5 ideas
594 | Speusippus suggested underlying principles for every substance, and ended with a huge list [Speussipus, by Aristotle] |
Full Idea: Speusippus suggested principles for each substance, including principles for numbers, magnitude and the soul. He thus arrived at no mean list of substances. | |
From: report of Speussipus (thirty titles (lost) [c.367 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 1028b |
22241 | Don't fear god or worry about death; the good is easily got and the terrible easily cured [Philodemus] |
Full Idea: Don't fear god, Don't worry about death; What is good is easy to get, What is terrible is easy to cure. | |
From: Philodemus (Herculaneum Papyrus [c.50 BCE], 1005,4.9-14) | |
A reaction: This is known as the Four-Part Cure, and is an epicurean prayer, probably formulated by Epicurus. |
13304 | Learned men gain more in one day than others do in a lifetime [Posidonius] |
Full Idea: In a single day there lies open to men of learning more than there ever does to the unenlightened in the longest of lifetimes. | |
From: Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]), quoted by Seneca the Younger - Letters from a Stoic 078 | |
A reaction: These remarks endorsing the infinite superiority of the educated to the uneducated seem to have been popular in late antiquity. It tends to be the religions which discourage great learning, especially in their emphasis on a single book. |
20820 | Time is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed [Posidonius, by Stobaeus] |
Full Idea: Posidonius defined time thus: it is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed and slowness. | |
From: report of Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.08.42 | |
A reaction: Hm. Can we define motion or speed without alluding to time? Looks like we have to define them as a conjoined pair, which means we cannot fully understand either of them. |
2632 | Speusippus said things were governed by some animal force rather than the gods [Speussipus, by Cicero] |
Full Idea: Speusippus, following his uncle Plato, held that all things were governed by some kind of animal force, and tried to eradicate from our minds any notion of the gods. | |
From: report of Speussipus (thirty titles (lost) [c.367 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - On the Nature of the Gods ('De natura deorum') I.33 |