38. 38. body can have any part in [alteration]? The fact is in brief, my dear Aristotle, that regarded as earth the moon has the aspect of a very beautiful, august, and elegant object; but as a star or luminary or a divine and heavenly body she is, I am afraid, misshapen, ugly, and a disgrace to the noble title, if it is true that of all the host in heaven she alone goes about in need of alien light,At 1116 A Plutarch quotes Parmenides as having called the moon άλλότριον φῶς (= Parmenides, frag. B 14 [i, p. 243. 19, Diels-Kranz]); cf. Empedocles, frag. B 45 (i, p. 331. 2 [Diels-Kranz]). as Parmenides says Fixing her glance forever on the sun.= Parmenides, frag. B 15 (i, p. 244. 3 [Diels-Kranz]), quoted also at 282 B. Our comrade in his discourseSee note a on p. 48 supra. won approval by his demonstration of this very proposition of Anaxagorass that the sun imparts to the moon her brilliance = Anaxagoras, frag. B 18 (ii, p. 41. 5-7 [Diels-Kranz]).; for my part, I shall not speak about these matters that I learned from you or in your company but shall gladly proceed to what remains. Well then, it is plausible that the moon is illuminated not by the suns irradiating and shining through her in the manner of glasscf. Aëtius, ii. 25. 11 (, p. 356 B 21) = Ion of Chios, frag. A 7 (i, p. 378. 33-34 [Diels-Kranz]). or iceSee note c on 922 C supra. nor again as the result of some sort of concentration of brilliance or aggregation of rays, the light increasing as in the case of torches.cf., 891 F = Aëtius, ii. 29. 4 (, p. 360 A 3-8 and b 5-11). Were that true, we should see the moon at the full on the first of the month no less than in the middle of the month, if she does not conceal and obstruct the sun but because of her subtility lets his light through or as a result of combining with it flashes forth and joins in kindling the light in herself.The latter was the theory of Posidonius as Plutarch indicates in 929 D s.v.; cf. Cleomedes, ii. 4. 101 (pp. 182. 20-184. 3 [Ziegler]) and ii. 4. 104-105 (pp. 188. 5-190. 16). Certainly her deviations or aversionsi.e. the various deflections of the moon in latitude and the varying portion of the lunar hemisphere turned away from the sun as the moon revolves in her orbit. For these two variations in the explanation of the lunar phases cf. Cleomedes, ii. 4. 100 (pp. 180. 26-182. 7 [Ziegler]), and Geminus, ix. 5-12 (p. 126. 5 ff. [Manitius]). cannot be alleged as the cause of her invisibility when she is in conjunction, as they are when she is at the half and gibbous or crescent; then, rather, standing in a straight line with her illuminant, says Democritus, she sustains and receives the sun, = Democritus, frag. A 89 a (ii, p. 105. 32-34 [DielsKranz]). For the meaning of κατὰ στάθμην cf. , 883 a, 884 C. The words ὑπολαμβάνει καὶ δέχεται have a sexual meaning here; cf. 944 E s.v., , 372 D, , 770 A, and Roscher, über Selene und Verwandtes, pp. 76 ff. so that it would be reasonable for her to be visible and to let him shine through. Far from doing this, however, she is at that time invisible herself and often has concealed and obliterated him. His beams she put to flight, as Empedocles says, From heaven above as far as to the earth, Whereof such breadth as had the bright-eyed moon She cast in shade,= Empedocles, frag. B 42 (i, p. 330. 11-13 [Diels-Kranz]). just as if the light had fallen into night and darkness and not upon an other star. As for the explanation of Posidonius that the profundity of the moon prevents the light of the sun from passing through her to us,See note h on 929 C supra. In Cleomedes, ii. 4. 105 (p. 190. 4-16 [Ziegler]) the refutation given by Plutarch here is answered or anticipated by the statement that the air does not have βάθος as the moon does, and from what follows it appears that by the βάθος of the moon Posidonius must have meant not mere spatial depth but a certain density as well. this is obviously refuted by the fact that the air, though it is boundless and has many times the profundity of the moon, is in its entirety illuminated and filled with sunshine by the rays. There remains then the theory of Empedocles that the moonlight which we see comes from the moons reflection of the sun. That is why there, is neither warmtha At 937 B s.v. and , 404 D it is said that in being reflected from the moon the sun’s rays lose their heat entirely (cf. Macrobius, i. 19. 12-13 [p. 560. 30 ff., Eyssenhardt]). Just above, however, at 929 A Plutarch ascribed to the moonlight a feeble heat, and so he does in 918 A (cf. Aristotle, 680 A 3334; [Aristotle], , 942 A 24-26; Theophrastus, iv. 14. 3). Kepler (, note 200) asserts that he had felt the heat from the rays of the full moon concentrated in a concave parabolic mirror; but the first real evidence of the moon’s heat was obtained by Melloni in 1846 by means of the newly invented thermopile. cf. R. Pixis, , p. 135; S. Günther, , p. 82, n. 3; Nasmyth-Carpenter, (London, 1885), p. 184. nor brilliance in it when it reaches us, as we should expect there to be if there had been a kindling or mixture of [the] lights [of sun and moon].I have added the words sun and moon in the translation to make explicit the meaning of [τῶν] φώτων. For the theory referred to see note h on 929 C supra. To the contrary, just as voices when they are reflected produce an echo which is fainter than the original sound and the impact of missiles after a ricochet is weaker, Thus, having struck the moon’s broad disk, the ray= Empedocles, frag. B 43 (i, p. 330. 20 [Diels-Kranz]). comes to us in a refluence weak and faint because the deflection slackens its force.

Sulla then broke in and said: No doubt this position has its plausible aspects; but what tells most strongly on the other side, did our comradeSee 929 B and note a on p. 48 supra. explain that away or did he fail to notice it? What’s that? said Lucius, or do you mean the difficulty with respect to the half-moon? Exactly, said Sulla, for there is some reason in the contention that, since all reflection occurs at equal angles,This expression is intended to have the same sense as πρὸς ἴσας γίγνεσθαι γωνίας ἀνάκλασιν πᾶσαν (930 A s.v.), and both of them mean (pace Raingeard, p. 100, and Kepler in note 28 to his translation) the angle of reflection is always equal to the angle of incidence. cf. [Euclid], aà (= Euclid, , vii, p. 286. 21-22 [Heiberg]) with Olympiodorus, p. 212. 7 = Hero Alexandrinus, , ii. 1, p. 368. 5 (Nix-Schmidt) and [Ptolemy], , ii = Hero Alexandrinus, , ii. 1, p. 320. 12-13 (Nix-Schmidt); and contrast the more precise formulation of Philoponus, p. 27. 34-35. whenever the moon at the half is in mid-heaven the light cannot move earthwards from her but must glance off beyond the earth. The ray that then touches the moon comes from the sun on the horizonKepler in note 19 to his translation points out that this is true only if μεσουρανῇ is in mid-heaven refers not to the meridian but to the great circle at right-angles to the ecliptic. and therefore, being reflected at equal angles, would be produced to the point on the opposite horizon and would not shed its light upon us, or else there would be great distortion and aberration of the angle, which is impossible. Cleomedes, ii. 4. 103 (p. 186. 7-14 [Ziegler]) introduces as σχεδὸν γνώριμον his summary of this argument against the theory that moonlight is merely reflected sunlight. Yes, by Heaven, said Lucius, there was talk of this too; and, looking at Menelaus the mathematician as he spoke, he said: In your presence, my dear Menelaus, I am ashamed to confute a mathematical proposition, the foundation, as it were, on which rests the subject of catoptrics. Yet it must be said that the proposition, all reflection occurs at equal angles, See note e on 929 F supra. is neither self-evident nor an admitted fact.It has been suggested that οὔθ’ ὁμολογούμενον is a direct denial of ὡμολογηένον ἐστι παρὰ πᾶσιν at the beginning of Hero’s demonstration (Schmidt in Hero Alexandrinus, [ed. Nix-Schmidt], ii. 1, p. 314. However that may be, the law is assumed in Proposition XIX of Euclid’s , where it is said to have been stated in the (Euclid, , vii, p. 30. 1-3 [Heiberg]); and a demonstration of it is ascribed to Archimedes (, 7 = Euclid, , vii, p. 348. 17-22 [Heiberg]; cf. Lejeune, , xxxviii [1947], pp. 51 ff.). It is assumed by Aristotle in , iii. 3-5 and possibly also by Plato (cf. Cornford, Platos , pp. 154 f. on , 46 B); cf. also Lucretius, iv. 322-323 and [Aristotle], , 901 B 21-22 and 915 B 30-35. Proposition XIX of Euclids , referred to above, is supposed to be part of the Dioptrics of Euclid which Plutarch cites at , 1093 E (cf. Schmidt, Op. cit. p. 304). It is refuted in the case of convexi.e. cylindrical, not spherical, convex mirrors; cf. xlvi (1951), pp. 142-143 for the construction and meaning of this sentence. mirrors when the point of incidence of the visual ray produces images that are magnified in one respect; and it is refuted by folding mirrors,For such mirrors cf. [Ptolemy], , xii = Hero Alexandrinus, , ii. 1, p. 342. 7 ff. either plane of which, when they have been inclined to each other and have formed an inner angle, exhibits a double image, so that four likenesses of a single object are produced, two reversed on the outer surfaces and two dim ones not reversed in the depth of the mirrors. The reason for the production of these images Plato explains,Plutarch means , 46 B - C, where Plato, however, describes a concave, cylindrical mirror, not a folding plane mirror. Plutarch apparently mistook the words ἔνθεν καὶ ἔνθεν ὕξη λαβoῦσα, by which Plato describes the horizontal curvature of the mirror, to mean that the two planes of a folding mirror were raised to form an angle at the hinge which joined them. for he has said that when the mirror is elevated on both sides the visual rays interchange their reflection because they shift from one side to the other. So, if of the visual rays (some) revert straight to us (from the plane surfaces) while others glance off to the opposite sides of the mirrors and thence return to us again, it is not possible that all reflections occur at equal angles.See note e on 929 F supra. Consequently (some people) take direct issue (with the mathematicians) and maintain that they confute the equality of the angles of incidence and reflection by the very streams of light that flow from the moon upon the earth, for they deem this fact to be much more credible than that theory. Nevertheless, suppose that thisi.e. the theory that the angle of reflection is always equal to the angle of incidence. must be conceded as a favour to geometry, the dearly beloveds3 In the first place, it is likely to occur only in mirrors that have been polished to exact smoothness; but the moon is very uneven and rugged, with the result that the rays from a large body striking against considerable heights which receive reflections and diffusions of light from one another are multifariously reflected and intertwined and the refulgence itself combines with itself, coming to us, as it were, from many mirrors. In the second place, even if we assume that the reflections on the surface of the moon occur at equal angles, it is not impossible that the rays as they travel through such a great interval get fractured and deflectedWith these words Plutarch means to refer to the effects of refraction; cf. , 894 C = Aëtius, iii. 5. 5 (, p. 372. 21-26); Cleomedes, ii. 6. 124-125 (p. 224. 8-28 [Ziegler]); Alexander, p. 143. 7-10. so as to be blurred and to bend their light. Some people even give a geometrical demonstration that the moon sheds many of her beams upon the earth along a line extended from the surface that is bent away from uscf. the argument given by Cleomedes, ii. 4. 103 (pp. 186. 14-188.7 [Ziegler]) and especially: ὅτι δ᾽ ἀπὸ παντὸς τοῦ κύκλου αὐτῆς φωτίζεται ἡ γῆ, γνώριμον. εὐθέως γὰρ ἅμα τῷ τὴν πρώτην ἴτυν ἀνασχεῖν ἐκ τοῦ ὁρίζοντος φωτίζει τὴν γῆν, τούτων τῶν μερῶν αὐτῆς περικλινῶν ὄντων καὶ πρός τὸν οὐρανόν, ἀλλ᾽οὐχί, μὰ Δία, πρὸς τὴν γῆν ὁρώντων For ἡ ἐκκεκλιμένη cf. Hippocrates, 38 (iv, p. 168. 18 [Littrè]).; but I could not construct a geometrical diagram while talking, and talking to many people too.

Speaking generally, he said, I marvel that they adduce against us the moon’s shining upon the earth at the half and at the gibbous and the crescent phases too.i.e. the moon at the half, gibbous, and crescent phases presents such a great difficulty for the Stoics themselves that it is strange for them to adduce these phenomena as refutation of the theory that the moon shines by reflected light. Wyttenbach’s conjecture, ἐκπίπτουσαν for ἐμπίπτουσαν, approved by Purser and apparently adopted by Prickard in his translation of 1918, betrays a misapprehension of the meaning of the text. After all, if the mass of the moon that is illuminated by the sun were ethereal or fiery, the sun would not leave herFor ἀπέλειπεν cf. 931 C s.v.. The dative with the verb is unobjectionable, cf. e.g. [] 178 D, 195 F. a hemisphere that to our perception is ever in shadow and unilluminated; on the contrary, if as he revolves he grazed her ever so slightly, she should be saturated in her entirety and altered through and through by the light proceeding easily in all directions. Since wine that just touches water at its surfaceFor κατὰ πέρας cf. , 1080 E ( = ii, frag, 487): ψαύειν κατὰ πέρας τὰ σώματα λέγουσι and ii, frag. 433 cited in note d on 930 F s.v.. The emendations of Emperius and Papabasileios are consequently ill-advised. or a drop of blood fallen into liquid at the moment [of contact] stains all the liquid red,cf., 1078 D - E ( = ii, frag. 480) and ii, frags. 473, 477, 479. and since they say that the air itself is filled with sunshine not by having any effluences or rays commingled with it but by an alteration and change that results from impact or contact of the light,cf. ii, frag. 433 (Galen, iv, vol. xvii, B, p. 161 [Kühn], especially: τοῖς ἄνω πέρασιν αὐτοῦ (scil. τοῦ ἀέρος) προσπιπτούσης τῆς ἡλιακῆς αὐγῆς ὅλος ἀλλοιοῦταί τε καὶ μεταβάλλεται συνεχὴς ὢν ἑαυτῷ). cf. also note a on 922 E supra. how do they imagine that a star can come in contact with a star or light with light and instead of blending and producing a thorough mixture and change merely illuminate those portions of the surface which it touches?cf. Cleomedes, ii. 4. 101 (p. 182. 20 ff. [Ziegler]) for the doctrine of Posidonius, which Plutarch here turns against him and the Stoics generally: τρίτη ἐστὶν αἵρεσις ἡ λέγουσα κιρνᾶσθαι αὐτῆς (scil. τῆς σελήνης) τὸ φῶς ἔκ τε τοῦ οἰκείου καὶ τοῦ ἡλιακοῦ φωτὸς καὶ τοιοῦτον γίνεσθαι οὐκ ἀπαθοῦς μενούσης αὐτῆς ἀλλ᾽ ἀλλοιουμένης ὑπὸ τοῦ ἡλιακοῦ φωτὸς καὶ κατὰ τοιαύτην τὴν κρᾶσιν ἴδιον ἰσχούσης τὸ φῶς cf. ibid. 104 (p. 188. 4-7). In fact, the circle which the sun in its revolution describes and causes to turn about the moon now coinciding with the circle that divides her visible and invisible parts and now standing at right angles to it so as to intersect it and be intersected by it, by different inclinations and relations of the bright part to the dark producing in her the gibbous and crescent phases,cf. Cleomedes, ii. 5. 109-111 (pp. 196. 28-200. 23 [Ziegler]). conclusively demonstrates that her illumination is the result not of combination but of contact, not of a concentration of light within her but of light shining upon her from without. In that she is not only illuminated herself, however, but also transmits to us the semblance of her illumination, she gives us all the more confidence in our theory of her substance. There are no reflections from anything rarefied or tenuous in texture, and it is not easy even to imagine light rebounding from light or fire from fire; but whatever is to cause a repercussion or a reflection must be compact and solid,Here ἐμβριθές is used as the opposite of λεπτομερές (cf. Liddell and Scott, s.v. ἐμβρίθεια ii) as πυκνόν is of ἀραιόν. in order that it may stop a blow and repel it.cf. Cleomedes, ii. 4. 101-102 (p. 184. 9-18 [Ziegler]). Cleomedes, assuming that the moon is μανόν, uses this as an argument against reflection; Plutarch, having established the necessity of reflection, uses the argument to support the contention that the moon is earthy. At any rate, the same sunlight that the air lets pass without impediment or resistance is widely reflected and diffused from wood and stone and clothing exposed to its rays. The earth too we see illuminated by the sun in this fashion. It does not let the light penetrate its depths as water does or pervade it through and through as air does; but such as is the circle of the sun that moves around the moon and so great as is the part of her that it intercepts, just such a circle in turn moves around the earth, always illuminating just so much and leaving another part unilluminated,cf. Cleomedes, ii. 5. 108 (p. 194. 20 ff. [Ziegler]). for the illuminated portion of either body appears to be slightly greater than a hemisphere.Cleomedes, ii. 5. 109 (p. 198. 6-9 [Ziegler]). Give me leave then to put it in geometrical fashion in terms of a proportion. Given three things approached by the light from the sun: earth, moon, air; if we see that the moon is illuminated not as the air is rather than as the earth, the things upon which the same agent produces the same effects must be of a similar nature. I have tried to preserve the contorted form in which Plutarch expresses the point that the moon, since it is affected by sunlight as the earth is and not as air is, must have the consistency of earth and not of air.

When all had applauded Lucius, I said: Congratulations upon having added to an elegant account an elegant proportion, for you must not be defrauded of what belongs to you, He smiled thereat and said: Well then proportion must be used a second time, in order that we may prove the moon to be like the earth not only because the effects of the same agent are the same on both but also because the effects of both on the same patient are the same. Now, grant me that nothing that happens to the sun is so like its setting as a solar eclipse. You will if you call to mind this conjunction recently which, beginning just after noonday, made many stars shine out from many parts of the skyConcerning this eclipse see the Introduction, § 3 supra on the date of the dialogue. and tempered the air in the manner of twilight.For λυκανγές see 941 D s.v. and Lucian, ii, 12. Prickard takes the κρᾶσις to refer to the degree of heat; Raingeard, like Amyot and Wyttenbach, takes it to refer to colour or light. Either is possible, but I think a reference to colour the more probable; for κρᾶσις used of colour cf. 647 c. If you do not recall it, Theon here will cite us Mimnermuscf., ed. Diehl², i. 1, pp. 50-57, and Edmonds, , i, pp. 82-103; Mimnermus is mentioned in the pseudo-Plutarchean , chap. 8, 1133 f. and Cydiascf. Plato, , 155 d; Edmonds, , iii, p. 68; Wilamowitz, , p. 40, n. 1. and Archilochuscf. Archilochus, frag. 74 (, ed. Diehl², i. 3, p. 33 = Edmonds, , ii, p. 134). and Stesichorus besides and Pindar,cf. Pliny, ii. 12, § 54: quo in metu fuisse Stesichori et Pindari vatum sublimia ora palam est deliquio solis. who during eclipses bewail the brightest star bereft = Pindar, Paean, ix. 2-3: ἄστρον ὑπέρτατον ἐν ἁμέρᾳ κλεπτόμενον. and at midday night falling Possibly Stesichorus, cf. Bergk, , iii, p. 229 (frag. 73), and Edmonds, , i, p. 102, n. 1. and say that the beam of the sun [is sped] the path of shade cf. Pindar, Paean, ix. 5: ἐτίσκοτον ἀτραπὸν ἐσσυμένα. For the genitive σκότους cf. , 36 E, and , 1130 B.; and to crown all he will cite Homer, who says the faces of men are covered with night and gloomAdapted from , xx. 351-352. and the sun has perished out of heaven, xx. 356-357. speaking with reference to the moon and [hinting that] this naturally occurs When waning month to waxing month gives say., xix. 307. For this interpretation of the Homeric lines cf., chap. 108 (vii, p. 388. 15 ff. [Bernardakis]), and Heraclitus, , § 75 (pp. 98. 20-99. 18 [Oelmann]). For the rest, I think that it has been reduced by the precision of mathematics to the [clear] and certain [formula] that night is the shadow of earthcf., 953 A and 1006 F, where on , 40 C Plutarch quotes Empedocles to this effect. Aristotle refers to the definition, , 146 B 28 and , 345 B 7-8. and the eclipse of the sun is the shadow of the mooncf. the lines of Empedocles quoted at 929 c-d supra. In , 890 F = Aëtius, ii. 24. 1 this explanation of solar eclipses is ascribed to Thales — quite unhistorically, as the subsequent entries show. whenever the visual ray encounters it. The fact is that in setting the sun is screened from our vision by the earth and in eclipse by the moon; both are cases of occultation, but the vespertine is occultation by the earth and the ecliptic by the moon with her shadow intercepting the visual ray.cf. Cleomedes, ii. 3. 94-95 (p. 172. 6-10 [Ziegler]) and ii. 4. 106 (p. 192. 16-24); Geminus, x (pp. 130. 11-132. 12 [Manitius]). What follows from this is easy to perceive. If the effect is similar, the agents are similar, for it must be the same agents that cause the same things to happen to the same subject. Nor should we marvel if the darkness of eclipses is not so deep or so oppressive of the air as night is. The reason is that the body which produces night and that which produces the eclipse while the same in substance are not equal in size. In fact the Egyptians, I think, say that the moon is one seventy-second part (of the earth),I know of no other reference to such an estimate. and Anaxagoras that it is the size of the PeloponnesusAccording to Hippolytus, i. 8. 6-10 ( = , p. 562 = Anaxagoras, frag. A 42 [ii, p. 16. 16-31, Diels-Kranz]), Anaxagoras said that the sun exceeds the Peloponnesus in size (cf. Aëtius, ii. 21. 3 and Diogenes Laertius, ii. 8). The statement here concerning the moon is missing from Diels-Kranz.; and Aristarchus demonstrates that the ratio of [the earth’s diameter to] the diameter of the moon is smaller than 60 to 19 and greater than 108 to 43.This is Proposition 17 of Aristarchus’s essay, On the Sizes and Distances of the Sun and Moon (cf. Heath’s edition and translation in his , pp. 351 ff.). Although Plutarch does not say that this contradicts Stoic doctrine, the older, orthodox Stoics held that the moon as well as the sun is larger than the earth (, 891 C = Aëtius, ii. 26. 1 = ii, frag. 666; cf. Pliny, ii. 11 [8]. 49). Consequently the earth because of its size removes the sun from sight entirely, for the obstruction is large and its duration is that of the night. Even if the moon, however, does sometimes cover the sun entirely, the eclipse does not have duration or extension; but a kind of light is visible about the rim which keeps the shadow from being profound and absolute.cf. Cleomedes, ii. 4. 105 (p. 190. 17-26). The ancient Aristotle gives this as a reason besides some others why the moon is observed in eclipse more frequently than the sun, saying that the sun is eclipsed by interposition of the moon but the moon [by that of the earth, which is much larger].= Aristotle, frag. 210 (Rose). The reference is not to , 293 B 20-25, for in that passage Aristotle gives not his own opinion but that of some Pythagoreans (cf. Cherniss, , pp. 198-199, and Aëtius, ii. 29. 4 cited there). For the terminology σελήνης or γῆς ἀντίφραξις cf. Aristotle, 90 a 15-18, and with the whole passage cf. Pseudo-Alexander, 2. 46 (quoted by Rose, , § 194, p. 222), and Philoponus, p. 15. 21-23. Posidonius gave this definition: The following condition is an eclipse of the sun, conjunction of the moon’s shadow with whatever [parts of the earth it may obscure], for there is an eclipse only for those whose visual ray the shadow of the moon intercepts and screens from the suncf. Cleomedes, ii. 3. 94-95 (p. 172. 6-17 [Ziegler]) and 98 (p. 178. 13-24), ii. 4. 106 (p. 192. 14-20).; — since he concedes then that a shadow of the moon falls upon us, he has left himself nothing to say that I can see. Of a star there can be no shadow, for shadow means the unlighted and light does not produce shadow but naturally destroys it.Posidonius ranked the moon as a star; cf. Arius Didymus, , frag. 32 (, p. 466. 18-21), and Edelstein, lvii (1936), p. 297. For the theory that the light of the moon is a product of her own proper light and the solar light which produces an alteration in her cf. Cleomedes, ii. 4.101 (pp. 182. 20-184. 3 [Ziegler]) and 104 (p. 188. 5-27), the latter of which indicates how the present contention of Plutarch could have been answered from the point of view of Posidonius.