Iamblichus' Life of Pythagoras, or Pythagoric Life: Accompanied by Fragments of the Ethical Writings of certain Pythagoreans in the Doric dialect; and a collection of Pythagoric Sentences from Stobaeus and others, which are omitted by Gale in his Opuscula Mythologica, and have not been noticed by any editorIamblichus
Philosophy
Iamblichus' Life of Pythagoras, or Pythagoric Life: Accompanied by Fragments of the Ethical Writings of certain Pythagoreans in the Doric dialect; and a collection of Pythagoric Sentences from Stobaeus and others, which are omitted by Gale in his Opuscula Mythologica, and have not been noticed by any editor
Iamblichus
Ethics, Ancient; Philosophers -- Greece -- Biography; Philosophy, Ancient; Pythagoras; Pythagoras and Pythagorean school
At that time also, when he was journeying from Sybaris to Crotona, he
met near the shore with some fishermen, who were then drawing their nets
heavily laden with fishes from the deep, and told them he knew the exact
number of the fish they had caught. But the fishermen promising they
would perform whatever he should order them to do, if the event
corresponded with his prediction, he ordered them, after they had
accurately numbered the fish, to return them alive to the sea: and what
is yet more wonderful, not one of the fish died while he stood on the
shore, though they had been detained from the water a considerable time.
Having therefore paid the fishermen the price of their fish, he departed
for Crotona. But they every where divulged the fact, and having learnt
his name from some children, they told it to all men. Hence those that
heard of this affair were desirous of seeing the stranger, and what they
desired was easily obtained. But they were astonished on surveying his
countenance, and conjectured him to be such a man as he was in reality.
A few days also after this, he entered the Gymnasium, and being
surrounded with a crowd of young men, he is said to have delivered an
oration to them, in which he incited them to pay attention to their
elders, evincing that in the world, in life, in cities, and in nature,
that which has a precedency is more honorable than that which is
consequent in time. As for instance, that the east is more honorable
than the west; the morning than the evening; the beginning than the end;
and generation than corruption. In a similar manner he observed, that
natives were more honorable than strangers, and the leaders of colonies
than the builders of cities: and universally Gods than dæmons; dæmons
than demigods; and heroes than men. Of these likewise he observed, that
the authors of generation are more honorable than their progeny. He said
these things, however, for the sake of proving by induction, that
children should very much esteem their parents, to whom he asserted they
owed as many thanks as a dead man would owe to him who should be able to
bring him back again into light. Afterwards, he observed, that it was
indeed just to love those above all others, and never to give them pain,
who first benefited us, and in the greatest degree. But parents alone
benefit their children prior to their birth, and are the causes to their
offspring of all their upright conduct; and that when children show
themselves to be in no respect inferior to their parents in beneficence
towards them, it is not possible for them in this respect to err. For it
is reasonable to suppose, that the Gods will pardon those who honor
their parent in no less a degree than the divinities themselves; since
we learnt from our parents to honor divinity. Hence Homer also added the
same appellation to the king of the Gods; for he denominates him the
father of Gods and mortals. Many other mythologists also have delivered
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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