Book 1
7
Apparently Alcmaeon of Croton speculated along the same lines, and either he derived the theory from them or they from him; for [Alcmaeon was contemporary with the old age of Pythagoras, and]This statement is probably true, but a later addition. his doctrines were very similar to theirs.He was generally regarded as a Pythagorean. He says that the majority of things in the world of men are in pairs; but the contraries which he mentions are not, as in the case of the Pythagoreans, carefully defined, but are taken at random, e.g. white and black, sweet and bitter, good and bad, great and small.
8
Thus Alcmaeon only threw out vague hints with regard to the other instances of contrariety, but the Pythagoreans pronounced how many and what the contraries are. Thus from both these authoritiesThe section of Pythagoreans mentioned in 6, and Alcmaeon. we can gather thus much, that the contraries are first principles of things; and from the former, how many and what the contraries are.
9
How these can be referred to our list of causes is not definitely expressed by them, but they appear to reckon their elements as material; for they say that these are the original constituents of which Being is fashioned and composed.
