[22] γυμνοὺς καὶ ἀσχήμονας, nudos et turpes, Cr. Stripped of originality seems to be the threat intended.
[23] φιλοσοφίαν φυσικήν. What we should now call Physics.
[24] τὸ πᾶν is the phrase here and elsewhere used for the universe or “whole” of Nature, and includes Chaos or unformed Matter. The κόσμος or ordered world is only part of the universe. Diog. Laert., I, vit. Thales, c. 6, says merely that Thales thought water to be the ἀρχή or beginning of all things. As this is confirmed by all other Greek writers who have quoted him, we may take the further statement here attributed to him as the mistake of Hippolytus or of the compiler he is copying.
[25] ἀέρων in text. Roeper suggests ἄστρων, “stars.”
[26] So Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis, V, c. 14, and Diog. Laert., I. vit. cit., c. 9.
[27] Diog. Laert., I, vit. cit., c. 8, makes his derider an old woman. Θρᾶττα is not a proper name, but means a Thracian woman, as Hippolytus should have known.
[28] Roeper adds καὶ ἀριθμετικήν, apparently in view of the speculations about the monad.
[29] Aristotle in his Metaphysica, Bk. I, c. 5, attributes the first use of this dogma to Xenophanes.
[30] By these are meant the planets, including therein the Sun and Moon. Cf. Sextus Empiricus, Adversus Astrologos, p. 343 (Cod.) passim.
[31] τὰ ὅλα = entities which must needs differ from one another in kind. The phrase is thus used by Plato, Aristotle and all the neo-Platonic writers.