Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, Frank Cole Babbitt (Translator), 45

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[45] Hence it is not unreasonable to say that the statement of each person individually is not right, but that the statement of all collectively is right; for it is not drought nor wind nor sea nor darkness,¹ but everything harmful and destructive that Nature contains, which is to be set down as a part of Typhon. The origins of the universe are not to be placed in inanimate bodies, according to the doctrine of Democritus and Epicurus, nor yet is the Artificer of undifferentiated matter, according to the Stoic doctrine,² one Reason, and one Providence which gains the upper hand and prevails over all things. The fact is that it is impossible for anything bad whatsoever to be engendered where God is the Author of all, or anything good where God is the Author of nothing; for the concord of the universe, like that of a lyre or bow, according to Heracleitus,³ is resilient if disturbed; and according to Euripides,⁴

The good and bad cannot be kept apart,

But there is some commingling, which is well.

Wherefore this very ancient opinion comes dowTn from writers on religion and from lawgivers to poets and philosophers; it can be traced to no source, but it carried a strong and almost indelible conviction, and is in circulation in many places among barbarians and Greeks alike, not only in story and tradition but also in rites and sacrifices, to the effect that the Universe is not of itself suspended aloft without sense or reason or guidance, nor is there one Reason which rules and guides it by rudders, as it were, or by controlling reins,⁵ but, inasmuch as Nature brings, in this life of ours, many experiences in which both evil and good are commingled, or better, to put it very simply, Nature brings nothing which is not combined with something else, we may assert that it is not one keeper of two great vases⁶ who, after the manner of a barmaid, deals out to us our failures and successes in mixture, but it has come about, as the result of two opposed principles and two antagonistic forces, one of which guides us along a straight course to the right, while the other turns us aside and backward, that our life is complex, and so also is the universe; and if this is not true of the whole of it, yet it is true that this terrestrial universe, including its moon as well, is irregular and variable and subject to all manner of changes. For if it is the law of Nature that nothing comes into being without a cause, and if the good cannot provide a cause for evil, then it follows that Nature must have in herself the source and origin of evil, just as she contains the source and origin of good.

De Iside et Osiride. Plutarch. Frank Cole Babbitt (Translator). Cambridge, MA. 1936.

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Current edition Perseus

Isis and Osiris (English) (Plutarch. Moralia, Vol. V. Babbitt, Frank Cole, translator. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1936 (printing).)

Editions (1)

Περὶ Ἴσιδος και Ὀσίριδος Perseus (Plutarch. Plutarchi Chaeronensis Moralia, Vol II. Vernardakēs, Grēgorios N., editor. Leipzig: Teubner, 1889.) — 45 focus

[45] ὅθεν οὐκ ἀπέοικεν εἰπεῖν, ὡς ἰδίᾳ μὲν οὐκ ὀρθῶς ἕκαστος, ὁμοῦ δὲ πάντες ὀρθῶς λέγουσιν. οὐ γὰρ αὐχμὸν οὐδʼ ἄνεμον οὐδὲ θάλατταν οὐδὲ σκότος, 25 ἀλλὰ πᾶν ὅσον ἡ φύσις βλαβερὸν καὶ φθαρτικὸν ἔχει, μόριον τοῦ Τυφῶνος ἔστιν.¹ οὔτε γὰρ ἐν ἀψύχοις σώμασι τὰς τοῦ παντὸς ἀρχὰς θετέον, ὡς Δημόκριτος καὶ Ἐπίκουρος, οὔτʼ ἀποίου² δημιουργὸν ὕλης ἕνα λόγον καὶ μίαν πρόνοιαν, ὡς οἱ Στωικοί, περιγιγνομένην ἁπάντων καὶ κρατοῦσαν. ἀδύνατον 5 γὰρ ἢ φλαῦρον ὁτιοῦν, ὅπου πάντων, ἢ χρηστόν, 369b ὅπου μηδενὸς ὁ θεὸς αἴτιος, ἐγγενέσθαι. παλίντονος γάρ ἁρμονίη κόσμου, ὅκωσπερ³ λύρης καὶ τόξου καθʼ Ἡράκλειτον·⁴ καὶ κατʼ Εὐριπίδην⁵

οὐκ ἂν γένοιτο χωρὶς ἐσθλὰ καὶ κακά, 10

ἀλλʼ ἔστι τις σύγκρασις ὥστʼ ἔχειν καλῶς.

διὸ καὶ παμπάλαιος αὕτη κάτεισιν ἐκ θεολόγων καὶ νομοθετῶν εἴς τε ποιητὰς καὶ φιλοσόφους δόξα, τὴν ἀρχὴν ἀδέσποτον ἔχουσα, τὴν δὲ πίστιν ἰσχυρὰν καὶ δυσεξάλειπτον, οὐκ ἐν λόγοις μόνον οὐδʼ ἐν φήμαις, 15 ἀλλʼ ἔν τε τελεταῖς ἔν τε θυσίαις καὶ βαρβάροις καὶ Ἕλλησι πολλαχοῦ περιφερομένη,⁶ ὡς οὔτʼ ἄνουν 369c καὶ ἄλογον καὶ ἀκυβέρνητον αἰωρεῖται τῷ αὐτομάτῳ τὸ πᾶν, οὔθʼ εἷς ἐστιν ὁ κρατῶν καὶ κατευθύνων ὥσπερ οἴαξιν ἤ τισι πειθηνίοις χαλινοῖς λόγος, ἀλλὰ 20 πολλὰ καὶ μεμιγμένα κακοῖς καὶ ἀγαθοῖς· μᾶλλον δὲ μηδὲν ὡς ἁπλῶς εἰπεῖν ἄκρατον ἐνταῦθα τῆς φύσεως φερούσης, οὐ δυεῖν πίθων εἷς ταμίας ὥσπερ νάματα τὰ πράγματα καπηλικῶς διανέμων ἀνακεράννυσιν ἡμῖν ἀλλʼ ἀπὸ δυεῖν ἐναντίων ἀρχῶν καὶ δυεῖν ἀντιπάλων 25 δυνάμεων τῆς μὲν ἐπὶ τὰ δεξιὰ καὶ κατʼ 369d εὐθεῖαν ὑφηγουμένης, τῆς δʼ ἔμπαλιν ἀναστρεφούσης καὶ ἀνακλώσης, ὅ τε βίος μικτὸς ὅ τε κόσμος, εἰ καὶ μὴ πᾶς, ἀλλʼ ὁ περίγειος οὗτος καὶ μετὰ σελήνην ἀνώμαλος καὶ ποικίλος γέγονε καὶ μεταβολὰς πάσας δεχόμενος. εἰ γὰρ οὐδὲν ἀναιτίως πέφυκε γίγνεσθαι,⁷ 5 αἰτίαν δὲ κακοῦ τἀγαθὸν οὐκ ἂν παράσχοι, δεῖ γένεσιν ἰδίαν καὶ ἀρχὴν ὥσπερ ἀγαθοῦ καὶ κακοῦ τὴν φύσιν ἔχειν.

Translations (1)

Of Isis and Osiris, or of the Ancient Religion and Philosophy of Egypt. Perseus (Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals, Vol. IV. Goodwin, William W., editor; Baxter, William, translator. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company; Cambridge: Press of John Wilson and Son, 1874.) — 45 focus

[45] Wherefore it seems to me not to be unconsonant to reason to hold that each of them apart is not in the right, but all together are. For it is not drought, nor wind, nor sea, nor darkness, but every part of Nature that is hurtful or destructive, that belongs to Typhon. For we are not to place the first origins of the universe in inanimate bodies, as do Democritus and Epicurus; nor to make one reason, and one forecast overruling and containing all things, the creator of matter without attribute, as the Stoics do; for it is alike impossible for any thing bad to exist where God is the cause of all things, and for any thing good to exist where he is the cause of nothing. For the harmony of the world is (according to Heraclitus) like that of a bow or a harp, alternately tightened and relaxed; and according to Euripides,

Nor good nor bad here’s to be found apart;

But both immixed in one, for greater art.

And therefore this most ancient opinion hath been handed down from the theologists and law-givers to the poets and philosophers, it having an original fathered upon none, but having gained a persuasion both strong and indelible, and being everywhere professed and received by barbarians as well as Grecians, — and that not only in vulgar discourses and public fame, but also in their secret mysteries and open sacrifices, — that the world is neither hurried about by wild chance without intelligence, discourse, and direction, nor yet that there is but one reason, which as it were with a rudder or with gentle and easy reins directs it and holds it in; but that on the contrary, there are in it several differing things, and those made up of bad as well as good; or rather (to speak more plainly) that Nature produces nothing here but what is mixed and tempered. Not that there is as it were one store-keeper, who out of two different casks dispenses to us human affairs adulterated and mixed together,² as a host doth his liquors; but by reason of two contrary origins and opposite powers — whereof the one leads to the right hand and in a direct line, and the other turns to the contrary hand and goes athwart — both human life is mixed, and the world (if not all, yet that part which is about the earth and below the moon) is become very unequal and various, and liable to all manner of changes. For if nothing can come without a cause, and if a good thing cannot afford a cause of evil, Nature then must certainly have a peculiar source and origin of evil as well as of good.

Notes on the current edition

Isis and Osiris

1. Cf. 364 a, supra, and 376 f, infra.

2. Cf. von Arnim, Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, ii. p. 1108, and Diogenes Laertius, vii. 134.

3. Cf. Diels, Frag. der Vorsokratiker, i. p. 87, no. b 51. Plutarch quotes this again in Moralia, 473 f and 1026 b.

4. Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag., Euripides, no. 21, from the Aeolus; quoted again in Moralia, 25 c and 474 a.

5. The language is reminiscent of a fragment of Sophocles quoted by Plutarch in Moralia, 767 e, and Life of Alexander, chap. vii. (668 b). Cf. Nauck, Trag. Graec. Frag., Sophocles, no. 785. A task for many reins and rudders too ( πολλῶν χαλινῶν ἔργον οἰάκων θ’ ἅμα).

6. The reference is to Homer, Il. xxiv. 527-528, as misquoted in Plato, Republic, 379 d. Cf. also Moralia, 24 a (and the note), 105 c (and the ntoe), and 473 b. Moralia, 600 c, is helpful in understanding the present passage.

Plutarch De Iside et Osiride 45

Frank Cole Babbitt (Translator)

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