rest of the elements. All these the
creator first set in order, and out of them he constructed the universe,
which was a single animal comprehending in itself all other animals,
mortal and immortal. Now of the divine, he himself was the creator,
but the creation of the mortal he committed to his offspring. And they,
imitating him, received from him the immortal principle of the soul; and
around this they proceeded to fashion a mortal body, and made it to
be the vehicle of the soul, and constructed within the body a soul of
another nature which was mortal, subject to terrible and irresistible
affections,--first of all, pleasure, the greatest incitement to evil;
then, pain, which deters from good; also rashness and fear, two
foolish counsellors, anger hard to be appeased, and hope easily led
astray;--these they mingled with irrational sense and with all-daring
love according to necessary laws, and so framed man. Wherefore, fearing
to pollute the divine any more than was absolutely unavoidable, they
gave to the mortal nature a separate habitation in another part of the
body, placing the neck between them to be the isthmus and boundary,
which they constructed between the head and breast, to keep them apart.
And in the breast, and in what is termed the thorax, they encased the
mortal soul; and as the one part of this was superior and the other
inferior they divided the cavity of the thorax into two parts, as the
women's and men's apartments are divided in houses, and placed the
midriff to be a wall of partition between them. That part of the
inferior soul which is endowed with courage and passion and loves
contention they settled nearer the head, midway between the midriff and
the neck, in order that it might be under the rule of reason and might
join with it in controlling and restraining the desires when they are no
longer willing of their own accord to obey the word of command issuing
from the citadel.

The heart, the knot of the veins and the fountain of the blood which
races through all the limbs, was set in the place of guard, that when
the might of passion was roused by reason making proclamation of any
wrong assailing them from without or being perpetrated by the desires
within, quickly the whole power of feeling in the body, perceiving
these commands and threats, might obey and follow through every turn and
alley, and thus allow the principle of the best to have the command in
all of them. But the gods, foreknowing