The Commentaries on the Timaeus of Plato — trans. Thomas Taylor

And thus much against Atticus.

But let us recur to our principles, and discuss the affair as follows: Whether is the world perpetual being, in the same maaner as the eternal, or is it not tf

* For gws here, it is necessary to read payer,p. 440 eternal, but consubsistent with time? And whether is it self-subsistent, or produced ἡ by another? Such then is the inquiry. But the answer is, that it is produced by another, and is consubsistent with time. A thing of this kind however, is generated. For if it has a composite form, it has a ceneration according to the composition. And if it alone subsists from another cause, it is generated, as not being itself productive of itself. If likewise it is not * eternal, it has the whole of its hypostasis according to time. For it is fabricated on account of another, and is generated as a flowing image of being. Hence, as that which is composite is to that which is simple, and as time is to eternity, so is generation to essence, Tf, therefore, a simple and uniform essence is eternal, the essence which is composite, multiform, and conjoined with time, is generation, For it is divinely said by Plato, that the world originated from a certain principle, For thet which is generated ina portion of time began from a temporal, from a producing, from a final, from a material, and from a formal cause. Lor since principle is multifariously predicated that which was once generated has a beginning of generation according to all these causes. The world however originated from a certain, and not from every principle, What therefore is this principle ? You must not say it is a temporal principle. Por that which originates from this is also allotted the principle of generation from all the rest, But it onyinated froin that principle, In which he afterwards instructs us, IT mean the most proper, or the final principle. For it was generated on account of the good ; and this is the principle from which its generation originated, He says therefore that this is the most proper principle, so that this may be called the principle of the generation of the world. lence in the first place he shows that the world is generated from its composition; forit is visible and tangible. Phese, therefore, are the extremes of the universe. For heaven is visible, but earth is tangible, And visibility is in earth so far as it participates of light; and tangibility in heaven, so far as a terres: trial nature is antecedently comprehended in it according to cause, But the world is simply {visible and tangible], ! and has a body in order that you may also assume the middle plenitudes which it contains, And this again is asserted by Plato conformably to the oracle, which says: /é ts an tnitation of intellect, but that which is fabricated has somethings of body. So far, therefore, as the universe 2and has a body in order that you may also assume the middle plenitudes which it contains, And this again is asserted by Plato conformably to the oracle, which says: /é ts an tnitation of intellect, but that which is fabricated has somethings of body. So far, therefore, as the universe

has something corporeal, it is generated ; for according to this it is visible and tanzible, But every thing visible and tangible, is sensible 5 for sense is touching and secing. That however which is sensible is the object of opinion, as being mingled from sensibles, and not able to preserve the purity of intelligible forms. But every thing of this kind ts generated, as having a composite essence. ;

Plato, therefore, does not subvert the perpetuity of the universe, as some who follow the Aristotelian hypotheses faney he does. And that this is true we may easily learn from hence. | He says that time was generated together with the heaven oY universe. If therefore time is perpetual, the universe also is perpetual.

πε if the universe had a temporal beginning, then time also had a temporal beginning, which is of all things the most impossible." They say, however, that time is twofold, the one disorderly, but the other proceeding according to number, For motion is twofold, the one kind disorderly and confused, but the other orderly and elegant. But there is a time * co-ordinate to each of these motions. That a body, however, may be moved equably or anomalously is possible 5 but it is impossible to conceive an equable and anomalous time. For thus the essence of time will be a composite. And why do 1 say this? For when the motion is anomalous, time is equable. There are now, therefore, many motions 3 and some are switter, but others slower, and one is more equable than another ; but there is one continued time -of all these, and which proceeds according to number. Ehence itis not τι τ, thus to make a twofold time. If, however, time is one and continued; ifindeed itis unbegotten, the universe also is unhegotten, Which is consubsistent with time. But if it was generated, an absurdity will follow 3 since time, in order that it may be generated, will be in want of time, and this, though it does not yet exist. For when time was gencrated, time was not yet.

Farther still, Plato conjoins the soul of the universe immediately on its being generated, with body, and does not give to it life prior to the corporeal-formed nature, but as soon as itis constituted incloses it in body. Moreover, he “says ‘ that soul ranks among beings that always exist. If, therefore, he makes body and soul to be consubsistent, but soul always exists, according to him body also is perpetual. Vor that which is at once consubsistent with the perpetual, is unbe-