Delphi Complete Works of Lucretius

by Titus Lucretius Carus

  contingunt mellis dulci flavoque liquore,

  ut puerorum aetas inprovida ludificetur

  15 labrorum tenus, interea perpotet amarum

  absinthi laticem deceptaque non capiatur,

  sed potius tali facto recreata valescat,

  sic ego nunc, quoniam haec ratio plerumque videtur

  tristior esse quibus non est tractata, retroque

  20 volgus abhorret ab hac, volui tibi suaviloquenti

  carmine Pierio rationem exponere nostram

  et quasi musaeo dulci contingere melle;

  si tibi forte animum tali ratione tenere

  versibus in nostris possem, dum percipis omnem

  25 naturam rerum ac persentis utilitatem.

  Sed quoniam docui cunctarum exordia rerum

  qualia sint et quam variis distantia formis

  sponte sua volitent aeterno percita motu

  quoque modo possit res ex his quaeque creari,

  [1] I TRAVERSE the pathless haunts of the Pierides never yet trodden by sole of man.

  I love to approach the untasted springs and to quaff; I love to cull fresh flowers and gather for my head a distinguished crown from spots whence the muses have yet veiled the brows of none; first because I teach of great things and essay to release the mind from the fast bonds of religious scruples, and next because on a dark subject I pen such lucid verses, overlaying all with the muses’ charm.

  For that too would seem to be not without good grounds: even as physicians when they propose to give nauseous wormwood to children, first smear the rim round the bowl with the sweet yellow juice of honey, that the unthinking age of children may be fooled as far as the lips, and meanwhile drink up the bitter draught of wormwood and though beguiled yet not be betrayed, but rather by such means recover health and strength: so now, since this doctrine seems generally somewhat bitter to those by whom it has not been handled, and the multitude shrinks back from it in dismay, have resolved to set forth to you our doctrine in sweet-toned Pierian verse and overlay it, as it were, with the pleasant honey of the muses, if haply by such means I might engage your mind on my verses, till such time as you apprehend all the nature of things and thoroughly feel what use it has.

  And now that I have taught what the nature of the mind is and out of what things it is formed into one quickened being with the body, and how it is dissevered and returns into its first-beginnings, I will attempt to lay before you a truth which most nearly concerns these questions, the existence of things which we call idols of things:

  30 nunc agere incipiam tibi quod vehementer ad has res

  attinet esse ea quae rerum simulacra vocamus,

  quae quasi membranae vel cortex nominitandast,

  atque animi quoniam docui natura quid esset

  et quibus e rebus cum corpore compta vigeret

  35 quove modo distracta rediret in ordia prima,

  nunc agere incipiam tibi, quod vehementer ad has res

  attinet esse ea quae rerum simulacra vocamus,

  quod speciem ac formam similem gerit eius imago,

  cuius cumque cluet de corpore fusa vagari;

  40 quae quasi membranae summo de corpore rerum

  dereptae volitant ultroque citroque per auras,

  atque eadem nobis vigilantibus obvia mentes

  terrificant atque in somnis, cum saepe figuras

  contuimur miras simulacraque luce carentum,

  45 quae nos horrifice languentis saepe sopore

  excierunt ne forte animas Acherunte reamur

  effugere aut umbras inter vivos volitare

  neve aliquid nostri post mortem posse relinqui,

  cum corpus simul atque animi natura perempta

  50 in sua discessum dederint primordia quaeque.

  dico igitur rerum effigias tenuisque figuras

  mittier ab rebus summo de cortice eorum;

  id licet hinc quamvis hebeti cognoscere corde.

  Principio quoniam mittunt in rebus apertis

  55 corpora res multae, partim diffusa solute,

  robora ceu fumum mittunt ignesque vaporem,

  et partim contexta magis condensaque, ut olim

  cum teretis ponunt tunicas aestate cicadae,

  et vituli cum membranas de corpore summo

  60 nascentes mittunt, et item cum lubrica serpens

  exuit in spinis vestem; nam saepe videmus

  illorum spoliis vepres volitantibus auctas.

  quae quoniam fiunt, tenuis quoque debet imago

  ab rebus mitti summo de corpore rerum.

  65 nam cur illa cadant magis ab rebusque recedant

  quam quae tenvia sunt, hiscendist nulla potestas;

  praesertim cum sint in summis corpora rebus

  multa minuta, iaci quae possint ordine eodem

  quo fuerint et formai servare figuram,

  70 et multo citius, quanto minus indupediri

  pauca queunt et quae sunt prima fronte locata.

  nam certe iacere ac largiri multa videmus,

  non solum ex alto penitusque, ut diximus ante,

  verum de summis ipsum quoque saepe colorem.

  75 et volgo faciunt id lutea russaque vela

  et ferrugina, cum magnis intenta theatris

  per malos volgata trabesque trementia flutant;

  [30] these, like films peeled from the surface of things, fly to and fro through the air, and do likewise frighten our minds when they present themselves to us awake as well as in sleep, what time we behold strange shapes and idols of the light-bereaved, which have often startled us in appalling wise as we lay relaxed in sleep: this I will essay, that we may not haply believe that souls break loose from Acheron or that shades fly about among the living or that something of us is left behind after death, when the body and the nature of the mind destroyed together have taken their departure into their several first-beginnings.

  I say then that pictures of things and thin shapes are emitted from things off their surface, to which an image serves as a kind of film, or name it if you like a rind, because such image bears an appearance and form like to the thing whatever it is from whose body it is shed and wanders forth.

  This you may learn, however dull of apprehension, from what follows.

  First of all, since among things open to sight many emit bodies, some in a state of loose diffusion, like smoke which logs of oak, heat which fires emit; some of a closer and denser texture, like the gossamer coats which at times cicades doff in summer, and the films which calves at their birth cast from the surface of their body, as well as the vesture which the slippery serpent puts off among the thorns; for often we see the brambles enriched with their flying spoils: since these cases occur, a thin image likewise must be emitted from things off their surface.

  For why those films should drop off and withdraw from things rather than films which are really thin, not one tittle of proof can be given; especially since there are on the surface of things many minute bodies which maybe discharged in the same order they had before and preserve the outline of the shape, and be discharged with far more velocity, inasmuch as they are less liable to get hampered being few in number and stationed in the front rank.

  For without doubt we see many things discharge and freely give not only from the core and center, as we said before, but from their surfaces, besides other things, color itself.

  And this is commonly done by yellow and red and dark blue awnings, when they are spread over large theaters and flutter and wave as they stretch across their poles and crossbeams;

  namque ibi consessum caveai supter et omnem

  scaenai speciem patrum matrumque deorsum

  80 inficiunt coguntque suo fluitare colore.

  et quanto circum mage sunt inclusa theatri

  moenia, tam magis haec intus perfusa lepore

  omnia conrident correpta luce diei.

  ergo lintea de summo cum corpore fucum

  85 mittunt, effigias quoque debent mittere tenvis

  res quaeque, ex summo quoniam iaculantur utraqu
e.

  sunt igitur iam formarum vestigia certa,

  quae volgo volitant subtili praedita filo

  nec singillatim possunt secreta videri.

  90 Praeterea omnis odor fumus vapor atque aliae res

  consimiles ideo diffusae rebus abundant,

  ex alto quia dum veniunt extrinsecus ortae

  scinduntur per iter flexum, nec recta viarum

  ostia sunt, qua contendant exire coortae.

  95 at contra tenuis summi membrana coloris

  cum iacitur, nihil est quod eam discerpere possit,

  in promptu quoniam est in prima fronte locata.

  Postremo speculis in aqua splendoreque in omni

  quae cumque apparent nobis simulacra, necessest,

  100 quandoquidem simili specie sunt praedita rerum,

  exin imaginibus missis consistere eorum.

  nam cur illa cadant magis ab rebusque recedant

  quam quae tenuia sunt, hiscendist nulla potestas.

  sunt igitur tenues formarum illis similesque

  105 effigiae, singillatim quas cernere nemo

  cum possit, tamen adsiduo crebroque repulsu

  reiectae reddunt speculorum ex aequore visum,

  nec ratione alia servari posse videntur,

  tanto opere ut similes reddantur cuique figurae.

  110 Nunc age, quam tenui natura constet imago

  percipe. et in primis, quoniam primordia tantum

  sunt infra nostros sensus tantoque minora

  quam quae primum oculi coeptant non posse tueri,

  nunc tamen id quoque uti confirmem, exordia rerum

  115 cunctarum quam sint subtilia percipe paucis.

  primum animalia sunt iam partim tantula, corum

  tertia pars nulla possit ratione videri.

  horum intestinum quodvis quale esse putandumst!

  quid cordis globus aut oculi? quid membra? quid artus?

  120 quantula sunt! quid praeterea primordia quaeque,

  unde anima atque animi constet natura necessumst,

  nonne vides quam sint subtilia quamque minuta?

  [78] for then they dye the seated assemblage below and all the show of the stage and the richly attired company of the fathers, and compel them to dance about in their color.

  And the more these objects are shut in all round by the walls of the theater the more do all of them within laugh on all hands, overlaid with graceful hues, the light of day being narrowed.

  Therefore since sheets of canvass emit color from their surface, all things will naturally emit thin pictures too, since in each case alike they discharge from the surface.

  There are therefore as now shown sure outlines of shapes, which fly all about possessed of an exquisitely small thickness and cannot when separate be seen one at a time.

  Again, all smell, smoke, heat, and other such-like things stream off things in a state of diffusion, because while they are coming from the depths of the body having arisen within it, they are torn in their winding passage, and there are no straight orifices to the paths, for them to make their way out by in a mass.

  But on the other hand, when a thin film of surface color is discharged, there is nothing to rend it, since it is ready to hand, stationed in front rank.

  Lastly, in the case of all idols which show themselves to us in mirrors, in water or any other shining object, since their outsides are possessed of an appearance like to the things they represent, they must be formed of emitted images of things.

  There are therefore thin shapes and pictures like to the things, which, though no one can see them one at a time, yet when thrown off by constant and repeated reflection give back a visible image from the surface of mirrors; and in no other way it would seem can they be kept so entire that shapes are given back so exceedingly like each object.

  Now mark, and learn how thin in the nature of an image is.

  And first of all, since first-beginnings are so far below the ken of our senses and much smaller than the things which our eyes first begin to be unable to see, to strengthen yet more the proof of this also, learn in a few words how minutely fine are the beginnings of all things.

  First, living things are in some cases so very little, that their third part cannot be seen at all.

  Of what size are we to suppose any gut of such creatures to be? Or the ball of the heart or the eyes? The limbs? Or any part of the frame? How small they must be!

  And then further, the several first-beginnings of which their soul and the nature of their mind must be formed?

  praeterea quaecumque suo de corpore odorem

  expirant acrem, panaces absinthia taetra

  125 habrotonique graves et tristia centaurea,

  quorum unum quidvis leviter si forte duobus

  * * *

  quin potius noscas rerum simulacra vagari

  multa modis multis, nulla vi cassaque sensu?

  Sed ne forte putes ea demum sola vagari,

  130 quae cumque ab rebus rerum simulacra recedunt,

  sunt etiam quae sponte sua gignuntur et ipsa

  constituuntur in hoc caelo, qui dicitur aer,

  quae multis formata modis sublime feruntur,

  ut nubes facile inter dum concrescere in alto

  135 cernimus et mundi speciem violare serenam

  aëra mulcentes motu; nam saepe Gigantum

  ora volare videntur et umbram ducere late,

  inter dum magni montes avolsaque saxa

  montibus ante ire et solem succedere praeter,

  140 inde alios trahere atque inducere belua nimbos.

  nec speciem mutare suam liquentia cessant

  et cuiusque modi formarum vertere in oras.

  Nunc ea quam facili et celeri ratione genantur

  perpetuoque fluant ab rebus lapsaque cedant

  * * *

  145 semper enim summum quicquid de rebus abundat,

  quod iaculentur. et hoc alias cum pervenit in res,

  transit, ut in primis vestem; sed ubi aspera saxa

  aut in materiam ligni pervenit, ibi iam

  scinditur, ut nullum simulacrum reddere possit.

  150 at cum splendida quae constant opposta fuerunt

  densaque, ut in primis speculum est, nihil accidit horum;

  nam neque, uti vestem, possunt transire, neque autem

  scindi; quam meminit levor praestare salutem.

  qua propter fit ut hinc nobis simulacra redundent.

  155 et quamvis subito quovis in tempore quamque

  rem contra speculum ponas, apparet imago;

  perpetuo fluere ut noscas e corpore summo

  texturas rerum tenuis tenuisque figuras.

  ergo multa brevi spatio simulacra genuntur,

  160 ut merito celer his rebus dicatur origo.

  et quasi multa brevi spatio summittere debet

  lumina sol, ut perpetuo sint omnia plena,

  sic ab rebus item simili ratione necessest

  temporis in puncto rerum simulacra ferantur

  165 multa modis multis in cunctas undique partis;

  [122] Do you not perceive how fine, how minute they are?

  Again in the case of all things which exhale from their body a pungent smell, all-heal, nauseous wormwood, strong scented southernwood and the bitter centauries, any one of which, if you happen to [feel it] lightly between two [fingers, will impregnate them with a strong smell] but rather you are to know that idols of things wander about many in number in many ways, of no force, powerless to excite sense.

  But lest haply you suppose that only those idols of things which go off from things and no others wander about, there are likewise those which are spontaneously begotten and are formed by themselves in this lower heaven which is called air: these fashioned in many ways are borne along on high and being in a fluid state cease not to alter their appearance and change it into the outline of shapes of every possible kind; as we see clouds sometimes gather into masses on high and blot the calm clear face of heaven, fanning the air with their motion.


  Thus often the faces of giants are seen to fly along and draw after them a far-spreading shadow; sometimes great mountains and rocks torn from the mountains are seen to go in advance and pass across the sun; and then some huge beast is observed to draw with it and bring on the other storm clouds.

  Now [I will proceed to show] with what ease and celerity they are begotten and how incessantly they flow and fall away from things.

  The outermost surface is ever streaming off from things and admits of being discharged: when this reaches some things, it passes through them, glass especially.

  But when it reaches rough stones or the matter of wood, it is then so torn that it cannot give back any idol.

  But when objects at once shining and dense have been put in its way, a mirror especially, none of these results has place: it can neither pass through it, like glass, nor can it be torn either; such perfect safety the polished surface minds to ensure.

  In consequence of this idols stream back to us from such objects; and however suddenly at any moment you place anything opposite a mirror, an image shows itself: hence you may be sure that thin textures and thin shapes of things incessantly stream from their surface.

  Therefore many idols are begotten in a short time, so that the birth of such things is with good reason named a rapid one.

  And as the sun must send forth many rays of light in a short time in order that all things may be continually filled with it, so also for alike reason there must be carried away from things in a moment of time idols of things many in number in many ways in all directions round;

  quandoquidem speculum quo cumque obvertimus oris,

  res ibi respondent simili forma atque colore.

  Praeterea modo cum fuerit liquidissima caeli

  tempestas, perquam subito fit turbida foede,

  170 undique uti tenebras omnis Acherunta rearis

  liquisse et magnas caeli complesse cavernas.

  usque adeo taetra nimborum nocte coorta

  inpendent atrae Formidinis ora superne;

  quorum quantula pars sit imago dicere nemost

  175 qui possit neque eam rationem reddere dictis.

  Nunc age, quam celeri motu simulacra ferantur,

  et quae mobilitas ollis tranantibus auras

  reddita sit, longo spatio ut brevis hora teratur,

  in quem quaeque locum diverso numine tendunt,