| Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers (English) (XML Header) [word count] [lemma count] [Diog. Laert.]. | ||
| <<Diog. Laert. 8.2.75 | Diog. Laert. 8.4.82 (Greek) | >>Diog. Laert. 8.8.87 |
Archytas of Tarentum, son of Mnesagoras or, if we may believe Aristoxenus, of Hestiaeus, was another of the Pythagoreans. He it was whose letter saved Plato when he was about to be put to death by Dionysius. He was generally admired for his excellence in all fields ; thus he was generalissimo of his city seven times, while the law excluded all others even from a second year of command. We have two letters written to him by Plato, he having first written to Plato in these terms :
"Archytas wishes Plato good health.
8.4.80"You have done well to get rid of your ailment, as we learn both from your own message and through Lamiscus that you have : we attended to the matter of the memoirs and went up to Lucania where we found the true progeny of Ocellus [to wit, his writings]. We did get the works On Law, On Kingship, Of Piety, and On the Origin of the Universe, all of which we have sent on to you ; but the rest are, at present, nowhere to be found ; if they should turn up, you shall have them." This is Archytas's letter ; and Plato's answer is as follows:
"Plato to Archytas greeting.
8.4.81"I was overjoyed to get the memoirs which you sent, and I am very greatly pleased with the writer of them ; he seems to be a right worthy descendant of his distant forbears. They came, so it is said, from Myra, and were among those who emigrated from Troy in Laomedon's time, really good men, as the traditional story shows. Those memoirs of mine about which you wrote are not yet in a fit state ; but such as they are I have sent them on to you. We both agree about their custody, so I need not give any advice on that head. Farewell."
These then are the letters which passed between them.
8.4.82Four men have borne the name of Archytas : (1) our subject ; (2) a musician, of Mytilene ; (3) the compiler of a work On Agriculture ; (4) a writer of epigrams. Some speak of a fifth, an architect, to whom is attributed a book On Mechanism which begins like this : "These things I learnt from Teucer of Carthage." A tale is told of the musician that, when it was cast in his teeth that he could not be heard, he replied, "Well, my instrument shall speak for me and win the day."
Aristoxenus says that our Pythagorean was never defeated during his whole generalship, though he once resigned it owing to bad feeling against him, whereupon the army at once fell into the hands of the enemy.
8.4.83He was the first to bring mechanics to a system by applying mathematical principles ; he also first employed mechanical motion in a geometrical construction, namely, when he tried, by means of a section of a half-cylinder, to find two mean proportionals in order to duplicate the cube. note In geometry, too, he was the first to discover the cube, as Plato says in the Republic. note
Alcmaeon of Croton, another disciple of Pythagoras, wrote chiefly on medicine, but now and again he touches on natural philosophy, as when he says, "Most human affairs go in pairs." He is thought to have been the first to compile a physical treatise, so we learn from Favorinus in his Miscellaneous History ; and he said that the moon [and] generally [the heavenly bodies] are in their nature eternal.
He was the son of Pirithous, as he himself tells us at the beginning of his treatise note : "These are the words of Alcmaeon of Croton, son of Pirithous, which he spake to Brotinus, Leon and Bathyllus : `Of things invisible, as of mortal things, only the gods have certain knowledge ; but to us, as men, only inference from evidence is possible,' and so on." He held also that the soul is immortal and that it is continuously in motion like the sun.
Hippasus of Metapontum was another Pythagorean, who held that there is a definite time which the changes in the universe take to complete and that the All is limited and ever in motion.
According to Demetrius in his work on Men of the Same Name, he left nothing in writing. There were two men named Hippasus, one being our subject, and the other a man who wrote The Laconian Constitution in five books ; and he himself was a Lacedaemonian.
Philolaus of Croton was a Pythagorean, and it was from him that Plato requests Dion to buy the Pythagorean treatises. note He (Dion) was put to death because he was thought to be aiming at a tyranny. note This is what we have written upon him note :
Fancies of all things are most flattering ; If you intend, but do not, you are lost. So Croton taught Philolaus to his cost,
Who fancied he would like to be their king. note
| Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers (English) (XML Header) [word count] [lemma count] [Diog. Laert.]. | ||
| <<Diog. Laert. 8.2.75 | Diog. Laert. 8.4.82 (Greek) | >>Diog. Laert. 8.8.87 |
