Clement of Alexandria · a new plain-English translation from the original language
According to the Greeks, once Orpheus, Linus, and the oldest poets of their nation had passed, the men first honored for wisdom were a group of seven called the Sages: four hailed from Asia — Thales of Miletus, Bias of Priene, Pittacus of Mytilene, and Cleobulus of Lindos — and a pair came from Europe, namely Solon the Athenian together with Chilon of Lacedaemon; concerning the seventh figure, accounts differ: some name Periander of Corinth, others point to Anacharsis from Scythia, and still others to Epimenides of Crete (a man he recognizes as a prophet among the Greeks, one whom the apostle Paul cites in his letter to Titus, writing thus: "A prophet belonging to their own nation declared, 'Cretans are forever liars, vicious beasts, lazy gluttons'; and that statement holds true." Notice how readily he concedes a degree of truth even to Greek prophets, unashamed, when building up his hearers or exposing the faults of certain persons, to draw likewise on Greek verse; indeed, in his letter to the Corinthians — since this is not his only instance — while making his case for the resurrection of the dead, he borrows a line of tragic iambic verse: "What benefit is there for me," he asks, "should the dead never rise? Let us feast and drink, since tomorrow brings death. Be not misled: bad company ruins upright character.") Some also count Acusilaus of Argos among these seven sages, and others name Pherecydes of Syros instead. Plato, however, sets aside Periander — deeming him unfit for wisdom because he had ruled as a tyrant — and puts Myson of Chenae in his place.
That the wise men among the Greeks arose at some point well after the age of Moses will be shown a little further on; but the manner of philosophy among them, as being Hebraic and enigmatic, must already be examined. They embraced, at any rate, a terse manner of speech given to exhortation, the most beneficial kind. Plato himself, for instance, long ago says that this manner came about through deliberate effort, common to all the Greeks generally, but especially so among the Lacedaemonians and the Cretans, who had the best laws.
Now the saying "know thyself" some have supposed to belong to Chilon, but Chamaeleon in his work On the Gods attributes it to Thales, and Aristotle to the Pythia. It can, however, be taken as an exhortation to pursue self-knowledge. For it is not possible to know the parts without knowing the substance of the whole; one must therefore inquire diligently into the origin of the cosmos, through which it will also be possible to learn thoroughly the nature of man.
Once more, Chilon of Lacedaemon is credited with the maxim "nothing in excess"; yet Strato, in his treatise On Discoveries, gives that saying instead to Sodamus of Tegea, while Didymus attributes it to Solon, much as "measure is best" gets attributed to Cleobulus. Regarding "pledge yourself, and ruin follows," Cleomenes writes in his work On Hesiod that Homer had already voiced it in these words: "pitiful are the pledges that pitiful men offer as security"; Aristotle's circle, however, credits it to Chilon, whereas Didymus says the warning originates with Thales. Moving on, the maxim "most people are wicked" or "the majority are wicked" (since the same saying circulates in two versions) is claimed for Bias by the school of Sotades of Byzantium, who likewise want "habit overcomes everything" credited to Periander, and who similarly hold that the counsel "seize the fitting moment" belongs to Pittacus. Solon, for his part, gave the Athenians their laws, while Pittacus did the same for the people of Mytilene. Afterward came Pythagoras, a student of Pherecydes, the first man to call himself a philosopher.
After the men already mentioned, then, there arose three successions of philosophy named after the places in which their members spent their time: the Italian, from Pythagoras; the Ionian, from Thales; and the Eleatic, from Xenophanes. Pythagoras, then, was a Samian, son of Mnesarchus, as Hippobotus says; but as Aristoxenus says in his Life of Pythagoras, and also Aristarchus and Theopompus, he was Tyrrhenian. But according to Neanthes, he was Syrian or Tyrian, so that according to most accounts Pythagoras was a barbarian by race. But Thales too, as Leander and Herodotus record, was a Phoenician, though as some have supposed, a Milesian. He alone is thought to have conferred with the prophets of the Egyptians, and no teacher is recorded for him, just as none is recorded for Pherecydes the Syrian either, whose pupil Pythagoras became.
But the Italian school of philosophy that followed Pythagoras grew old at Metapontum in Italy.
Anaximander, son of Praxiades, a Milesian, succeeds Thales; and Anaximenes, son of Eurystratus, a Milesian, succeeds him; after whom comes Anaxagoras, son of Hegesibulus, of Clazomenae. This man transferred the school from Ionia to Athens. Archelaus succeeds him, whose pupil was Socrates. Now from these there turned aside "the stone-carver, the endless talker about law, the enchanter of the Greeks" — as Timon says in his Silloi — on account of his having turned away from natural philosophy toward ethics. Of those who heard Socrates, Antisthenes became a Cynic, while Plato withdrew to the Academy. Aristotle, having philosophized under Plato, moved on to the Lyceum and founded the Peripatetic school. Theophrastus succeeds him, whom Strato succeeds, whom Lycon succeeds, then Critolaus, then Diodorus. Speusippus succeeds Plato; him Xenocrates succeeds, whom Polemon succeeds. Of Polemon's hearers were Crates and Crantor, in whom the Old Academy deriving from Plato came to its end. Arcesilaus took part with Crantor, from whom, down to Hegesinus, the Middle Academy flourished.
Then Carneades succeeds Hegesinus, and those after him; and Zeno of Citium, who founded the Stoic school, becomes a pupil of Crates. Cleanthes succeeds him, whom Chrysippus succeeds, and those after him.
The Eleatic school was founded by Xenophanes of Colophon, who according to Timaeus lived during the era of Hieron, Sicily's ruler, and of the poet Epicharmus, whereas Apollodorus places his birth near the fortieth Olympiad and has him surviving into the age of Darius and Cyrus. Parmenides in turn studied under Xenophanes; Zeno studied under Parmenides; then came Leucippus; then Democritus. Among Democritus's students were Protagoras from Abdera along with Metrodorus from Chios; Metrodorus taught Diogenes of Smyrna, who taught Anaxarchus, who taught Pyrrho, who taught Nausiphanes. Some claim that Epicurus in turn studied under this last man.
Such, then, in summary, is the succession of the Greek philosophers; but the dates of those who first began philosophy among them must be stated next in order, so that by comparison we may demonstrate that the philosophy of the Hebrews is older by many generations.
Concerning Xenophanes, who began the Eleatic philosophy, it has already been said; and as for Thales, Eudemus in his Astrological Histories says that he foretold the eclipse of the sun that occurred in the years when the Medes and Lydians joined battle with each other, when Cyaxares, father of Astyages, was reigning over the Medes, and Alyattes, father of Croesus, over the Lydians. Herodotus agrees with him in his first book. The date falls around the fiftieth Olympiad. Pythagoras is found to have flourished in the time of Polycrates the tyrant, around the sixty-second Olympiad. Mnesiphilus is recorded as an admirer of Solon, with whom Themistocles spent time. Solon, then, flourished around the forty-sixth Olympiad. As for Heraclitus, son of Blyson, he persuaded the tyrant Melancomas to lay down his rule; and when King Darius urged him to come to Persia, he disregarded him.
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