Lines 27.14–17 of the text published by Justin Stover as Apuleius, De Platone 3Footnote 1 are printed by him as follows:
quorum [sc. animalium] inmortalia esse quae in caelo sint; idcirco illa ordine cieri et eodem semper modo et alioquin esse prudentia.
Of them [sc. animals], the immortal animals are those which are in the heavens; thus they move in an ordered pattern in the same way, and in addition, they are rational. (trans. J. Stover)
As Stover notes,Footnote 2 this passage is based on Epinomis 981e–982a and 982d–e:
… νομίσαι δὲ δὴ δεῖ πάλιν τὰ κατ’ οὐρανὸν ζῴων γένη [cf. quae in caelo sint], ὃ δὴ πᾶν χρὴ φάναι θεῖον γένος ἄστρων γεγονέναι, σώματος μὲν τυχὸν καλλίστου, ψυχῆς δ’ εὐδαιμονεστάτης τε καὶ ἀρίστης. δυοῖν δὲ αὐτοῖς μοιρῶν τὴν ἑτέραν χρὴ δόξῃ μεταδιδόναι σχεδόν· ἢ γὰρ ἀνώλεθρόν τε καὶ ἀθάνατον ἕκαστον αὐτῶν εἶναι [cf. inmortalia esse] καὶ θεῖον τὸ παράπαν ἐξ ἁπάσης ἀνάγκης, ἤ τινα μακραίωνα βίον ἔχειν ἱκανὸν ἑκάστῳ ζωῆς, ἧς οὐδέν τι πλείονος ἂν προσδεῖσθαί ποτε.
… and these [sc. creatures with fiery bodies] again we must conceive to be heavenly kinds of creatures [lit. ‘animals’], which altogether, we must agree, have been born of the divine race of stars, endowed with the fairest body as also with the happiest and best soul. One or other of two lots we may very well, in our opinion, assign to them: for each of them is either imperishable and immortal, and by all necessity wholly divine, or has a certain longevity sufficient for the life of each, such that nothing could ever require a longer one. (trans. W.R.M. Lamb)
τοῦθ’ ἡμῶν τοῖς πολλοῖς αὐτὸ τοὐναντίον ἔδοξεν, ὅτι τὰ αὐτὰ καὶ ὡσαύτως πράττει, ψυχὴν οὐκ ἔχειν· οὕτω τοῖς ἄφροσι συνεφέσπετο τὸ πλῆθος, ὡς τὸ μὲν ἀνθρώπινον ἔμφρον καὶ ζῶν ὡς κινούμενον ὑπολαβεῖν, τὸ δὲ θεῖον ἄφρον ὡς μένον ἐν ταῖς αὐταῖς φοραῖς [cf. ordine]· ἐξῆν δὲ ἀνθρώπῳ γε ἐπὶ τὰ καλλίω καὶ βελτίω καὶ φίλα τιθεμένῳ λαμβάνειν ὡς διὰ τοῦτο αὐτὸ ἔμφρον [cf. prudentia] δεῖ νομίζειν τὸ κατὰ ταὐτὰ καὶ ὡσαύτως καὶ διὰ ταὐτὰ πρᾶττον ἀεί [cf. semper eodem modo], τοῦτο δ’ εἶναι τὴν τῶν ἄστρων φύσιν …
Most of us have thought just the opposite—that because they [sc. the stars] do the same things in the same way they have no soul: the multitude followed the lead of the unintelligent so far as to suppose that, whereas humanity was intelligent and living because it moved about, divinity was unintelligent because it abode in the same courses. But if man had sided with the fairer and better and friendly part, he might have concluded that he ought to regard as intelligent—and for this very reason—that which acts always in the same respects, in the same way, and from the same causes; and that this is the nature of the stars … (trans. W.R.M. Lamb)
ordine cieri is Stover's conjecture for the manuscript reading ordinem queri; he translates ‘thus they move in an ordered pattern’. In his noteFootnote 3 Stover makes it clear that he considers cieri here an equivalent of κινούμενον in the Greek text (though applied there to a different object), and points out that Cicero uses cieri of motion in his Timaeus (cf. Cic. Tim. 24: orbis semper in eodem erat eodemque modo ciebatur). But, whether the text is really by Apuleius or not and whatever its date,Footnote 4 the manuscript reading shows that what should be read there is definitely ordine moueri, the corruption being due to incorrect word division.Footnote 5 moueri is also a much more expected word choice for the author of the ‘new Apuleius’: elsewhere in this text he uses moueo four times (thrice in passive; for example, cf. 32.15 moueri autem eum [sc. mundum] in orbem) and never uses cieo.Footnote 6
