Iamblichus, Life of Pythagoras

ToposText · Iamblichus · 271 sections

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§ 22.101 Tradition tells of another kind of teaching by Pythagorean maxims pertaining to human opinions and practices, some examples of which may here be mentioned. It advised to remove strife from untrue friendship. If possible, this was to apply to all friendship; but at all events to that towards parents, elders, and benefactors. Existing friendships with such as these would not be preserved (but destroyed) by rivalry, contention, anger and subsequent graver passions. The scars and ulcers which their advice sometimes cause should be minimized as much as possible, which will be effected if especially the younger of the two should learn how to yield, and subdue his angry emotions. On the other hand, the so-called paedartases, or corrections and admonitions of the elder towards the younger, should be made with much suavity of manners, and great caution; also with much solicitude and tact, which makes the reproof all the more graceful and useful.
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§ 22.102 Faith should never be separated from friendship, whether seriously or in jest. Existing friendship cannot survive the insinuation of deceit between professors of friendship. Nor should friendship be affected by misfortune or other human vicissitude; and the only rejection of friendship which is commendable is that which follows definite and incurable vice. Such is an example of the Pythagorean hortatory maxims, which extended to all the virtues, and the whole of life.
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§ 23.103 Pythagoras considered most necessary the use of parables in instruction. Most of the Greeks had adopted it, as the most ancient; and it had been both preferentially and in principle employed by the Egyptians, who had developed it in the most varied manner. In harmony with this it will be found that Pythagoras attended to it sedulously, if from the Pythagoric symbols we unfold their significance and arcane intentions, developing their content of rectitude and truth, liberating them from their enigmatic form. When, according to straightforward and uniform tradition they are accommodated to the sublime intelligence of these philosophers, they deify beyond human conception.
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§ 23.104 Those who came from this school, not only the most ancient Pythagoreans, but also those who during his old age were still young, such as Philolaus, and Eurytus, Charondas and Zaleucus, Brysson and the elder Archytas, Aristeas, Lysis and Empedocles, Zamolxis and Epimenides, Milo and Leucippus, Alcmaeon and Hippasus, and Thymaridas were all of that age, a multitude of savants, incomparably excellent, — all these adopted this mode of teaching, both in their conversations, and commentaries and annotations. Their writings also, and all the books which they published, most of which have been preserved, to our times, were not composed in popular or vulgar diction, or in a manner usual to all other writers, so as to be immediately understood, but in a way such as to be not easily apprehended by their readers. For they adopted Pythagoras's law of reserve, in an arcane manner concealing divine mysteries from the uninitiated, obscuring their writings and mutual conversations.
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§ 23.105 The result is that they who presents theses symbols without unfolding their meaning by a unsuitable exposition, runs the danger of exposing them to the charge of being ridiculous and inane, trifling and garrulous. When however they expounded according to these symbols, and made clear and obvious even to the crowds, then they will be found analogous to prophetic sayings such as the oracles of the Pythian Apollo. Their admirable meaning will inspire those who unite intellect and scholarliness. It might be well to mention a few of them, explain this mode of discipline. Not negligently enter into a temple or adore carelessly, even if only at the doors. Sacrifice and adore unshod. Shunning public roads, walk in unfrequented paths. Not without light speak about Pythagoric affairs. Such is a sketch of the symbolic mode of teaching adopted by Pythagoras.
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§ 24.106 Since food, used properly and regularly, greatly contributes to the best discipline, it may be interesting to consider Pythagoras's precepts on the subject. Forbidden was generally all food causing flatulence or indigestion, while he recommended the contrary kind of food, that preserve and are astringent. Wherefore he recommended the nutritious qualities of millet. Rejected was all food foreign to the Gods, as withdrawing us from communion with them. On the other hand, he forbade to his disciples all food that was sacred, as too honorable to subserve common utility. He exhorted his disciples to abstain from such things as were an impediment to prophecy or to the purity and chastity to the soul, or to the habit of temperance, and virtue. Lastly, he rejected all things that were an impediment to sanctity and disturbed or obscured the other purities of the soul, and the phantasms which occur in sleep. Such were the general regulations about food.
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§ 24.107 Specially, however, the most contemplative of the philosophers, who had arrived at the summit of philosophic attainments, were forbidden superfluous, food such as wine, or unjustifiable food such as was animated; and not to sacrifice animals to the Gods, nor by any means to injure animals, but to observe most solicitous justice towards them.
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§ 24.108 He himself lived after this manner, abstaining from animal food, and adoring altars undefiled with blood. He was likewise careful to prevent others from destroying animals of a nature kindred to ours, and rather corrected and instructed savage animals, than injured them as punishment. Further, he ordered abstaining from animal food even to politicians; for as they desired to act justly to the highest degree, they must certainly not injure any kindred animals. How indeed could they persuade others to act justly, if they themselves were detected in an insatiable avidity in devouring animals allied to us. These are conjoined to us by a fraternal alliance through the communion of life, and the same elements, and the commingling of these. Eating of the flesh of certain animals was however permitted to those whose life was not entirely purified, philosophic and sacred; but even for these was appointed a definite time of abstinence.
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§ 24.109 Besides, these were not to eat the heart, nor the brain, which entirely forbidden to all Pythagoreans. For these organs are predominant and as it were ladders and seats of wisdom and life. Food other than animal was by him also considered sacred, on account of the nature of divine reason. Thus his disciples were to abstain from mallows, because this plant is the first messenger and signal of the sympathy of celestial with terrestrial natures. Moreover, the fish melanurus was interdicted because sacred to the terrestrial gods. Likewise, the erythinus. Beans also on account of many causes also were interdicted, physical, psychic and sacred. Many other similar precepts were enjoined in the attempt to lead men to virtue through their food.
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§ 25.110 Pythagoras was likewise of opinion that music, if properly used, greatly contributed to health. For he was wont to use it in no careless way, but as a purification. Indeed, he restricted this word to signify music used as medicine. About the vernal season he used a melody in this manner. In the middle was placed a person who played on the lyre, and seated around him in a circle were those able to sing. Then the lyrist in the centre struck up and the singers raised certain paeans, through which they were evidently so overjoyed that their manners became elegant and orderly. This music instead of medicines was also used at certain other times.
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§ 25.111 Certain melodies were devised as remedies against the passions of the soul, as also against despondency and gnashing of the teeth, which were invented by Pythagoras as specifics. Further, he employed other melodies against anger and rage, and all other aberrations of the soul. Another kind of modulation was invented against desires. He likewise used dancing, which was accompanied by the lyre, instead of the pipe, which he conceived to have an influence towards insolence, being theatrical, and by no means liberal. For the purpose of correcting the soul, he also used select verses of Homer and Hesiod.
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§ 25.112 It is related among the deeds of Pythagoras that once, through a spondaic song, he extinguished the rage of a Tauromenian lad, who after feasting by night, intended to burn the vestibule of the house of his mistress, on seeing her issuing from the house of a rival. (To this rash attempt the lad had been inflamed, by a Phrygian song, which however Pythagoras at once suppressed.) As Pythagoras was astronomizing he happened to meet this Phrygian piper at an unseasonable time of night, and persuaded him to change his Phrygian song for a spondaic one; through which the fury of the lad being immediately repressed, he retired home in an orderly manner, although but a little while since he had stupidly insulted Pythagoras as on meeting him, would bear no admonition, and could not be restrained. Here is another instance.
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§ 25.113 Anchitus, the host of Empedocles, had as judge, condemned to death the father of a youth, who rushed on Anchitus with drawn sword, intending to slay him. Empedocles changed the youth's intention by singing, to his lyre, that verse of Homer (Od,4): Nepenthe, without gall, o'er every ill Oblivion spreads; thus saving his host Anchitus from death, and the youth from committing murder.
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§ 25.114 It is said that from that time on the youth became one of the most faithful disciples of Empedocles. The Pythagoreans distinguished three states of mind, called exartysis, or readiness; synarmoge, or fitness, and epaphe, or contact, which converted the soul to contrary passions, and these could be produced by certain appropriate songs. When they retired, they purified their reasoning powers from the noises and perturbations to which they had been exposed during the day, by certain odes and hymns which produced tranquil sleep, and few, but good dreams. But when they arose from slumbers, they again liberated themselves from the dazedness and torpor of sleep by songs of another kind. Sometimes the passions of the soul and certain diseases were, as they said, genuinely lured by enchantments, by musical sounds alone, without words. This is indeed probably the origin of the general use of this word epode. Thus therefore, through music Pythagoras produced the most beneficial correction of manners and lives.
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§ 26.115 While describing Pythagoras's wisdom in instructing his disciples, we must not fail to note that he invented the harmonic science and ratios. But to explain this we must go a little backwards in time. Once as he was intently considering music, and reasoning with himself whether it would be possible to devise some instrumental assistance to the sense of hearing, so as to systematize it, as sight is made precise by the compass rule, and [telescope], or touch is made reckonable by balance and measures,
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§ 26.116 so thinking of these things Pythagoras happened to pass by a bronze worker's shop, where providentially he heard the hammers beating out a piece of iron on the anvil, producing sounds that harmonized, except one. But he recognized in these sounds, the concord of the octave, the fifth, and the fourth. He saw that the sound between the fourth and the fifth, taken by itself, was a dissonance, and yet completed the greater sound among them. Delighted, therefore, to find that the thing he was anxious to discover had by divine assistance succeeded, he went into the smithy, and by various experiments discovered that the difference of sound arose from the magnitude of the hammers, but not from the force of the strokes, nor from the shape of the hammers, nor from the change of position of the beaten iron. Having then accurately examined the weights and the swing of the hammers, he returned home, and fixed one stake diagonally to the walls, lest some difference should arise from there being several of them, or from some difference in the material of the stakes. From this stake he then suspended four gut-strings, of similar materials, size, thickness and twist. A weight was suspended from the bottom of each.
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§ 26.177 When the strings were equal in length, he struck two of them simultaneously, he reproduced the former intervals, forming different pairs. He discovered that the string stretched by the greatest weight, when compared with that stretched by the smallest weight, the interval of an octave. The weight of the first was twelve pounds, and that of the latter six. Being therefore in a double ratio, it formed the octave, which was made plain by the weights themselves. Then he found that the string from which the greater weight was suspended compared with that from which was suspended the weight next to the smallest, and which weight was eight pounds, produced the interval known as the fifth. Hence he discovered that this interval is in a ratio of one and a half to one, or three to two, in which ratio the weights also were to each other. The he found that the string stretched by the greatest weight produced, when compared with that which was next to it, in weight, namely, nine pounds, the interval called the fourth, analogous to the weights. This ratio, therefore, he discovered to be in the ratio of one and a third to one, or four to three; while that of the from string from which a weight of nine pounds was suspended to the string which had the smallest weight, again in a ratio of three to two, which is 9 to 6.
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§ 26.118 In like manner, the string next to that from which the small weight was suspended, was to that which had the smallest weight, in the ratio of 4 to 3 (being 8 to 6) but to the string which had the greatest weight, in a ratio of 3 to 2, being 12 to 8. Hence that which is between the fifth and fourth, and by which the fifth exceeds the fourth is proved to be as nine is to eight. But either way it may be proved that the octave is a system consisting of the fifth in conjunction with fourth, just as the double ratio consists of three to two, and four to three; as for instance 12, 8 and 6; or, conversely of the fourth and the fifth, as in the double ratio of four to three and three to two, as for instance, 12, 9 and 6 therefore, and in this order, having confirmed both his hand and hearing to the suspended weights, and having established according to them the ratio of the proportions, by an easy artifice he transferred the common suspension of the strings from the diagonal stake to the head of the instrument which he called chordotenon, or string-stretcher. Then by the aid of pegs he produced a tension of the strings analogous to that effected by the weights.
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§ 26.119 Employing this method, therefore, as a basis, and as it were an infallible rule, he afterward extended the experiment to other instruments, namely, the striking of pans, to flutes and pipes, to monochords, triangles, and the like in all of which he found the same ratio of numbers to obtain. Then he named the sound which participates in the number 6, tonic; that which participates of the number 8, and is four to three, sub-dominant; that which participates of the number 9, and is one tone higher then the sub-dominant, he called, dominant, and 9 to 8; but that which participates of the number 12, octave. Then he filled up the middle spaces with analogous sounds in diatonic order, and formed an octochord from symmetric numbers; from the double, the three to two, the four to three, and from the difference of these, the 8 to 9.
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§ 27.120 Thus he discovered the harmonic progression, which tends by a certain physical necessity from the lowest to the most acute sound, diatonically. Later, from the diatonic he progressed to the chromatic and enharmonic orders, as we shall later show when we treat of music. This diatonic scale however, seems to have the following progression, a semi-tone, a tone, and a tone; and this is the fourth, being a system consisting of two tones, and of what is called a semi-tone. Afterwards, adding another tone, we produce the fifth, which is a system consisting of three tones and a semi-tone. Next to this is the system of a semi-tone, a tone, and a tone, forming another fourth, that is, another four to three ratio. Thus in the more ancient octave indeed, all the sounds from the lowest pitch which are with respect to each other fourths, produce everywhere with each other fourths; the semi-tone, by transition, receiving the first, middle and third place, according to that tetrachord.
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§ 27.121 Now in the Pythagoric octave, however, which by conjunction is a system of the tetrachord and pentachord, but if disjoined is a system of two tetrachords separated from each other, the progression is from the gravest to the most acute sound. Hence all sounds that by their distance from each other are fifths, with each other produce the interval of the fifth; the semi-tone successively proceeding into four places, the first, second, third, and fourth. This is the way in which music is said to have been discovered by Pythagoras. Having reduced it to a system, he delivered it to his disciples to utilize it to produce things as beautiful as possible.
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§ 27.122 Many deeds of the Pythagoreans in the political sphere are deservedly praised. At one time the Crotonians were in the habit of making funerals and interments too sumptuous. Thereupon one of them said to the people that once he had heard Pythagoras converse about divine natures, during which he had observed that the Olympian divinities attended to the dispositions of the sacrificers, and not to the multitude of the offerings. The chthonian gods, on the contrary, being interested in less important matters, rejoiced in lamentations and banquets, libations, delicacies, and obsequial pomp;
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§ 27.123 And as proof thereof, the divinity of Hades is called Plouton (wealth) from his wish to receive. Those that honor him slenderly (he does not much care for), and permits to stay quite a little while; but he hastens to draw down those disposed to spend profusely on funeral solemnities, that he may obtain the honors offered in commemoration the dead. The result was that the Crotonians that heard this advice were persuaded that if they conducted themselves moderately in misfortunes, they would be promoting their own salvation, but would die prematurely if immoderate in such expenses.
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§ 27.124 A certain difference arose about an affair in which there was no witness. A Pythagorean was made arbitrator; and he led both litigants to a certain monument, announcing that the man buried was exceedingly equitable. The one prayed that he might receive much reward for this good life, while the other declared that the defunct was no better-off for his opponent's prayers. The Pythagorean condemned the latter, confirming that he who praised the dead man for his worth had earned credibility. In a cause of great moment, this Pythagorean decided that one of the two who has agreed to settle that affair by arbitration, should pay four talents, while the other should receive two. Then from him who had received two he took three, and gave them to the other, so that each had been mulcted one talent. Two persons had fraudulently deposited a garment with a woman who belonged to a court of justice, and told her that she was not to give it to either of them unless both were present. Later, with intent to defraud, one claimed and got the common deposit, saying he had the consent of the other party. The other one turned informer and related the compact made at the beginning to the magistrates. A certain Pythagorean, however, as arbitrator, decided that the woman was guiltless, construing the claimed assent as constructive presence.
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§ 27.125 Two persons, who had seemed to be great friends, but who had gotten to suspect each other through calumnies of a sycophant, who told the one the other had taken undue liberties with his wife. A Pythagorean happened to enter the smithy where the injured party was finding fault with the blacksmith for not having sufficiently sharpened a sword he had brought him for that purpose. The Pythagorean suspecting the use to which the sword was be put said, The sword is sharper than all things except calumny. This caused the prospective avenger to consider that he should not rashly sin against his friend who was within on an invitation (for the purpose of killing him).
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§ 27.126 A stranger in the temple of Aesculapius accidentally dropped his belt, on which were gold ornaments. When he tried to pick it up, he was informed that the temple-regulations forbad picking up anything on the floor. He was indignant, and a Pythagorean advised him to remove the golden ornaments which were not touching the floor leaving the belt which was. During a public spectacle, some cranes flew over the theatre. One sailor said to his companion, Do you see the witnesses? A Pythagorean near by hailed them into a court presided over by a thousand magistrates, where, being examined they confessed to having thrown certain boys into the sea, who, on drowning had called on the cranes, flying above them, to witness to the deed. This story is mistakenly located elsewhere, but it really happened at Croton. Certain recent disciples of Pythagoras were at variance with each other, and the junior came to the senior, declaring there was no reason to refer the matter to an arbitrator, inasmuch as all they needed to do was to dismiss their anger. The elder agreed, but regretted he had not been the first to make that proposition.
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§ 27.127 We might relate here the story of Damon and Phintias, of Plato and Archytas, and of Clinias and Prorus. At present however we shall limit ourselves to that of Eubulus the Messenian, who, when sailing homeward, was taken captive by the Tyrrhenians, where he was recognized by a Pythagorean named Nausithus, who redeemed him from the pirates, and sent him home in safety.
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§ 27.128 When the Carthaginians were about to send five thousand soldiers into a desert island, the Carthaginian Miltiades saw among them the Argive Pythagorean Posides. Approaching him, and without revealing his intentions, he advised him to return home with all possible haste. He placed him in a ship then sailing near the shore, supplied him with the travel necessaries, and thus saved him from the impending danger. He who would try to relate all the fine deeds that beautified the mutual relations of the Pythagoreans would find the task exceeding space and patience.
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§ 27.129 I shall therefore pass on to show that some of the Pythagoreans were competent administrators, adapted to rule. Many were custodians of the laws, and ruled over certain Italian cities, infolding to them, and advising them to adopt the most salutary measures, while themselves refusing all pay. Though greatly calumniated, their probity and the desire of the citizens prevailed to make them administrators. At this time the best governed states seem to have been in Italy and Sicily.
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§ 27.130 One of the best legislators, Charondas the Catanean, was a Pythagorean, and so were the celebrated Locrian legislators Zaleucus and Timares. Pythagoreans also were those Rheginic polities, called the Gymnasiarchic, named after Theocles. Excelling in studies and manners which were then adopted by their fellow-citizens, were Phytius, Theocles, Helicaon and Aristocrates. Indeed, it is said that Pythagoras was the originator of all political erudition, when he said that nothing existent pure, inasmuch as earth participates of fire, fire of air, and air of water, and water of spirit. Likewise the beautiful participates in the deformed, the just of the unjust, and so on; so that from this principle human impulse may (by proper direction) be turned in either direction. He also said that there were two motions, one of the body which is irrational, and one of the soul, which is the result of deliberate choice. He also said polities might be likened to three lines whose extremities join, forming a (triangle containing) one right angle (the lines being as 4, 3 and 2); so that one of them is as 4 to 3, another as 5 to 2, and the other (3) is the arithmetical medium between 2 and 4.
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§ 27.131 Now when, by reasoning, we study the mutual relations of these lines, and the places under them, we shall find that they represent the best image of a polity. Plato plagiarized, for in his Republic he clearly says, That the result of the 4 to 3 ratio, conjoined with the 5 ratio, produce two harmonies.( This means that) he cultivated the moderation of the passions, and the middle path between extremes, rendering happy the life of his disciples by relating them to ideals of the good.
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§ 27.132 We are also told that he persuaded the Crotonians to give up associations with courtesans and prostitutes. Crotonian wives came to Deino, the wife of the Pythagorean Brontinus, who was a wise and splendid woman, the author of the maxim that it was proper for women to sacrifice on the same day they had risen from the embraces of their husbands, (which some ascribe to Pythagoras' wife Theano ) — and entreated to persuade Pythagoras to discourse to them on their continence as due to their husbands. This she did, and Pythagoras accordingly made an address to the Crotonians, which successfully ended the then prevalent incontinence.
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§ 27.133 When ambassadors came from Sybaris to Croton to demand the (return of ) the exiles, and Pythagoras, seeing one of the ambassadors who with his own hand had slain one of Pythagoras's friends, made no answer whatever. But when this man insisted on an explanation and addressed Pythagoras, the latter said it was unlawful to converse with murderers. This induced many to believe he was Apollo. All these stories, together with what we mentioned above about the destruction of tyrants, and the democratization of the cities of Italy and Sicily, and many other circumstances, are eloquent of the benefits conferred on mankind by Pythagoras, in political respects.
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§ 28.134 Henceforward we shall confine ourselves to the works flowing from Pythagoras's virtues. As usual, we shall begin from the divinities, endeavoring to exhibit his piety, and marvelous deeds. Of his piety, let this be a specimen: that he knew what his soul was, whence it came into the body, and also its former lives, of this giving the most evident indications. Again, once passing over the river Nessus along with many associates, he addressed the river, which, in a distinct and clear voice, in the hearing of all his associates, answered, Hail, Pythagoras! Further, all his biographers insist that during the same day he was present in Metapontum in Italy, and at Tauromenium in Sicily, discoursing with his disciples in both places, although these cities are separate, both by land and sea by many stadia, the traveling over which consumes many days.
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§ 28.135 It is also a matter of common report that showed his golden thigh to the Hyperborean Abaris, who said that he resembled the Apollo worshipped among the Hyperboreans, and of whom Abaris was the priest; and that he had done this so that he was not deceived therein. A myriad of other more admirable and divine particulars are likewise unanimously and uniformly related of the man, such as infallible predictions of earthquakes, rapid expulsions of pestilences, and hurricanes, instantaneous cessations of hail, tranquilizations of the waves of rivers and seas, in order that his disciples might the more easily pass over them. The power of effecting miracles of this kind was achieved by Empedocles of Agrigentum, Epimenides the Cretan, and Abaris the Hyperborean, and these persons performed them in many places.
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§ 28.136 Their deeds were so manifest that Empedocles was surnamed a wind-stiller, Epimenides an expiator, and Abaris an air-walker, because, carried on the arrow given him by the Hyperborean Apollo, he passed over rivers, and seas and inaccessible places like one carried on air. Many think that Pythagoras did the same thing, when in the same day he discoursed with his disciples at Metapontum and Tauromenium. It is also said that he predicted there would be an earthquake from the water of a well which he had tasted; and that a ship was sailing with a prosperous wind, would be submerged in the sea. These are sufficient proofs of his piety.
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§ 28.137 Pitching my thoughts on a higher key, I wish to exhibit the principle of the worship of the Gods, established by Pythagoras and his disciples: that the mark aimed at by all plans, whether to do or not to do, is consent with the divinity. The principle of their piety, and indeed their whole life is arranged with a view to follow God. Their philosophy explicitly asserts that men act ridiculously in searching for good from any source other than God; and that in respect the conduct of most men resembles that of a man who, in a country governed by a king should reverence one of the city magistrates, neglecting him who is the ruler of all of them. Since God exists as the lord of all things, it is evident and acknowledged that good must be requested of him. All men impart good to those they love, and admire, and the contrary to those they dislike. Evidently we should do those things in which God delights.
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§ 28.138 Not easy, however, is it for a man to know which these are, unless he obtains this knowledge from one who has heard God, or has heard God himself, or procures it through divine art. Hence also the Pythagoreans were studious of divination, which is an interpretation of the benevolence of the Gods. That such an employment is worth while will be admitted by one who believes in the Gods; but he who thinks that either of these is folly will also be of opinion that both are foolish. Many of the precepts of the Pythagoreans derived from the mysteries; for they did not conceive them to be the productions of arrogance, hut to originate from a certain divinity. And in a similar manner, all the Pythagoreans believe such things as are mythologically related of Aristeas the Proconnesian, and Abaris the Hyperborean, and other particulars of a like nature. For they consider every thing of this kind to be credible; and of many [such] things they make trial themselves. They also frequently recollect such-like particulars as appear to be fabulous, as not disbelieving in any thing which may be referred to divinity.
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§ 28.139 A certain person therefore relates, that Eurytus said, that a shepherd feeding his sheep near the tomb of Philolaus, heard some one singing. But the person to whom this was related, did not at all disbelieve the narration, but asked what kind of harmony it was? Both of them, however, were Pythagoreans, and Eurytus was the disciple of Philolaus. It is likewise said, that a certain person told Pythagoras, that he dreamed once that he was conversing with his dead father, and he asked Pythagoras what this was a sign of? Pythagoras replied, of nothing, but that he had in reality conversed with his father. As therefore, said he, nothing is signified by my now discoursing with you, so neither is any thing signified by your conversing with your father. Hence, in all particulars of this kind, they did not think that they were naive, but those that disbelieved in them. For they did not suppose that some things are possible to the Gods, but other things impossible, as do those who reason sophistically; but that all things are possible. And this very principle is in the verses, which they ascribe to Linus, but which may actually be theirs: All things may be the objects of our hope, Since nothing hopeless any where is found; All things with ease the God effects, And nought can frustrate his almighty power.
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§ 28.140 The Pythagoreans derive their confidence in their views from the fact that the first to express them was no ordinary man, but God. One of their traditions relates to the question'Who art thou, Pythagoras?' they say he is the Hyperborean Apollo. This is supposed to be evidenced by two facts: when he got up during the games he showed a thigh of gold, and when he entertained Abaris the Hyperborean he stole from him the arrow by which he was guided.
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§ 28.141 Abaris is said to have come from the Hyperboreans collecting money for the temple and prophesying pestilence; he lived in the sacred shrines and was never seen to drink or eat anything; it is said, too, that in Lacedaemon he offered preventive sacrifices, and that for this reason there was never again a plague in Lacedaemon. From this Abaris Pythagoras took the golden arrow without which he could not find his way, and so made Abaris witness to his power.
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§ 28.142 At Metapontum, when certain people prayed that they might receive the cargo of the ship that was sailing thither, he said,'Then you will have a dead man'; and the ship was found to carry a corpse. At Sybaris he seized and dispatched the serpent that had killed the hare, and similarly the little serpent in Tyrrhenia which killed by biting. At Croton (they say) he caressed the white eagle, which made no resistance. When someone wanted to hear him speak, he said he would never speak until a sign had appeared; and after that the white bear appeared in Caulonia. In speech with someone who was about to announce to him the death of his son, he announced it first himself.
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§ 28.143 He told Myllias of Croton that he was Midas the son of Gordius; and Myllias went off to the mainland to do over Midas' tomb what Pythagoras had bidden. They say, too, that the man who bought his house and destroyed it dared tell no one what he had seen, and for this crime was convicted at Croton of sacrilege and put to death; he was found guilty of seizing the golden beard which fell from Pythagoras' statue. These things and others like them are what the Pythagoreans say in confirmation of their belief. And as these are acknowledged to be true, and it is impossible they should have happened to one man, they consequently think it is clear, that what is related of Pythagoras, should be received as pertaining to a being superior to man, and not to a mere man.
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§ 28.144 This is also what is meant by their maxim, that man, bird, and another thing are bipeds, the third being Pythagoras. Such, therefore, on account of his piety, was Pythagoras; and such he was truly thought to be. Oaths were religiously observed by the Pythagoreans, who were mindful of that precept of theirs, As duly by law, thy homage pay first to the immortal Gods; Then to thy oath, and last to the heroes illustrious. For instance: A Pythagorean was in court, and asked to take an oath. Rather than to disobey this principle, although the oath would have been a religiously permitted one, he preferred to pay to the defendant a fine of three talents.
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§ 28.145 Pythagoras taught that no occurrence happened by chance or luck, but rather conformably to divine Providence, and especially so to good and pious men. This is well illustrated by a story from Androcides's treatise on Pythagoric symbols about the Tarentine Pythagorean Thymaridas. He was happening to be sailing away from his country, his friends were all present to bid him farewell, and to embrace him. He had already embarked when someone cried to him, O Thyramidas, I pray that the Gods may shape all your circumstances accord into your wishes! But he retorted, Predict me better things; namely, that what may happen to me may be conformable to the will of the Gods! For he thought it more scientific and prudent not to resist or grumble against divine providence.
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§ 28.146 If asked about the source whence these men derived so much piety, we must acknowledge that the Pythagorean number-theology was clearly fore-shadowed, to some extent, in the Orphic writings. Nor is it to be doubted that when Pythagoras composed his treatise Concerning the Gods, he received assistance from Orpheus, wherefore indeed that theological treatise is sub-titled, the learned and trustworthy Pythagoreans assert, by Telauges; taken from the commentaries left by Pythagoras himself to his daughter, Damo, Telauges's sister, and which, after her death, were said to have been given to Bitale, Damo's daughter and to Telauges, the son of Pythagoras and husband of Bitale, when he was of mature age for he was at Pythagoras's death left very young with his mother Theano. Now who can judge who it was that delivered what there is said of the Gods from the Sacred Discourse, or Treatise on the Gods, which bears both titles. For we read: Pythagoras, the son of Mnesarchus was instructed in what pertains to the Gods when he celebrated orgies in the Thracian Libethra, being therein initiated by Aglaophemus; and that Orpheus, the son of Calliope, having learned wisdom from his mother in the mountain Pangaeus, said that the eternal essence of number is the most providential principle of the universe, of heaven and earth, and of the intermediate nature; and farther still, that it is the root of the permanency of divine natures, of Gods, and divinities.
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§ 28.147 From this it is evident that he learned from the Orphic writers that the essence of the Gods is defined by number. Through the same numbers also, he produced a wonderful prognostication and worship of the Gods, both of which are particularly allied to numbers. As conviction is best produced by an objective fact, the above principle may be proved as follows. When Abaris performed sacred rites according to his customs, he procured a foreknowledge of events, which is studiously cultivated by all the Barbarians, by sacrificing animals, especially birds; for they think that the entrails of such animals are particularly adapted to this purpose. Pythagoras, however, not wishing to suppress his ardent pursuit of the truth, but to guide it into a safer way, without blood and slaughter, and also because he thought that a cock was sacred to the sun, furnished him with a consummate knowledge of all truth, through arithmetical science.
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§ 28.148 From piety, also, he derived faith concerning the Gods. For Pythagoras always insisted that nothing marvelous concerning Gods or divine teachings should be disbelieved, inasmuch as the Gods are competent to effect anything. But the divine teachings in which we must believe are those delivered by Pythagoras. The Pythagoreans therefore assumed and believed what they taught (on the priori ground that) they were not the offspring of false opinion. Hence Eurytus the Crotonian, the disciple of Philolaus, said that a shepherd feeding his sheep had heard the voice of Philolaus from the tomb, though he died many years before, while he was singing. But the person to whom this was related did not at all question this, merely asking what kind of harmony it was. Pythagoras himself also, being asked by a certain person the significance of the converse with his defunct father in sleep, answered that it meant nothing. For neither is anything portended by your speaking with me, said he.
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§ 28.149 Pythagoras wore clean white garments, and used clean white coverlets, avoiding the woolen ones. This custom he enjoined on his disciples. In speaking of super-human natures, he used honorable appellations, and words of good omen, on every occasion mentioning and reverencing the Gods; so, while at supper, he performed libations to the divinities, and taught his disciples daily to celebrate the super-human beings with hymns. He attended likewise to rumors and omens, prophecies and lots, and in short to all unexpected circumstances.
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§ 28.150 Moreover, he sacrificed to the Gods with incense, millet, cakes, honeycombs, myrrh, and the other fumigants. But he did not sacrifice animals, nor did any of the contemplative philosophers. His other disciples, however, the Hearers and the Politicians, were by him ordered to sacrifice animals such as cock, or a lamb, or some other young animal, but not frequently; but they were prohibited from sacrificing oxen. Another indication of the honor he paid the Gods was his teaching that his disciples must never use the names of the divinities uselessly in swearing. For instance, Syllus, one of the Crotonian Pythagoreans, paid a fine rather than swear, though he could have done so without violating the truth. Just as the Pythagoreans abstained from using the names of the Gods, also, through reverence, they were unwilling to name Pythagoras, indicating him whom they meant by the invention of the Tetraktys. Such is the form of an oath ascribed to them: I swear by the discoverer of the Tetraktys, which is the spring of all our wisdom; The perennial fount and root of Nature.
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§ 28.151 In short, they say Pythagoras became a devotee of the Orphic mode of interpretation and disposition, and honored the Gods closest to Orpheus, setting them up as statues and bronze not linked in our (human) forms, but the divine receptacle, because they comprehend and provide for all things, being of a nature and form similar to all, declaring their purifications and rituals having the most accurate knowledge of them. But his divine philosophy and worship was compound, having learned much from the Orphic followers, but much also from the Egyptian priests, the Chaldeans and Magi, the mysteries of Eleusis, Imbros, Samothrace, and Delos and even the Celtic and Iberian.
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§ 28.152 It is also said that Pythagoras's Sacred Discourse is current among the Latins, not being read to or by all, but only by those who are disposed to learn, the best things, avoiding all that is base. He ordered that libations should be made thrice, observing that Apollo delivered oracles from the tripod, the triad being the first number. Sacrifices to Venus were to be made on the sixth day, because this number is the first to partake of every number and when divided in every possible way, receives the power of the numbers subtracted, and those that remain. Sacrifices to Hercules, however, should be made on the eighth day, of the month, counting from the beginning, commemorating his birth in the seventh month.
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§ 28.153 He ordained that those who entered into a sanctuary should be clothed in a clean garment, in which no one had slept; because sleep, just as and brack and brown, indicates sluggishness, while cleanliness is a sign, of equality and justice in reasoning. If blood should be found unintentionally spilled in a sanctuary, there should be made a lustration, either in a golden vessel, or with sea-water; gold being the most beautiful of all things and the measure of exchange of everything else; while the latter was derived from the principle of moistness, the food of the first and more common matter. Also, children should not be brought forth in a sanctuary; where the divine part of the soul should not be bound to the body.
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§ 28.154 On a festal day neither should the hair be cut, nor the nails pared; as it was unworthy to disturb the worship of the Gods, to attend to our own advantage. Nor should lice be killed in a sanctuary, as divine power should not participate in anything superfluous or degrading. The Gods should be honored with cedar, laurel, cypress, oak and myrtle; nor should the body be purified with these, nor the teeth cleaned with them. He also ordered that what is boiled should not be roasted, signifying hereby that mildness has no need of anger. The bodies of the dead he did not suffer to be burned, herein following the Magi, being unwilling that anything (so) divine (as fire) should be mingled with mortal nature.
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§ 28.155 He thought it holy for the dead to be carried out in white garments; thereby obscurely prefiguring the simple and first nature, according to number, and the principle of all things. Above all, he ordained that an oath should be taken religiously; since that which is behind (the futurity of punishment) is long. He said it was much more holy to be a man injured than to kill a man; for judgment is pronounced in Hades, where the soul and its essence, and the first nature of things is correctly appraised. He ordered that coffins should not be made of cypress, either because the scepter of Zeus was made of this wood, or for some other mystic reason. Libations were to be performed before the altar of Zeus the Saviour, of Hercules, and the Dioscuri; thus celebrating Zeus as the presiding cause and leader of the meal; Hercules as the power of Nature, and the Dioscuri, as the symphony of all things.
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§ 28.156 Libations should not be offered with closed eyes, as nothing beautiful should be undertaken with bashfulness and shame. When it thundered, one ought to touch the earth, in remembrance of the generation of things. Holy places should be entered from places on the right hand; and left from the left hand; for the right hand is the principle of what is called the odd number, and is divine; while the left hand is a symbol of the even number, and of dissolution. Such are many of the injunctions he is said to have adopted in the pursuance of piety. Other particulars which have been omitted may be inferred from what has been given. Hence the subject be closed.
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§ 29.157 The Pythagoreans' Commentaries best express his wisdom; being accurate, concise, savoring of the ancient elegance of style, and deducing the conclusions exquisitely. They contain the most condensed conceptions, and are diversified in form and matter. The are both accurate and eloquent, full of clear and indubitable arguments, accompanied by scientific demonstration, in syllogistic form; as indeed will be discovered by any careful reader. In his writings, Pythagoras, from a supernal source, delivers the science of intelligible natures and Gods.
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§ 29.158 Afterwards, he teaches the whole of physics, completely unfolding ethics and logic. Then come various discipline and other excellent sciences. There is nothing pertaining to human knowledge which is not discussed in these encyclopedic writings. If therefore it is acknowledged that of the (Pythagoric) writings which are now in circulation, some were written by Pythagoras himself, while others consist of what he was heard to say, and on this account are anonymous, though of Pythagoric origin; — if all this be so, it is evident that he was abundantly skilled in all wisdom. It is said that while he was in Egypt he very much applied himself to geometry. For Egyptian life bristles with geometric problem; since, from remote periods, when the Gods were fabulously said to have reigned in Egypt, on account of the rising and falling of the Nile, the skillful have been compelled to measure all the Egyptian land which they cultivated; wherefrom indeed the science's name, geometry, was derived. Besides, the Egyptians studied the theories of the celestial orbs, in which Pythagoras also was skilled. All theorems about lines seem to have been derived from that country. All that relates to numbers and computation is said to have been discovered in Phoenicia.
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§ 29.159 The theorems about the heavenly bodies have by some been referred to the Egyptians and Chaldeans in common. Whatever Pythagoras received, however, he developed further, he arranged them for learners, and personally demonstrated them with perspicuity and elegance. He was the first to give a name to philosophy, describing it as a desire for and love of wisdom, which latter he defined as the science of objectified truth. Beings he defined as immaterial and eternal natures, alone possessing a power that is efficacious, as are incorporeal essences. The rest of things are beings only figuratively, and considered such only through the participation of real beings; such are corporeal and material forms, which arise and decay without ever truly existing. Now wisdom is the science of things which are truly beings; but not of the mere figurative entities. Corporeal natures are neither the objects of science, nor admit of a stable knowledge, since they are infinite, and by science incomprehensible, and when compared with universals resemble non-beings, and are in a genuine sense non-definable.
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§ 29.160 Indeed it is impossible to conceive that there should be a science of things not naturally the objects of science; nor could a science of non-existent things prove attractive to anyone. Far more desirable will be things which are genuine beings, existing in invariable permanency, and always answering to their description. For the perception of objects existing only figuratively, never truly being what they seem to be, follows the apprehension of real beings, just as the knowledge of particulars is posterior to the science of universals. For, as said Archytas, he who properly knows universals, will also have a clear perception, of the nature of particulars, That is why beings are not alone, only-begotten, nor simple, but various and multiform. For those genuine beings are intelligible and incorporeal natures, while others are corporeal, falling under the perception of sense, communicate with that which is really existent only by participation. Concerning all these, Pythagoras formed sciences the most apposite, leaving nothing uninvestigated. Besides, he developed the master-sciences of method, common to all of them, such as logic, definitions, and analysis, as may be gathered from the Pythagoric commentaries.
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§ 29.161 To his intimates he was wont to utter symbolically oracular sentences, wherein the smallest number of words were pregnant with the most multifarious significance, not unlike certain oracles of the Pythian Apollo, or like nature herself in tiny seeds, the former exhibiting conceptions, and the latter effects innumerable in multitude, and difficult to understand.
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§ 29.162 Such was Pythagoras's own maxim, The beginning is the half of the whole. In this and similar utterances the most divine Pythagoras concealed the sparks of truth, as in a treasury, for those capable of being kindled thereby. In this brevity of diction he deposited an extension of theory most ample, and difficult to grasp, as in the maxim, All things accord in number, which he frequently repeated to his disciples. Another one was, Friendship is equality; Equality is friendship. He even used single words, such as cosmos, or, adorned world; or, philosophy or further, Tetractys! All these and many other similar inventions were by Pythagoras devised for the benefit and amendment of his associates; and by those that understood them they were considered to be so worthy of veneration, and so divinely inspired, that those who dwelt in the common auditorium adopted this oath: I swear by the discoverer of the Tetraktys, which is the spring of all our wisdom; The perennial founts and root of Nature. This was the form of his so admirable wisdom.
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§ 29.163 Of the sciences honored by the Pythagoreans not the least were music, medicine and divination. [...] silent and listening and to praise among them the one able to hear. Of medicine, the most emphasized part was dietetics; and they were most scrupulous in its exercise. First, they sought to understand the physical symptoms of equanimity, labor, eating and repose. They were nearly the first to make a business of the preparation of food, and to describe its methods. More frequently than their predecessors the Pythagoreans used poultices, however disapproving more of medicated ointments, which they chiefly limited to the cure of ulcerations. Most they disapproved of cuts and cauterizations.
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§ 29.164 Some diseases they cured by incantations. Music, if used in a proper manner, was by Pythagoras supposed to contribute greatly to health. The Pythagoreans likewise employed select sentences of Homer and Hesiod for the amendment of souls. The Pythagoreans were habitually silent and prompt to hear, and he won praise who listened (most effectively). But that which they had learned and heard was supposed to be retained and preserved in the memory. Indeed, this ability of learning and remembering determined the amount of disciplines and lectures, inasmuch as learning is the power by which knowledge is obtained, and remembering that by which it is preserved. Hence memory was greatly honored, abundantly exercised, and given much attention. In learning also it was understood that they were not to dismiss what they were taught, till its first rudiments had been entirely mastered. This was their method of recalling what they daily heard.
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§ 29.165 No Pythagorean rose from his bed till he had first recollected the transactions of the day before; and he accomplished this by endeavoring to remember what he first said, or heard, or ordered done by his domestics before rising; or what was the second or third thing he had said, heard or commanded. The same method was employed for the remainder of the day. He would try to remember the identity of the first person he had met on leaving home, and who was the second; and with, whom he had discoursed first, second or third. So also he did with everything else, endeavoring to resume in his memory all the events of the whole day, and in the very same order in which each of them had occurred. If however, after rising there was enough leisure to do so, the Pythagoreans reminisced about day before yesterday.
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§ 29.166 Thus they made it a point to exercise their memories systematically; considering that the ability of remembering was most important for experience, science and wisdom. This Pythagorean school filled Italy with philosophers; and this place which before was unknown, was later, on account of Pythagoras called Greater Greece, which became most famous for is philosophers, poets and legislators. Indeed, the rhetorical arts, demonstrative reasonings and legislation was entirely transferred from Greece. As to physics, we might mention the principal physiologists, Empedocles and the Elean Parmenides. As to ethical maxims, this is Epicharmus, whose conceptions are used by all philosophers. Thus much concerning the wisdom of Pythagoras, how in a certain respect he very much impelled all his hearers to its pursuit, so far as they were adapted to its participation, and how perfectly he delivered it.
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§ 30.167 Concerning justice, how he cultivated and delivered it to humanity we shall best understand if we trace it to its first principle, and ultimate cause. Also we must investigate the ultimate cause of injustice, which will show us how he avoided it, and what methods he adopted to make justice fructify in his soul. The principle of justice is mutuality and equality, through which, in a way most nearly approximating union of body and soul, all men become cooperative, and distinguish the mine from the thine. This is also testified by Plato, who learned this from Pythagoras.
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§ 30.168 Pythagoras effected this in the best possible manner by erasing from common life every thing private, while increasing everything held in common, so far as ultimate possessions, which after all are the causes of tumult and sedition (Among his disciples[),] everything, was common, and the same to all, no one possessing anything private. He himself indeed, who most approved of this communion, made use of common possessions in the most just manner; but disciples who changed their minds was given back his original contribution, with an addition, and left. Thus Pythagoras established justice in the best possible manner, beginning at its very first principle. In the next place, justice is introduced by association with other people, while injustice is, produced by unsociability and neglect of other people. Wishing therefore to spread this sociability as far as possibility among men, he ordered his disciples to extend it to the most kindred animal races, considering these as their intimates and friends, which would forbid injuring, slaying, or eating any of them.
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§ 30.169 He who recognizes the community of elements and life between men and animals will in much greater degree establish fellowship with those who share a kindred and rational soul. This also shows that Pythagoras prompted justice beginning from its very root principle. Since lack of money often compels men sometimes to act contrary to justice, he tried to avoid this by practising such economy that his necessary expenses might be liberal, and yet retain a just sufficiency. For as cities are only magnificent households, so the arrangement of domestic concerns is the principle of all good order in cities.
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§ 30.170 For instance, it was said that he himself was the heir to the property of Alcaeus, who died after completing an embassy to the Lacedemonians; but that in spite of this Pythagoras was admired for his economy no less than for his philosophy. Also when he married, he so educated the daughter that was born to him, and who afterwards married the Crotonian Meno, that while unmarried she was a choir-leader, while as wife she held the first place among those who worshipped at altars. It is also said that the Metapontines preserved Pythagoras's memory by turning his house into a shrine of Demeter, and the street in which he lived into a museum.
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§ 30.171 Because injustice also frequently results from insolence, luxury, and lawlessness, he daily exhorted his disciples to support laws, and shun lawlessness. He considered luxury the first evil that usually glides into houses and cities; the second insolence, the third destruction. Luxury therefore should by all possible means be excluded and expelled; and that from birth men should be accustomed to live temperately, and in a manly manner. He also added the necessity of purification from bad language, whether it be piteous, or provocative, reviling, insolent or scurrilous.
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§ 30.172 Besides this household justice, he added another and most beautiful kind, the legislative, which both orders what to do and what not to do. Legislative justice is more beautiful that the judicial kind, resembling medicine which heals the diseased, but differs in this that it is preventive, planning the health of the soul from afar. That is why the best of legislators graduated from the school of Pythagoras: first, Charondas the Catanean, and next Zaleucus and Timaratus, who legislated for the Locrians. Besides these were Theaetetus and Helicaon, Aristocrates and Phytius, who legislated for the Rhegini. All these aroused from the citizens honors comparable to those offered to divinities.
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§ 30.173 For Pythagoras did not act like Heraclitus, who agreed to write laws for the Ephesians, but also petulantly added that in those laws he would order the citizens to hang themselves. What laws Pythagoras endeavored to establish were benevolent and scientific. Nor need we specially admire those (above mentioned professional) legislators. Pythagoras had a slave by the name of Zamolxis, hailing from Thrace. After hearing Pythagoras's discourses, and obtaining his freedom, he returned to the Getae, and there, as has already been mentioned at the beginning of this work, exhorted the citizens to fortitude, persuading then that the soul is immortal. So much so is this that even at present all the Galatians and Trallians, and many others of the Barbarians, persuade their children that the soul cannot be destroyed, but survives death, so that the latter is not to be feared, so that (ordinary) danger is to be met with a firm and manly mind. For instructing the Getae in these things, and for having written laws for them, Zamolxis was by them considered as the greatest of the gods.
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§ 30.174 Further, Pythagoras conceived that the dominion of the divinities was most efficacious for establishing justice; and from this principle he deduced a hole polity, particular laws and a principle of justice. Thus his basic theology was that we should realize God's existence, and that his disposition towards the human race is such that he inspects and does not neglect it. This theology was very useful: for we require an inspection that we would not be disposed to resist, such as the inspective government of the divinity, for if divine nature is of this nature, it deserves the empire of the universe. For the Pythagoreans rightly taught that (the natural) man is an animal naturally insolent, and changeable in impulse, desire and passions. He therefore requires an extraordinary inspectionary government of this kind, which may produce some chastening and ordering.
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§ 30.175 They therefore thought that any who recognize their changeableness should never be forgetful of piety towards and worship of divinity. Everyone should pay heed, beneath the divine nature, and that of genii, to his parents and the laws, and obey them unfeignedly and faithfully. In general, they thought it necessary to believe that there is no evil greater than anarchy; since the human race is not naturally adapted to salvation without some guidance. The Pythagoreans also considered it advisable to adhere to the customs and laws of their ancestors, even though somewhat inferior to other regulations.
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§ 30.176 For it is unprofitable and not salutary to evade existing laws, or to be studious of innovation. Pythagoras, therefore, to evince that his life was conformable to his doctrines gave many other specimens of piety to the Gods. It may be quite suitable to mention one of these, as an example of the rest.
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§ 30.177 I will relate what Pythagoras said and did relative to the embassy from Sybaris to Croton, relative to the return of the exiles. By order of the ambassadors, some of his associates had been slain, a part of them, indeed, by one of the ambassadors himself, while another one of them was the son of one of those who had excited the sedition, and had died of disease. When the Crotonians therefore were deliberating how they should act in this affair, Pythagoras told his disciples he was displeased that the Crotonians should be so much at odds over the matter, and that in his opinion the ambassadors should not even be permitted to lead victims to the altar, let alone drag thence the suppliant exiles. When the Sybarites came to him with their complaints, and the man who had slain some of his disciples with his own hands was defending his conduct, Pythagoras declared he would make no answer to (a murderer). Another (ambassador) accused him of asserting that he was Apollo, because when in the past, some person had asked him about a certain subject, why the thing was so; and he had retorted. Would he think it sensible, when Apollo was delivering oracles to him, to ask Apollo why he did so?
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§ 30.178 Another one of the ambassadors derided his school, wherein he taught the return of souls to this world saying that, as Pythagoras was about to descend into Hades, the ambassador would give Pythagoras an epistle to his father, and begged him to bring back an answer, when he returned. Pythagoras responded that he was not about to descend into the abode of the impious, where he clearly knew that murderers were punished. As then the rest of the ambassadors reviled him, Pythagoras, followed by many people, went to the seashore, and sprinkled himself with water. After reviling the rest of the ambassadors, one of the Crotonian counselors observed that he understood they had defamed Pythagoras, whom not even a brute would dare to blaspheme, though all animals should again utter the same voice as men, as prehistoric fables relate.
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§ 30.179 Pythagoras discovered another method of restraining men from injustice: the fear of judgment. He knew that this method could be taught, and that fear was often able to suppress justice. He asserted therefore that it is much better to be injured, than to kill a man; for judgment is dispensed in Hades, where the soul and its essence and the first nature of beings, are accurately appraised. Desiring to exhibit among unequal, indefinite and unsystematic human affairs the equality, definiteness and symmetry of justice, and to show how it ought to be exercised, he likened justice to (a right-angled) triangle, the only one among geometrical forms, which, though, having an infinite diversity of adjustments of indeed unequal parts (the length of the sides), yet has equal powers (the square on the hypotenuse is equal to the squares on the other two sides).
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§ 30.180 Since all associations (imply relations with some other person) and therefore entail justice, the Pythagoreans declared that there were two kinds of associations, that differed: the seasonable, and the unseasonable, according to age, merit, familiarity, philanthropy, and so forth. For instance, the association of a younger person with an elderly one is unseasonable, while that of two young persons is seasonable. No kind of anger, threatening or boldness is becoming in a younger towards an elderly man, all which unseasonable conduct should be cautiously avoided.
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§ 30.181 So also with respect to merit, for, towards a man who has arrived at the true dignity of consummate virtue, neither unrestrained form of speech, nor any other of the above manners of conduct is seasonable. Not unlike this was what he taught about the relations towards parents and benefactors. He said that the use of the opportune time was various. For of those who are angry or enraged, some are so seasonably, and some unseasonably. The same distinction obtains with desires, impulsions and passions, actions, dispositions, associations and meetings.
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§ 30.182 He further observed that to a certain extent, the opportuneness is to be taught, and that also the unexpected might be analysed artificially; while none of the above qualifications obtain when applied universally, and simply. Nevertheless its results are very similar to those of opportuneness, namely elegance, propriety, congruence, and the like. Reminding us that unity is the principle of the universe, being its principal element, so also is it in science, experiment, and growth. However two-fold-ness is most honorable in houses, cities, camps, and such like organizations. For in sciences we learn and judge not by any single hasty glance, but by a thorough examination of every detail. There is therefore grave danger of entire misapprehension of things, when the principle has been mistaken; for while the true principle remains unknown, no consequent conclusions can be final.
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§ 30.183 The same situation obtains in things of another kind. Neither a city nor a house can be well organized unless each has an effective ruler who governs voluntary servants. For voluntariness is as necessary with the ruler to govern, as in the ruled to obey. So also must there be a concurrence of will between teacher and learner; for no satisfactory progress can be made while there obtains resistance on either side. Thus he demonstrated the beauty of being persuaded by rulers, and to be obedient to preceptors.
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§ 30.184 This was the greatest objective illustration of this argument. Pherecydes the Syrian had been his teacher, but now was afflicted with phtheiriasis (lice disease), Pythagoras therefore went from Italy to Delos, to nurse him, tending him until he died, and piously performing whatever funeral rites were due to his former teacher. So diligent was he in discharge of his duties towards those from whom he had received instruction.
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§ 30.185 Pythagoras insisted strenuously with his disciples on the fulfillment of mutual agreements. (Here is an illustration). Lysis had once completed his worship in the sanctuary of Hera, and was leaving as he met in the propylaia with Euryphamus the Syracusan, one of his fellow disciples, who was then entering into the sanctuary. Euryphamus asked Lysis to wait for him, till he had finished his worship also. So Lysis sat down on a stone seat there, and waited. Euryphamus went in, finished his worship, but, having become absorbed in some profound considerations, forgot his appointment, and passed out by another gate. Lysis however continued to wait, without leaving his seat, the remainder of that day, and the following and also the greater part of the next day. And perhaps he would have been there longer, had not Euryphamos the next day in the auditorium heard one of Lysis's companions asking about him and remembered. And going he found him waiting there in accordance with the agreement. He explained the cause of his forgetfulness and exclaimed, “One of the gods caused this in me to be a test of your steadfastness.”
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§ 30.186 Pythagoras also ordained abstinence from animal food, for many reasons, besides the chief one that it conduced to peaceableness. Those who are trained to abominate the slaughter of animals as iniquitous and unnatural will not think it much more unlawful to kill a man, or engage in war. For war promotes slaughter, and legalizes it. increasing it. and strengthening it. Pythagoras's maxim “not to touch the balance above the beam” is in itself an exhortation to justice, demanding the cultivation of everything that is just, as will be shown when we study the Pythagorean symbols. In all these particulars. therefore. Pythagoras paid great attention to the practice of justice; and to its preachment to men, both in deeds and words.
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§ 31.187 Temperance is our next topic, cultivated as it was by Pythagoras, and taught to his associates. The common precepts about it have already been detailed, in which we learned that everything irregular should be cut off with fire and sword. A similar precept is the abstaining from animal food, and also from such likely to produce intemperance, and lulling the vigilance and genuine energies of the reasoning powers. A further step in this direction is the precept to introduce, at a banquet, sumptuous fare, which is to be shortly sent away, and given to the servants, having been exhibited merely to chasten the desires. Another one was that none but courtesans should wear gold, not the free women.
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§ 31.188 Further the practice of taciturnity, and even entire silence, for the purpose of governing the tongue. Next, intensive and continuous puzzling out of the most difficult speculations, for the sake of which wine, food and sleep would be minimized. Then would come genuine discrediting of notoriety, wealth, and the like; a sincere reverence towards those to whom reverence is due; joined with an unassumed democratic geniality towards one's equals in age, and towards the juniors guidance and counsel, free from envy, and everything similar which is to be deduced from temperance.
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§ 31.189 The temperance of the Pythagoreans, and how Pythagoras taught this virtue, may be learned from what Hippobotus and Neanthes narrate of Myllias and Timycha, who were Pythagoreans. It seems that Dionysius the tyrant could not obtain the friendship of any one of the Pythagoreans, though he did everything possible to accomplish that purpose; for they had noted, and condemned his monarchical leanings. He therefore sent a troop of thirty soldiers, under the command of Eurymenes the Syracusan, who was the brother of Dion, through (whose) treachery he hoped to take advantage of the Pythagoreans' usual annual migration to catch some of them; for they were in the habit of changing their abode at different seasons of the year, and they selected places suitable to such a migration.
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§ 31.190 Therefore in Phalae, a rugged part of Tarentum, through which the Pythagoreans were scheduled to pass, Eurymenes insidiously concealed his troop; and when the unsuspecting Pythagoreans reached there about noon, the soldiers rushed upon them with shouts, after the manner of robbers. Disturbed and terrified at an attack so unexpected, at the superior number of their enemies, the Pythagoreans amounting to no more than ten, and being unarmed against regularly equipped soldiery, the Pythagoreans saw that they would inevitably be taken captive, so they decided that their only safety lay in flight, which they did not consider inadmissible to virtue. For they knew that according to right reason, fortitude is the art of avoiding as well as enduring.
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§ 31.191 So they would have escaped, and their pursuit would have been given up by Eurymenes's soldiers, who were heavily armed, had their flight not led them up against a field sown with beans, which were already flowering. Unwilling to violate their principle not to touch beans, they stood still, and driven to desperation turned, and attacked their pursuers with stones and sticks, and whatever they found to hand, till they had wounded many, and slain some. But all the Pythagoreans were slain by the spearmen, as none of them would suffer himself to be taken captive, preferring death, according to the sect's teachings.
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§ 31.192 As Eurymenes and his soldiers had been sent for the express purpose of taking some of the Pythagoreans alive to Dionysius, they were much crest-fallen; and having thrown the corpses in a common sepulchre, and piled earth thereupon, they turned homewards. But as they were returning they met two of the Pythagoreans who had lagged behind. Myllias the Crotonian, and his Lacedemonian wife Timycha, who had not been able to keep up with the others, being in the sixth month of pregnancy. These therefore the soldiers gladly made captive, and led to the tyrant with every precaution, so as to insure their arrival alive.
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§ 31.193 On learning what had happened, the tyrant was very much disheartened, and said to the two Pythagoreans, You shall obtain from me honors of unusual dignity if you shall be willing to reign in partnership with me. All his offers, however, were by Myllias and Timycha rejected. Then said he, I will release you with a safe-guard if you will tell me one thing only. On Myllias asking what he wished to learn, Dionysius replied: Tell me only why your companions chose to die rather than to tread on beans? But Myllis at once answered, My companions did indeed prefer death to treading on beans; but I had rather do that than tell you the reason.
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§ 31.194 Astonished at this answer, Dionysius ordered him removed forcibly, and Timycha tortured, for he thought that a pregnant woman, deprived of her husband, would weaken before the torments, and easily tell him all he wanted to know. The heroic woman, however, with her teeth bit her tongue until it was separated and spat it out at the tyrant, thus demonstrating that the offending member should be entirely cut off, even if her sex's weakness, vanquished by the torments, should be compelled to disclose something that should be reserved in silence. Such difficulties did they make to the admission of outside friendships, even though they happened to be royal.
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§ 31.195 Similar to these also were the precepts concerning silence, which tended to the practice of temperance; for of all continence, the subjugation of the tongue is the most difficult. The same virtue is illustrated by Pythagoras's persuading the Crotonians to relinquish all sacrilegious and questionable commerce with courtesans. Moreover Pythagoras restored to temperance a youth who had become wild with amatory passion, through music. Exhortations against lascivious insolence promote the same virtue.
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§ 31.196 Such things were delivered to the Pythagoreans by Pythagoras himself, who was their cause. They took such care of their bodies that they remained in the same condition, not being at one time lean, and at another stout, which changes they considered anomalous. With respect to their mind also, they managed to remain uniformly mildly joyful, and not at one time hilarious, and at another sad, which could be achieved only by expelling perturbations, despondency or rage. It was a precept of theirs that no human casualties ought to be unexpected by the intelligent, expecting everything which it is not in their power to prevent. If however at any time any of them fell into a rage, or into despondency, he would withdraw from his associates' company, and seeking solitude, endeavor to digest and heal the passion.
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§ 31.197 Of the Pythagoreans it is also reported that none of them punished a servant or admonished a free man during angers but waited until he had recovered his wonted serenity. They used an especial word, paidartan, to signify such (self-controlled) rebukes, effecting this calming by silence and quiet. So Spintharus relates of Archytas the Tarentine that on returning after a certain time from the war against the Messapians waged by the Tarentines, to inspect some land belonging to him, and finding that the bailiff and the other servants had not properly cultivated it, greatly neglecting it, he became enraged, and was so furious that he told his servants that it was well for them that he was angry, for otherwise, they would not have escaped the punishment due to so great an offense.
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§ 31.198 A similar anecdote is related of Clinias, according to Spintharus; for he also was wont to defer all admonitions and punishments until his mind was restored to tranquillity. Of the Pythagoreans it is further related that they restrained themselves from all lamentation, weeping and the like; and that neither gain, desire, anger or ambition, or anything of the like, ever became the cause of dissension among them; all Pythagoreans being disposed towards each other as parents towards their offspring. Another beautiful trait of theirs was that they gave credit to Pythagoras for everything, naming it after him, not claiming the glory of their own inventions, except very rarely. Few are there who acknowledged their own works.
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§ 31.199 Admirable too is the careful secrecy with which, they preserved the mystery of their writings. For during so many centuries, prior to the times of Philolaus, none of the Pythagorean commentaries appeared publicly. Philolaus first published those three celebrated books which, at the request of Plato, Dion of Syracuse is said to have bought for a hundred minas. For Philolaus had been overtaken by sudden severe poverty, and he capitalized the writings of which he was partaker through his alliance with the Pythagoreans.
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§ 31.200 As to the value of opinion, such were their views: A stupid man should defer to the opinion of any one, especially to that of the crowds. Only a very few are qualified to apprehend and opine rightly; for evidently this is limited to the intelligent, who are very few. To the crowds, such a qualification of course does not extend. But to despise the opinion of every one is also stupid; for such a person will remain unlearned and incorrigible. The unscientific should study that of which he is ignorant, or lacks scientific knowledge. A learner should also defer to the opinion of the scientific, and is able to teach.

Via ToposText (topostext.org), a project of the Aikaterini Laskaridis Foundation created by Brady Kiesling. Translated by Kenneth Sylvan Launfal Guthrie (1871-1940). Composed ca. 300 CE. Licence: public domain. Source.