30 THE GREEK SCHOOL PHILOSOPHY. 



no want of a theory. Not so the Greeks ; they had 

 their reasons to render, though they were not such 

 as satisfied Herodotus. "Some of the Greeks," he 

 says, "who wish to be considered great philosophers, 

 ('EAAj/i/aJi/ Tti/es eTTto'tjfioi (3ov\6/j.itot yeveaOat ao&iriv) 

 have propounded three ways of accounting for these 

 floods. Two of them," he adds, "I do not think 

 worthy of record, except just so far as to mention 

 them." But as these are some of the earliest Greek 

 essays in physical philosophy, it will be worth while, 

 even at this day, to preserve the brief notice he has 

 given of them, and his own reasonings upon the 

 same subject. 



"One of these opinions holds that the Etesian 

 winds [which blew from the north] are the cause of 

 these floods, by preventing the Nile from flowing 

 into the sea." Against this the historian reasons 

 very simply and sensibly. "Very often when the 

 Etesian winds do not blow, the Nile is flooded 

 nevertheless. And moreover, if the Etesian winds 

 were the cause, all other rivers, which have their 

 course opposite to these winds, ought to undergo 

 the same changes as the Nile ; which the rivers of 

 Syria and Libya so circumstanced do not." 



"The next opinion is still more unscientific, 

 (dveTTiGTrifjioveGTepri) and is, in truth, marvellous for 

 its folly. This holds that the ocean flows all round 

 the earth, and that the Nile comes out of the ocean, 

 and by that means produces its effects." "Now," 

 says the historian, " the man who talks about this 



