{"schema_version":1,"access":"public","rights":"Public-domain or compatibly licensed source editions; provenance is retained per record.","work":{"slug":"heraclitus-fragments","title":"Fragments","author":"Heraclitus","tradition":"greek","language":"grc","genre":"philosophy","period":"c. 500 BCE","source_url":"https://archive.org/details/diefragmentederv01diel_0","original":{"text":"### Fragments 1–10\n\n[1] τοῦ δὲ λόγου τοῦδ’ ἐόντος ἀεὶ ἀξύνετοι γίνονται ἄνθρωποι καὶ πρόσθεν ἢ ἀκοῦσαι καὶ ἀκούσαντες τὸ πρῶτον· γινομένων γὰρ πάντων κατὰ τὸν λόγον τόνδε ἀπείροισιν ἐοίκασι, πειρώμενοι καὶ ἐπέων καὶ ἔργων τοιούτων, ὁκοίων ἐγὼ διηγεῦμαι διαιρέων ἕκαστον κατὰ φύσιν καὶ φράζων ὅκως ἔχει. τοὺς δὲ ἄλλους ἀνθρώπους λανθάνει ὁκόσα ἐγερθέντες ποιοῦσιν, ὅκωσπερ ὁκόσα εὕδοντες ἐπιλανθάνονται.\n\n[2] διὸ δεῖ ἕπεσθαι τῶι ⟨ξυνῶι, τουτέστι τῶι⟩ κοινῶι· ξυνὸς γὰρ ὁ κοινός. τοῦ λόγου δ’ ἐόντος ξυνοῦ ζώουσιν οἱ πολλοὶ ὡς ἰδίαν ἔχοντες φρόνησιν.\n\n[3] (περὶ μεγέθους ἡλίου) εὖρος ποδὸς ἀνθρωπείου.\n\n[4] (H. dixit quod) si felicitas esset in delectationibus corporis, boves felices diceremus, cum inveniant orobum ad comedendum.\n\n[5] καθαίρονται δ’ ἄλλως αἵματι μιαινόμενοι οἷον εἴ τις εἰς πηλὸν ἐμβὰς πηλῶι ἀπονίζοιτο. μαίνεσθαι δ’ ἂν δοκοίη, εἴ τις αὐτὸν ἀνθρώπων ἐπιφράσαιτο οὕτω ποιέοντα. καὶ τοῖς ἀγάλμασι δὲ τουτέοισιν εὔχονται, ὁκοῖον εἴ τις δόμοισι λεσχηνεύοιτο, οὔ τι γινώσκων θεοὺς οὐδ’ ἥρωας οἵτινές εἰσι.\n\n[6] (ὁ ἥλιος οὐ μόνον, καθάπερ ὁ Ἡ. φησι,) νέος ἐφ’ ἡμέρηι (ἐστίν, ἀλλ’ ἀεὶ νέος συνεχῶς).\n\n[7] εἰ πάντα τὰ ὄντα καπνὸς γένοιτο, ῥῖνες ἂν διαγνοῖεν.\n\n[8] τὸ ἀντίξουν συμφέρον καὶ ἐκ τῶν διαφερόντων καλλίστην ἁρμονίαν καὶ πάντα κατ’ ἔριν γίνεσθαι.\n\n[9] ὄνους σύρματ’ ἂν ἑλέσθαι μᾶλλον ἢ χρυσόν.\n\n[10] συνάψιες ὅλα καὶ οὐχ ὅλα, συμφερόμενον διαφερόμενον, συνᾶιδον διᾶιδον, καὶ ἐκ πάντων ἓν καὶ ἐξ ἑνὸς πάντα.\n\n### Fragments 11–20\n\n[11] πᾶν γὰρ ἑρπετὸν πληγῆι νέμεται.\n\n[12] ποταμοῖσι τοῖσιν αὐτοῖσιν ἐμβαίνουσιν ἕτερα καὶ ἕτερα ὕδατα ἐπιρρεῖ· καὶ ψυχαὶ δὲ ἀπὸ τῶν ὑγρῶν ἀναθυμιῶνται.\n\n[13] (δεῖ γὰρ τὸν χαρίεντα μήτε ῥυπᾶν μήτε αὐχμεῖν μήτε) βορβόρωι χαίρειν.\n\n[14] νυκτιπόλοις, μάγοις, βάκχοις, λήναις, μύσταις· (τούτοις ἀπειλεῖ τὰ μετὰ θάνατον, τούτοις μαντεύεται τὸ πῦρ·) τὰ γὰρ νομιζόμενα κατ’ ἀνθρώπους μυστήρια ἀνιερωστὶ μυεῦνται.\n\n[15] εἰ μὴ γὰρ Διονύσωι πομπὴν ἐποιεῦντο καὶ ὕμνεον ᾆσμα αἰδοίοισιν, ἀναιδέστατα εἴργαστ’ ἄν· ὡυτὸς δὲ Ἀίδης καὶ Διόνυσος, ὅτεωι μαίνονται καὶ ληναΐζουσιν.\n\n[16] τὸ μὴ δῦνόν ποτε πῶς ἄν τις λάθοι;\n\n[17] οὐ γὰρ φρονέουσι τοιαῦτα πολλοί, ὁκόσοι ἐγκυρεῦσιν, οὐδὲ μαθόντες γινώσκουσιν, ἑωυτοῖσι δὲ δοκέουσι.\n\n[18] ἐὰν μὴ ἔλπηται, ἀνέλπιστον οὐκ ἐξευρήσει, ἀνεξερεύνητον ἐὸν καὶ ἄπορον.\n\n[19] ἀκοῦσαι οὐκ ἐπιστάμενοι οὐδ’ εἰπεῖν.\n\n[20] γενόμενοι ζώειν ἐθέλουσι μόρους τ’ ἔχειν, μᾶλλον δὲ ἀναπαύεσθαι, καὶ παῖδας καταλείπουσι μόρους γενέσθαι.\n\n### Fragments 21–30\n\n[21] θάνατός ἐστιν ὁκόσα ἐγερθέντες ὁρέομεν, ὁκόσα δὲ εὕδοντες ὕπνος.\n\n[22] χρυσὸν γὰρ οἱ διζήμενοι γῆν πολλὴν ὀρύσσουσι καὶ εὑρίσκουσιν ὀλίγον.\n\n[23] Δίκης ὄνομα οὐκ ἂν ἤιδεσαν, εἰ ταῦτα μὴ ἦν.\n\n[24] ἀρηιφάτους θεοὶ τιμῶσι καὶ ἄνθρωποι.\n\n[25] μόροι γὰρ μέζονες μέζονας μοίρας λαγχάνουσι.\n\n[26] ἄνθρωπος ἐν εὐφρόνηι φάος ἅπτεται ἑαυτῶι ἀποθανών, [ἀποσβεσθεὶς ὄψεις], ζῶν δέ· ἅπτεται τεθνεῶτος εὕδων, ἀποσβεσθεὶς ὄψεις, ἐγρηγορὼς ἅπτεται εὕδοντος.\n\n[27] ἀνθρώπους μένει ἀποθανόντας ἅσσα οὐκ ἔλπονται οὐδὲ δοκέουσιν.\n\n[28] δοκέοντα γὰρ ὁ δοκιμώτατος γινώσκει, φυλάσσει· καὶ μέντοι καὶ Δίκη καταλήψεται ψευδῶν τέκτονας καὶ μάρτυρας.\n\n[29] αἱρεῦνται γὰρ ἓν ἀντὶ ἁπάντων οἱ ἄριστοι, κλέος ἀέναον θνητῶν, οἱ δὲ πολλοὶ κεκόρηνται ὅκωσπερ κτήνεα.\n\n[30] κόσμον τόνδε, τὸν αὐτὸν ἁπάντων, οὔτε τις θεῶν οὔτε ἀνθρώπων ἐποίησεν, ἀλλ’ ἦν ἀεὶ καὶ ἔστιν καὶ ἔσται πῦρ ἀείζωον, ἁπτόμενον μέτρα καὶ ἀποσβεννύμενον μέτρα.\n\n### Fragments 31–40\n\n[31] πυρὸς τροπαὶ πρῶτον θάλασσα, θαλάσσης δὲ τὸ μὲν ἥμισυ γῆ, τὸ δὲ ἥμισυ πρηστήρ. (δυνάμει γὰρ λέγει ὅτι τὸ πῦρ ὑπὸ τοῦ διοικοῦντος λόγου καὶ θεοῦ τὰ σύμπαντα δι’ ἀέρος τρέπεται εἰς ὑγρὸν τὸ ὡς σπέρμα τῆς διακοσμήσεως, ὃ καλεῖ) θάλασσαν, (ἐκ δὲ τούτου αὖθις γίνεται γῆ καὶ οὐρανὸς καὶ τὰ ἐμπεριεχόμενα. ὅπως δὲ πάλιν ἀναλαμβάνεται καὶ ἐκπυροῦται, σαφῶς διὰ τούτων δηλοῖ·) θάλασσα διαχέεται καὶ μετρέεται εἰς τὸν αὐτὸν λόγον, ὁκοῖος πρόσθεν ἦν ἢ γενέσθαι γῆ.\n\n[32] ἓν τὸ σοφὸν μοῦνον λέγεσθαι οὐκ ἐθέλει καὶ ἐθέλει Ζηνὸς ὄνομα.\n\n[33] νόμος καὶ βουλῆι πείθεσθαι ἑνός.\n\n[34] ἀξύνετοι ἀκούσαντες κωφοῖσιν ἐοίκασι· φάτις αὐτοῖσιν μαρτυρεῖ παρεόντας ἀπεῖναι.\n\n[35] χρὴ γὰρ εὖ μάλα πολλῶν ἵστορας φιλοσόφους ἄνδρας εἶναι.\n\n[36] ψυχῆισιν θάνατος ὕδωρ γενέσθαι, ὕδατι δὲ θάνατος γῆν γενέσθαι, ἐκ γῆς δὲ ὕδωρ γίνεται, ἐξ ὕδατος δὲ ψυχή.\n\n[37] sues caeno, cohortales aves pulvere vel cinere lavari.\n\n[38] (Θαλῆς δοκεῖ κατά τινας) πρῶτος ἀστρολογῆσαι (… μαρτυρεῖ δ’ αὐτῶι καὶ Ἡ. καὶ Δημόκριτος).\n\n[39] ἐν Πριήνηι Βίας ἐγένετο ὁ Τευτάμεω, οὗ πλείων λόγος ἢ τῶν ἄλλων.\n\n[40] πολυμαθίη νόον ἔχειν οὐ διδάσκει· Ἡσίοδον γὰρ ἂν ἐδίδαξε καὶ Πυθαγόρην αὖτίς τε Ξενοφάνεά τε καὶ Ἑκαταῖον.\n\n### Fragments 41–50\n\n[41] εἶναι γὰρ ἓν τὸ σοφόν, ἐπίστασθαι γνώμην, ὁτέη ἐκυβέρνησε πάντα διὰ πάντων.\n\n[42] τόν τε Ὅμηρον (ἔφασκεν) ἄξιον ἐκ τῶν ἀγώνων ἐκβάλλεσθαι καὶ ῥαπίζεσθαι καὶ Ἀρχίλοχον ὁμοίως.\n\n[43] ὕβριν χρὴ σβεννύναι μᾶλλον ἢ πυρκαϊήν.\n\n[44] μάχεσθαι χρὴ τὸν δῆμον ὑπὲρ τοῦ νόμου ὅκωσπερ τείχεος.\n\n[45] ψυχῆς πείρατα ἰὼν οὐκ ἂν ἐξεύροιο, πᾶσαν ἐπιπορευόμενος ὁδόν· οὕτω βαθὺν λόγον ἔχει.\n\n[46] τήν τε οἴησιν ἱερὰν νόσον (ἔλεγε) καὶ τὴν ὅρασιν ψεύδεσθαι.\n\n[47] μὴ εἰκῆ περὶ τῶν μεγίστων συμβαλλώμεθα.\n\n[48] τῶι οὖν τόξωι ὄνομα βίος, ἔργον δὲ θάνατος.\n\n[49] εἷς ἐμοὶ μύριοι, ἐὰν ἄριστος ἦι.\n\n[49a] ποταμοῖς τοῖς αὐτοῖς ἐμβαίνομέν τε καὶ οὐκ ἐμβαίνομεν, εἶμέν τε καὶ οὐκ εἶμεν.\n\n[50] οὐκ ἐμοῦ, ἀλλὰ τοῦ λόγου ἀκούσαντας ὁμολογεῖν σοφόν ἐστιν ἓν πάντα εἶναι.\n\n### Fragments 51–60\n\n[51] οὐ ξυνιᾶσιν ὅκως διαφερόμενον ἑωυτῶι ὁμολογέει· παλίντροπος ἁρμονίη ὅκωσπερ τόξου καὶ λύρης.\n\n[52] αἰὼν παῖς ἐστι παίζων, πεσσεύων· παιδὸς ἡ βασιληίη.\n\n[53] Πόλεμος πάντων μὲν πατήρ ἐστι, πάντων δὲ βασιλεύς, καὶ τοὺς μὲν θεοὺς ἔδειξε τοὺς δὲ ἀνθρώπους, τοὺς μὲν δούλους ἐποίησε τοὺς δὲ ἐλευθέρους.\n\n[54] ἁρμονίη ἀφανὴς φανερῆς κρείττων.\n\n[55] ὅσων ὄψις ἀκοὴ μάθησις, ταῦτα ἐγὼ προτιμέω.\n\n[56] ἐξηπάτηνται, (φησίν,) οἱ ἄνθρωποι πρὸς τὴν γνῶσιν τῶν φανερῶν παραπλησίως Ὁμήρωι, ὃς ἐγένετο τῶν Ἑλλήνων σοφώτερος πάντων. ἐκεῖνόν τε γὰρ παῖδες φθεῖρας κατακτείνοντες ἐξηπάτησαν εἰπόντες· ὅσα εἴδομεν καὶ ἐλάβομεν, ταῦτα ἀπολείπομεν, ὅσα δὲ οὔτε εἴδομεν οὔτ’ ἐλάβομεν, ταῦτα φέρομεν.\n\n[57] διδάσκαλος δὲ πλείστων Ἡσίοδος· τοῦτον ἐπίστανται πλεῖστα εἰδέναι, ὅστις ἡμέρην καὶ εὐφρόνην οὐκ ἐγίνωσκεν· ἔστι γὰρ ἕν.\n\n[58] καὶ ἀγαθὸν καὶ κακόν [ἕν ἐστιν]. οἱ γοῦν ἰατροί, (φησὶν ὁ Ἡ.,) τέμνοντες, καίοντες πάντη, βασανίζοντες κακῶς τοὺς ἀρρωστοῦντας, ἐπαιτέονται μηδὲν ἄξιοι μισθὸν λαμβάνειν παρὰ τῶν ἀρρωστούντων, ταὐτὰ ἐργαζόμενοι, (τὰ ἀγαθὰ καὶ τὰς νόσους).\n\n[59] γναφείωι ὁδὸς εὐθεῖα καὶ σκολιὴ (ἡ τοῦ ὀργάνου τοῦ καλουμένου κοχλίου ἐν τῶι γναφείωι περιστροφὴ εὐθεῖα καὶ σκολιή· ἄνω γὰρ ὁμοῦ καὶ κύκλωι περιέρχεται) μία ἐστί, (φησί,) καὶ ἡ αὐτή.\n\n[60] ὁδὸς ἄνω κάτω μία καὶ ὡυτή.\n\n### Fragments 61–70\n\n[61] θάλασσα ὕδωρ καθαρώτατον καὶ μιαρώτατον, ἰχθύσι μὲν πότιμον καὶ σωτήριον, ἀνθρώποις δὲ ἄποτον καὶ ὀλέθριον.\n\n[62] ἀθάνατοι θνητοί, θνητοὶ ἀθάνατοι, ζῶντες τὸν ἐκείνων θάνατον, τὸν δὲ ἐκείνων βίον τεθνεῶτες.\n\n[63] ἔνθα δ’ ἐόντι ἐπανίστασθαι καὶ φύλακας γίνεσθαι ἐγερτὶ ζώντων καὶ νεκρῶν.\n\n[64] τὰ δὲ πάντα οἰακίζει Κεραυνός.\n\n[65] (καλεῖ δὲ αὐτὸ) χρησμοσύνην καὶ κόρον.\n\n[66] πάντα γάρ, (φησί,) τὸ πῦρ ἐπελθὸν κρινεῖ καὶ καταλήψεται.\n\n[67] ὁ θεὸς ἡμέρη εὐφρόνη, χειμὼν θέρος, πόλεμος εἰρήνη, κόρος λιμός (τἀναντία ἅπαντα· οὗτος ὁ νοῦς), ἀλλοιοῦται δὲ ὅκωσπερ ⟨πῦρ⟩, ὁπόταν συμμιγῆι θυώμασιν, ὀνομάζεται καθ’ ἡδονὴν ἑκάστου.\n\n[67a] sic⟨ut⟩ aranea, (ait,) stans in medio telae sentit, quam cito musca aliquem filum suum corrumpit itaque illuc celeriter currit quasi de fili perfectione dolens, sic hominis anima aliqua parte corporis laesa illuc festine meat quasi impatiens laesionis corporis, cui firme et proportionaliter iuncta est.\n\n[68] (καὶ διὰ τοῦτο εἰκότως αὐτὰ) ἄκεα (Ἡ. προσεῖπεν ὡς ἐξακεσόμενα τὰ δεινὰ καὶ τὰς ψυχὰς ἐξάντεις ἀπεργαζόμενα τῶν ἐν τῆι γενέσει συμφορῶν).\n\n[69] (θυσιῶν τοίνυν τίθημι διττὰ εἴδη· τὰ μὲν) τῶν ἀποκεκαθαρμένων παντάπασιν ἀνθρώπων, οἷα ἐφ’ ἑνὸς ἄν ποτε γένοιτο σπανίως, (ὥς φησιν Ἡ.,) ἢ τινων ὀλίγων εὐαριθμήτων ἀνδρῶν.\n\n[70] (πόσωι δὴ οὖν βέλτιον Ἡ.) παίδων ἀθύρματα (νενόμικεν εἶναι τὰ ἀνθρώπινα δοξάσματα).\n\n### Fragments 71–80\n\n[71] (μεμνῆσθαι δὲ καὶ) τοῦ ἐπιλανθανομένου ἧι ἡ ὁδὸς ἄγει.\n\n[72] ὧι μάλιστα διηνεκῶς ὁμιλοῦσι λόγωι (τῶι τὰ ὅλα διοικοῦντι), τούτωι διαφέρονται, καὶ οἷς καθ’ ἡμέραν ἐγκυροῦσι, ταῦτα αὐτοῖς ξένα φαίνεται.\n\n[73] οὐ δεῖ ὥσπερ καθεύδοντας ποιεῖν καὶ λέγειν· (καὶ γὰρ καὶ τότε δοκοῦμεν ποιεῖν καὶ λέγειν.)\n\n[74] (οὐ δεῖ ⟨ὡς⟩) παῖδας τοκεώνων, (τοῦτ’ ἔστι κατὰ ψιλόν· καθότι παρειλήφαμεν.)\n\n[75] (τοὺς καθεύδοντας οἶμαι ὁ Ἡ.) ἐργάτας (εἶναι λέγει) καὶ συνεργοὺς τῶν ἐν τῶι κόσμωι γινομένων.\n\n[76] ζῆι πῦρ τὸν γῆς θάνατον καὶ ἀὴρ ζῆι τὸν πυρὸς θάνατον, ὕδωρ ζῆι τὸν ἀέρος θάνατον, γῆ τὸν ὕδατος.\n\n[77] ψυχῆισι (φάναι) τέρψιν ἢ θάνατον ὑγρῆισι γενέσθαι.\n\n[78] ἦθος γὰρ ἀνθρώπειον μὲν οὐκ ἔχει γνώμας, θεῖον δὲ ἔχει.\n\n[79] ἀνὴρ νήπιος ἤκουσε πρὸς δαίμονος ὅκωσπερ παῖς πρὸς ἀνδρός.\n\n[80] εἰδέναι δὲ χρὴ τὸν πόλεμον ἐόντα ξυνόν, καὶ δίκην ἔριν, καὶ γινόμενα πάντα κατ’ ἔριν καὶ †χρεώμενα.\n\n### Fragments 81–90\n\n[81] (ἡ δὲ τῶν ῥητόρων εἰσαγωγὴ πάντα τὰ θεωρήματα πρὸς τοῦτ’ ἔχει τείνοντα καὶ κατὰ τὸν Ἡράκλειτον) κοπίδων ἐστὶν ἀρχηγός.\n\n[82] πιθήκων ὁ κάλλιστος αἰσχρὸς ἀνθρώπων γένει συμβάλλειν.\n\n[83] ἀνθρώπων ὁ σοφώτατος πρὸς θεὸν πίθηκος φανεῖται καὶ σοφίαι καὶ κάλλει καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις πᾶσιν.\n\n[84] μεταβάλλον ἀναπαύεται (καὶ) κάματός ἐστι τοῖς αὐτοῖς μοχθεῖν καὶ ἄρχεσθαι.\n\n[85] θυμῶι μάχεσθαι χαλεπόν· ὅ τι γὰρ ἂν θέληι, ψυχῆς ὠνεῖται.\n\n[86] ἀπιστίηι διαφυγγάνει μὴ γιγνώσκεσθαι.\n\n[87] βλὰξ ἄνθρωπος ἐπὶ παντὶ λόγωι ἐπτοῆσθαι φιλεῖ.\n\n[88] ταὐτό τ’ ἔνι ζῶν καὶ τεθνηκὸς καὶ τὸ ἐγρηγορὸς καὶ τὸ καθεῦδον καὶ νέον καὶ γηραιόν· τάδε γὰρ μεταπεσόντα ἐκεῖνά ἐστι κἀκεῖνα πάλιν μεταπεσόντα ταῦτα.\n\n[89] τοῖς ἐγρηγορόσιν ἕνα καὶ κοινὸν κόσμον εἶναι, (τῶν δὲ κοιμωμένων ἕκαστον εἰς ἴδιον ἀποστρέφεσθαι).\n\n[90] πυρός τε ἀνταμοιβὴ τὰ πάντα καὶ πῦρ ἁπάντων ὅκωσπερ χρυσοῦ χρήματα καὶ χρημάτων χρυσός.\n\n### Fragments 91–100\n\n[91] ποταμῶι γὰρ οὐκ ἔστιν ἐμβῆναι δὶς τῶι αὐτῶι (οὐδὲ θνητῆς οὐσίας δὶς ἅψασθαι κατὰ ἕξιν ⟨τῆς αὐτῆς⟩· ἀλλ’ ὀξύτητι καὶ τάχει μεταβολῆς) σκίδνησι καὶ πάλιν συνάγει (μᾶλλον δὲ οὐδὲ πάλιν οὐδ’ ὕστερον, ἀλλ’ ἅμα συνίσταται καὶ ἀπολείπει) καὶ πρόσεισι καὶ ἄπεισι.\n\n[92] Σίβυλλα δὲ μαινομένωι στόματι (καθ’ Ἡράκλειτον) ἀγέλαστα καὶ ἀκαλλώπιστα καὶ ἀμύριστα φθεγγομένη (χιλίων ἐτῶν ἐξικνεῖται τῆι φωνῆι) διὰ τὸν θεόν.\n\n[93] ὁ ἄναξ, οὗ τὸ μαντεῖόν ἐστι τὸ ἐν Δελφοῖς, οὔτε λέγει οὔτε κρύπτει ἀλλὰ σημαίνει.\n\n[94] ἥλιος γὰρ οὐχ ὑπερβήσεται μέτρα· εἰ δὲ μή, Ἐρινύες μιν Δίκης ἐπίκουροι ἐξευρήσουσιν.\n\n[95] ἀμαθίην γὰρ ἄμεινον κρύπτειν, (ἔργον δὲ ἐν ἀνέσει καὶ παρ’ οἶνον).\n\n[96] νέκυες γὰρ κοπρίων ἐκβλητότεροι.\n\n[97] κύνες γὰρ καταβαΰζουσιν ὧν ἂν μὴ γινώσκωσι.\n\n[98] αἱ ψυχαὶ ὀσμῶνται καθ’ Ἅιδην.\n\n[99] εἰ μὴ ἥλιος ἦν, ἕνεκα τῶν ἄλλων ἄστρων εὐφρόνη ἂν ἦν.\n\n[100] (ὁ ἥλιος ἐπιστάτης ὢν καὶ σκοπὸς ὁρίζειν καὶ βραβεύειν καὶ ἀναδεικνύναι καὶ ἀναφαίνειν μεταβολὰς καὶ) ὥρας αἳ πάντα φέρουσι.\n\n### Fragments 101–110\n\n[101] ἐδιζησάμην ἐμεωυτόν.\n\n[101a] ὀφθαλμοὶ γὰρ τῶν ὤτων ἀκριβέστεροι μάρτυρες.\n\n[102] τῶι μὲν θεῶι καλὰ πάντα καὶ ἀγαθὰ καὶ δίκαια, ἄνθρωποι δὲ ἃ μὲν ἄδικα ὑπειλήφασιν ἃ δὲ δίκαια.\n\n[103] ξυνὸν γὰρ ἀρχὴ καὶ πέρας ἐπὶ κύκλου περιφερείας.\n\n[104] τίς γὰρ αὐτῶν νόος ἢ φρήν; δήμων ἀοιδοῖσι πείθονται καὶ διδασκάλωι χρείωνται ὁμίλωι οὐκ εἰδότες ὅτι ‘οἱ πολλοὶ κακοί, ὀλίγοι δὲ ἀγαθοί’\n\n[105] (Ἡ. ἐντεῦθεν) ἀστρολόγον (φησὶ τὸν Ὅμηρον).\n\n[106] unus dies par omni est.\n\n[107] κακοὶ μάρτυρες ἀνθρώποισιν ὀφθαλμοὶ καὶ ὦτα βαρβάρους ψυχὰς ἐχόντων.\n\n[108] ὁκόσων λόγους ἤκουσα, οὐδεὶς ἀφικνεῖται ἐς τοῦτο, ὥστε γινώσκειν ὅτι σοφόν ἐστι πάντων κεχωρισμένον.\n\n[109] κρύπτειν ἀμαθίην κρέσσον ἢ ἐς τὸ μέσον φέρειν.\n\n[110] ἀνθρώποις γίνεσθαι ὁκόσα θέλουσιν οὐκ ἄμεινον.\n\n### Fragments 111–120\n\n[111] νοῦσος ὑγιείην ἐποίησεν ἡδύ, κακὸν ἀγαθόν, λιμὸς κόρον, κάματος ἀνάπαυσιν.\n\n[112] τὸ φρονεῖν ἀρετὴ μεγίστη, καὶ σοφίη ἀληθέα λέγειν καὶ ποιεῖν κατὰ φύσιν ἐπαΐοντας.\n\n[113] ξυνόν ἐστι πᾶσι τὸ φρονέειν.\n\n[114] ξὺν νόωι λέγοντας ἰσχυρίζεσθαι χρὴ τῶι ξυνῶι πάντων, ὅκωσπερ νόμωι πόλις, καὶ πολὺ ἰσχυροτέρως. τρέφονται γὰρ πάντες οἱ ἀνθρώπειοι νόμοι ὑπὸ ἑνὸς τοῦ θείου· κρατεῖ γὰρ τοσοῦτον ὁκόσον ἐθέλει καὶ ἐξαρκεῖ πᾶσι καὶ περιγίνεται.\n\n[115] ψυχῆς ἐστι λόγος ἑαυτὸν αὔξων.\n\n[116] ἀνθρώποισι πᾶσι μέτεστι γινώσκειν ἑωυτοὺς καὶ φρονεῖν.\n\n[117] ἀνὴρ ὁκόταν μεθυσθῆι, ἄγεται ὑπὸ παιδὸς ἀνήβου σφαλλόμενος, οὐκ ἐπαΐων ὅκηι βαίνει, ὑγρὴν τὴν ψυχὴν ἔχων.\n\n[118] αὐγὴ ξηρὴ ψυχὴ σοφωτάτη καὶ ἀρίστη.\n\n[119] ἦθος ἀνθρώπωι δαίμων.\n\n[120] ἠοῦς καὶ ἑσπέρας τέρματα ἡ ἄρκτος καὶ ἀντίον τῆς ἄρκτου οὖρος αἰθρίου Διός.\n\n### Fragments 121–126\n\n[121] ἄξιον Ἐφεσίοις ἡβηδὸν ἀπάγξασθαι πᾶσι καὶ τοῖς ἀνήβοις τὴν πόλιν καταλιπεῖν, οἵτινες Ἑρμόδωρον ἄνδρα ἑωυτῶν ὀνήιστον ἐξέβαλον φάντες· ἡμέων μηδὲ εἷς ὀνήιστος ἔστω, εἰ δὲ μή, ἄλλη τε καὶ μετ’ ἄλλων.\n\n[122] ἀγχιβασίην.\n\n[123] φύσις (δὲ καθ’ Ἡράκλειτον) κρύπτεσθαι φιλεῖ.\n\n[124] (ὥσπερ) σάρμα εἰκῆ κεχυμένον ὁ κάλλιστος, (φησὶν Ἡράκλειτος,) [ὁ] κόσμος.\n\n[125] καὶ ὁ κυκεὼν διίσταται ⟨μὴ⟩ κινούμενος.\n\n[125a] μὴ ἐπιλίποι ὑμᾶς πλοῦτος, (ἔφη,) Ἐφέσιοι, ἵν’ ἐξελέγχοισθε πονηρευόμενοι.\n\n[126] τὰ ψυχρὰ θέρεται, θερμὸν ψύχεται, ὑγρὸν αὐαίνεται, καρφαλέον νοτίζεται.","download_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/heraclitus-fragments/original.txt"},"translations":[{"id":"trn_heraclitus_fragments_mouseia","translator":"Mouseia","kind":"curated","note":"Mouseia’s complete machine-assisted Musean translation of all 130 genuine fragments in Hermann Diels’s Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker (4th ed., 1922), made directly from the Ionic Greek and Latin and checked against the printed page. Words of the ancient authors who quote Heraclitus stand in round parentheses.","text":"### Fragments 1–10\n\n[1] Though this Logos is forever, people remain without understanding, both before they hear it and when they have first heard it. For all things come to pass according to this Logos, yet they seem without experience, though they experience such words and deeds as I unfold, distinguishing each according to its nature and showing how it is. The rest of humanity is unaware of what it does awake, just as it forgets what it does asleep.\n\n[2] So we must follow the common, that is, what is shared; for what is shared is common. Yet though the Logos is common, the many live as if they had a private understanding.\n\n[3] (On the sun’s size:) the width of a human foot.\n\n[4] (Heraclitus said that) if happiness lay in bodily pleasures, we would call oxen happy when they found bitter vetch to eat.\n\n[5] They cleanse themselves in vain by staining themselves with blood, as if someone who had stepped in mud washed himself with mud. Anyone who saw him doing this would think him mad. And they pray to these statues as if one were chatting with houses, knowing nothing of who the gods and heroes are.\n\n[6] (The sun is not only, as Heraclitus says,) new each day (but always new, continually).\n\n[7] If all that exists became smoke, noses would tell one thing from another.\n\n[8] What opposes unites; from differences comes the most beautiful harmony; all things come to pass through strife.\n\n[9] Donkeys would choose sweepings over gold.\n\n[10] Joinings: wholes and not wholes, converging diverging, in tune out of tune; from all things one, and from one all things.\n\n### Fragments 11–20\n\n[11] For every creature is driven to pasture by a blow.\n\n[12] Over those who step into the same rivers flow different and ever different waters; souls, too, rise as vapor from what is wet.\n\n[13] (For a refined person must neither be dirty nor unkempt nor) delight in mire.\n\n[14] Night-wanderers, magi, Bacchants, Bacchic women, initiates: (these he threatens with what comes after death; for these he foretells fire;) for the mysteries sanctioned among people are celebrated without holiness.\n\n[15] If they did not hold the procession for Dionysus and sing the hymn to the genitals, their deed would be most shameless; but Hades and Dionysus are the same, for whom they rave and hold their Bacchic rites.\n\n[16] How can anyone hide from what never sets?\n\n[17] For the many do not understand the things they meet; even after learning them, they do not know them, though they think they do.\n\n[18] Without expectation you will not find the unexpected: it cannot be searched out, and no path leads to it.\n\n[19] They know neither how to listen nor how to speak.\n\n[20] Once born, they wish to live and meet their doom—or rather, to rest—and leave children behind for dooms to be born.\n\n### Fragments 21–30\n\n[21] All we see awake is death; all we see asleep is sleep.\n\n[22] For those who seek gold dig much earth and find little.\n\n[23] They would not know Justice’s name if these things did not exist.\n\n[24] Gods and humans honor those slain in war.\n\n[25] For greater deaths win greater shares.\n\n[26] A man at night kindles a light for himself, dead, [his sight extinguished], yet living; asleep, his sight extinguished, he touches the dead; awake, he touches the sleeper.\n\n[27] What waits for people after death is what they neither expect nor imagine.\n\n[28] For the most esteemed knows and guards what seems true; yet Justice will seize the makers and witnesses of lies.\n\n[29] For the best choose one thing over all: undying renown among mortals. The many are stuffed like cattle.\n\n[30] This world-order, the same for all, no god or human made. It always was and is and will be: ever-living fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures.\n\n### Fragments 31–40\n\n[31] Fire’s turnings: first sea; of sea, half earth, half fiery storm. (For in effect he says that fire, under the Logos and god governing all things, turns through air into moisture, the seed, as it were, of the ordering of the world, which he calls) sea, (and from this, earth and heaven and all they contain come into being again. How it is taken up again and kindled into fire he makes clear in these words:) Sea pours out and is measured by the same measure as before it became earth.\n\n[32] The wise, one alone, is unwilling and willing to bear the name of Zeus.\n\n[33] It is law, too, to obey the counsel of one.\n\n[34] Hearing without understanding, they are like the deaf; the saying bears witness to them: present, they are absent.\n\n[35] For lovers of wisdom must indeed be inquirers into very many things.\n\n[36] For souls it is death to become water; for water, death to become earth. From earth comes water, from water soul.\n\n[37] Pigs bathe in mud, barnyard birds in dust or ash.\n\n[38] (Thales is thought by some to have been) the first to study the stars (… Heraclitus and Democritus also bear him witness).\n\n[39] In Priene lived Bias, son of Teutamas, held in higher account than the rest.\n\n[40] Much learning does not teach understanding. Otherwise it would have taught Hesiod and Pythagoras, and Xenophanes and Hecataeus too.\n\n### Fragments 41–50\n\n[41] For the wise is one thing: to know the thought that has steered all things through all.\n\n[42] Homer (he said) deserves to be driven from the contests and beaten, and Archilochus likewise.\n\n[43] Arrogance must be quenched more urgently than a blaze.\n\n[44] The people must fight for the law as for the city wall.\n\n[45] You would not find the soul’s limits in your travels, though you walked every road: so deep is its account.\n\n[46] Presumption is a sacred disease (he said), and sight lies.\n\n[47] Let us not guess at random about the greatest things.\n\n[48] The bow’s name is life; its work is death.\n\n[49] One is ten thousand to me, if he is the best.\n\n[49a] Into the same rivers we step and do not step; we are and are not.\n\n[50] For those who listen not to me but to the Logos, it is wise to agree that all things are one.\n\n### Fragments 51–60\n\n[51] They do not understand how what pulls apart agrees with itself: a harmony turning back, like that of bow and lyre.\n\n[52] Time is a child at play, moving pieces on a board; the kingship is a child’s.\n\n[53] War is father of all and king of all: some he has shown as gods, others as humans; some he has made slaves, others free.\n\n[54] Unseen harmony is stronger than seen.\n\n[55] What sight, hearing, and learning reveal—this I prize.\n\n[56] People are deceived (he says) in their knowledge of what lies in plain sight, much as Homer was, who was wiser than all the Greeks. For boys killing lice deceived him when they said: “What we saw and caught, we leave behind; what we neither saw nor caught, we carry.”\n\n[57] Teacher to most is Hesiod. They are certain he knows the most—he who did not know day and night: they are one.\n\n[58] Both good and evil [are one]. Doctors, for instance (Heraclitus says), cut, burn, torture the sick cruelly in every way, and demand a fee from the sick, though they deserve none, producing the same things (benefits and diseases).\n\n[59] In the fuller’s shop the straight and crooked path (the turning of the instrument called the screw in the fuller’s shop is straight and crooked, for it moves at once upward and around) is one (he says) and the same.\n\n[60] The road up and down is one and the same.\n\n### Fragments 61–70\n\n[61] Sea: water purest and foulest, drinkable and life-preserving for fish, undrinkable and deadly for humans.\n\n[62] Immortals mortal, mortals immortal: living the others’ death, dead in the others’ life.\n\n[63] They rise before the one who is there and become wakeful guardians of the living and the dead.\n\n[64] Thunderbolt steers all things.\n\n[65] (He calls it) want and fullness.\n\n[66] For all things (he says) will be judged and seized by fire when it comes.\n\n[67] God is day night, winter summer, war peace, fullness hunger (all opposites: this is the meaning); he changes as fire does when mixed with incense, taking a name from the savor of each.\n\n[67a] Just as a spider (he says), standing in the middle of its web, feels it as soon as a fly breaks one of its threads and swiftly runs there, as though grieving for the thread’s wholeness, so the human soul, when any part of the body is hurt, hurries there, as though unable to bear injury to the body, to which it is firmly joined in due proportion.\n\n[68] (And for this reason they were rightly called) remedies (by Heraclitus, as things that would cure terrors and raise souls above the misfortunes of coming into being).\n\n[69] (I distinguish, then, two kinds of sacrifices: those) of people utterly purified, such as might occur in one person only rarely (as Heraclitus says), or in a few men who can easily be counted.\n\n[70] (How much better, then, that Heraclitus took for) children’s playthings (the opinions of human beings).\n\n### Fragments 71–80\n\n[71] (Remember also) the man who forgets where the road leads.\n\n[72] With the Logos, their closest, constant companion (which governs the whole), they are at odds; what they meet every day seems foreign to them.\n\n[73] We must not act and speak as though asleep. (For even then we seem to act and speak.)\n\n[74] (We must not act like) children of their parents (that is, put simply: as we have been taught).\n\n[75] (Heraclitus, I think, calls those who sleep) workers (he says they are) and fellow workers in what comes to pass in the world-order.\n\n[76] Fire lives earth’s death, and air lives fire’s death; water lives air’s death, earth water’s.\n\n[77] For souls (he said), becoming wet is pleasure or death.\n\n[78] For human character has no insight; divine character does.\n\n[79] A man is called a child by a divinity, just as a child is by a man.\n\n[80] We must know that war is common, that Justice is strife, and that all things come to pass through strife and necessity.\n\n### Fragments 81–90\n\n[81] (The rhetoricians’ introductory teaching aims all its principles at this and, in Heraclitus’ words,) is the ringleader of swindlers.\n\n[82] The most beautiful ape is ugly beside the human race.\n\n[83] The wisest human will seem an ape beside a god, in wisdom, beauty, and all else.\n\n[84] It rests in change (and) it is weariness to toil for the same people and be ruled by them.\n\n[85] Passion is hard to fight: whatever it wants, it buys with the soul.\n\n[86] Through disbelief it escapes being known.\n\n[87] A fool takes fright at every word.\n\n[88] The same: living and dead, waking and sleeping, young and old. These, changed, are those; those, changed again, are these.\n\n[89] For the waking there is one common world-order (but each sleeper turns aside into a private one).\n\n[90] All things are given in exchange for fire, and fire for all things, as goods for gold and gold for goods.\n\n### Fragments 91–100\n\n[91] For one cannot step twice into the same river (nor touch mortal substance twice in the same state; rather, through the sharpness and speed of change) it scatters and gathers again (or rather, not again or afterward: it forms and falls away at once), and comes and goes.\n\n[92] The Sibyl, with a raving mouth (according to Heraclitus), uttering words without laughter, adornment, or perfume (reaches across a thousand years with her voice) through the god.\n\n[93] The lord whose oracle is at Delphi neither speaks nor conceals, but gives a sign.\n\n[94] For the sun will not overstep its measures; otherwise the Furies, Justice’s helpers, will track it down.\n\n[95] For it is better to hide ignorance (but that is hard in leisure and over wine).\n\n[96] For corpses are fitter to be thrown out than dung.\n\n[97] For dogs bark at whatever they do not know.\n\n[98] Souls have a sense of smell in Hades.\n\n[99] If there were no sun, there would be night, despite the other stars.\n\n[100] (The sun, as overseer and watchman, marks out, judges, displays, and brings to light the changes and) seasons that bring all things.\n\n### Fragments 101–110\n\n[101] I went in search of myself.\n\n[101a] For eyes are more exact witnesses than ears.\n\n[102] To the god, all things are beautiful and good and just; humans have taken some for unjust, others for just.\n\n[103] For on a circle’s circumference, beginning and end share a common point.\n\n[104] What mind or understanding do they have? They trust the people’s singers and take the crowd for their teacher, not knowing that “the many are bad, the few good.”\n\n[105] (From this line Heraclitus calls) an astronomer (Homer).\n\n[106] One day is equal to every other.\n\n[107] Eyes and ears are poor witnesses for people with barbarian souls.\n\n[108] Of all those whose accounts I have heard, not one comes to this: to know that the wise is set apart from all.\n\n[109] Better to hide ignorance than bring it into the open.\n\n[110] It is not better for people to have all they wish.\n\n### Fragments 111–120\n\n[111] Sickness makes health sweet, evil good, hunger fullness, weariness rest.\n\n[112] Sound thought is the greatest excellence, and wisdom is to speak the truth and act according to nature, with understanding.\n\n[113] Thinking is common to all.\n\n[114] Those who speak with understanding must draw strength from what is common to all, as a city does from law, and far more strongly. For all human laws are nourished by the one divine law: it rules as far as it wishes, suffices for all, and has more to spare.\n\n[115] The soul has an account that enlarges itself.\n\n[116] All people have it in them to know themselves and think well.\n\n[117] When a man gets drunk, he is led by a boy not yet of age, stumbling, not knowing where he steps, his soul wet.\n\n[118] A dry radiance—the wisest and best soul.\n\n[119] A person’s character is their divinity.\n\n[120] The limits of dawn and evening are the Bear and, opposite the Bear, the boundary of bright-skied Zeus.\n\n### Fragments 121–126\n\n[121] The Ephesians deserve to hang themselves, every man of age, and leave the city to those not yet grown: they expelled Hermodorus, the most valuable man among them, saying, “Let no one among us be most valuable; if anyone is, let him be elsewhere and among others.”\n\n[122] Drawing near.\n\n[123] Nature (according to Heraclitus) loves to hide.\n\n[124] (Like) sweepings strewn at random is the most beautiful (Heraclitus says) world-order.\n\n[125] Even the mixed drink separates unless it is stirred.\n\n[125a] May wealth never fail you (he said), Ephesians, so that your wrongdoing may be exposed.\n\n[126] Cold things grow warm; what is warm grows cold; what is wet dries; what is parched grows moist.","download_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/heraclitus-fragments/translations/trn_heraclitus_fragments_mouseia.txt"},{"id":"trn_heraclitus_fragments_plain","translator":"Mouseia","kind":"plain","note":"Mouseia’s complete Plain English edition, made independently and directly from the same 130 fragments. Words of the ancient authors who quote Heraclitus stand in round parentheses.","text":"### Fragments 1–10\n\n[1] Although this account (the Logos) holds forever, people do not understand it, either before hearing it or when they first hear it. Everything happens according to the Logos, but they seem inexperienced even as they experience words and actions like those I explain, examining each thing according to its nature and saying how it is. Other people are unaware of what they do when awake, just as they forget what they do when asleep.\n\n[2] So we must follow what is common, that is, what is shared. For what is shared is common. Although the Logos is common, most people live as if they had an understanding of their own.\n\n[3] (On the sun’s size:) the width of a human foot.\n\n[4] (Heraclitus said that) if happiness were found in bodily pleasures, we would call cattle happy when they find bitter vetch to eat.\n\n[5] They try to purify themselves in vain by staining themselves with blood. It is as if someone stepped into mud and tried to wash himself clean with mud. Anyone who noticed him doing this would think he was mad. And they pray to these statues, as if someone were chatting with houses, without knowing at all who the gods or heroes are.\n\n[6] (The sun is not only, as Heraclitus says,) new each day (but is always and continuously new).\n\n[7] If everything that exists became smoke, noses could tell things apart.\n\n[8] What opposes also unites. The finest harmony comes from things that differ, and everything comes about through conflict.\n\n[9] Donkeys would choose sweepings rather than gold.\n\n[10] Connections: whole and not whole, coming together and pulling apart, in tune and out of tune; from all things, one, and from one, all things.\n\n### Fragments 11–20\n\n[11] For every crawling creature is driven by a blow.\n\n[12] Different waters keep flowing over those who step into the same rivers. Souls too rise as vapor from what is wet.\n\n[13] (For a refined person must not be dirty or grimy or) delight in mud.\n\n[14] Night wanderers, magicians, male worshippers of Dionysus, female worshippers of Dionysus, initiates. (He threatens these people with what comes after death; he foretells fire for them.) For people are initiated in an unholy way into the mysteries they customarily practice.\n\n[15] If they were not holding their procession for Dionysus and singing a hymn to genitals, what they did would be utterly shameless. But Hades is the same as Dionysus, for whom they go mad and perform their rites.\n\n[16] How could anyone hide from what never sets?\n\n[17] Most people do not understand the things they encounter. Even after learning about them, they do not know them, though they think they do.\n\n[18] Unless you expect the unexpected, you will not find it. It cannot be searched out, and there is no path to it.\n\n[19] They do not know how to listen or how to speak.\n\n[20] Once born, they want to live and meet their deaths—or rather, to rest. They leave children behind to meet death in turn.\n\n### Fragments 21–30\n\n[21] Everything we see when awake is death; everything we see when asleep is sleep.\n\n[22] For people looking for gold dig up a lot of earth and find little.\n\n[23] They would not know the name of Justice if these things did not exist.\n\n[24] Gods and people honor those killed in battle.\n\n[25] For greater deaths win greater shares.\n\n[26] A person lights a light for himself at night, dead, [his sight extinguished], yet alive. In sleep he touches the dead, his sight extinguished; awake, he touches the sleeping.\n\n[27] After death, people face things they do not expect or imagine.\n\n[28] For the most respected person knows and guards what seems true. Yet Justice will catch those who make up lies and those who testify to them.\n\n[29] For the best choose one thing over everything else: everlasting fame among mortals. But most people stuff themselves like cattle.\n\n[30] No god or human made this world-order, the same for all. It always was, is, and will be ever-living fire, lighting up in measured amounts and going out in measured amounts.\n\n### Fragments 31–40\n\n[31] Fire’s changes: first sea; of sea, half earth and half fiery whirlwind. (For he means that fire is changed by the Logos and god that govern everything, passing through air into moisture, which is like the seed of the world-order and which he calls) sea. (From this, earth and sky and everything they contain come into being in turn. How it is taken back again and set on fire he makes clear in these words:) Sea spreads out and is measured in the same proportion as before it became earth.\n\n[32] The wise, the one and only, both refuses and accepts the name of Zeus.\n\n[33] Law also means obeying the will of one.\n\n[34] People who hear without understanding are like the deaf. The saying describes them: “Present, yet absent.”\n\n[35] For those who love wisdom must investigate a great many things.\n\n[36] For souls, becoming water is death. For water, becoming earth is death. But water comes from earth, and soul comes from water.\n\n[37] Pigs bathe in mud, barnyard birds in dust or ashes.\n\n[38] (Thales seems, to some people, to have been) the first to study the stars (… Heraclitus and Democritus also bear witness for him).\n\n[39] In Priene lived Bias, son of Teutamas. He had a greater reputation than the others.\n\n[40] Learning many things does not teach understanding. If it did, it would have taught Hesiod and Pythagoras, and also Xenophanes and Hecataeus.\n\n### Fragments 41–50\n\n[41] For the wise is one thing: to know the intelligence that steers everything through everything.\n\n[42] Homer (he said) deserved to be thrown out of the contests and beaten with a rod, and Archilochus deserved the same.\n\n[43] We must put out arrogance more urgently than a raging fire.\n\n[44] The people must fight for their law as they would for their city wall.\n\n[45] You could not find the soul’s limits on your travels, even if you traveled every road. Its Logos is so deep.\n\n[46] Conceit (he said) is a sacred disease, and sight deceives.\n\n[47] Let us not guess at random about the greatest matters.\n\n[48] The bow’s name also means “life,” but its work is death.\n\n[49] One person is worth ten thousand to me, if he is the best.\n\n[49a] We step and do not step into the same rivers. We are and are not.\n\n[50] When you have listened not to me but to the Logos, it is wise to agree that all things are one.\n\n### Fragments 51–60\n\n[51] They do not understand how something at odds with itself agrees with itself. It is a harmony that turns back on itself, like that of the bow and the lyre.\n\n[52] A lifetime is a child at play, moving pieces on a board. The kingship belongs to a child.\n\n[53] War is the father of all and the king of all. It has shown some to be gods and others humans; it has made some slaves and others free.\n\n[54] Hidden harmony is stronger than visible harmony.\n\n[55] I prefer things that can be seen, heard, and learned.\n\n[56] People are deceived (he says) in their knowledge of visible things, just as Homer was, the wisest of all the Greeks. Children killing lice tricked him by saying: “What we saw and caught, we leave behind. What we neither saw nor caught, we carry with us.”\n\n[57] Hesiod is the teacher of most people. They are sure he knows the most, yet he did not understand day and night. For they are one.\n\n[58] Good and evil [are one]. Doctors, at any rate, (Heraclitus says,) cut and burn all over, cruelly torturing the sick. They demand payment from the sick, though they deserve none, since they produce the same things (good things and diseases).\n\n[59] In a cloth-cleaner’s workshop, the straight and crooked path (the tool called a screw in the workshop turns in a straight and crooked path, since it moves both upward and in a circle at once) is one (he says) and the same.\n\n[60] The path up and the path down are one and the same.\n\n### Fragments 61–70\n\n[61] The sea is the purest and most polluted water. For fish it is drinkable and keeps them alive; for people it is undrinkable and deadly.\n\n[62] Immortals are mortal, mortals immortal: they live the others’ death and are dead in the others’ life.\n\n[63] And they rise before the one who is there and become watchful guards of the living and the dead.\n\n[64] The Thunderbolt steers everything.\n\n[65] (He calls it) need and fullness.\n\n[66] For when fire comes (he says), it will judge and seize everything.\n\n[67] God is day and night, winter and summer, war and peace, fullness and hunger (all the opposites—this is the meaning). But he changes like fire: when it is mixed with incense, it gets its name from the pleasant scent of each kind.\n\n[67a] Just as a spider (he says) standing in the middle of its web feels at once when a fly breaks one of its threads, and quickly runs there as if distressed that the thread is no longer whole, so a person’s soul, when some part of the body is injured, rushes there as if unable to bear the injury to the body, to which it is firmly joined in due proportion.\n\n[68] (And for this reason they were rightly called) remedies (by Heraclitus, since they would cure terrible ills and make souls safe from the misfortunes of life).\n\n[69] (So I distinguish two kinds of sacrifice. One kind is that) of completely purified people, such as might occur only rarely in the case of one person (as Heraclitus says) or a few easily counted people.\n\n[70] (How much better, then, that Heraclitus regarded as) children’s playthings (the opinions people hold).\n\n### Fragments 71–80\n\n[71] (We must also remember) the person who forgets where the road leads.\n\n[72] The Logos (which governs everything) is what they are always in closest contact with, yet they are at odds with it. And the things they meet every day seem strange to them.\n\n[73] We must not act and speak like people asleep. (For even then we think we are acting and speaking.)\n\n[74] (We must not act like) children of their parents (that is, simply following what has been handed down to us).\n\n[75] (I think Heraclitus means that people who are asleep are) workers (that is what he says) and fellow workers in what happens in the world-order.\n\n[76] Fire lives the death of earth, and air lives the death of fire. Water lives the death of air, and earth the death of water.\n\n[77] For souls (he said), it is pleasure or death to become wet.\n\n[78] For human character has no understanding, but divine character does.\n\n[79] A man is called childish by a divinity, just as a child is by a man.\n\n[80] We must know that war is common, that Justice is conflict, and that everything happens through conflict and necessity.\n\n### Fragments 81–90\n\n[81] (The orators’ introductory teaching aims all its lessons at this and, according to Heraclitus,) is the ringleader of cheats.\n\n[82] The most beautiful ape is ugly compared with the human race.\n\n[83] The wisest human will seem like an ape compared with a god, in wisdom, beauty, and everything else.\n\n[84] It rests by changing (and) it is exhausting to work for the same people and be ruled by them.\n\n[85] It is hard to fight passion. It buys whatever it wants at the price of the soul.\n\n[86] It escapes recognition because of disbelief.\n\n[87] A stupid person tends to get worked up over every report.\n\n[88] The same thing is alive and dead, awake and asleep, young and old. For these change into those, and those change back into these.\n\n[89] Those who are awake have one common world-order (but each person asleep turns away into a private one).\n\n[90] All things are exchanged for fire, and fire for all things, just as goods are exchanged for gold and gold for goods.\n\n### Fragments 91–100\n\n[91] For you cannot step into the same river twice (or touch mortal substance twice in the same state; instead, because change is so swift and sudden) it scatters and gathers again (or rather, not again or later, but it comes together and falls away at the same time) and comes near and goes away.\n\n[92] The Sibyl, with her raving mouth (according to Heraclitus), utters words without laughter, decoration, or perfume (and reaches across a thousand years with her voice) because of the god.\n\n[93] The lord whose oracle is at Delphi neither tells nor hides, but gives a sign.\n\n[94] For the sun will not go beyond its measures. If it does, the Furies, the helpers of Justice, will find it.\n\n[95] For it is better to hide ignorance (but that is hard when relaxing and drinking wine).\n\n[96] For corpses are more fit to be thrown out than dung.\n\n[97] For dogs bark at anyone they do not know.\n\n[98] Souls sense smells in Hades.\n\n[99] If there were no sun, it would be night, despite the other stars.\n\n[100] (The sun, as overseer and lookout, defines, regulates, reveals, and brings to light the changes and) seasons that bring all things.\n\n### Fragments 101–110\n\n[101] I searched for myself.\n\n[101a] For eyes are more accurate witnesses than ears.\n\n[102] To God, all things are beautiful, good, and just. But people have judged some things unjust and others just.\n\n[103] For the beginning and end are one common point on a circle’s edge.\n\n[104] What understanding or sense do they have? They trust the people’s singers and take the crowd as their teacher, not knowing that “most people are bad, and few are good.”\n\n[105] (Heraclitus uses this line to call) an astronomer (Homer).\n\n[106] One day is equal to any other.\n\n[107] Eyes and ears are poor witnesses for people whose souls speak a foreign language.\n\n[108] Not one of those whose accounts I have heard has reached the point of knowing that the wise is separate from everything.\n\n[109] It is better to hide ignorance than to put it on display.\n\n[110] People are not better off getting everything they want.\n\n### Fragments 111–120\n\n[111] Illness makes health pleasant; evil makes good pleasant; hunger makes fullness pleasant; exhaustion makes rest pleasant.\n\n[112] Thinking well is the greatest virtue. Wisdom is telling the truth and acting according to nature, with understanding.\n\n[113] Thinking is common to everyone.\n\n[114] Those who speak with understanding must rely firmly on what is common to all, as a city relies on its law, and much more firmly than that. For all human laws are fed by one divine law. It rules as far as it wishes, is enough for all, and has more to spare.\n\n[115] The soul has a Logos that grows on its own.\n\n[116] All people can know themselves and think well.\n\n[117] When a man gets drunk, a boy who has not reached puberty leads him. He stumbles without knowing where he is going. His soul is wet.\n\n[118] A dry gleam is the wisest and best soul.\n\n[119] A person’s character is their guiding spirit.\n\n[120] The limits of dawn and evening are the Bear and, opposite the Bear, the boundary of Zeus’s clear sky.\n\n### Fragments 121–126\n\n[121] All adult Ephesians deserve to hang themselves and leave the city to the children. They expelled Hermodorus, the most useful man among them, saying: “Let none of us be the most useful. If anyone is, let him be so somewhere else and among other people.”\n\n[122] Coming close.\n\n[123] Nature (according to Heraclitus) likes to hide.\n\n[124] The most beautiful world-order (Heraclitus says) is (like) sweepings scattered at random.\n\n[125] Even the mixed drink separates if it is not stirred.\n\n[125a] May your wealth never run out (he said), Ephesians, so that you may be exposed as wrongdoers.\n\n[126] Cold things warm up, what is warm cools down, what is wet dries out, and what is dry grows damp.","download_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/heraclitus-fragments/translations/trn_heraclitus_fragments_plain.txt"}],"retex_markdown_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/heraclitus-fragments/retex.md"}}