Theophrastus (
Greek Te?f?ast??;
371 – c.
287 BC), a native of
Eressos in
Lesbos,
[1] was the successor of
Aristotle in the
Peripatetic school. His interests were wide-ranging, extending from
biology and
physics to
ethics and
metaphysics. His two surviving
botanical works,
Enquiry into Plants and
On the Causes of Plants, were an important influence on
medieval science. There are also surviving works
On Moral Characters,
On Sensation,
On Stones, and fragments on
Physics and
Metaphysics. In philosophy, he studied
grammar and
language, and continued Aristotle's work on
logic. He also regarded
space as the mere arrangement and position of bodies,
time as an accident of motion, and
motion as a necessary consequence of all activity. In
ethics, he regarded
happiness as depending on external influences as well as on
virtue, and famously said that "life is ruled by fortune, not wisdom." He succeeded
Aristotle at the
Lyceum.
All the biographical information we have of him was provided by Diogenes Laërtius' Lives of the Philosophers, written four hundred years after Theophrastus' time, though "there is no intrinsic improbability in most of what Diogenes records."[2] His given name was Tyrtamus (Greek ???taµ??), but he later became known by the nickname "Theophrastus", given to him, it is said, by Aristotle to indicate the grace of his conversation (ancient Greek Te?? = God and f?ast?? = to phrase i.e divine expression).[3]
According to some sources, Theophrastus' father was named Messapus, and was married to a woman named Argiope and was the father of Cercyon -- but, this is not certain.
After receiving his first introduction to philosophy in Lesbos from one Leucippus or Alcippus, he proceeded to Athens, and became a member of the Platonist circle.[4] After Plato's death he attached himself to Aristotle, and in all probability accompanied him to Stagira. The intimate friendship of Theophrastus with Callisthenes,[5] the fellow-pupil of Alexander the Great, the mention made in his will of an estate belonging to him at Stagira,[6] and the repeated notices of the town and its museum in the nine books of his Enquiry into plants and his six books of Causes of Plants point to this conclusion.
