Nemesius
On the Nature of Man
Distributed for Liverpool University Press
Translated with an Introduction by Philip van der Eijk and R. W. Sharples
256 pages
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5-3/4 x 8-1/4
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© 2008
On the Nature of Man is an invaluable text for historians of ancient thought, not only as a much contested source of evidence for earlier works now lost, but also as a vivid illustration of intellectual life in the late fourth century. Nemesius, its author, was a Christian bishop who was influenced by the medical works of Galen, as well as the philosophical writings of Plato, Aristotle, and Porphyry; the subject of the text is not only the nature of human beings and their place in the scheme of created things, but also an anthropological study of early Christian theology. A considerable influence on later Byzantine and medieval Latin philosophical theology, On the Nature of Man is an essential text for any scholar of the early history of medicine, theological history, and ancient studies.
Gretchen Reydams-Schils | Catholic Historical Review
"This translation with notes makes an important work accessible to a wider audience of scholars. . . . [The text] is important for the range of issues it covers, for the information it provides on how sources were used and philosophical views summarized and transmitted in late antiquity, and for enhancing our understanding of the interaction between pagan and Christian culture."
Contents
Preface
Abbreviations
Introduction
1 The importance of Nemesius
2 Nemesius and the scope of his treatise
3 Nemesius' Christianity
4 Nemesius' views
5 Nemesius' sources
Nemesius, On the Nature of Man
1 On the nature of man
2 On the soul
3 On the union of soul and body
4 On the body
5 On the elements
6 On imagination
7 On sight
8 On touch
9 On taste
10 On hearing
11 On smell
12 On thought
13 On memory
14 On immanent and expressed reason
15 Another division of the soul
16 On the non-rational part or kind of the soul, which is also called the affective and appetitive
17 On the desirous part
18 On pleasures
19 On distress
20 On anger
21 On fear
22 On the non-rational element that is not capable of obeying reason
23 On the nutritive faculty
24 On pulsation
25 On the generative or seminal faculty
26 Another division of the powers controlling living beings
27 On movement according to impulse or choice, which belongs to the appetitive part
28 On respiration
29 On the intentional and unintentional
30 On the unintentional
31 On the unintentional through ignorance
32 On the intentional
33 On choice
34 About what things do we deliberate?
35 On fate
36 On what is fated through the stars
37 On those who say that choice of actions is up to us
38 On Plato's account of fate
39 On what is up to us, or on autonomy
40 Concerning what things are up to us
41 For what reason were we born autonomous?
42 On providence
43 About what matters there is providence
Bibliography
Index of passages cited
General index
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