HERACLITUS

Heraclitus lived around the year 500 BC, in the Greek city of Ephesus in Asia Minor. Little is known about his life, but later ancient historians wrote that he was from an influential family; that he was a snob and wrote in a difficult language so that only few would understand him (hence the name “Heraclitus the obscure”); and that he was a pessimist (hence the name “the weeping philosopher”). He died of some illness at the age of 60.

Heraclitus wrote one book in which he attempted to cover all knowledge. Its main themes were: that all things follow the Logos – the universal law that governs all; that most people live half-asleep and do not understand the Logos; that everything in the world is in a constant change; that fire is the basic principle of reality; that good and bad are relative to one’s perspective; and that the processes of nature are governed by conflict between opposites, or tension between opposite forces.

1. Although the Logos is valid forever, yet men are unable to understand it, not only before they hear it, but even after hearing it for the first time. Thus, although all things come into being according to this Logos, men seem as if they have never experienced it – in terms of the ideas and processes I am explaining here, separating each thing according to its nature and explaining how it behaves. Other men are not aware of what they are doing when awake, just as they are when asleep.

2. We should let ourselves be guided by the Logos which is common to all. But although the Logos is common to all, most people live as if they had their own private understanding.

8. What opposes unites, and the finest harmony comes from things that are different from each other.

12. When different people step into the same river, they always have different waters flowing upon them.

30. This cosmos, which is the same for all, was not made by any god or man, but it always was, is, and will be. It is an ever-living fire, kindled in regular measures and reduced in regular measures.

35. Men who love wisdom must inquire about very many things indeed.

41. Wisdom is one thing: to understand the intelligence which directs all things through all things.

45. You cannot discover the limits of the soul, even if you travel the whole way; so deep is its meaning.

47. Let us not speculate randomly about the most important things.

49a. In the same river, we both step and do not step, we are and we are not.

51. People do not understand how things which are in conflict with themselves agree with themselves. Harmony consists of opposing tension, like the tension of the bow and the lyre.

60. The way up and the way down are one and the same.

61. The sea is the purest and most polluted: For fish, it is drinkable and life-giving; for men it is undrinkable and destructive.

72. The Logos: Although people are connected with the Logos most closely, yet they separate themselves from it, and those things which they encounter daily seem to them strange.

73. We must not act and speak like men asleep.

78. Human nature has no power of understanding; but the divine nature has it.

80. One should understand that war is universal, that justice is conflict, and all things come into being through conflict and necessity.

88. What is in us, is the same thing: living and dead, awake and asleep, young and old. Because the second in each pair changes to become the first, and then it is changed back to become the second.

89. Those who are awake have one cosmos that is common to all, but when they are asleep each man turns away to a world of his own.

90. All things are an exchange for fire, and fire is an exchange for all things, just as goods are exchanged for gold and gold for goods.

91. You cannot step twice into the same river, because new water scatters and combines, approaches and separates.

101. I have searched myself.

107. The eyes and ears are bad witnesses for me, if they have barbarian souls.

114. To speak with intelligence, we must rely on what is common to all, just as a city relies on its law, and even more strongly. Because all human laws are nourished by the divine law, which governs as much as it wants, and is enough for all things, and more than enough.

124. The most beautiful universe is just a heap of dust piled up randomly.

126. Cold things grow hot, hot things grow cold, the wet dries, the dry is moistened.