[452] c. Cels. 6. 56; de princ. 2. 10.
[453] De princ. 3. 1. 14, 17.
[454] 3. 6. 3.
[455] Cf. Justin, Dial. c. Tryph. 2.
[456] The more common conception of the earliest Greek philosophy was that of τὰς ἐνδιηκούσας τοῖς στοιχείοις ἢ τοῖς σώμασι δυνάμεις, Aetius ap. Stob. Ecl. Phys. 2. 29.
[457] The form in which it is given by Sextus Empiricus, in whose time the distinction was clearly understood, implies this: ἓν εἶναι τὸ πάν καὶ τὸν θεόν συμφιῆ πᾶσι, Pyrrh. Hypotyp. 225.
[458] This is a post-Platonic summary of Plato’s conception; into the inner development, and consequently varying expressions, of it in Plato’s own writings it is not necessary to enter here. It is more important in relation to the history of later Greek thought to know what he was supposed to mean than what he meant. The above is taken from the summary of Aetius in Plut. de plac. philos. 1. 7, Euseb. Præp. evang. 14. 16 (Diels, Doxographi Græci, p. 304). The briefest and most expressive statement of the transcendence of God (τὸ ἀγαθόν) in Plato’s own writings is probably Republic, p. 509, οὐκ οὐσίας ὄντος τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ, ἀλλ’ ἔτι ἐπέκεινα τῆς οὐσίας πρεσβείᾳ καὶ δυνάμει ὑπερέχοντος.
[459] It was a struggle between this and Stoicism.
[460] Plutarch, de Ei ap. Delph. 18; cf. Ocellus Lucanus in the Augustan Age, ap. Diels, 187, Mullach, i. p. 383 sq. The universe has no beginning and no end: it always was and always will be (1. 1. p. 388). It comprises, however, τὸ ποιοῦν and τὸ πάσχον, the former above the moon, the latter below, so that the course of the moon marks the limit between the changing and changeless, the ἀεὶ θέοντος θείου and the ἀεὶ μεταβάλλοντος γενητοῦ (2. 1, p. 394, 2. 23, p. 400).
[461] Max. Tyr. Diss. 8. 9.