SVF II.54
Stoic: Chrysippus of Soli · Ancient source: Aëtius, Placita IV 12,1 (DDG p. 401,14) — Plac. 4.12,1 · Source language: Ancient Greek · Source status: Testimonium, Paraphrase by ancient source
Original — Ancient Greek
Χρύσιππος διαφέρειν ἀλλήλων φησὶ τέτταρα ταῦτα. φαντασία μὲν οὖν ἐστι πάθος ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ γιγνόμενον, ἐνδεικνύμενον ἐν αὑτῷ καὶ τὸ πεποιηκός. — Εἴρηται δὲ ἡ φαντασία ἀπὸ τοῦ φωτός· καθάπερ γὰρ τὸ φῶς αὑτὸ δείκνυσι καὶ τὰ ἄλλα τὰ ἐν αὐτῷ περιεχόμενα, καὶ ἡ φαντασία δείκνυσιν ἑαυτὴν καὶ τὸ πεποιηκὸς αὐτήν. Φανταστὸν δὲ τὸ ποιοῦν τὴν φαντασίαν· οἷον τὸ λευκὸν καὶ τὸ ψυχρὸν καὶ πᾶν ὅ,τι ἂν δύνηται κινεῖν τὴν ψυχήν, τοῦτ᾽ ἔστι φανταστόν. Φανταστικὸν δέ ἐστι διάκενος ἑλκυσμός, πάθος ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ ἀπ᾽ οὐδενὸς φανταστοῦ γινόμενον, καθάπερ ἐπὶ τοῦ σκιαμαχοῦντος καὶ κενοῖς ἐπιφέροντος τὰς χεῖρας· τῇ γὰρ φαντασίᾳ ὑπόκειταί τι φανταστόν, τῷ δὲ φανταστικῷ οὐδέν. Φάντασμα δέ ἐστιν ἐφ᾽ ὃ ἑλκόμεθα κατὰ τὸν φανταστικὸν διάκενον ἑλκυσμόν· ταῦτα δὲ γίνεται ἐπὶ τῶν μελαγχολώντων καὶ μεμηνότων.
StoicOs Translation
Chrysippus says these four differ from one another. An impression (phantasia) is an affection arising in the soul which reveals in itself also what produced it. — The impression is named from light: for as light shows itself and the other things contained in it, so the impression shows itself and what produced it. The impressor (phantaston) is what produces the impression: the white, the cold, everything able to move the soul. Empty attraction (phantastikon) is an affection in the soul arising from no impressor, as with the man who shadow-boxes and strikes at emptiness — for the impression has some impressor underlying it, the empty attraction none. A figment (phantasma) is that to which we are drawn in such empty attraction; these things occur in the melancholic and the mad.
Context
The doxographer Aëtius preserves, under Chrysippus' name, the school's technical vocabulary of cognition — the entry-point of the whole Stoic theory of knowledge that Zeno had founded with the kataleptic impression.
Text verified against von Arnim, SVF II (1903), no. 54, pp. 21–22 (OCR of the scanned edition; Greek OCR of Vol. II is of high quality). Excerpted: the four definitions; the elided passages give a sensory example and Euripides' Orestes as illustration of the phantasma.
What the source actually tells us
A named report ('Chrysippus says…') in doxographic language, with the light-comparison and the shadow-boxer example preserved — images concrete enough to suggest his own manner. The definitions themselves are fourfold and systematic, his hallmark.
Philosophical meaning
Cognition begins with a distinction. A true impression carries its cause within it, like light showing both itself and its objects; hallucination is pull without an object. On this fourfold grid rest assent, katalepsis and action: the sane mind is the one that can tell what kind of appearance it is receiving.
Scholarly uncertainty
The wording is the doxographer's compression; which book of Chrysippus it summarises is not stated. The etymology of phantasia from phōs is school lore that may predate him.
Go deeper
- Read SVF I.59 — Zeno's kataleptic impression
- Read SVF II.277 — the sorites: when the wise man falls silent
- Read SVF II.974 — impression, assent and the cylinder
About this edition
StoicOs Ancient Library is a developing multilingual digital study edition of surviving early Stoic material. The Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta assembled by Hans von Arnim provides the traditional reference framework. StoicOs distinguishes carefully between fragments, testimonia, later reports and interpretation. StoicOs translations are prepared from the surviving ancient-language sources where available.
Chrysippus of Soli — SVF · Ancient Library · StoicOs.ai — Home