The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers

INTRODUCTION.

all things had been produced at the same time, and that then intellect had come and arranged them all in order.

They say, moreover, that Linus died in Euboea, having been shot with an arrow by Apollo, and that this epitaph was set over him:

IV. And thus did philosophy arise among the Greeks; its very name shows it has no connection with the barbarians. Those who attribute its origin to them introduce Orpheus the Thracian, claiming he was a philosopher and the most ancient of all. But if one should call a man a philosopher who has said such things about the gods as he has, I do not know what name one should give to a person who did not hesitate to attribute all sorts of human feelings to the gods, and even discreditable actions rarely spoken of among men. Tradition relates that he was murdered by women original: "Spretae Ciconum quo munere matres / Inter sacra Deum nocturnique orgia Bacchi, / Discerptum latos juvenem sparsere per agros." (Virgil, Georgics IV. 520). Translation: "The Thracian matrons who the youth accused, / Of love disdained and marriage rites refused; / With furies and nocturnal orgies fired, / At length against his sacred life conspired; / Whom even the savage beasts had spared they killed, / And strewed his mangled limbs about the field." (Dryden’s translation).; however, there is an inscription at Dium in Macedonia saying he was killed by lightning, which runs thus:

V. But those who say philosophy originated among the barbarians also describe the different systems prevailing among various tribes. They say that the Gymnosophists and the Druids philosophize by delivering their maxims in enigmatical language, bidding men worship the gods, do no evil, and practice manly virtue.