Plato on Providential Ecology
Disobedient Stomachs
“What comes next needs to be pursued along the same lines, and that is: how has the rest of our body come to be? It would be more fitting than anything else if it had been composed following a rationale like the following: those who were putting our kind together were aware of the intemperance for food and drink that would exist within us, and that we would want much more than what is moderate or necessary because of our gluttony. Therefore, to prevent wasting away swiftly through disease and the immediate and complete coming to an end of the incomplete race of mortals, the gods, foreseeing these problems, set up a receptacle, called the “lower belly,” to serve as a container for surplus food and drink; and they coiled the entrails around as they made them, in order to prevent food from passing through too quickly, a situation which would quickly compel the body to need even more food and produce insatiable desire, a gastric-gluttony on account of which the whole race would be rendered unphilosophical, uncultured and disobedient to what is most divine in us.”
τὸ δ᾽ ἑξῆς δὴ τούτοισιν κατὰ ταὐτὰ μεταδιωκτέον: ἦν δὲ τὸ τοῦ σώματος ἐπίλοιπον ᾗ γέγονεν. ἐκ δὴ λογισμοῦ τοιοῦδε συνίστασθαι μάλιστ᾽ ἂν αὐτὸ πάντων πρέποι. τὴν ἐσομένην ἐν ἡμῖν ποτῶν καὶ ἐδεστῶν ἀκολασίαν ᾔδεσαν οἱ συντιθέντες ἡμῶν τὸ γένος, καὶ ὅτι τοῦ μετρίου καὶ ἀναγκαίου διὰ μαργότητα πολλῷ χρησοίμεθα πλέονι: ἵν᾽ οὖν μὴ φθορὰ διὰ νόσους ὀξεῖα γίγνοιτο καὶ ἀτελὲς τὸ γένος εὐθὺς τὸ θνητὸν τελευτῷ, ταῦτα προορώμενοι τῇ τοῦ περιγενησομένου πώματος ἐδέσματός τε ἕξει τὴν ὀνομαζομένην κάτω κοιλίαν ὑποδοχὴν ἔθεσαν, εἵλιξάν τε πέριξ τὴν τῶν ἐντέρων γένεσιν, ὅπως μὴ ταχὺ διεκπερῶσα ἡ τροφὴ ταχὺ πάλιν τροφῆς ἑτέρας δεῖσθαι τὸ σῶμα ἀναγκάζοι, καὶ παρέχουσα ἀπληστίαν, διὰ γαστριμαργίαν ἀφιλόσοφον καὶ ἄμουσον πᾶν ἀποτελοῖ τὸ γένος, ἀνυπήκοον τοῦ θειοτάτου τῶν παρ᾽ ἡμῖν.