Philosophumena; or, The refutation of all heresies, Volume I — David Hume — John Shaqi
Philosophumena; or, The refutation of all heresies, Volume I
David Hume · en
But Democritus was an acquaintance of Leucippus. This was Democritus of
Abdera, son of Damasippus,[87] who met with many Gymnosophists among
the Indians and with priests and astrologers[88] in Egypt and with
Magi in Babylon. But he speaks like Leucippus about elements, to wit,
fulness and void, saying that the full is that which is but the void
that which is not, and he said this because things are ever moving in
the void. He said also that the ordered worlds are boundless and differ
in size, and that in some there is neither sun nor moon, but that in
others both are greater than with us, and in yet others more in number.
[Sidenote: p. 28.] And that the intervals between the ordered worlds
are unequal, here more and there less, and that some increase, others
flourish and others decay, and here they come into being and there they
are eclipsed.[89] But that they are destroyed by colliding with one
another. And that some ordered worlds are bare of animals and plants
and of all water. And that in our cosmos the earth came into being
first of the stars and that the moon is the lowest of the stars, and
then comes the sun and then the fixed stars: but that the planets are
not all at the same height. And he laughed at everything, as if all
things among men deserved laughter.
12. _About Xenophanes._
But Xenophanes of Colophon was the son of Orthomenes.[90] He survived
until the time of Cyrus. He first declared the incomprehensibility of
all things,[91] saying thus:
Although anyone should speak most definitely
He nevertheless does not know, and it is a guess[92] which occurs
about all things.