Diogenes Laërtius · fl. 3rd century CE
Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.110 — Diogenes Laërtius on the Stoics
Translation by R. D. Hicks (1925)
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.110
Reported speech · Diogenes Laërtius on the Stoics
And in things intermediate also there are duties; as that boys should obey the attendants who have charge of them. According to the Stoics there is an eight-fold division of the soul: the five senses, the faculty of speech, the intellectual faculty, which is the mind itself, and the generative faculty, being all parts of the soul. Now from falsehood there results perversion, which extends to the mind; and from this perversion arise many passions or emotions, which are causes of instability. Passion, or emotion, is defined by Zeno as an irrational and unnatural movement in the soul, or again as impulse in excess. The main, or most universal, emotions, according to Hecato in his treatise On the Passions, book ii., and Zeno in his treatise with the same title, constitute four great classes, grief, fear, desire or craving, pleasure.
Cite this passage
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.110 (on the Stoics), tr. R. D. Hicks (1925)
https://whatwouldstoicsdo.com/passage/lives-of-the-stoics/7.110
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Book VII, tr. R. D. Hicks (Loeb, 1925). Text: Perseus Digital Library (CC BY-SA 4.0). Sources and licences
In plain English
AI-written notesOrdinary routine matters carry duties too, such as children obeying their minders. The soul is divided into senses, speech, reason and reproduction. False beliefs twist the mind and breed passions, defined as irrational, unnatural impulses in excess, and the four main kinds are grief, fear, craving and pleasure.
Older wording
- “perversion”
- — a twisted state of mind caused by false belief
- “passion”
- — a disturbing emotion that overrides reason
- “faculty”
- — a power or capacity of the soul
Themes and situations
- Emotions and the passions
- Judgements and impressions
- Duty and roles
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