Opening Fragments — Heraclitus in Plato Scroll…
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Heraclitus · John Burnet
Translated by John Burnet, 1920 (Early Greek Philosophy, 3rd edition). Fragment numbers follow Burnet; the parenthetical numbers are Bywater’s. Tap the Ω mark to view the Greek text of a fragment. (2) Though this Word is true evermore, yet men are as unable to understand it when they hear it for the first time as before they have heard it at all. For, though all things come to pass in accordance with this Word, men seem as if they had no experience of them, when they make trial of words and deeds such as I set forth, dividing each thing according to its kind and showing how it truly is. But other men know not what they are doing when awake, even as they forget what they do in sleep. R. P. 32. (92) So we must follow the common, yet though my Word is common, the many live as if they had a wisdom of their own. R. P. 44. (The sun is the width of a human foot.) (51a) Oxen are happy when they …
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