Timaeus

Much have I written, both in my Academic treatises, against the natural philosophers, and often debated, in the manner and method of Carneades, with Publius Nigidius. For that man was furnished with all the other accomplishments that befit a free man, and was besides a keen and careful investigator of those matters which Nature seems to have wrapped in obscurity; and indeed I am of this opinion: that after those celebrated Pythagoreans, whose school had in a manner died out — though for several ages it had flourished in Italy and Sicily — it was he who arose to renew it.

Now when, as I was setting out for Cilicia, he had awaited me at Ephesus — being himself on his way back to Rome from a legation — and when Cratippus too had come to the same place from Mytilene to greet and visit me — Cratippus, in my judgment easily the foremost of all the Peripatetics whom I have ever heard — it was with the greatest pleasure that I both saw Nigidius and made the acquaintance of Cratippus. And the first part of the time, that of greeting, we spent in inquiry . . .

What is that which always is and has no coming-to-be, and what is that which is forever coming to be and never is? The one of these is grasped by intelligence and by reason, being ever one and the same; the other, which sense — devoid of reason — presents as opinion, being wholly a thing of opinion, comes into being and perishes, and can never truly be. But everything that comes into being must of necessity come into being from some cause; for once a thing's cause is set aside, no origin for it can be found.

And therefore, if he who sets about accomplishing some work shall fix his gaze upon that form which is ever the same, and set this before himself as his model, of necessity he will produce a work surpassingly fair; but if he looks to that which comes into being, he will never attain to the beauty he seeks. The whole heaven, then — or the universe, or whatever other name it delights to bear — let it for our part be called by this name—

— concerning which let us first consider that which, at the outset, must be considered in every inquiry: whether it has always been, generated by no coming-to-be, or whether it came into being from some beginning in time. It came into being, inasmuch as it is seen and touched and is on every side endowed with body. And all such things move the senses; and the things that move the senses are those that settle into the realm of opinion; and these, as we have said, have a coming-to-be and are generated; and nothing can be generated without causes.

And as for him who is, as it were, the parent of this universe, to find him is hard, and, when once you have found him, to declare him to the multitude is forbidden. Again, then, it must be considered whether that craftsman of so great a work imitated the model that is ever one and the same and like to itself, or that which we call generated and brought into being. And surely, if this universe is fair and its artificer good, then beyond doubt he chose to imitate the form of the eternal; but if otherwise — which it is not even lawful to utter — he followed a generated pattern in place of the eternal.

There is no doubt, then, that he chose to follow the eternal, since nothing is fairer than the universe nor more excellent than its builder. So, then, having been generated, it was fashioned after that which is grasped by reason and wisdom and is held fast in unchanging eternity. From which it follows of necessity that this universe which we behold is an everlasting image of something eternal. But in every investigation the beginning of the argument is the hardest part. Of the matters, then, that we have spoken of, let this stand as the first distinction.

Every discourse seems to have a kinship with the things it sets forth. And so, when a discourse treats of that which is stable and unchanging, let it be itself of such a kind — one that can neither be refuted nor confuted. But when it has entered upon images that are imitations and copies, it counts it well done if it attains the mere likeness of truth. For as eternity stands to that which has come into being, so does truth stand to belief. Wherefore, if perchance, in discoursing of the nature of the gods and the origin of the universe, we fall short of what our minds long for — that the whole discourse should hold together, lucid and plainly adorned, and agree with itself in every part — it will be no wonder at all; and you must be content if what is said is probable. For it is fair to remember both that I, who shall discourse, am but a man, and that you, who shall judge, are men also; so that, if probable things are said, you require nothing further.

Let us inquire, then, into the cause that moved him who contrived these things to seek a new origin and fashioning of the world. Clearly he was supreme in goodness; and the good man grudges nothing to anyone; and so he generated all things in his own likeness. This, beyond doubt, was the most just cause for the begetting of the universe. For when the god had resolved to fill the universe with all good things and to mingle in it nothing of evil, so far as nature would suffer, he took to himself whatever there was that fell under the perception of sight — not tranquil and at rest, but in unmeasured agitation and flux — and brought it out of disorder into order; for he judged this to be the more excellent.

And it neither is nor ever was lawful for him who was best to make anything but the fairest. When, therefore, he had taken thought, he found that, of those things that are perceived by nature, no unintelligent thing is, in its whole kind, more excellent than an intelligent one. Wherefore he enclosed intelligence within soul, and soul within body. Thus he reckoned that the work he was producing would be the fairest of all. For which cause we must not hesitate to declare — if indeed anything can be traced out by conjecture — that this universe is a living being, and that an intelligent one, established by divine providence.

This being laid down, what follows must be considered: which of living beings the god, in fashioning the universe, took as the likeness to follow. Of none, assuredly, of the living beings known to us; for they are all parted into certain kinds, or but begun, in no part complete; and nothing can be fair if it is like to the imperfect and the unfinished. Let us say, then, that the universe is like to that of which every living being is, as it were, a sort of particle, whether it be discerned in single instances or in the whole kind. For all the living beings that are discerned by the mind and apprehended by reason are embraced within the compass of reason and intelligence — even as men in this world, and the beasts, and all things that fall beneath the sight, are comprehended.

For since that is the fairest which can be conceived in the nature of things, and that which is in every part most complete, the god, when he wished to make the universe like to it, fashioned a single visible living being, within which all living beings should be contained. Was it rightly, then, that we said one universe, or would it be better and truer to say there were several, or numberless? One, beyond doubt, inasmuch as it was made after the model. For that which embraces all the living beings that are apprehended by reason cannot exist alongside another. For again there would needs be yet another living being to contain it, of which these would be parts, themselves the higher living beings, and this heaven would be the image of that last one, not of the nearest. And that none of these things might come to pass, and that this universe might be most like to the complete living being, by this very fact — that it was alone and one — the god therefore brought forth this universe single and only-begotten.

Now everything that has come into being must of necessity be corporeal, and visible, and likewise tangible. Nothing, moreover, void of fire can be looked upon and seen, nor anything be touched that lacks solidity, and nothing is solid that is without a share of earth; for which reason the god, in setting about to make the universe, first joined earth and fire. But every two things require some third for their cohering, and call, as it were, for a knot and a bond. And of bonds that is the fittest and fairest which, out of itself and out of the things it binds, makes them as far as possible one. This is best accomplished by what in Greek is called analogia, and in Latin (for one must venture, since these terms are now for the first time coined by us) may be called comparison or proportion.

For when, of three things — whether numbers, or figures, or any kinds whatsoever — it comes about that the middle is so related to the first in proportion as the last is to it, and conversely, that as the last stands to the middle, so the middle stands to the first, then that which is the middle becomes at once first and last, while the last and the first become middle; and so necessity compels that the things which had been distinct should be the same; and once they have been made the same, the result is that all are one. But if the body of the universe had been spread out flat and even, and there had been nothing in it requiring depth, a single middle term set between would have bound together both itself and the things between which it was placed.

But since solidity was sought for the universe, and solid things are never joined by one middle term but always by two, it so came about that the god placed water and air between fire and earth, and set them in due relation to one another and joined them by proportion, so that, as fire stands to air, so air should render itself to water, and as air stands to water, so water should render itself to earth. And by this conjoining the heaven was so fitted together that it falls beneath sight and touch. And so, for this cause and out of these things, four in number, the body of the universe was made, bound fast by that proportion of which I have spoken; whence it embraces itself in a certain concord of friendship and affection, and so aptly coheres that it can in no wise be dissolved save by that same one by whom it was bound together.

And of those four things which I named above, all the parts were so disposed throughout the whole universe that no part of any one kind was left outside, and that within this universe were contained those kinds entire — and this for these reasons: first, that the living universe might be complete out of complete parts; next, that it might be one, no part being left over from which another could be generated; and finally, that no disease and no old age might be able to touch it.

For every fitting-together of body is shaken and broken by the force of heat or of cold, or by some violent shock, and is driven on toward diseases and old age. This reasoning, then, the maker and fashioner of the universe, the god, held: that he should bring to completion one work, whole and perfect, out of things all whole and perfect, which should be free of all disease and decay. And he gave it a shape most kindred to it and seemly. For from the living being by which he wished all the rest of the living beings to be contained, he gave it that shape within which all the other shapes are enclosed, and fashioned it spherical — what the Greeks call sphaeroides — every extremity of which is touched by equal radii from the center; and he so turned it on the lathe that he could make nothing rounder, that it should have no roughness, no rub, nothing cut into angles, nothing winding, nothing jutting out, nothing hollowed in, but all its parts most like to all the others — for in his judgment likeness was preferable to unlikeness.

And he encompassed the whole shape of the universe with utter smoothness on every side. For it had no need of eyes, since nothing was left outside that could be seen, nor of ears, since there was not even anything to be heard; nor was air poured about the outermost reaches of the universe, that it should require breath; nor did it want either nourishment for the body or the casting-off of food once digested and spent — for no diminution could occur, nor any increase, nor indeed was there any source from which. And so it fed itself by its own wasting and decay, since it underwent and did all things by itself and from itself. For thus he reckoned, who joined and founded these things, that the universe was sufficient unto itself and had no need of another.

And so he fixed upon it no hands, since there was nothing for it either to grasp or to ward off, nor feet, nor other limbs by which to support the going of a body. For he gave to the heaven that motion which was fittest for its shape, the one of the seven motions which most stirs mind and intelligence. And so by one and the same revolution it is turned and rolled about itself. But the six remaining motions he separated from it, and thus freed it from all wandering. To this revolution, then, which had no need of feet or of step, he gave no limbs for walking.

These things the god who was, taking thought of a god that should one day be, made it smooth, and everywhere even, and equal from the center to the surface, and complete, and finished out of things finished and complete. And the soul he both set in the midst of it and stretched throughout the whole; then he encompassed it round with body and clothed it from without, and embraced it with a heaven solitary in its wandering and rolling and driven in a circle — a heaven that, by reason of its excellence, could readily be at ease with itself and want no other, being to itself sufficiently known and familiar.

Thus that eternal god brought forth this perfectly blessed god. But the soul he did not begin — as we have just now spoken — only then, when he had made its body; for it would not be right that the elder should obey the younger; yet we say many things heedlessly and at random. The god, however, begot the soul as the elder both in origin and in worth, and set it over the body, obedient to it, as its lord and ruler; and this he wrought after some such fashion as this. Out of that substance which is indivisible and ever of one mode and like to itself, and out of that which is generated as divisible in bodies, he mingled in the midst a third kind of substance from the two — one partaking of the same nature and one of the other — and set it between the indivisible and that which was divisible in body.

When he had taken these three, he tempered them into a single form, and that nature which we called the other — shrinking from union and alien to such joining — he forced into conjunction with the same; and mingling these with the substance, when out of the three he had made one, he divided this same whole into the parts that were fitting. Now each single part he tempered out of the same, and the other, and the substance. And the division was of this kind: first he drew off one part from the whole; then a second, double the first part; then a third, which was half again as much as the second, and triple the first; then a fourth, which was double the second; then a fifth, triple the third; then a sixth, eightfold the first; and last a seventh, which exceeded the first by twenty-seven parts.

Next he set about filling up the double and triple intervals, cutting off parts again from the whole; and these he placed within the intervals in such a way that in each there were two means (for I scarcely dare to say medieties, what the Greeks call mesotetes; but let it be understood as though I had so spoken, for it will be plainer): of these means, the one exceeding the extremes by the same fraction of itself and exceeded by them likewise, the other exceeding the extremes by an equal number and exceeded by an equal number. And with intervals of one and a half, and of one and a third, and of one and an eighth arising from these bindings, he filled up all the intervals of one and a third with the interval of one and an eighth in the original intervals, leaving over a small portion of each.

And when the interval of that small portion was left, number had to number, at the extremes, the same proportion and ratio as two hundred and fifty-six has to two hundred and forty-three; and so he had now used up the whole of that mixture out of which he cut these. This whole conjoining, then, he split lengthwise into two, and fitting middle to middle he crossed them like an X; then he bent them into a circle, so that both each should be joined to itself and the two to each other at the junction set over against the point of meeting; and with that motion whose circuit was ever in the same place and stirred in the same manner, he embraced them round about on every side.

And thus, having embraced the one as the outer circle and the other as the inner, he marked the former as of the same nature and the latter as of the other; and that which was of the same he turned aside from the flank toward the right, and this nearer one he directed from the middle line toward the left; but he gave the supremacy to the upper, which alone he left undivided. The inner, when he had divided it into six parts, he bade move as seven unequal circles, with intervals double and triple, in courses opposed to one another. And of these he made three of equal speeds, but the other four both unlike one another and unlike the three remaining.

When, then, that god who brought forth the universe had begotten the soul out of his own mind and will, only then did he lay beneath the soul all that was concrete and corporeal, and set it within, and so, fitting middle to middle, joined them together. Thus the soul, set out from the center, cast itself in a rounded circuit about the outermost reach of heaven from the topmost region, and, turning about itself, ushered in the divine beginning of an everlasting and wise life.

And the body of the heaven was made visible, but the soul escapes the gaze of the eyes. It alone, of all things, partakes and has its share of reason and of that concord which in Greek is called harmonia, and of things everlasting and falling under intelligence; than which nothing better has been brought forth by that best and most excellent begetter. For, joined of the same and the other nature, with substance added, compacted by a tempering of the three parts in proportion, turning about itself, whether it has laid hold of changeable substance or again of the indivisible and simple, it is moved wholly through itself and discerns what is of the same kind and what of the other, and judges all the rest — what is most fitting for each thing, what befalls it in each place or manner or time, and what distinction there is between the things that come to be and the things that are forever the same.

But true reason, which is concerned with the things that are forever the same and with the things that change — when it is moved within the same and within the other, of itself, without voice and without any sound, when it touches that part by which sense can be stirred, and the circle of that other kind, undisturbed and direct, declares all things to the soul and to the mind, then opinions and assents firm and true are begotten; but when it is turned among those things which, abiding ever the same, are held not by sense but by intelligence . . . By reason, then, and by the divine mind, the course of the sun and moon was devised for the origin of time . . .

. . . nature should so turn it, that the moon's course should circle the earth most nearly, and next above the earth should be the orbit of the sun. Then the Morning Star and the holy star of Mercury have a course equal to the sun in speed, but a certain opposing force; and by that running-together which the Morning Star, Mercury, and the sun have among themselves, they in turn overtake one another and are overtaken.

What the cause was for the placing of the remaining stars, and what their disposition is, must be put off to another discourse, lest more be said on what had merely to be touched upon than on that for whose sake we touch upon it. When, then, each of those stars had attained the course seemly for itself — those by which the measure of time was to be marked out — and when, their bodies bound by living bonds, living beings had arisen and had learned to obey command, then, running aslant from the motion of the other nature into the motion of the same, and clinging within it and hampered there — since some traversed a greater orbit, some a lesser, those more slowly that traversed the greater, those more swiftly that traversed the lesser — by the motion of one and the same nature those that moved most swiftly seemed to be overtaken in speed by the slower, and, when they were overtaking, to be overtaken.

For every one of their circuits turned with what was, as it were, the bending of a spiral, because, advancing at once in two ways in opposite directions, they brought it about that what was slowest came to lie nearest the swiftest. And that there might be some plain measure to make clear, in the eight courses, the swiftnesses and the slownesses, the god himself kindled the sun, as it were a light, at the second orbit above the earth, that the heaven might shine most fully upon all things, and that the living beings to which it was given to learn might, from the motion of the same and of that which was like it, come to know the nature and power of numbers.

Night, then, and day, brought into being after this manner and for these causes, make up one circuit of the wisest and best of orbits; a month is reckoned when the moon, having traversed her own course, has overtaken the sun; and a year, when the sun has accomplished and journeyed through his whole orbit.

But of the circuits of the other stars men, being ignorant — save for a very few — neither call them by name nor measure them off against one another by number. And so they do not know that these wanderings of the stars are that very thing which is rightly called time, endowed as they are with infinite multitude and marvelous variety. And yet this much can be discerned and understood: that the complete and perfect number of time, and the complete and perfect year, are brought to fullness only when the eight circuits, having finished their courses, have returned to the same point of beginning, and when the same and ever self-like orbit has measured them out.

For these causes, then, the stars came into being, which, making their way through the heaven, should turn themselves back at the solstice and the winter's turning, that this whole living being which we see might be most like, in imitation of eternity, to that living being which we apprehend by thought. And all else, indeed, down to the birth of time, he had shaped, stamping it from those things which it imitated; but because he had not yet enclosed within the universe every living being, in that respect the likeness of the image fell short of the model set before it. As many, then, and of such kinds, as were the forms of living beings that the mind, gazing upon the very form of things, could discern, so many and of such kinds he resolved within himself to fashion in this universe.

Now the kinds of living beings were four: one divine and heavenly, another winged and of the air, a third of the water, and the fourth of the earth. The form of the divine kind he fashioned chiefly out of fire, that it might be most resplendent and fairest to behold. And since he wished to make it like to the nature of the universe, he rounded it for revolving, and made it the companion of the best wisdom of the best mind, and distributed it evenly about the whole heaven, that this — marked out in its variety — the Greeks should rightly call kosmos, and we the shining universe.

To the divine kinds he gave two sorts of motion: one, which should be ever within the same, and concerning the same, and after one manner; the other, which should be driven toward the forward part by the revolution of the same and the like. But of the five remaining motions he willed it to be bereft and without share, unmoved and standing still. Of this kind are those stars which, fixed in the heaven, do not move from their place — which are living beings, and divine, and for that cause cling to their seats and abide forever. But those that glide in wandering and shifting courses came into being as we have said above.

And the earth, our nurse, which is sustained upon the axis driven through it, the maker of day and night and their guardian, he willed to be the most ancient of all the gods that should be brought into being within the heaven. But the dancings of the gods and their meetings among themselves, and what turnings and what overtakings come about in their circuits, and how, when they nearly touch one another, of those that draw close together in the opposite region, behind which or before which they glide, and at what times they hide themselves from our sight and, emerging again, strike terror into those who lack reason — if we should try to set these forth in words with no image of the things placed before the eyes, the labor would be undertaken in vain. But let these things be said by us as enough; and let what we have set forth concerning the nature of the gods who are seen and who have come into being have here its bound.

But of the rest, whom the Greeks call daimonas, and ours, I suppose, the Lares — if indeed this can seem rightly rendered — both to know and to declare their origin is a greater matter than that I should venture to profess to write of it. We must, beyond doubt, believe the ancient and primeval men, as they say, who declared themselves to be the offspring of the gods, and who therefore handed down to us the names of those gods. And they could best know their own begetters; and it is a hard thing to withhold belief from those sprung from the gods, even though their account is confirmed by no sure proofs or reasonings; but since they seem to speak of matters their own, the ancient law and custom must be obeyed.

So, then, as it has been handed down by them, let the origin of these gods be held and told: that we record Oceanus and Salacia as generated and brought forth from the sowing of Heaven and the conceiving of Earth; and from these Saturn and Ops; thereafter Jupiter and Juno, and the rest, whom we see used and called brothers among themselves and kindred; and their lineage — to use an old word — their progeny.

When, therefore, all had been created — both those that move and show themselves openly, and those that are revealed to us only so far as they themselves will — then to them the god who begot all things speaks: “Give heed, you who are sprung from the sowing of the gods: of those works whereof I am parent and maker, these are indissoluble against my will; though everything that is bound together can be dissolved, yet it is in no way the part of one who is good to wish to dissolve what has been bound by reason. But since you have come into being, you cannot indeed be immortal and indissoluble; yet you shall in no wise be dissolved, nor shall any fates of death destroy you, nor any treachery more powerful than my counsel, which is a greater bond to your perpetuity than those by which you were bound together when you were being begotten.

Learn, then, what I purpose: three kinds remain for us, and these mortal; and if they be passed over, the completion of the heaven will not be perfect. For it will not hold all the kinds of living beings in its compass; yet hold them it must, that nothing be wanting from the whole. Should these be made by my own self, they could match the life of the gods. That they may therefore be brought into being under a mortal condition, do you take this task upon yourselves: beget them, and imitate that power of mine which you remember I used in your own origin. And among them, those that shall be created such as to be worthy to be, as it were, kinsmen of the immortal gods, let them be called of divine race and hold the chief place over all living beings, and obey you willingly by right and law; the beginning and seed of whom shall be handed to you by me, while you for your part shall weave on a mortal part to that which shall be immortal. So shall living beings arise, whom you shall both nourish while they live and receive again into your bosom when they are spent.”

These words he spoke. Then he returned to the earlier tempering, in which, tempering the whole soul of the universal nature, he mingled it, and, pouring out the remnants of the earlier mixture, he made them even in much the same manner — save that they were not so uncorrupted as the first, but he took from them a second grade, and even a third.

The whole, then, being wholly established, he distributed a number of souls equal to the stars, and joined each to each, and so set them, as it were, upon the chariot of the universe, and showed them the laws of fate and of necessity, and made plain that the first birth would be one and the same for all, and that one ordered and steadfast and diminished by none; and that, the souls being thus sown abroad, there would arise at fixed intervals of time the living being most fit for the worship of the gods.

But since the nature of the human race was twofold, the matter so stood that the more excellent kind was that of those who should be men. And when he had implanted souls in bodies by necessity, and there was to bodies now an accession, now a departure, first of necessity there arose sense — one and common to all, awakened by a more violent motion and bound up with nature; then love, mingled of pleasure and of pain; after these anger and fear and the other movements of the soul, companions of the former and even contrary to them and at variance with them; and he who shall govern these by reason will have lived justly, but he who shall surrender himself to them, unjustly.

And he who shall have completed rightly and honourably the course of life given by nature will return to that star with which he was fitted; but he who shall have lived without measure and without restraint, him a second birth will pass over into the shape of a woman; and if not even then he makes an end of his vices, he shall be tossed about yet more grievously, and be passed over, after the manner of his own ways, into the shapes of beasts and wild things most like to them; nor shall he behold an end of his evils before he has begun to follow that revolution of the same and the like which he had inborn and implanted within himself. And that will come to pass when, by reason, he has driven out those turbulent and reasonless things which from fire, air, water, and earth had settled within him, and has come through to the first and best condition of the soul.

And when he had so ordained these things, and had set himself beyond all blame and cause, should any treachery or vice arise thereafter, scattering some upon the earth, some upon the moon, some upon the remaining parts of the universe — which are appointed as signs and marks of the spaces of time — he sowed them, as it were, abroad. And after that sowing he committed it to the younger gods, so to call them, to fashion mortal bodies, and to polish and bring to completion whatever remained of the human soul that ought to be added thereto, and all that should follow upon it; then to offer themselves as chiefs and leaders to this living being, and to rule and govern its life as fairly as might be, in so far as it should not, though itself well made, by its own fault seek out some misery for itself.

And he who composed all things abode steadfastly in his own state; but those who had been created by him, when they had learned the ordinance of their parent, followed it. And so, when they had received the immortal principle of a mortal living being, imitating their begetter and maker, they borrowed from the universe particles of fire and earth and water and air, which they should one day give back again, and joined these together among themselves — not by the same bonds with which they themselves were bound, but by such as could not be seen for their smallness — and with frequent little wedges, as it were, melted in, they made out of all one body, and within it, as the tides of the divine soul flowed in and out, they bound those tides fast.

And so those tides, plunged into the stream, neither held nor were held, but with great force now bore along, now were borne along. Thus the whole living being was indeed moved, but without measure and at random, so that it was carried in the six motions. For both forward and backward, and to the left and to the right, and upward and downward, now this way, now that . . .

But if it has settled upon a polished surface, then either the same image, or sometimes an altered one, is given back, when the fire of the eyes has blended and joined itself with that fire which is spread before the face. And the things that are on the left are seen as on the right, because the contrary parts of the eyes touch the contrary parts of the object. But right answers to right and left to left by the turning of the rays, when these do not cling together among themselves. This comes about when the smoothness of mirrors has taken on height from this side and from that, and so has thrust the right toward the left part of the eyes and the left toward the right. Faces too are seen inverted by the casting-back of the rays, which, turning them about, gives back as lower what are the upper parts.

And all these belong to that class of things which are auxiliary to causes; and these the god uses as his ministers, when, so far as may be, he brings to pass the form of the best. But most men suppose that these are not aids of causes, but are themselves the causes of all things — these things that have the power of cooling and of heating, of congealing and of dissolving, but are devoid of all intelligence and reason, which save in soul are found nowhere else in nature. But soul escapes all perception of the eyes; whereas fire, air, water, and earth are bodies, and these are seen.

But he who professes himself a lover of intelligence and wisdom must needs seek out, first, the causes that belong to an intelligent and wise nature, and then the secondary causes of those things which of necessity move others, while they are themselves moved by others. Wherefore I judge that we must do thus: that we should indeed speak of both kinds of causes, but treat separately of those which, joined with intelligence, are productive of things fairest and best, and of those which, void of prudence, produce things inconstant and disordered.

And as for the causes of the eyes — that they should have that power which they now possess — I think enough has been said in the main. But let their greatest usefulness, bestowed upon the race of men by the gift of the gods, be set forth next. For the eyes brought to us the knowledge of things most excellent. For this discourse which has been held by us concerning the universe would never have been discovered, had neither the stars nor the sun nor the heaven been able to fall beneath the sight of the eyes. But now, day and night being known by the eyes, and the revolutions of months and years, they have contrived number and measured the span of time and driven us on to the inquiry into the whole of nature; from which things we have won philosophy, than which no good more to be desired, none more excellent, has ever been given, or ever shall be, to the race of mortals by the grant and gift of the gods . . .