ed, or perishes,
or exists, according to this method of proceeding; but I mix up another
method of my own at random, for this I can on no account give in to."

"But, having once heard a person reading from a book, written, as he
said, by Anaxagoras, and which said that it is intelligence that sets in
order and is the cause of all things, I was delighted with this cause,
and it appeared to me in a manner to be well that intelligence should be
the cause of all things, and I considered with myself, if this is so,
that the regulating intelligence orders all things, and disposes each in
such way as will be best for it. 106. If any one, then, should desire to
discover the cause of every thing, in what way it is produced, or
perishes, or exists, he must discover this respecting it--in what way it
is best for it either to exist, or to suffer, or do any thing else. From
this mode of reasoning, then, it is proper that a man should consider
nothing else, both with respect to himself and others, than what is most
excellent and best; and it necessarily follows that this same person
must also know that which is worst, for that the knowledge of both of
them is the same. Thus reasoning with myself, I was delighted to think I
had found in Anaxagoras a preceptor who would instruct me in the causes
of things, agreeably to my own mind, and that he would inform me, first,
whether the earth is flat or round, and, when he had informed me,
would, moreover, explain the cause and necessity of its being so,
arguing on the principle of the better, and showing that it is better
for it to be such as it is; and if he should say that it is in the
middle, that he would, moreover, explain how it is better for it to be
in the middle; and if he should make all this clear to me, I was
prepared no longer to require any other species of cause. 107. I was in
like manner prepared to inquire respecting the sun and moon and the
other stars, with respect to their velocities in reference to each
other, and their revolutions and other conditions, in what way it is
better for both to act and be affected as it does and is. For I never
thought that after he had said that these things were set in order by
intelligence, he would introduce any other cause for them than that it
is best for them to be as they are. Hence, I thought, that in assigning
the cause to each of them, and to all in common, he would explain that
which is best for each, and the common good of all. And