The story is reported, That noble Pherecydes Whom Syros calls her own, Was eaten up by lice; And so he bade his friends, Convey his corpse away To the Magnesian land, That he might victory give To holy Ephesus. For well the God had said, (Though he alone did know Th’ oracular prediction), That this was fate’s decree. So in that land he lies. This then is surely true, That those who’re really wise Are useful while alive, And e’en when breath has left them. VIII. And he flourished about the fifty-ninth Olympiad. There is a letter of his extant in the following terms:— PHERECYDES TO THALES. May you die happily when fate overtakes you. Disease has seized upon me at the same time that I received your letter. I am all over lice, and suffering likewise under a low fever. Accordingly, I have charged my servants to convey this book of mine to you, after they have buried me. And do you, if you think fit, after consulting with the other wise men, publish it; but if you do not approve of doing so, then keep it unpublished, for I am not entirely pleased with it myself. The subject is not one about which there is any certain knowledge, nor do I undertake to say that I have arrived at the truth; but I have advanced arguments, from which any one who occupies himself with speculations on the divine nature, may make a selection; and as to other points, he must exercise his intellect, for I speak obscurely throughout. I, myself, as I am afflicted more severely by this disease every day, no longer admit any physicians, or any of my friends. But when they stand at the door, and ask me how I am, I put out my finger to them through the opening of the door, and show them how I am eaten up with the evil; and I desired them to come to-morrow to the funeral of Pherecydes. These, then, are they who were called wise men; to which list some writers add the name of Pisistratus. But we must also speak of the philosophers. And we will begin first with the Ionic philosophy, the founder of which school was Thales, who was the master of Anaximander. BOOK II. LIFE OF ANAXIMANDER. I. Anaximander, the son of Praxiadas, was a citizen of Miletus. II. He used to assert that the principle and primary element of all things was the Infinity, giving no exact definition as to whether he meant air or water, or anything else. And he said that the parts were susceptible of change, but that the whole was unchangeable; and that the earth lay in the middle, being placed there as a sort of centre, of a spherical shape. The moon, he said, had a borrowed light, and borrowed it from the sun; and the sun he affirmed to be not less than the earth, and the purest possible fire.