PROCLUS ON THE TIMAEUS BOOK III [Tim. 31 BC]

...from fire and earth, so that it might be made visible through fire and tangible through the solidity of earth; and indeed, he Plato named this "solid" with great precision. For a physical solid is one thing and a mathematical solid is another; the latter is intangible, while the former is tangible, which is exactly 5 what the current argument requires. For that tangible solid is what is "physical." Those who are puzzled as to why earth alone is called "solid" are being absurd; for they say that water and air are also such things. It is possible to say to them that "resistance" original: ἀντίτυπον (antitypon) — the quality of pushing back or being impenetrable belongs most of all to earth. This, at any rate, is the foundation for the others; for earth 10 supports both water and air, both of them. Therefore, earth is the "first tangible" and the "first resistant" thing, and for this reason, the "first solid." We reject those who say that in these passages he Plato called the three elements after fire "earth"; for what would then be left to be the "middle" between earth and fire? It is impossible to say.

15 > But it is not possible for two things alone to be well composed without a third; for there must be some bond in the middle to bring them both together. And the most beautiful of bonds is that which makes itself and the things bound by it into a unity [31 BC].

In these words, the "bond" is introduced as providing 20 an image of divine union and the communion of powers, according to which the intellectual causes of the whole produce their offspring in relation to one another. "Beauty" appears as having a unifying and binding essence and power; for both the phrase "to be well composed" and 25 "the most beautiful of bonds" seem to me to be indicative of this. Having begun, then, from the "dyad" The number two, representing division or difference as being linked to generation, procession, and otherness, he introduces "union" to the...

Critical apparatus comparing manuscript variants (M, P, Q) and Plato's original text

4 and the one Q | cf. Aristotle Physics book 2, chapter 1. 193b 18 ff. 5 for it is the Q 15 "Two" original: Δύω (dyō) MPQ with a few Plato manuscripts: "two" original: δύο (dyo) common reading of Plato; cf. page 14, 14. 17, 23 "alone" dual form manuscripts with Plato, same on page 14, 14: "some" Proclus page 17, 24; cf. Rheinisches Museum 58 (1903) 254f. 16 "not possible" MPQ with Plato: "impossible" common reading of Proclus; cf. page 14, 15. 17, 24. 29, 6 17 "but" manuscripts with certain Plato manuscripts: "but the" common reading of Plato. 18 "itself" MQ with common reading of Plato; "both and" manuscripts with corrected Plato manuscript: "and" common reading of Plato; but cf. page 16, 1 "one" manuscripts with Plato: "as much as possible one" common reading of Plato; but cf. page 16, 1 "makes" Q; but see page 16, 1 20 "himself/itself" P 26 "the" omitted by P