Note 168 — BOOK IV DIVINERS AND MAGICIANS
Francis Legge translation
The worshippers of the Greek Isis declared Isis to be the earth and Osiris water. See Forerunners, I, 73, for references. If Hippolytus is here recapitulating Books II and III, it is probable that the lacuna was occupied with some reference to the Alexandrian deities and their connection with the arithmetical speculations of the Neo-Pythagoreans. Could this be substantiated, we should not need to look further for the origin of the Simonian and Valentinian heresies.