Timaeus
diviner part of us—then, I say, the motions of the stronger,
getting the better and increasing their own power, but making the
soul dull, and stupid, and forgetful, engender ignorance, which
is the greatest of diseases. There is one protection against both
kinds of disproportion:—that we should not move the body without
the soul or the soul without the body, and thus they will be on
their guard against each other, and be healthy and well balanced.
And therefore the mathematician or any one else whose thoughts
are much absorbed in some intellectual pursuit, must allow his
body also to have due exercise, and practise gymnastic; and he
who is careful to fashion the body, should in turn impart to the
soul its proper motions, and should cultivate music and all
philosophy, if he would deserve to be called truly fair and truly
good. And the separate parts should be treated in the same
manner, in imitation of the pattern of the universe; for as the
body is heated and also cooled within by the elements which enter
into it, and is again dried up and moistened by external things,
and experiences these and the like affections from both kinds of
motions, the result is that the body if given up to motion when
in a state of quiescence is overmastered and perishes; but if any
one, in imitation of that which we call the foster-mother and
nurse of the universe, will not allow the body ever to be
inactive, but is always producing motions and agitations through
its whole extent, which form the natural defence against other
motions both internal and external, and by moderate exercise
reduces to order according to their affinities the particles and
affections which are wandering about the body, as we have already
said when speaking of the universe, he will not allow enemy
placed by the side of enemy to stir up wars and disorders in the
body, but he will place friend by the side of friend, so as to
create health. Now of all motions that is the best which is
produced in a thing by itself, for it is most akin to the motion
of thought and of the universe; but that motion which is caused
by others is not so good, and worst of all is that which moves
the body, when at rest, in parts only and by some external
agency. Wherefore of all modes of purifying and re-uniting the
body the best is gymnastic; the next best is a surging motion, as
in sailing or any other mode of conveyance which is not
fatiguing; the third sort of motion may be of use in a case of
extreme necessity, but in any other will be adopted by no man of
sense: I mean the purgative treatment of physicians; for diseases
unless they are very dangerous should not be irritated by
medicines, since every form of disease is in a manner akin to the
living being, whose complex frame has an appointed term of life.
For not the whole race only, but each individual—barring
inevitable accidents—comes into the world having a fixed span,
and the triangles in us are originally framed with power to last
for a certain time, beyond which no man can prolong his life. And
this holds also of the constitution of diseases; if any one
regardless of the appointed time tries to subdue them by
medicine, he only aggravates and multiplies them. Wherefore we
ought always to manage them by regimen, as far as a man can spare
the time, and not provoke a disagreeable enemy by medicines.
Enough of the composite animal, and of the body which is a part
of him, and of the manner in which a man may train and be trained
by himself so as to live most according to reason: and we must
above and before all provide that the element which is to train
him shall be the fairest and best adapted to that purpose. A
minute discussion of this subject would be a serious task; but
if, as before, I am to give only an outline, the subject may not
unfitly be summed up as follows.
I have often remarked that there are three kinds of soul located
within us, having each of them motions, and I must now repeat in
the fewest words possible, that one part, if remaining inactive
and ceasing from its natural motion, must necessarily become very
weak, but that which is trained and exercised, very strong.
Wherefore we should take care that the movements of the different
parts of the soul should be in due proportion.
And we should consider that God gave the sovereign part of the
human soul to be the divinity of each one, being that part which,
as we say, dwells at the top of the body, and inasmuch as we are
a plant not of an earthly but of a heavenly growth, raises us
from earth to our kindred who are in heaven. And in this we say
truly; for the divine power suspended the head and root of us
from that place where the generation of the soul first began, and
thus made the whole body upright. When a man is always occupied
with the cravings of desire and ambition, and is eagerly striving
to satisfy them, all his thoughts must be mortal, and, as far as
it is possible altogether to become such, he must be mortal every
whit, because he has cherished his mortal part. But he who has
been earnest in the love of knowledge and of true wisdom, and has
exercised his intellect more than any other part of him, must
have thoughts immortal and divine, if he attain truth, and in so
far as human nature is capable of sharing in immortality, he must
altogether be immortal; and since he is ever cherishing the
divine power, and has the divinity within him in perfect order,
he will be perfectly happy. Now there is only one way of taking
care of things, and this is to give to each the food and motion
which are natural to it. And the motions which are naturally akin
to the divine principle within us are the thoughts and
revolutions of the universe. These each man should follow, and
correct the courses of the head which were corrupted at our
birth, and by learning the harmonies and revolutions of the
universe, should assimilate the thinking being to the thought,
renewing his original nature, and having assimilated them should
attain to that perfect life which the gods have set before
mankind, both for the present and the future.
Thus our original design of discoursing about the universe down
to the creation of man is nearly completed. A brief mention may
be made of the generation of other animals, so far as the subject
admits of brevity; in this manner our argument will best attain a
due proportion. On the subject of animals, then, the following
remarks may be offered. Of the men who came into the world, those
who were cowards or led unrighteous lives may with reason be
supposed to have changed into the nature of women in the second
generation. And this was the reason why at that time the gods
created in us the desire of sexual intercourse, contriving in man
one animated substance, and in woman another, which they formed
respectively in the following manner. The outlet for drink by
which liquids pass through the lung under the kidneys and into
the bladder, which receives and then by the pressure of the air
emits them, was so fashioned by them as to penetrate also into
the body of the marrow, which passes from the head along the neck
and through the back, and which in the preceding discourse we
have named the seed. And the seed having life, and becoming
endowed with respiration, produces in that part in which it
respires a lively desire of emission, and thus creates in us the
love of procreation. Wherefore also in men the organ of
generation becoming rebellious and masterful, like an animal
disobedient to reason, and maddened with the sting of lust, seeks
to gain absolute sway; and the same is the case with the
so-called womb or matrix of women; the animal within them is
desirous of procreating children, and when remaining unfruitful
long beyond its proper time, gets discontented and angry, and
wandering in every direction through the body, closes up the
passages of the breath, and, by obstructing respiration, drives
them to extremity, causing all varieties of disease, until at
length the desire and love of the man and the woman, bringing
them together and as it were plucking the fruit from the tree,
sow in the womb, as in a field, animals unseen by reason of their
smallness and without form; these again are separated and matured
within; they are then finally brought out into the light, and
thus the generation of animals is completed.
Thus were created women and the female sex in general. But the
race of birds was created out of innocent light-minded men, who,
although their minds were directed toward heaven, imagined, in
their simplicity, that the clearest demonstration of the things
above was to be obtained by sight; these were remodelled and
transformed into birds, and they grew feathers instead of hair.
The race of wild pedestrian animals, again, came from those who
had no philosophy in any of their thoughts, and never considered
at all about the nature of the heavens, because they had ceased
to use the courses of the head, but followed the guidance of
those parts of the soul which are in the breast. In consequence
of these habits of theirs they had their front-legs and their
heads resting upon the earth to which they were drawn by natural
affinity; and the crowns of their heads were elongated and of all
sorts of shapes, into which the courses of the soul were crushed
by reason of disuse. And this was the reason why they were
created quadrupeds and polypods: God gave the more senseless of
them the more support that they might be more attracted to the
earth. And the most foolish of them, who trail their bodies
entirely upon the ground and have no longer any need of feet, he
made without feet to crawl upon the earth. The fourth class were
the inhabitants of the water: these were made out of the most
entirely senseless and ignorant of all, whom the transformers did
not think any longer worthy of pure respiration, because they
possessed a soul which was made impure by all sorts of
transgression; and instead of the subtle and pure medium of air,
they gave them the deep and muddy sea to be their element of
respiration; and hence arose the race of fishes and oysters, and
other aquatic animals, which have received the most remote
habitations as a punishment of their outlandish ignorance. These
are the laws by which animals pass into one another, now, as
ever, changing as they lose or gain wisdom and folly.
We may now say that our discourse about the nature of the
universe has an end. The world has received animals, mortal and
immortal, and is fulfilled with them, and has become a visible
animal containing the visible—the sensible God who is the image
of the intellectual, the greatest, best, fairest, most
perfect—the one only-begotten heaven.