Heraclides Lembus Quotes

Heraclides Lembus was a Greek Peripatetic philosopher and Egyptian official of the second century BC, who served Ptolemy VI Philometor and is credited with negotiating the famous Day of Eleusis intervention by Rome to expel Antiochus IV from Egypt in 168 BC. As a philosopher he composed a continuation of Sotion of Alexandria's Successions of the Philosophers and a long collection of historical and antiquarian materials, and is best known for the abridgment of Aristotle's lost Constitutions of Greek States, fragments of which survive in later epitomes. The quotes below are attributed to Heraclides Lembus, organized by topic.

Heraclides Lembus on Knowledge

Attributed to Heraclides Lembus:

“Successions of the philosophers are the trellis on which their thought has grown.”
Attributed to Heraclides Lembus:

“What is preserved of Aristotle's research must be re-read by every age in turn.”
Attributed to Heraclides Lembus:

“He who would write the history of thought must first know the politics of his own day.”

Heraclides Lembus on Politics

Attributed to Heraclides Lembus:

“The wise man is a citizen first; his philosophy must serve the city he inhabits.”
Attributed to Heraclides Lembus:

“Public life is the testing ground for what private philosophy has already settled.”