The Pre-Socratic World-Picture

¹ This paper has been much improved as a result of discussions with Mr. G. S. Kirk, who must not, however, be thought to agree with every point made in it.

² By ‘mystical’ in this context I mean that type of religion which envisages the possibility of a union, however achieved, between human and divine.

³ Phys. iii. 4. 203 b 13.

⁴ Fr. 2 DK.

⁵ Fr. 2 DK.

⁶ Fr. 5.

⁷ DK ii p. 56 1. 3.

⁸ For Linforth's view of this passage (Arts of Orpheus, University of California Press 1941, p. 147), see Guthrie, , The Greeks and their Gods (Methuen 1950) p. 311 n. 3.

⁹ For the evidence on which this paragraph is based, see Guthrie, , Orpheus and Greek Religion (Methuen 1935) ch. v.

¹⁰ I.G. i. 442. If some think this is to read too much into the inscription, I can only state my own opinion, which is based on the general belief in the divinity of aither, on parallels like Eur. Hel. 1014 ff. (quoted below, p. 98), and on other considerations which find their place in my text. Their cumulative effect seems to me considerable.

¹¹ Aristotle remarked (Diels-Kranz A 4, vol. i, p. 144, and note on p. 150) that the word ἀεὶ in this sentence might qualify either the preceding ἐóντoς or the following ἀξúνετoι. I am inclined to think that H. intended the former, but in any case the permanence of the λóγoς is sufficiently evident apart from this particular phrase.

¹² Onians, R. B. (The Origins of European Thought, Cambridge 1951) has noted that in an age before writing has become familiar, speech and thought are naturally conceived materially, as composed of breath. He brings this idea into connection with Heraclitus's logos on p. 77, n. 9.

¹³ History of Sicily ii. 342.

¹⁴ This point is made by Dodds, E. R. in The Greeks and the Irrational (University of California Press 1951), pp. 152 f.

¹⁵ 29 e foll., 37 d.

¹⁶ Aristotle, Phys. iv. 6. 213 b 23.