Pythagoras: His Life and Teaching, a Compendium of Classical Sources Read Online Free PDF Page A

present in each thing, as the unifier of the many which brings discord into accord. Pythagoras assigned special importance to this principle, seeing that it was a necessary condition of each discrepant unit of being: for instance, it is inherent in musical structure, and in the constitution of individuals.
    To understand Pythagoras we cannot minimize his preoccupation with numbers and their application to specific concepts and objects. His theory applies specific numbers to everything, both animate and inanimate—for example, to man, plant, and earth. He also applied numbers to concepts: two is equated with opinion, four with justice, five with marriage, seven with timeliness.
    The decad was regarded as the inclusive, culminating, sacred number. The Pythagoreans, therefore, divided the universe into ten spheres: first was the circle of the Divine Fire, then the seven spheres of the planets, the earth, and Antichthon, which they proposed as a counter earth. This we never see, since its motion always keeps it at 180° from the earth, kept from view by the sun. They conceived of the heavenly bodies, not so much as physical bodies, but as energy centers, serving as agencies through which Divine intelligence expresses.
    The Tetractys, representing universal forces and processes, forms a pyramid by the use of 10 dots. It was the most revered symbol of the Pythagoreans. To construct the figure, four dots are used to form the base, three are placed above these, and then two upon them, and finally one. The one is unity, the two, diversity, the three, equilibrium, while the four is the smallest number of lines that can enclose a square.
    Pythagoras draws attention to the properties of the ten basic numbers:
    1.  The Monad, accepted before all others, because having no diversity, it is always the same;
    2.  The Duad, the audacious, because the first to separate from the One;
    3.  The Triad, because it grows out of the Duad, or great mother and the Monad, or divine father;
    4.  The Tetrad, because it provides the foundation of structure;
    5.  The Pentad, or equilibrium, because it divides ten into equal halves;
    6.  The Hexad, because it comprises the form of forms, and concerns the perfection of parts;
    7.  The Heptad, because it is the number of life and law;
    8.  The Ogdoad, because it symbolizes counsel, prudence, and love;
    9.  The Ennead, because it contains the first square of an odd number (3 × 3), and entails boundary or limitation;
    10.  The Decad, because it is the most inclusive, number, involving all arithmetic and harmonic possibilities.
    From the first ten numbers all others were created, since these involve the nature of all numbers.
    Pythagorean metaphysics teaches that creation was the result of a central fire formed in the center of the universe. This fire is the One, or Monad and therefore, is good. It is the moving principle of all, including the gods and heavenly bodies. Pythagoras was convinced that the central fire always was; hence, it was not appropriate to speculate upon a beginning of this first cause. As the objects of time and space were regarded mathematically, so the central fire was regarded dynamically. It is the spirit or soul of individuals, as well as of the universe, and is fused throughout the entirety of Being.
    The stars are highly evolved phases of the universe, having everything that the earth has, except more perfect. Pythagoras discovered Venus to be both a morning and evening star. He knew the motion of the heavenly bodies, and was aware of the unchangeable regularity of their orbits. In this he saw something divine. From the revolution of heavenly bodies he arrived at his theory of a universal year.
    The heavenly bodies give off a sound which the Pythagoreans called the harmony of the spheres. The tones produced by these bodies is in relation to their size, distance, density, and movement. As the planetary system produces a harmony, so too does the universe in its