a native of Scyros, flourished about the year 560 before the Christian era, and was disciple of Pittacus, one of the seven wise men of Greece (see PITTAUS). He is said to have been the first of all the philosophers who has written on natural subjects and the essence of the gods. He was also the first, it is said, who held the ridiculous opinion, "that animals are mere machines." He was Pythagoras's master, who loved him as his own father. This grateful scholar having heard that Pherecydes lay dangerously ill in the island of Delos, immediately repaired thither, in order to give every necessary assistance to the old man, and to take care that no means should be left untried for the recovery of his health. His great age, however, and the violence of his disease, having rendered every prescription ineffectual, his next care was to see him decently buried; and when he had paid the last duty to his remains, and erected a monument to his memory, he set out again for Italy. Other causes have been assigned for the death of Pherecydes: some say he was eaten up by lice, and others that he fell headlong from the top of Mount Corycins in his way to Delphos. He lived to the age of 85 years, and was one of the first prose writers among the Greeks.

"Marvellous circumstances have been related of him, which only deserve to be mentioned, in order to show that what has been deemed supernatural by ignorant spectators may be easily conceived to have happened from natural causes. A ship in full sail was at a distance approaching its harbour; Pherecydes predicted that it would never come into the haven, and it happened accordingly; for a storm arose which sunk the vessel. After drinking water from a well, he predicted an earthquake, which happened three days afterwards. It is easy to suppose that these predictions might have been the result of a careful observation of those phenomena which commonly precede storms or earthquakes in a climate where they frequently happen."

"It is difficult to give in any degree an accurate account of the doctrines of Pherecydes; both because he delivered them, after the manner of the times, under the concealment of symbols; and because very few memoirs of this philosopher remain. It is most probable that he taught those opinions concerning the gods and the origin of the world which the ancient Grecian theologians borrowed from Egypt;" and of which the reader will find accounts in different articles.