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Plato Bilingual Anthology : MOTIONS OF THE UNIVERSE

from Politicus, * 268.d-274.e, translated by B. Jowett

Greek Fonts / Plato Complete works / Plato Concept


ELPENOR EDITIONS IN PRINT
Page 5

STR. Let us now reflect and try to gather from what has been said the nature of the phenomenon which we affirmed to be the cause of all these wonders. It is this. YSOC. What? STR. The reversal which takes place from time to time of the motion of the universe. YSOC. How is that the cause? STR. Of all changes of the heavenly motions, we may consider this to be the greatest and most complete. YSOC. I should imagine so. STR. And it may be supposed to result in the greatest changes to the human beings who are the inhabitants of the world at the time. YSOC. Such changes would naturally occur. STR. And animals, as we know, survive with difficulty great and serious changes of many different kinds when they come upon them at once. YSOC. Very true. STR. Hence there necessarily occurs a great destruction of them, which extends also to-the life of man; few survivors of the race are left, and those who remain become the subjects of several novel and remarkable phenomena, and of one in particular, which takes place at the time when the transition is made to the cycle opposite to that in which we are now living. ΞΕ. Λογισάμενοι δὴ συννοήσωμεν τὸ πάθος ἐκ τῶν νῦν λεχθέντων͵ ὃ πάντων ἔφαμεν εἶναι τῶν θαυμαστῶν αἴτιον. ἔστι γὰρ οὖν δὴ τοῦτ΄ αὐτό. ΝΕ. ΣΩ. Τὸ ποῖον; ΞΕ. Τὸ τὴν τοῦ παντὸς φορὰν τοτὲ μὲν ἐφ΄ ἃ νῦν κυκλεῖται φέρεσθαι͵ τοτὲ δ΄ ἐπὶ τἀναντία. ΝΕ. ΣΩ. Πῶς δή; ΞΕ. Ταύτην τὴν μεταβολὴν ἡγεῖσθαι δεῖ τῶν περὶ τὸν οὐρανὸν γιγνομένων τροπῶν πασῶν εἶναι μεγίστην καὶ τελεωτάτην τροπήν. ΝΕ. ΣΩ. Ἔοικε γοῦν. ΞΕ. Μεγίστας τοίνυν καὶ μεταβολὰς χρὴ νομίζειν γίγνεσθαι τότε τοῖς ἐντὸς ἡμῖν οἰκοῦσιν αὐτοῦ. ΝΕ. ΣΩ. Καὶ τοῦτο εἰκός. ΞΕ. Μεταβολὰς δὲ μεγάλας καὶ πολλὰς καὶ παντοίας συμφερομένας ἆρ΄ οὐκ ἴσμεν τὴν τῶν ζῴων φύσιν ὅτι χαλεπῶς ἀνέχεται; ΝΕ. ΣΩ. Πῶς δ΄ οὔ; ΞΕ. Φθοραὶ τοίνυν ἐξ ἀνάγκης τότε μέγισται συμβαίνουσι τῶν τε ἄλλων ζῴων͵ καὶ δὴ καὶ τὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπων γένος ὀλίγον τι περιλείπεται· περὶ δὲ τούτους ἄλλα τε παθήματα πολλὰ καὶ θαυμαστὰ καὶ καινὰ συμπίπτει͵ μέγιστον δὲ τόδε καὶ συνεπόμενον τῇ τοῦ παντὸς ἀνειλίξει τότε͵ ὅταν ἡ τῆς νῦν καθεστηκυίας ἐναντία γίγνηται τροπή.
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