Vitae philosophorum

Diogenes Laertius

Diogenes Laertius. Hicks, R. D., editor. Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1925.

when his former beauty was consumed by vermin, gave orders that he should be taken straight to the Magnesian land in order that he might give victory to the noble Ephesians. There was an oracle, which he alone knew, enjoining this; and there he died among them. It seems then it is a true tale; if anyone is truly wise, he brings blessings both in his lifetime and when he is no more.

He lived in the 59th Olympiad. He wrote the following letter:

Pherecydes to Thales[*](This forgery is easily analysed. There is the tradition of the malady which proved fatal to Pherecydes ( cf. Porphyry, Vit. Pyth. §55), with the anecdote of his protruding his finger through the door. There is also an allusion to the alleged obscurity of the work on the gods which passed current as written by him.)

May yours be a happy death when your time comes. Since I received your letter, I have been attacked by disease. I am infested with vermin and subject to a violent fever with shivering fits. I have therefore given instructions to my servants to carry my writing to you after they have buried me. I would like you to publish it, provided that you and

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the other sages approve of it, and not otherwise. For I myself am not yet satisfied with it. The facts are not absolutely correct, nor do I claim to have discovered the truth, but merely such things as one who inquires about the gods picks up. The rest must be thought out, for mine is all guess-work. As I was more and more weighed down with my malady, I did not permit any of the physicians or my friends to come into the room where I was, but, as they stood before the door and inquired how I was, I thrust my finger through the keyhole and showed them how plague-stricken I was; and I told them to come to-morrow to bury Pherecydes.

So much for those who are called the Sages, with whom some writers also class Pisistratus the tyrant. I must now proceed to the philosophers and start with the philosophy of Ionia. Its founder was Thales, and Anaximander was his pupil.