De Defectu Oraculorum

On this topic it is not necessary to use more words at present. The truth is that whatever cause one may postulate as the author of these occurrences and changes, that cause will keep each of the worlds together within itself; for each world has earth and sea, and each has its owTn centre and occurrences that

affect its component bodies; it has its own transmutations and a nature and a power which preserves each one and keeps it in place. In what lies beyond, whether it be nothing or an infinite void, no centre exists, as has been said; and if there are several worlds, in each one is a centre which belongs to it alone, with the result that the movements of its bodies are its own, some towards it, some away from it, and some around it, quite in keeping with the distinctions which these men themselves make. But anyone who insists that, while there are many centres, the heavy substances are impelled from all sides towards one only,[*](Cf.Moralia, 928 a-b.) does not differ at all from him who insists that, while there are many men, the blood from all shall flow together into a single vein and the brains of all shall be enveloped in a single membrane, deeming it a dreadful thing in the case of natural bodies if all the solids shall not occupy one place only and the fluids also only one place. Such a man as that will be abnormal, and so will he be who is indignant if everything constituting a whole has its own parts, of which it makes use in their natural arrangement and position in every case. For that would be preposterous, and so too if anybody called that a world which had a moon somewhere inside it[*](Instead of revolving around it.); as well call that a man who carries his brains in his heels or his heart in his head But to make more worlds than one, each separate from the other, and to delimit and distinguish the parts belonging to each to go with the whole is not preposterous. For the land and the sea and the heavens in each will be placed to accord with nature, as is fitting; and each of the worlds has its above and below and its round about and its centre, not with reference to another world or the outside, but in itself and with reference to itself.

As for the stone which some assume to exist in the regions outside the world, it does not readily afford a concept regarding either its fixity or its motion. For how is it either to remain fixed, if it has weight, or to move towards the world like other heavy substances when it is no part of the world and has no place in the order of its being? Land embraced in another world and bound up with it ought not to raise any question as to how it comes about that it does not break away from the whole and transfer itself to our world, because we see the nature and the tension under which each of the parts is held secure. For if we take the expressions below and above as referring, not to the world, but outside of it,[*](Cf.Moralia, 1054 b.) we shall become involved in the same difficulties as Epicurus,[*](Frag. 299.) who would have all his atoms move to places under our feet, as if either the void had feet, or infinity granted us to conceive of below and above within itself! Wherefore we may well wonder at Chrysippus,[*](Cf. von Arnim, Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, i. 551 (p. 174), and Moralia, 1054 c.) or rather be quite unable to understand what possessed him to assert that the world has been firmly set in the centre and that its substance, having pre-empted the central place from time eternal, thereby gains the greatest help towards its permanence, and that is as much as to say its immunity from destruction. This is actually what he says in the fourth book of his work on Things Possible, where he indulges in a day-dream of a central place in the infinite and still more preposterously ascribes the cause of the permanence of the world to the non-existent centre; yet in other

works lie has often said that substance is regulated and held together by its movements towards its own centre and away from its own centre.

Then again, who could feel alarm at the other notions of the Stoics, who ask how there shall continue to be one Destiny and one Providence, and how there shall not be many supreme gods bearing the name of Zeus or Zen, if there are more worlds than one? For, in the first place, if it is preposterous that there should be many supreme gods bearing this name, then surely these persons’ ideas will be far more preposterous; for they make an infinite number of suns and moons and Apollos and Artemises and Poseidons in the infinite cycle of worlds. But the second point is this: what is the need that there be many gods bearing the name of Zeus, if there be more worlds than one, and that there should not be in each world, as pre-eminent governor and ruler of the whole, a god possessing sense and reason, such as the one who among us bears the name of Lord and Father of all? Or again, what shall prevent all worlds from being subject to the Destiny and Providence of Zeus, and what shall prevent his overseeing and directing them all in turn and supplying them all with first principles, material sources, and schemes of all that is being carried out? Do we not in this world of ours often have a single body composed of separate bodies,[*](Cf.Moralia, 142 e; Sextus Empiricus, Adversus Mathematicos, vii. 102.) as, for example, an assembly of people or an army or a band of dancers, each one of whom has the contingent faculty of living, thinking, and learning, as Chrysippus[*](Cf. von Arnim, Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, ii. 367 (p. 124).) believes, while in the whole universe, that there should be ten worlds, or fifty, or an hundred even, living under one reasoned plan, and organized under one government, is an

impossibility? Yet such an organization is altogether appropriate for the gods. For we must not make them unable to go out, like the queens in a hive of bees, nor keep them imprisoned by enclosing them with matter, or rather fencing them about with it, as those[*](Ibid. 1055 (p. 311).) do who make the gods to be atmospheric conditions, or regard them as powers of waters or of fire blended therewith, and bring them into being at the same time with the world, and burn them up with it, since they are not unconfined and free like drivers of horses or pilots of ships, but, just as statues are riveted and welded to their bases, so they are enclosed and fastened to the corporeal; and are partners with it even unto destruction, dissolution, and transmutation, of whatsoever sort may befall.

That other concept is, I think, more dignified and sublime, that the gods are not subject to outside control, but are their own masters, even as the twin sons of Tyndareüs[*](Castor and Pollux, the protectors of sailors.) come to the aid of men who are labouring in the storm,

1. Soothing the oncoming raging sea,
2. Taming the swift-driving blasts of the winds,[*](Repeated with some variants by Plutarch in Moralia, 1103 c-d; cf. Bergk, Poet. Lyr. Graec. iii. p. 730.)

not, however, sailing on the ships and sharing in the danger, but appearing above and rescuing; so, in the same way, one or another of the gods visits now this world and now that, led thither by pleasure in the sight, and co-operates with Nature in the directing of each. The Zeus of Homer[*](Homer, Il. xiii. 3.) turned his gaze not so very far away from the land of Troy towards the Thracian regions and the wandering tribes about the Danube; but the real Zeus has a fair and fitting variety of spectacles in numerous worlds, not viewing the infinite void outside nor concentrating his mind upon himself and nothing else, as some have imagined,[*](Cf. Aristotle, The Eudemian Ethics, vii. 12. 16 (1245 b 14).) but surveying from above the many works of gods and men and the movements and courses of the stars in their cycles. In fact, the Deity is not averse to changes, but has a very great joy therein, to judge, if need be, by the alternations and cycles in the heavens among the bodies that are visible there. Infinity is altogether senseless and unreasoning, and nowhere admits a god, but in all relations it brings into action the concept of chance and accident. But the Oversight and Providence in a limited group and number of worlds, when compared with that which has entered one body and become attached to one and reshapes and remodels it an infinite number of times, seems to me to contain nothing involving less dignity or greater labour.

Having spoken at this length, I stopped. Philip, after no long interval, said, That the truth about these matters is thus or otherwise is not for me to assert. But if we eliminate the god from one world, there is the question why we make him the creator of only five worlds and no more, and what is the relation of this number to the great mass of numbers; and I feel that I would rather gain a knowledge of this than of the meaning of the E[*](The meaning is discussed in the second essay of this volume.) dedicated here. For the number five represents neither a triangle nor a square, nor is it a perfect number nor a cube, nor does it seem to present any

other subtlety for those who love and admire such speculations. Its derivation from the number of elements, at which the Master[*](Presumably Pythagoras, but possibly Plato.) hinted darkly, is in every way hard to grasp and gives no clear intimation of the plausibility which must have drawn him on to assert that it is likely that when five bodies with equal angles and equal sides and enclosed by equal areas are engendered in matter the same number of worlds should at once be perfected from them.

Yes, said I, Theodorus of Soli[*](Cf.Moralia, 1027 d.) seems to follow up the subject not ineptly in his explanations of Plato’s mathematical theories. He follows it up in this way: a pyramid, an octahedron, an icosahedron, and a dodecahedron, the primary figures which Plato predicates, are all beautiful because of the symmetries and equalities in their relations, and nothing superior or even like to these[*](The five solids of which each has the same number of sides on all its faces, and all its solid angles made up of the same number of plane angles. Cf. Plato, Timaeus, 53 c - 56 c, and Grote’s Plato, iii. 269.) has been left for Nature to compose and fit together. It happens, however, that they do not all have one form of construction, nor have they all a similar origin, but the pyramid is the simplest and smallest, while the dodecahedron is the largest and most complicated. Of the remaining two the icosahedron is more than double the octahedron in the number of its triangles. For this reason it is impossible for them all to derive their origin from one and the same matter. For those that are simple and small and more rudimentary in their structure would necessarily be the first to respond to the instigating and formative power, and to be completed and acquire substantiality earlier than those of large parts and many bodies, from which class comes the dodecahedron, which requires

more labour for its construction. Hence it follows that the only primal body is the pyramid, and not one of the others, since by their nature they are outdistanced by it in coming into being. Accordingly, the remedy which exists for this strange state of affairs consists in the division and separation of matter into five worlds, one where the pyramid shall acquire substantiality first, another for the octahedron, and another for the icosahedron; then from the one that first acquires substantiality in each world the rest will have their origin, since a transmutation for everything into everything takes place according to the adaptability of parts to fit together, as Plato[*](Plato, Timaeus, 55 e ff.) himself has indicated, going into the details of nearly all cases. But for us it will suffice to acquire the knowledge in brief form. Since air is formed when fire is extinguished, and when rarefied again gives off fire out of itself, we must observe the behaviour of each of the generative elements and their transmutations. The generative elements of fire are the pyramid,[*](Does Plutarch (or Plato before him) see an etymological relation between pyramid and pyr (fire)? See also 428 d infra.) composed of twenty-four primary triangles, and likewise for air the octahedron, composed of forty-eight of the same. Therefore one element of air is produced from two corpuscles of fire combined and united; and that of air again, when divided, is separated into two corpuscles of fire, and again, when compressed and condensed, it goes off into the form of water. The result is that in every case the one which first acquires substantiality always affords the others a ready means of coming into being through transmutation; and it is not one alone that first exists, but another in a different environment is endowed with movement, which takes the lead and forestalls the others in coming into being, and thus the name of being first is kept by all.

Manfully and zealously, said Ammonius, have these matters been worked out by Theodorus; but I should be surprised if it should not appear that he has made use of assumptions which nullify each other. For he insists that all the five shall not undergo construction at the same time, but the simplest always, which requires the least trouble to construct, shall first issue forth into being. Then, as a corollary to this, and not conflicting with it, he lays down the principle that not all matter brings forth the simplest and most rudimentary form first, but that sometimes the ponderous and complex forms, in the time of their coming into being, are earlier in arising out of matter. But apart from this, five bodies having been postulated as primary, and on the strength of this the number of worlds being put as the same, he adduces probability with reference to four only; the cube he has taken off the board, as if he were playing a game with counters, since, because of its nature, it cannot transmute itself into them nor confer upon them the power of transmutation into itself, inasmuch as the triangles are not homologous triangles. For in the others the common triangle which underlies them all is the half-triangle; but in this, and peculiar to it alone, is the isosceles triangle, which makes no convergence towards the other nor any conjunction that would unify the two. If, therefore, there are five bodies and five worlds, and in each one body only has precedence in coming into being, then where the cube has been the first to come

into being, there will be none of the others, since, because of its nature, it cannot transmute itself into any one of them. I leave out of account the fact that they make the element of the dodecahedron, as it is called, something else and not that scalene from which Plato constructs the pyramid and the octahedron and the icosahedron. So, added Ammonius, laughing,either you must solve these problems or else contribute something of your own concerning this difficulty in which we all find ourselves involved.

For the present, at least, said I, I have nothing more plausible to offer; but perhaps it is better to submit to examination on views of one’s own rather than on another’s. I repeat, therefore, what I said at the beginning, that if two natures be postulated, one evident to the senses, subject to change in creation and dissolution, carried now here now there, while the other is essentially conceptual and always remains the same, it is a dreadful thing that, while the conceptual nature has been parcelled out and has variety within itself, we should feel indignant and annoyed if anyone does not leave the corporeal and passive nature as a unity knit together and converging upon itself, but separates and parts it. For it is surely fitting that things permanent and divine should hold more closely together and escape, so far as may be, all segmentation and separation. But even on these the power of Differentiation has laid its hand and has wrought in things conceptual dissimilarities in reasons and ideas, which are vaster than the separations in location. Wherefore Plato,[*](Plato, Sophist, 256 c; Cf. also Moralia, 391 b, supra.) opposing those who declare for the unity of the whole, says that these five things exist: Being, Identity,

Differentiation, and, to crown all, Movement and Rest. Granted, then, that these five exist, it is not surprising if each of these five corporeal elements has been made into a copy and image of each of them respectively, not unmixed and unalloyed, but it is because of the fact that each of them participates most in its corresponding faculty. The cube is patently a body related to rest because of the security and stability of its plane surfaces. In the pyramid everybody may note its fiery and restless quality in the simplicity of its sides and the acuteness of its angles. The nature of the dodecahedron, which is comprehensive enough to include the other figures, may well seem to be a model with reference to all corporeal being. Of the remaining two, the icosahedron shares in the nature of Differentiation mostly, and the octahedron in that of Identity. For this reason the octahedron contributed air, which in a single form holds all being in its embrace, and the icosahedron water, which by admixture assumes the greatest variety of qualities. If, therefore, Nature demands an equal distribution in all things, there is a reasonable probability that the wrorlds which have been created are neither more nor less in number than the patterns, so that each pattern in each world may have the leading rank and power just as it has acquired it in the construction of the primary bodies.

However, let this be a comfort for him that wonders because we divide Nature into so many classes in its generation and transmutation. But here is another matter[*](Cf. 387 f ff., supra.) which I ask you all to consider,

and to give your undivided attention to it: of those numbers which come at the very first (I mean the number one and the indeterminate duality), the second, being the element underlying all formlessness and disarrangement, has been called infinity; but the nature of the number one limits and arrests what is void and irrational and indeterminate in infinity, gives it shape, and renders it in some way tolerant and receptive of definition, which is the next step after demonstration regarding things perceptible. Now these first principles make their appearance at the beginning in connexion with number; rather, however, larger amounts are not number at all unless the number one, created from the illimitability of infinity, like a form of matter, cuts off more on one side and less on the other. Then, in fact, any of the larger amounts becomes number through being delimited by the number one. But if the number one be done away with, once more the indeterminate duality throws all into confusion, and makes it to be without rhythm, bounds, or measure. Inasmuch as form is not the doing away with matter, but a shaping and ordering of the underlying matter, it needs must be that both these first principles be existent in number, and from this has arisen the first and greatest divergence and dissimilarity. For the indeterminate first principle is the creator of the even, and the better one of the odd. Two is the first of the even numbers and three the first of the odd; from the two combined comes five,[*](Cf. 388 a, supra.) which in its composition is common to both numbers and in its potentiality is odd. For when the perceptible and corporeal was divided into several parts because of the innate necessity of differentiation, that number had to be neither the first even nor the first odd, but the third number, which is formed from these two, so that it might be produced from both the primary principles, that which created the even and that which created the odd, because it was not possible for the one to be divorced from the other; for each possesses the nature and the potentiality of a first principle. So when the twro were paired, the better one prevailed over the indeterminate as it was dividing the corporeal and checked it; and when matter was being distributed to the two, it set unity in the middle and did not allow the whole to be divided into two parts, but there has been created a number of worlds by differentiation of the indeterminate and by its being carried in varying directions; yet the power of Identity and Limitation has had the effect of making that number odd, but the kind of odd that did not permit Nature to progress beyond what is best. If the number one were unalloyed and pure, matter would not have any separation at all; but since it has been combined with the dividing power of duality, it has had to submit to being cut up and divided, but there it stopped, the even being overpowered by the odd.

It was for this reason that among the people of olden time it was the custom to call counting numbering by fives, [*](Cf. 374 a and 387 e, supra.) I think also that panta (all) is derived from pente (five) in accord with reason, inasmuch as the pentad is a composite of the first numbers.[*](Cf. 374 a and 387 e, supra.) As a matter of fact, when the others are multiplied by other numbers, the result is a number different from themselves; but the pentad,

if it be taken an even number of times, makes ten exactly; and if an odd number of times, it reproduces itself.[*](Cf. 388 d, supra.) I leave out of account the fact that it is the first composite of the first two squares, unity and the tetrad[*](Ibid. 391 a.); and that it is the first whose square is equal to the two immediately preceding it, making with them the most beautiful of the right-angled triangles[*](Ibid. 373 f.); and it is the first to give the ratio 1 1/2: 1.[*](Ibid. 389 d.) However, perhaps these matters have not much relation to the subject before us; but there is another matter more closely related, and that is the dividing power of this number, by reason of its nature, and the fact that Nature does distribute most things by fives. For example, she has allotted to ourselves five senses and five parts to the soul[*](Cf. 390 f, supra; Plato, Republic, 410 b, 440 e - 441 a; and much diffused in Timaeus, 70 ff.): physical growth, perception, appetite, fortitude, and reason; also five fingers on each hand, and the most fertile seed when it is divided five times, for there is no record that a woman ever had more than five children together at one birth.[*](Cf.Moralia, 264 b; Aristotle, Historia Animalium, vii. 4 (584 b 33); since Plutarch’s time there have been a few authenticated cases of sextuplets.) The Egyptians have a tradition[*](Cf. 355 d-f, supra.) that Rhea gave birth to five gods, an intimation of the genesis of the five worlds from one single Matter; and in the universe the surface of the earth is divided among five zones, and the heavens by five circles, two arctic, two tropic, and the equator in the middle. Five, too, are the orbits of the planets, if the Sun and Venus and Mercury follow the same course. The organization of the world also is based on harmony, just as a tune with us is seen to depend on the five notes of the tetrachord[*](Cf. 389 e, 1028 f, 1138 f - 1139 e.): lowest, middle, conjunct, disjunct, and highest; and the musical intervals are five: quarter-tone, semitone, tone, tone and a half, and double tone. Thus it appears that Nature takes a greater delight in making all things in fives than in making them round, as Aristotle[*](Cf. Aristotle, De Caelo, ii. 4 (286 b 10).) has said.

Why, then, someone will say, did Plato[*](Plato, Timaeus, 55 c.) refer the number of his five worlds to the five geometric figures, saying that God used up the fifth construction on the universe in completing its embellishment? Further on, where he suggests the question about there being more worlds than one,[*](Ibid. 31 a; Cf. 389 f and 421 f, supra.) whether it is proper to speak of one or of five as in truth naturally existent, it is clear that he thinks that the idea started from this source. If, therefore, we must apply reasonable probability to his conception, let us consider that variations in movement necessarily follow close upon the variations in the bodies and their shapes, as he himself teaches[*](Plato, Timaeus, 57 c.) when he makes it plain that whatever is disunited or united changes its place at the same time with the alteration of its substance. For example, if fire is generated from air by the breaking up of the octahedron and its resolution into pyramids, or again if air is generated from fire by its being forced together and compressed into an octahedron, it is not possible for it to stay where it was before, but it escapes and is carried to some other place, forcing its way out and contending against anything that blocks its course or keeps it back.

What takes place he describes more clearly by a simile,[*](Plato, Timaeus, 52 e.) saying that in a manner like to grain and chaff being tossed about and winnowed by the fans and other tools used in cleaning the grain the elements toss matter about and are tossed about by it; and like always draws near1 to like, some things occupying one place and others another, before the universe becomes completely organized out of the elements. Thus, when matter was in that state in which, in all probability, is the universe from which God is absent, the first five properties, having tendencies of their own, were at once carried in different directions, not being completely or absolutely separated, because, when all things were amalgamated, the inferior always followed the superior in spite of Nature.[*](Some would prefer to make Plutarch say in keeping with Nature.) For this reason they produced in the different kinds of bodies, as these were carried some in one direction and others in another, an equal number of separate divisions with intervals between them, one not of pure fire, but fiery, another not of unmingled ether, but ethereal, another not of earth by itself alone, but earthy; and above all, in keeping with the close association of air with water, they contrived, as has been said,[*](Cf. 428 d-e, supra.) that these should come away filled with many foreign elements. It was not the Deity who parted substance and caused it to rest in different places, but, after it had been parted by its own action and was being carried in diverse ways in such great disarray, he took it over and set it in order and fitted it together by the use of proportions and means. Then, after establishing Reason in each as a governor and guardian, he creatjed as many worlds as the existing primal bodies. Let this, then, be an offering for the gratification of Plato on Ammonius’s account, but as for myself, I should not venture to assert regarding the number of wbrlds that they are just so many; but the opinion that sets their number at more than one, and yet not infinite, but limited in amount, I regard as no more irrational than either of the others, when I observe the dispersiveness and divisibility implicit by nature in Matter, and that it neither abides as a unit nor is permitted by Reason to progress to infinity. But if in any other place we have recalled the Academy[*](Cf. 387 f, supra.) to our mind, let us do so here as well, and divest ourselves of excessive credulity and, as if we were in a slippery place in our discussion about infinity, let us merely keep a firm footing.

When I had said this, Demetrius remarked, Lamprias gives the right advice; for

The gods make us to slip by many forms

not of tricks, as Euripides[*](Cf. Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag. p. 674, Euripides, no. 972.) says, but of facts, whenever we make bold to pronounce opinions about such matters as if we understood them. But the discussion must be carried back, as the same writer says,[*](Cf. the note on 390 c, supra.) to the assumption made at the beginning. For what was said then, that when the demigods withdraw and forsake the oracles, these lie idle and inarticulate like the instruments of musicians, raises another question of greater import regarding the causative means and power which they employ to make the prophetic priests and priestesses possessed by inspiration and able to present their visions. For it is not possible to hold that the desertion by the demigods is the reason for the silence of the oracles unless we are convinced as to the manner in which the demigods, by having the oracles in their charge and by their presence there, make them active and articulate.

Here Ammonius joined in and said, Do you really think that the demigods are aught else than souls that make their rounds, in mist apparelled, as Hesiod[*](Works and Days, 125.) says? To my mind the difference between man and man in acting tragedy or comedy is the difference between soul and soul arrayed in a body suitable for its present life. It is, therefore, not at all unreasonable or even marvellous that souls meeting souls should create in them impressions of the future, exactly as we do not convey all our information to one another through the spoken word, but by writing also, or merely by a touch or a glance, we give much information about what has come to pass and intimation of what is to come. Unless it be, Lamprias, that you have another story to tell. For not long ago a rumour reached us about your having had a long talk on these subjects with strangers at Lebadeia, but the man who told of it could recall none of it with exactness.

You need not be surprised, said I, since many activities and distractions occurring in the midst of it, because it was a day for oracles and sacrifice, made our conversation desultory and disconnected.

But now, said Ammonius, you have listeners with nothing to distract them and eager to seek and

gain information on this point or that; all strife and contention is banished and a sympathetic hearing and freedom of statement, as you observe, is granted for all that may be said.

As the others also joined in the request, I, after a moment of silence, continued, As a matter of fact, Ammonius, by some chance you happen to be the one who provided the opening and approach for what was said on that occasion. For if the souls which have been severed from a body, or have had no part with one at all, are demigods according to you and the divine Hesiod,[*](Works and Days, 123.)

Holy dwellers on earth and the guardian spirits of mortals,

why deprive souls in bodies of that power by virtue of which the demigods possess the natural faculty of knowing and revealing future events before they happen? For it is not likely that any power or portion accrues to souls when they have left the body, if they did not possess them before; but the souls always possess them; only they possess them to a slight degree while conjoined with the body, some of them being completely imperceptible and hidden, others weak and dim, and about as ineffectual and slow in operation as persons that try to see in a fog or to move about in water, and requiring much nursing and restoring of the functions that properly belong to them and the removal and clearing away of the covering which hides them. Just as the sun does not become bright when it bursts through the clouds, but is bright always, and yet in a fog appears to us indistinct and dim, even so the soul does not acquire the prophetic power when it goes forth from the body as from a cloud; it possesses that power even now, but is blinded by being combined and commingled with the mortal nature. We ought not to feel surprised or incredulous at this when we see in the soul, though we see naught else, that faculty which is the complement of prophecy, and which we call memory, and how great an achievement is displayed in preserving and guarding the past, or rather what has been the present, since nothing of all that has come to pass has any existence or substantiality, because the very instant when anything comes to pass, that is the end of it — of actions, words, experiences alike; for Time like an everflowing stream bears all things onward. But this faculty of the soul lays hold upon them, I know not how, and invests with semblance and being things not now present here. The oracle given to the Thessalians about Arnê[*](Cf. Thucydides, i. 12.) bade them note

A deaf man’s hearing, a blind man’s sight.

But memory is for us the hearing of deeds to which we are deaf and the seeing of things to which we are blind. Hence, as I said, it is no wonder that, if it has command over things that no longer are, it anticipates many of those which have not yet come to pass, since these are more closely related to it, and with these it has much in common; for its attachments and associations are with the future, and it is quit of all that is past and ended, save only to remember it.