Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers

​Euclides was from Megara on the Isthmus, or according to some, from Gela, as Alexander says in the Successions. He also adopted the Parmenidean teachings, and those who sprang from him were called Megarians, then Eristics, and later Dialecticians, whom Dionysius of Chalcedon first so named because they put their arguments into the form of question and answer. Hermodorus says that Plato and the rest of the philosophers went to him after the death of Socrates, fearing the cruelty of the tyrants. He used to declare that the Good is one, called by many names: for at times it is called prudence, at other times god, and at other times mind and the rest. But he abolished the things opposed to the Good, declaring that they do not exist.

​He attacked proofs not by their premises, but by their conclusion. And he abolished argument by analogy, saying that it consists either of like things or of unlike things; and if of like things, one ought to occupy oneself with the things themselves rather than with those to which they are like, but if of unlike things, the comparison is superfluous. For these reasons Timon also says of him as follows, while also snapping at the rest of the Socratics: "Nay, but for these babblers I care not, nor indeed for any other, neither for Phaedo, whoever he was, nor for the contentious Euclides, who instilled in the Megarians the frenzy of dispute."

​He composed six dialogues: Lamprias, Aeschines, Phoenix, Crito, Alcibiades, and The Amorous. Belonging to the succession of Euclides is also Eubulides of Miletus, who also proposed many arguments in dialectic: The Liar, The Disguised, Electra, The Veiled, The Sorites, The Horned, and The Bald. Concerning him, one of the comic poets says: "The eristic Eubulides, asking horned questions and confounding the orators with false and bragging arguments, departed with Demosthenes' pompous blather." For Demosthenes seems also to have been his pupil and, having had a speech defect, to have ceased from it.

​Eubulides was also at variance with Aristotle and slandered him greatly. Among others belonging to the succession of Eubulides was Alexinus of Elis, a most contentious man; wherefore he was also dubbed Elenxinus. He was especially at variance with Zeno. Hermippus says of him that, having left Elis for Olympia, he philosophized there. When his pupils asked why he resided there, he said that he wished to establish a school which should be called the Olympic. But they, being oppressed by lack of provisions and judging the place unhealthy, departed, and for the rest of the time Alexinus lived in solitude with a single servant; later, however, while swimming in the Alpheus, he was pierced by a reed and so perished.

​And there is an epigram of ours upon him, running as follows: "So that was no idle tale after all, that a certain unlucky man, while swimming, somehow pierced his foot with a nail. For the solemn man, Alexinus, before he could cross the Alpheus, died, pierced by a reed." He wrote not only against Zeno, but also other books, and against Ephorus the historian. Of Eubulides, Euphantus of Olynthus also became a pupil, who wrote a history of his own times. He also composed several tragedies, in which he won renown in the contests. He was also a teacher of King Antigonus, to whom he wrote a treatise On Kingship that was held in very high esteem. He ended his life in old age.

​There are also others who were pupils of Eubulides, among whom was Apollonius the Cronus, whose pupil was Diodorus, the son of Ameinias, of Iasus, who was himself surnamed Cronus, of whom Callimachus says in his Epigrams: "Momus himself wrote on the walls: 'Cronus is wise.'" He too was a dialectician, and was thought by some to have first discovered the Veiled and Horned arguments. While staying with Ptolemy Soter, he was asked certain dialectical arguments by Stilpo; and being unable to solve them on the spot, he was reproached by the king in other respects and indeed was called Cronus by way of a joke.

​Having left the symposium and written a treatise on the problem, he ended his life in despondency. And our epigram upon him is: "Diodorus Cronus, which of the deities brought you into wretched despondency, so that you cast yourself into Tartarus, unable to solve the riddling words of Stilpo? Truly you were found to be Cronus without the rho and the kappa." Of the pupils of Euclides there is also Ichthyas, son of Metallus, a worthy man, to whom Diogenes the Cynic also addressed a dialogue; and Clinomachus of Thurii, who first wrote on propositions, predicates, and the like; and Stilpo of Megara, a most illustrious philosopher, of whom we must speak.