19. CLEOMBROTUS compares the Stoic view of Gods who are perishable with
the Epicurean ‘Infinity’.
20. AMMONIUS defends Empedocles’ view of faulty daemons against the
Epicureans, who held that, if faulty, they must be short-lived. As the
Epicureans are not represented, he calls on Cleombrotus to continue his
argument for the migration of daemons.
21. CLEOMBROTUS, first referring to Plato, has a story of an oriental
recluse, whom he had met about the Red Sea. He knew all the Delphi
legend, and referred it to the struggles of daemons, who took on the
names of the Gods to whom they were severally attached.
22. ‘But how does Plato come in?’ asked HERACLEON. ‘Because’, replied
CLEOMBROTUS, ‘Plato allowed a possibility of more worlds than one, up to
five; the recluse asserted (giving no proof) that there were exactly one
hundred and eighty-three worlds.’
23. ‘The impostor!’ says LAMPRIAS; ‘that view is purely Greek, and was
put into a book by one Petron of Himera long ago.’ HERACLEON and
DEMETRIUS exchange remarks about Plato’s views on a plurality of worlds,
and agree to refer the matter to LAMPRIAS, who offers to give a cursory
account, the discussion then to revert to the original question.
[24-end. Lamprias is the speaker, with an interposition by Ammonius in
c. 33 and again in c. 46, and by Demetrius, who answers a question in c.
45, and some shorter ones.]
24. LAMPRIAS _loq._: It is _a priori_ likely that this world is not a
sole creation.
25. There need be no fear of interference from outside, of world with
world. Aristotle’s view of the arrangement of matter stated,