CHAPTER V EMPEDOKLES OF AKRAGAS · 5

Thus have all things thought by fortune’s will.... And inasmuch as the rarest things came together in their fall.

(The heart), dwelling in the sea of blood that runs in opposite directions, where chiefly is what men call thought; for the blood round the heart is the thought of men. R. P. 178 a.

For the wisdom of men grows according to what is before them. R. P. 177.

For out of these are all things formed and fitted together, 255and by these do men think and feel pleasure and pain. R. P. 178.

And just so far as they grow to be different, so far do different thoughts ever present themselves to their minds (in dreams).[568] R. P. 177 a.

For it is with earth that we see Earth, and Water with water; by air we see bright Air, by fire destroying Fire. By love do we see Love, and Hate by grievous hate. R. P. 176.

For if, supported on thy steadfast mind, thou wilt contemplate these things with good intent and faultless care, then shalt thou have all these things in abundance throughout thy life, and thou shalt gain many others from them. For these things grow of themselves into thy heart, where is each 5 man’s true nature. But if thou strivest after things of another kind, as is the way with men, ten thousand woes await thee to blunt thy careful thoughts. Soon will these things desert thee when the time comes round; for they long to return once more to their own kind; for know that all things have 10 wisdom and a share of thought.

And thou shalt learn all the drugs that are a defence against ills and old age; since for thee alone will I accomplish all this. Thou shalt arrest the violence of the weariless winds that arise and sweep the earth; and again, when thou so desirest, thou shalt bring back their blasts with a rush. Thou 5 shalt cause for men a seasonable drought after the dark rains, and again thou shalt change the summer drought for streams that feed the trees as they pour down from the sky. Thou shalt bring back from Hades the life of a dead man.

Friends, that inhabit the great town looking down on the yellow rock of Akragas, up by the citadel, busy in goodly works, harbours of honour for the stranger, men unskilled in meanness, all hail. I go about among you an immortal god, no mortal now, honoured among all as is meet, crowned with fillets and 5 flowery garlands. Straightway, whenever I enter with these in my train, both men and women, into the flourishing towns, is reverence done me; they go after me in countless throngs, asking of me what is the way to gain; some desiring oracles, while some, who for many a weary day have been pierced 10 by the grievous pangs of all manner of sickness, beg to hear from me the word of healing. R. P. 162 f.

But why do I harp on these things, as if it were any great matter that I should surpass mortal, perishable men?

Friends, I know indeed that truth is in the words I shall utter, but it is hard for men, and jealous are they of the assault of belief on their souls.

There is an oracle of Necessity,[569] an ancient ordinance of the gods, eternal and sealed fast by broad oaths, that whenever one of the dæmons, whose portion is length of days, has sinfully polluted his hands with blood,[570] or followed strife and 5 forsworn himself, he must wander thrice ten thousand years from the abodes of the blessed, being born throughout the time in all manners of mortal forms, changing one toilsome 257path of life for another. For the mighty Air drives him into the Sea, and the Sea spews him forth on the dry Earth; Earth tosses him into the beams of the blazing Sun, and he 10 flings him back to the eddies of Air. One takes him from the other, and all reject him. One of these I now am, an exile and a wanderer from the gods, for that I put my trust in insensate strife. R. P. 181.

Charis loathes intolerable Necessity.

For I have been ere now a boy and a girl, a bush and a bird and a dumb fish in the sea. R. P. 182.

I wept and I wailed when I saw the unfamiliar land. R. P. 182.

From what honour, from what a height of bliss have I fallen to go about among mortals here on earth.

We have come under this roofed-in cave.[571]

... the joyless land, where are Death and Wrath and troops of Dooms besides; and parching Plagues and Rottennesses and Floods roam in darkness over the meadow of Ate.

There were[572] Chthonie and far-sighted Heliope, bloody Discord and gentle-visaged Harmony, Kallisto and Aischre, Speed and Tarrying, lovely Truth and dark-haired Uncertainty, 258Birth and Decay, Sleep and Waking, Movement and Immobility, crowned Majesty and Meanness, Silence and Voice. 5 R. P. 182 a.

Alas, O wretched race of mortals, twice unblessed: such are the strifes and groanings from which ye have been born!

From living creatures he made them dead, changing their forms.

(The goddess) clothing them with a strange garment of flesh.[573]

Among beasts they[574] become lions that make their lair on the hills and their couch on the ground; and laurels among trees with goodly foliage. R. P. 181 b.

Nor had they[575] any Ares for a god nor Kydoimos, no nor King Zeus nor Kronos nor Poseidon, but Kypris the Queen.... Her did they propitiate with holy gifts, with painted figures[576] and perfumes of cunning fragrancy, with offerings of pure myrrh and sweet-smelling frankincense, casting on the 5 ground libations of brown honey. And the altar did not reek with pure bull’s blood, but this was held in the greatest abomination among men, to eat the goodly limbs after tearing out the life. R. P. 184.

And there was among them a man of rare knowledge, most skilled in all manner of wise works, a man who had won the utmost wealth of wisdom; for whensoever he strained with all his mind, he easily saw everything of all the things that are, in ten, yea, twenty lifetimes of men.[577] 5

For all things were tame and gentle to man, both beasts and birds, and friendly feelings were kindled everywhere. R. P. 184 a.

If ever, as regards the things of a day, immortal Muse, thou didst deign to take thought for my endeavour, then stand by me once more as I pray to thee, O Kalliopeia, as I utter a pure discourse concerning the blessed gods. R. P. 179.

Blessed is the man who has gained the riches of divine wisdom; wretched he who has a dim opinion of the gods in his heart. R. P. 179.

It is not possible for us to set God before our eyes, or to lay hold of him with our hands, which is the broadest way of persuasion that leads into the heart of man.

For he is not furnished with a human head on his body, two branches do not sprout from his shoulders, he has no feet, no swift knees, nor hairy parts; but he is only a sacred and unutterable mind flashing through the whole world with rapid thoughts. R. P. 180.