The Universe to Socrates

I believe that the earth is a round body in the centre of the heavens.

• It does not need air or any similar force for support
• It is kept there and hindered from falling or inclining any way by:
  • the equability of the surrounding heaven and
  • her own equipoise.

A thing in equipoise is in the centre of that which is equably diffused.

• It will not incline any way in any degree

I also believe that the earth is very vast.

• We live in the region extending from the river Phasis to the Pillars of Heracles.
• We inhabit a small portion only about the sea, like ants or frogs about a marsh
• There are other inhabitants of many other like places
• Everywhere on the face of the earth there are hollows of various forms and sizes, into which the water and the mist and the lower air collect.

But the true earth is pure and situated in the pure heaven—there are the stars also.

It is the heaven which we commonly call the ether. Our own earth is the sediment gathering in the hollows beneath it.

But we who live in these hollows are deceived into thinking that we are dwelling above on the surface of the earth. This is the same as a creature at the bottom of the sea fancies that:

• he was on the surface of the water, and
• the sea was the heaven through which he saw the sun and the stars

He has never come to the surface because of his feebleness and sluggishness. He has never lifted up his head and seen, nor ever heard from one who had seen, how much purer and fairer the world above is than his own.

We are dwelling in a hollow of the earth and imagine that we are on the surface. We call the air as heaven, in which we imagine that the stars move.

Due to our feebleness and sluggishness, we are prevented from reaching the surface of the air. If any man could arrive at the exterior limit, or take the wings of a bird and come to the top, then like a fish who puts his head out of the water and sees this world, he would see a world beyond.

If the nature of man could sustain the sight, he would acknowledge that this other world was the place of the true heaven and the true light and the true earth.

For our earth, the stones, and the entire region which surrounds us, are spoilt and corroded, as in the sea all things are corroded by the brine, neither is there any noble or perfect growth, but caverns only, and sand, and an endless slough of mud= and even the shore is not to be compared to the fairer sights of this world.

And still less is this our world to be compared with the other.

I can tell you a charming tale, Simmias, of that upper earth which is under the heaven.

The earth, when looked at from above, is streaked like one of those balls which have leather coverings in 12 pieces.

• It is decked with various colours like the ones used by painters on earth.

But there, the whole earth is made up of them. They are brighter far and clearer than ours.

There is a purple of wonderful lustre, the radiance of gold, and the white which is in the earth is whiter than any chalk or snow.

The earth is made up of these colors.

They are more in number and fairer than the eye of man has ever seen. The very hollows where we are is filled with air and water having a colour of their own.

They are seen like light gleaming amid the diversity of the other colours, so that the whole presents a single and continuous appearance of variety in unity.

In this fair region, everything that grows—trees, and flowers, and fruits—are in a like degree fairer than any here.

There are hills, having stones in them in a like degree smoother, and more transparent, and fairer in colour than our highly-valued emeralds and sardonyxes and jaspers, and other gems, which are but minute fragments of them.

There all the stones are like our precious stones, and fairer still.

This is because they are pure.

They are not like our precious stones which are infected or corroded by the corrupt briny elements which coagulate among us. These elements breed foulness and disease in:

• earth and stones
• animals and plants.

They are the jewels of the upper earth, which also shines with gold and silver and the like.

They are set in the light of day and are large and abundant and in all places, making the earth a sight to gladden the beholder’s eye.

There are animals and men, some in a middle region, others dwelling about the air as we dwell about the sea. Others in islands which the air flows round, near the continent.

The air is used by them as the water and the sea are by us. The ether is to them what the air is to us.

The temperament of their seasons is such that they have no disease, and live much longer than we do.

They have sight, hearing, smell, and all the other senses in far greater perfection, in the same proportion that air is purer than water or the ether than air.

They have temples and sacred places in which the gods really dwell.

They hear their voices and receive their answers, and are conscious of them and hold converse with them.

They see the sun, moon, and stars as they truly are, and their other blessedness is of a piece with this.

Such is the nature of the whole earth, and of the things which are around the earth.