Since, however, we have thus generally, and with arrangement, discussed
what pertains to Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans; let us after this
narrate such scattered particulars relative to this subject, as do not
fall under the above-mentioned order. It is said, therefore, that each
of the Greeks who joined himself to this community of the Pythagoreans,
was ordered to use his native language. For they did not approve of the
use of a foreign tongue. Foreigners also united themselves to the
Pythagoric sect, viz. the Messenians, the Lucani, Picentini, and the
Romans. And Metrodorus the son of Thyrsus who was the father of
Epicharmus,[48] and who transferred the greater part of his doctrine to
medicine, says in explaining the writings of his father to his brother,
that Epicharmus, and prior to him Pythagoras, conceived that the best
dialect, as well as the best harmony of music, is the Doric; that the
Ionic and the Æolic participate of the chromatic harmony; but that the
Attic dialect is replete with this in a still greater degree. They were
also of opinion, that the Doric dialect, which consists of vocal
letters, is enharmonic.
Fables likewise bear testimony to the antiquity of this dialect. For in
these it is said that Nereus married Doris the daughter of Ocean; by
whom he had fifty daughters, one of which was the mother of Achilles.
Metrodorus also says, that according to some, Hellen was the offspring
of Deucalion, who was the son of Prometheus and Pyrrha the daughter of
Epimetheus; and that from him came Dorus, and Æolus. He farther
observes, that he learnt from the sacred rites of the Babylonians, that
Hellen was the offspring of Jupiter, and that the sons of Hellen were
Dorus, Xuthus, and Æolus; with which narrations Herodotus also accords.
It is difficult, however, for those in more recent times to know
accurately, in particulars so ancient, which of these narrations is to
be preferred. But it may be collected from each of these histories, that
the Doric dialect is acknowledged to be the most ancient; that the Æolic
is next to this, which received its name from Æolus; and that the Ionic
ranks as the third, which derived its appellation from Ion the son of
Xuthus. The Attic is the fourth, which was denominated from Creusa, the
daughter of Erectheus, and is posterior to the former dialects by three
generations, as it existed about the time of the Thracians, and the rape
of Orithyia, as is evident from the testimony of most histories. Orpheus
also, who is the most ancient of the poets, used the Doric dialect.
Of medicine, however, they especially embraced the diætetic species, and
in the exercise of this were most accurate. And in the first place,
indeed, they endeavoured to learn the indications of symmetry, of labor,
food, and repose. In the next place, with respect to the preparation of
food, they were nearly the first who attempted to employ themselves in
it, and to define the mode in which it should be performed. The
Pythagoreans likewise employed cataplasms, more frequently than their
predecessors; but they in a less degree approved of medicated ointments.
These, however, they principally used in the cure of ulcerations. But
incisions and burnings they admitted the least of all things. Some
diseases also they cured by incantations. But they are said to have
objected to those who expose disciplines to sale; who open their souls
like the gates of an inn to every man that approaches to them; and who,
if they do not thus find buyers, diffuse themselves through cities, and,
in short, hire gymnasia and require a reward from young men for those
things which are without price. Pythagoras, however, concealed the
meaning of much that was said by him, in order that those who were
genuinely instructed might clearly be partakers of it; but that others,
as Homer says of Tantalus, might be pained in the midst of what they
heard, in consequence of receiving no delight from thence.
I think also, it was said by the Pythagoreans, respecting those who
teach for the sake of reward, that they show themselves to be worse than
statuaries, or those artists who perform their work sitting. For these,
when some one orders them to make a statue of Hermes, search for wood
adapted to the reception of the proper form; but those pretend that they
can readily produce the works of virtue from every nature.[49] The
Pythagoreans likewise said, that it is more necessary to pay attention
to philosophy, than to parents and agriculture; for it is owing to the
latter, indeed, that we live; but philosophers and preceptors are the
causes of our living well, and becoming wise, in consequence of having
discovered the right mode of discipline and instruction. Nor did they
think fit either to speak or write in such a way, that their conceptions
might be obvious to any casual persons; but Pythagoras is said to have
taught this in the first place to those that came to him, that, being
purified from all incontinence, they should preserve in silence the
doctrines they had heard. It is said, therefore, that he who first
divulged the theory of commensurable and incommensurable quantities, to
those who were unworthy to receive it, was so hated by the Pythagoreans
that they not only expelled him from their common association, and from
living with them, but also constructed a tomb for him, as one who had
migrated from the human and passed into a another life. Others also say,
that the Divine Power was indignant with those who divulged the dogmas
of Pythagoras: for that he perished in the sea, as an impious person,
who rendered manifest the composition of the _icostagonus_; viz. who
delivered the method of inscribing in a sphere the dodecaedron, which is
one of what are called the five solid figures. But according to others,
this happened to him who unfolded the doctrine of irrational and
incommensurable quantities.[50] Moreover, all the Pythagoric discipline
was symbolic, and resembled enigmas and riddles, consisting of
apothegms, in consequence of imitating antiquity in its character; just
as the truly divine and Pythian oracles appear to be in a certain
respect difficult to be understood and explained, to those who
carelessly receive the answers which they give. Such therefore, and so
many are the indications respecting Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans,
which may be collected from what is disseminated about them.