Greek Texts & Translations

Heraclitus, son of Bloson or, according to some, of Heracon, was a native of Ephesus. He flourished in the 69th Olympiad. ^note He was lofty-minded beyond all other men, ^note and over-weening, as is clear from his book in which he says : "Much learning does not teach understanding ; else would it have taught Hesiod and Pythagoras, or, again, Xenophanes and Hecataeus." ^note For "this one thing is wisdom, to understand thought, as that which guides all the world everywhere." ^note And he used to say that "Homer deserved to be chased out of the lists and beaten with rods, and Archilochus likewise." ^note

Again he would say : "There is more need to extinguish insolence than an outbreak of fire," ^note and "The people must fight for the law as for citywalls." ^note He attacks the Ephesians, too, for banishing his friend Hermodorus : he says : "The Ephesians would do well to end their lives, every grown man of them, and leave the city to beardless boys, for that they have driven out Hermodorus, the worthiest man among them, saying, `We will have none who is worthiest among us ; or if there be any such, let him go elsewhere and consort with others.'" ^note And when he was requested by them to make laws, he scorned the request because the state was already in the grip of a bad constitution. 9.1.3 He would retire to the temple of Artemis and play at knuckle-bones with the boys ; and when the Ephesians stood round him and looked on, "Why, you rascals," he said, "are you astonished? Is it not better to do this than to take part in your civil life ?"

Finally, he became a hater of his kind and wandered on the mountains, and there he continued to live, making his diet of grass and herbs. However, when this gave him dropsy, he made his way back to the city and put this riddle to the physicians, whether they were competent to create a drought after heavy rain. They could make nothing of this, whereupon he buried himself in a cowshed, expecting that the noxious damp humour would be drawn out of him by the warmth of the manure. But, as even this was of no avail, he died at the age of sixty.

There is a piece of my own about him as follows ^note :

Often have I wondered how it came about that Heraclitus endured to live in this miserable fashion and then to die. For a fell disease flooded his body with water, quenched the light in his eyes and brought on darkness.

Hermippus, too, says that he asked the doctors whether anyone could by emptying the intestines draw off the moisture ; and when they said it was impossible, he put himself in the sun and bade his servants plaster him over with cow-dung. Being thus stretched and prone, he died the next day and was buried in the market-place. Neanthes of Cyzicus states that, being unable to tear off the dung, he remained as he was and, being unrecognizable when so transformed, he was devoured by dogs.

He was exceptional from his boyhood ; for when a youth he used to say that he knew nothing, although when he was grown up he claimed that he knew everything. He was nobody's pupil, but he declared that he "inquired of himself," ^note and learned everything from himself. Some, however, had said that he had been a pupil of Xenophanes, as we learn from Sotion, who also tells us that Ariston in his book On Heraclitus declares that he was cured of the dropsy and died of another disease. And Hippobotus has the same story.

As to the work which passes as his, it is a continuous treatise On Nature, but is divided into three discourses, one on the universe, another on politics, and a third on theology. 9.1.6 This book he deposited in the temple of Artemis and, according to some, he deliberately made it the more obscure in order that none but adepts should approach it, and lest familiarity should breed contempt. Of our philosopher Timon ^note gives a sketch in these words ^note :

In their midst uprose shrill, cuckoo-like, a mob-reviler, riddling Heraclitus.

Theophrastus puts it down to melancholy that some parts of his work are half-finished, while other parts make a strange medley. As a proof of his magnanimity Antisthenes in his Successions of Philosophers cites the fact that he renounced his claim to the kingship in favour of his brother. So great fame did his book win that a sect was founded and called the Heracliteans, after him.

Here is a general summary of his doctrines. All things are composed of fire, and into fire they are again resolved ; further, all things come about by destiny, and existent things are brought into harmony by the clash of opposing currents ; again, all things are filled with souls and divinities. He has also given an account of all the orderly happenings in the universe, and declares the sun to be no larger than it appears. Another of his sayings is : "Of soul thou shalt never find boundaries, not if thou trackest it on every path ; so deep is its cause." ^note Self-conceit he used to call a falling sickness (epilepsy) and eyesight a lying sense. ^note Sometimes, however, his utterances are clear and distinct, so that even the dullest can easily understand and derive therefrom elevation of soul. For brevity and weightiness his exposition is incomparable.