[36]i. e. To spheres; Iamblichus indicating by this, that Pythagoras as well as Orpheus considered a spherical figure as the most appropriate image of divinity. For the universe is spherical; and, as Iamblichus afterwards observes, the Gods have a nature and _morphe_ similar to the universe; _morphe_, as we learn from Simplicius, pertaining to the color, figure, and magnitude of superficies. Keissling, having no conception of this meaning, and supposing the whole passage to be corrupt, has made nonsense of it by his alterations. For according to his version, Pythagoras, after the manner of Orpheus, worshipped the Gods not bound to a human form, but _to divine numbers_. For instead of ιδρυμασι he reads αριθμοις. But divine numbers both according to Orpheus and Pythagoras are the Gods themselves. [37]i. e. Futurity is long; Pythagoras signifying by this, that those who do not take an oath religiously, will be punished in some future period, if they are not at present. [38]i. e. From the time in which the Gods are fabulously said to have reigned in Egypt. [39]I wonder that the learned Obrechtus should translate ηβηδον, _cum omni juventute sua_. Had his translation, which is on the whole very excellent, been reviewed by English or Scotch critics, they would have immediately said from this circumstance, that he did not understand Greek. [40]Iamblichus here alludes to a right-angled triangle, and the Pythagoric theorem of 47. 1 of Euclid. For the square described on the longest side is equal to the two squares described on the two other sides. The longest side therefore is said by geometricians to be equal in power to the powers of the other sides. This however Kiessling not understanding, says, “that power is the space contained between the concurring lines of figures, and is the area of the triangle.” “Δυναμις idem est, quod εμβαδον, spatium, quod infra concurrentes lineas figurarum continetur, area trigoni.” But Kiessling, though a good verbalist, is a bad geometrician, and no philosopher. [41]In the original δεκατον _the tenth month_; but as it very seldom happens that a woman is in a state of pregnancy more than nine months, it appears to me that for δεκατον we should read εκτον _the sixth month_, as in the above translation. [42]Obrechtus by translating περι δε δοξης in this place, “De fama et gloria,” has evidently mistaken the meaning of Iamblichus.