This volume covers three main areas of study. Firstly, the metaphysics of Aristotle's logical works, secondly the logic in a more conventional sense and lastly the higher metaphysics of the Neoplatonists. All sources appear in English translation.

The physics of the commentators was innovatory. The Neoplatonists thought the world of space and time was ordered by a non-spatial, non-temporal world. Simplicius considered his teacher's ideas on space and time to be unprecedented, and Philoponus revised Aristotelianism around Christian thought.

Psychology was, for the Neoplatanist commentators, the gateway to metaphysics and theology. It was the subject on which Plato and Aristotle disagreed most. Ethics and religious practice fall naturally under psychology and are included in this volume. All sources appear in English translation.

Animals can't construct sentences. Therefore we can eat them. That was the view the Stoics eventually settled for, though they began with Aristotle's much broader claim that animals lack reason.

The volumes of ancient Greek commentators on Aristotle, constituted the largest corpus of extant Greek philosophical writings not translated into English or other European languages. "Proclus' Commentary on Plato's Cratylus" is only ancient commentary on this work to have come down to us. This work consists of excerpts from Proclus' commentary.

Until the launch of this series in 1985, the 15,000 volumes of the ancient Greek commentators on Aristotle, written mainly between 200 and 600 AD, constituted the largest corpus of extant Greek philosophical writings not translated into English or other European languages.
Syrianus, originally from Alexandria, moved to Athens and became the head of the Academy there after the death of Plutarch of Athens. Syrianus attacked Aristotle in his commentary on Books 13 and 14 of the Metaphysics, just as his pupil Proclus was to do later in his commentaries on Plato. This is because in...

Until the launch of this series nearly twenty years ago, the 15,000 volumes of the ancient Greek commentators on Aristotle, written mainly between 200 and 600 AD, constituted the largest corpus of extant Greek philosophical writings not translated into English or other European languages. Aspasius' commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics, of which six books have come down to us, is the oldest surviving Greek commentary on any of Aristotle's works, dating to the middle of the second century AD. It offers precious insight into the thinking and pedagogical methods of the Peripatetic school...

'The universe is, as it were, one machine, wherein the celestial spheres are analogous to the interlocking wheels and the particular beings are like the things moved by the wheels' and all events are determined by an inescapable necessity. To speak of free choice or self determination is only an illusion we human beings cherish. Thus writes Theodore the engineer to his old friend Proclus. Proclus' reply is one of the most remarkable discussions on fate, providence and free choice in Late Antiquity. It continues a long debate that had started with the first polemics of the Platonists against...

Aristotle devotes books 8-9 of the Nicomachean Ethics to friendship, distinguishing three kinds: a primary kind motivated by the other's character; and other kinds motivated by utility or pleasure. He takes up Plato's idea that one knows oneself better as reflected in another's eyes, as providing one of the benefits of friendship, and he also sees true friendship as modelled on true self-love. He further compares friendship with justice, and illustrates the ubiquity of friendship by referring to the way in which we help wayfarers as if they were kin (oikeion), a word he takes from...