Diogenes Laërtius · fl. 3rd century CE
Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.155 — Diogenes Laërtius on the Stoics
Translation by R. D. Hicks (1925)
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.155
Reported speech · Diogenes Laërtius on the Stoics
They maintain that the parts of the world are arranged thus. The earth is in the middle answering to a centre; next comes the water, which is shaped like a sphere all round it, concentric with the earth, so that the earth is in water. After the water comes a spherical layer of air. There are five celestial circles: first, the arctic circle, which is always visible; second, the summer tropic; third, the circle of the equinox; fourth, the winter tropic; and fifth, the antarctic, which is invisible to us. They are called parallel, because they do not incline towards one another; yet they are described round the same centre. The zodiac is an oblique circle, as it crosses the parallel circles.
Cite this passage
Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 7.155 (on the Stoics), tr. R. D. Hicks (1925)
https://whatwouldstoicsdo.com/passage/lives-of-the-stoics/7.155
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 notesDescribes the structure of the world: earth at the centre, surrounded by water, then air, with five celestial circles running parallel round the same centre and the zodiac crossing them at a slant.
Older wording
- “concentric”
- — sharing the same centre
- “tropic”
- — the circle marking the sun's northern or southern limit
- “zodiac”
- — the band of constellations the sun appears to pass through
Themes and situations
- Nature and the cosmos
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