Delphi Complete Works of Lucretius

by Titus Lucretius Carus

  [1] WHO is able with powerful genius to frame a poem worthy of the grandeur of the things and these discoveries? Or who is so great a master of words as to be able to devise praises equal to the deserts of him who left to us such prizes won and earned by his own genius? None, methinks, who is formed of mortal body.

  For if we must speak as the acknowledged grandeur of the things itself demands, a god he was, a god, most noble Memmius, who first found out that plan of life which is now termed wisdom, and who by trained skill rescued life from such great billows and such thick darkness and moored it in so perfect a calm and in so brilliant a light.

  Compare the godlike discoveries of others in old times: Ceres is famed to have pointed out to mortals corn, and Liber the vine-born juice of the grape; though life might well have subsisted without these things, as we are told some nations even now live without them.

  But a happy life was not possible without a clean breast; wherefore with more reason this man is deemed by us a god, from whom come those sweet solaces of existence which even now are distributed over great nations and gently soothe men’s minds.

  Then if you shall suppose that the deeds of Hercules surpass his, you will be carried still farther away from true reason.

  For what would yon great gaping maw of Nemean lion now harm us and the bristled Arcadian boar?

  Ay or what could the bull of Crete do and the hydra plague of Lerna, fenced round with its envenomed snakes?

  Or how could the triple-breasted might of threefold Geryon, [how could the birds with brazen arrowy feathers] that dwelt in the Stymphalian swamps do us such mighty injury, and the horses of Thracian Diomede breathing fire from their nostrils along the Bistonian borders and Ismara?

  aureaque Hesperidum servans fulgentia mala,

  asper, acerba tuens, immani corpore serpens

  arboris amplexus stirpes? quid denique obesset

  35 propter Atlanteum litus pelagique severa,

  quo neque noster adit quisquam nec barbarus audet?

  cetera de genere hoc quae sunt portenta perempta,

  si non victa forent, quid tandem viva nocerent?

  nil, ut opinor: ita ad satiatem terra ferarum

  40 nunc etiam scatit et trepido terrore repleta est

  per nemora ac montes magnos silvasque profundas;

  quae loca vitandi plerumque est nostra potestas.

  at nisi purgatumst pectus, quae proelia nobis

  atque pericula tumst ingratis insinuandum!

  45 quantae tum scindunt hominem cuppedinis acres

  sollicitum curae quantique perinde timores!

  quidve superbia spurcitia ac petulantia? quantas

  efficiunt clades! quid luxus desidiaeque?

  haec igitur qui cuncta subegerit ex animoque

  50 expulerit dictis, non armis, nonne decebit

  hunc hominem numero divom dignarier esse?

  cum bene praesertim multa ac divinitus ipsis

  iam mortalibus e divis dare dicta suerit

  atque omnem rerum naturam pandere dictis.

  55 Cuius ego ingressus vestigia dum rationes

  persequor ac doceo dictis, quo quaeque creata

  foedere sint, in eo quam sit durare necessum

  nec validas valeant aevi rescindere leges,

  quo genere in primis animi natura reperta est

  60 nativo primum consistere corpore creta,

  nec posse incolumem magnum durare per aevum,

  sed simulacra solere in somnis fallere mentem,

  cernere cum videamur eum quem vita reliquit,

  quod super est, nunc huc rationis detulit ordo,

  65 ut mihi mortali consistere corpore mundum

  nativomque simul ratio reddunda sit esse;

  et quibus ille modis congressus materiai

  fundarit terram caelum mare sidera solem

  lunaique globum; tum quae tellure animantes

  70 extiterint, et quae nullo sint tempore natae;

  quove modo genus humanum variante loquella

  coeperit inter se vesci per nomina rerum;

  [32] And the serpent which guards the bright golden apples of the Hesperides, fierce, dangerous of aspect, girding the tree’s stem with his enormous body, what harm pray could he do us beside the Atlantic shore and its sounding main, which none of us goes near and no barbarian ventures to approach?

  And all other monsters of the kind which have been destroyed, if they had not been vanquished, what harm could they do, I ask, though now alive?

  None methinks: the earth even now so abounds to repletion in wild beasts and is filled with troublous terror throughout woods and great mountains and deep forests; places which we have it for the most part in our own power to shun.

  But unless the breast is cleared, what battles and dangers must then find their way into us in our own despite! What poignant cares inspired by lust then rend the distressful man, and then also what mighty fears! And pride, filthy lust and wantonness? What disasters they occasion! And luxury and all sorts of sloth?

  He therefore who shall have subdued all these and banished them from the mind by words, not arms, shall he not have a just title to be ranked among the gods?

  And all the more so that he was wont to deliver many precepts in beautiful and god-like phrase about the immortal gods themselves and to open up by his teachings all the nature of things.

  While walking in his footsteps I follow out his reasonings and teach by my verses, by what law all things are made, what necessity there is then for them to continue in that law, and how impotent they are to annul the binding statutes of time: foremost in which class of things the nature of the mind has been proved to be formed of a body that had birth and to be unable to endure unscathed through great time, mere idols being wont to mock the mind in sleep, when we seem to see him whom life has abandoned.

  To continue, the order of my design has now brought me to this point, where I must proceed to show that the world is formed of a mortal body and at the same time had birth; to show too in what way that union of matter founded earth, heaven, sea, stars, sun, and the ball of the moon; also what living creatures sprang out of the earth, as well as those which never at any time were born; in what way too mankind began to use with one another varied speech by the names conferred on things;

  et quibus ille modis divom metus insinuarit

  pectora, terrarum qui in orbi sancta tuetur

  75 fana lacus lucos aras simulacraque divom.

  praeterea solis cursus lunaeque meatus

  expediam qua vi flectat natura gubernans;

  ne forte haec inter caelum terramque reamur

  libera sponte sua cursus lustrare perennis,

  80 morigera ad fruges augendas atque animantis,

  neve aliqua divom volvi ratione putemus.

  nam bene qui didicere deos securum agere aevom,

  si tamen interea mirantur qua ratione

  quaeque geri possint, praesertim rebus in illis

  85 quae supera caput aetheriis cernuntur in oris,

  rursus in antiquas referuntur religiones

  et dominos acris adsciscunt, omnia posse

  quos miseri credunt, ignari quid queat esse,

  quid nequeat, finita potestas denique cuique

  90 qua nam sit ratione atque alte terminus haerens.

  Quod super est, ne te in promissis plura moremur,

  principio maria ac terras caelumque tuere;

  quorum naturam triplicem, tria corpora, Memmi,

  tris species tam dissimilis, tria talia texta,

  95 una dies dabit exitio, multosque per annos

  sustentata ruet moles et machina mundi.

  nec me animi fallit quam res nova miraque menti

  accidat exitium caeli terraeque futurum,

  et quam difficile id mihi sit pervincere dictis;

  100 ut fit ubi insolitam rem adportes auribus ante

  nec tamen hanc possis oculorum subdere visu

  nec iacere indu manus, via qua munita fidei

&nbs
p; proxima fert humanum in pectus templaque mentis.

  sed tamen effabor. dictis dabit ipsa fidem res

  105 forsitan et graviter terrarum motibus ortis

  omnia conquassari in parvo tempore cernes.

  quod procul a nobis flectat fortuna gubernans,

  et ratio potius quam res persuadeat ipsa

  succidere horrisono posse omnia victa fragore.

  110 Qua prius adgrediar quam de re fundere fata

  sanctius et multo certa ratione magis quam

  Pythia quae tripode a Phoebi lauroque profatur,

  multa tibi expediam doctis solacia dictis;

  [73] and also in what ways yon fear of the gods gained an entry into men’s breasts, and now throughout the world maintains as holy fanes, lakes, groves, altars, and idols of the gods.

  Furthermore, I shall make clear by what force piloting nature guides the courses of the sun and the wanderings of the moon; lest haply we imagine that these of their own free will between heaven and earth traverse their everlasting orbits, graciously furthering the increase of crops and living creatures, or we think they roll on by any forethought of the gods.

  For they who have been rightly taught that the gods lead a life without care, if nevertheless they wonder by what plan all things can be carried on, above all in regard to those things which are seen overhead in the ethereal borders, are borne back again into their old religious scruples and take unto themselves hard taskmasters, whom they poor wretches believe to be almighty, not knowing what can, what cannot be, in short by what system each thing has its powers defined, its deep-set boundary mark.

  Well then not to detain you any longer by mere promises, look before all on seas and lands and heaven: their threefold nature, their three bodies, Memmius, three forms so unlike, three such wondrous textures a single day shall give over to destruction; and the mass and fabric of the world upheld for many years shall tumble to ruin.

  Nor can I fail to perceive with what a novel and strange effect it falls upon the mind, this destruction of heaven and earth that is to be, and how hard it is for me to produce a full conviction of it by words; as is the case when you bring to the ears a thing hitherto unexampled, and yet you cannot submit it to the eyesight nor put it into the hands; through which the straightest highway of belief leads into the human breast and quarters of the mind.

  But yet I will speak out: it well may be that the reality itself will bring credit to my words and that you will see earthquakes arise and all things grievously shattered to pieces in a short time.

  But this may pilot fortune guide far away from us, and may reason rather than the reality convince that all things may be overpowered and tumble in with a frightful crash.

  But before I shall begin on this question to pour forth decrees of fate with more sanctity and much more certainty than the Pythia who speaks out from the tripod and laurel of Phoebus, I will clearly set forth to you many comforting topics in learned language;

  religione refrenatus ne forte rearis

  115 terras et solem et caelum, mare sidera lunam,

  corpore divino debere aeterna manere,

  proptereaque putes ritu par esse Gigantum

  pendere eos poenas inmani pro scelere omnis,

  qui ratione sua disturbent moenia mundi

  120 praeclarumque velint caeli restinguere solem

  inmortalia mortali sermone notantes;

  quae procul usque adeo divino a numine distent

  inque deum numero quae sint indigna videri,

  notitiam potius praebere ut posse putentur

  125 quid sit vitali motu sensuque remotum.

  quippe etenim non est, cum quovis corpore ut esse

  posse animi natura putetur consiliumque.

  sicut in aethere non arbor, non aequore salso

  nubes esse queunt neque pisces vivere in arvis

  130 nec cruor in lignis neque saxis sucus inesse,

  certum ac dispositumst ubi quicquid crescat et insit,

  sic animi natura nequit sine corpore oriri

  sola neque a nervis et sanguine longius esse.

  quod si posset enim, multo prius ipsa animi vis

  135 in capite aut umeris aut imis calcibus esse

  posset et innasci quavis in parte soleret,

  tandem in eodem homine atque in eodem vase manere.

  quod quoniam nostro quoque constat corpore certum

  dispositumque videtur ubi esse et crescere possit

  140 seorsum anima atque animus, tanto magis infitiandum

  totum posse extra corpus formamque animalem

  putribus in glebis terrarum aut solis in igni

  aut in aqua durare aut altis aetheris oris.

  haud igitur constant divino praedita sensu,

  145 quandoquidem nequeunt vitaliter esse animata.

  Illud item non est ut possis credere, sedes

  esse deum sanctas in mundi partibus ullis.

  tenvis enim natura deum longeque remota

  sensibus ab nostris animi vix mente videtur;

  150 quae quoniam manuum tactum suffugit et ictum,

  tactile nil nobis quod sit contingere debet;

  tangere enim non quit quod tangi non licet ipsum.

  quare etiam sedes quoque nostris sedibus esse

  dissimiles debent, tenues de corpore eorum;

  155 quae tibi posterius largo sermone probabo.

  Dicere porro hominum causa voluisse parare

  praeclaram mundi naturam proptereaque

  adlaudabile opus divom laudare decere

  aeternumque putare atque inmortale futurum,

  160 nec fas esse, deum quod sit ratione vetusta

  gentibus humanis fundatum perpetuo aevo,

  sollicitare suis ulla vi ex sedibus umquam

  nec verbis vexare et ab imo evertere summa,

  [114] lest held in the yoke of religion you haply suppose that earth and sun and heaven, sea, stars and moon must last for ever with divine body; and therefore think it right that they after the fashion of the giants should all suffer punishment for their monstrous guilt, who by their reasoning displace the walls of the world and seek to quench the glorious sun of heaven, branding immortal things in mortal speech; though in truth these things are so far from possessing divinity and are so unworthy of being reckoned in the number of gods, that they may be thought to afford a notable instance of what is quite without vital motion and sense.

  For it is quite impossible to suppose that the nature and judgment of the mind can exist with any body whatever; even as a tree cannot exist in the ether nor clouds in the salt sea, nor can fishes live in the fields nor blood exist in woods nor sap in stones.

  Where each thing can grow and abide is fixed and ordained.

  Thus the nature of the mind cannot come into being alone without the body nor exist far away from the sinews and blood.

  But if (for this would be much more likely to happen than that) the force itself of the mind might be in the head or shoulders or heels or might be born in any other part of the body, it would after all be wont to abide in one and the same man or vessel.

  But since in our body even it is fixed and seen to be ordained where the soul and the mind can severally be and grow, it must still more strenuously be denied that it can abide out of the body and the living form altogether in crumbling clods of earth or in the fire of the sun or in water or in the high borders of ether.

  These things therefore are not possessed of divine sense, since they cannot be quickened with the vital feeling.

  This too you may not possibly believe, that the holy seats of the gods exist in any parts of the world: the fine nature of the gods far withdrawn from our senses is hardly seen by the thought of the mind; and since it has ever eluded the touch and stroke of the hands, it must touch nothing which is tangible for us; for that cannot touch which does not admit of being touched in turn.

  And therefore their seats as well must be unlike our seats, fine, even as their bodies are fine.

  All which I will
prove to you later in copious argument.

  To say again that for the sake of men they have willed to set in order the glorious nature of the world and therefore it is meet to praise the work of the gods, calling as it does for all praise, and to believe that it will be eternal and immortal, and that it is an unholy thing ever to shake by any force from its fixed seats that which by the forethought of the gods in ancient days has been established on everlasting foundations for mankind, or to assail it by speech and utterly overturn it from top to bottom;

  cetera de genere hoc adfingere et addere, Memmi,

  165 desiperest. quid enim inmortalibus atque beatis

  gratia nostra queat largirier emolumenti,

  ut nostra quicquam causa gerere adgrediantur?

  quidve novi potuit tanto post ante quietos

  inlicere ut cuperent vitam mutare priorem?

  170 nam gaudere novis rebus debere videtur

  cui veteres obsunt; sed cui nihil accidit aegri

  tempore in ante acto, cum pulchre degeret aevom,

  quid potuit novitatis amorem accendere tali?

  quidve mali fuerat nobis non esse creatis?

  175 an, credo, in tenebris vita ac maerore iacebat,

  donec diluxit rerum genitalis origo?

  natus enim debet qui cumque est velle manere

  in vita, donec retinebit blanda voluptas;

  qui numquam vero vitae gustavit amorem

  180 nec fuit in numero, quid obest non esse creatum?

  exemplum porro gignundis rebus et ipsa

  notities hominum divis unde insita primum est,

  quid vellent facere ut scirent animoque viderent,

  quove modost umquam vis cognita principiorum

  185 quidque inter sese permutato ordine possent.

  si non ipsa dedit speciem natura creandi?

  namque ita multa modis multis primordia rerum

  ex infinito iam tempore percita plagis

  ponderibusque suis consuerunt concita ferri

  190 omnimodisque coire atque omnia pertemptare,

  quae cumque inter se possint congressa creare,

  ut non sit mirum, si in talis disposituras

  deciderunt quoque et in talis venere meatus,

  qualibus haec rerum geritur nunc summa novando.

  195 Quod si iam rerum ignorem primordia quae sint,

  hoc tamen ex ipsis caeli rationibus ausim