Exhortation to the Greeks 5.66

Of the other philosophers, those who went beyond the elements and busied themselves with something loftier and more remarkable, some sang the praises of the infinite, like Anaximander (he was of Miletus), Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, and Archelaus of Athens. These two set mind over the infinite; while Leucippus of Miletus and Metrodorus of Chios also left two first principles, it seems, the full and the void; and Democritus of Abdera took these two and added the images (eidōla). Alcmaeon of Croton thought the stars were gods, being ensouled. I will not keep silent about their shamelessness: Xenocrates (he was of Chalcedon) hints that the seven planets are gods, and that the eighth is the world made up of all the fixed stars. Nor will I pass over those of the Stoa, who say that the divine pervades all matter, even the most dishonorable, and who simply disgrace philosophy. Having come this far, I think it will not be hard to mention the Peripatetics too. The father of the school, not recognizing the Father of all things, thinks that the one called “the Highest” is the soul of the universe; that is, by taking the soul of the world to be God, he impales himself on his own argument. For he limits providence to the region of the moon, and then, thinking the world to be God, he contradicts himself, declaring that to be God which has no share in God. Theophrastus of Eresus, the pupil of Aristotle, supposes God to be sometimes heaven, sometimes spirit. Epicurus alone I will willingly forget, who thinks that God cares for nothing, impious through and through. And what of Heraclides of Ponticus? Is he not somewhere dragged down to the images of Democritus too?