Preparation for the Gospel

Eusebius of Caesarea, tr. Gifford, 1903

Book 15, 47. Of the Course and Motion of the Heavenly Bodies

‘ANAXAGORAS, Democritus, Cleanthes: all the fixed stars pass from east to west.

‘Alcmaeon and the Mathematicians: the planets move in an opposite direction to the fixed stars; for theirs is the contrary course from west to east.

‘Anaximander: they are borne along by the circles and spheres on which they are each set.

‘Anaximenes: the stars do not revolve beneath the Earth, but around it.

‘Plato and the Mathematicians: the Sun, the Day-star, and Stilbon (Venus and Mercury) have equal orbits.’