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Xenophanes of Colophon

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Philospher and poet; b. c. *580 BC* (Colophon, Ionia), d. c. *488 BC*

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Details about Xenophanes' life are sketchy, and only fragments of his
works remain. Most of the evidence about him comes from the testimony of
others, which indicate that Xenophanes was held in high regard.

Diogenes reports that Xenophanes wrote an epic of 2,000 verses to
celebrate the founding of Elea in southern Italy. Others regard him as
one of the founders of the Eleatic school of philosophy, which taught
that the separate existence of material things was only appearance and
that unity of all things was the main principle of the universe.

Xenophanes had to leave Greece when the Persians conquered Colophon
about 546 BC. He lived in Sicily for a time but began to travel around
the Mediterranean, reciting his epics to support himself and eventually
making Elea his home.

The fragments of his epics known today show the conflict between the
religions of the ancient civilizations and the new Greek religion.
Xenophanes advocates the existence of one god and makes mockery of the
idea that gods resemble humans:

* "God is one, supreme among gods and men, and not like mortals in
body or in mind."
* "The whole [of god] sees, the whole perceives, the whole hears."
* "But without effort he sets in motion all things by mind and
thought."
* "It [ie. being] always abides in the same place, not moved at all,
nor is it fitting that it should move from one place to another."
* "But mortals suppose that the gods are born (as they themselves
are), and that they wear man's clothing and have human voice and
body."
* "But if cattle or lions had hands, so as to paint with their hands
and produce works of art as men do, they would paint their gods
and give them bodies in form like their own - horses like horses,
cattle like cattle."
* "Homer and Hesiod attributed to the gods all things which are
disreputable and worthy of blame when done by men; and they told
of them many lawless deeds, stealing, adultery, and deception of
each other." 

The idea of one god who "sets in motion all things" did not find favour
with his contemporaries. Xenophanes himself was influenced by the new
scientific attitude; some of his fragments show him as a natural
philosopher who tries to explain the nature of all things without
invoking a god:

* "For all things come from earth, and all things end by becoming
earth."
* "For we are all sprung from earth and water."
* "All things that come into being and grow are earth and water."
* "The sea is the source of water and the source of wind; for
neither would blasts of wind arise in the clouds and blow out from
within them, except for the great sea, nor would the streams of
rivers nor the rain-water in the sky exist but for the sea; but
the great sea is the begetter of clouds and winds and rivers."
* "This upper limit, of earth at our feet is visible and touches the
air, but below it reaches to infinity. " 

Aristotle, who shared some of Xenophanes' views, credits him with the
foundation of the philosophical school in Elea. Plato referred to this
also when he said that "The Eleatic school, beginning with Xenophanes
and even earlier, starts from the principle of the unity of all things."
Theophrastus said that Xenophanes' teaching rested on the premise that
"The all is one and the one is God."

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Reference

The translations of the fragments are taken from

Arthur Fairbanks, ed. and trans. (1898) Xenophanes, Fragments and
Commentary, in: /The First Philosophers of Greece/, London: K. Paul,
Trench, Trubner, 65-85.
(quoted from http://history.hanover.edu/texts/presoc/xenophan.htm)

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