{"schema_version":1,"access":"public","rights":"Public-domain or compatibly licensed source editions; provenance is retained per record.","work":{"slug":"lucretius-1","title":"De Rerum Natura, Book 1","author":"Lucretius","tradition":"roman","language":"la","genre":"didactic epic","period":"1st c. BCE","source_url":"https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/lucretius/lucretius1.shtml","original":{"text":"### Invocation to Venus\n\nAeneadum genetrix, hominum divomque voluptas,\nalma Venus, caeli subter labentia signa\nquae mare navigerum, quae terras frugiferentis\nconcelebras, per te quoniam genus omne animantum\nconcipitur visitque exortum lumina solis:\nte, dea, te fugiunt venti, te nubila caeli\nadventumque tuum, tibi suavis daedala tellus\nsummittit flores, tibi rident aequora ponti\nplacatumque nitet diffuso lumine caelum.\nnam simul ac species patefactast verna diei\net reserata viget genitabilis aura favoni,\naeriae primum volucris te, diva, tuumque\nsignificant initum perculsae corda tua vi.\ninde ferae pecudes persultant pabula laeta\net rapidos tranant amnis: ita capta lepore\nte sequitur cupide quo quamque inducere pergis.\ndenique per maria ac montis fluviosque rapacis\nfrondiferasque domos avium camposque virentis\nomnibus incutiens blandum per pectora amorem\nefficis ut cupide generatim saecla propagent.\nquae quoniam rerum naturam sola gubernas\nnec sine te quicquam dias in luminis oras\nexoritur neque fit laetum neque amabile quicquam,\nte sociam studeo scribendis versibus esse,\nquos ego de rerum natura pangere conor\nMemmiadae nostro, quem tu, dea, tempore in omni\nomnibus ornatum voluisti excellere rebus.\nquo magis aeternum da dictis, diva, leporem.\neffice ut interea fera moenera militiai\nper maria ac terras omnis sopita quiescant;\nnam tu sola potes tranquilla pace iuvare\nmortalis, quoniam belli fera moenera Mavors\narmipotens regit, in gremium qui saepe tuum se\nreiicit aeterno devictus vulnere amoris,\natque ita suspiciens tereti cervice reposta\npascit amore avidos inhians in te, dea, visus\neque tuo pendet resupini spiritus ore.\nhunc tu, diva, tuo recubantem corpore sancto\ncircum fusa super, suavis ex ore loquellas\nfunde petens placidam Romanis, incluta, pacem;\nnam neque nos agere hoc patriai tempore iniquo\npossumus aequo animo nec Memmi clara propago\ntalibus in rebus communi desse saluti.\n\n### The Light of Reason\n\nomnis enim per se divum natura necessest\nimmortali aevo summa cum pace fruatur\nsemota ab nostris rebus seiunctaque longe;\nnam privata dolore omni, privata periclis,\nipsa suis pollens opibus, nihil indiga nostri,\nnec bene promeritis capitur nec tangitur ira.\nHumana ante oculos foede cum vita iaceret\nin terris oppressa gravi sub religione,\nquae caput a caeli regionibus ostendebat\nhorribili super aspectu mortalibus instans,\nprimum Graius homo mortalis tollere contra\nest oculos ausus primusque obsistere contra;\nquem neque fama deum nec fulmina nec minitanti\nmurmure compressit caelum, sed eo magis acrem\ninritat animi virtutem, effringere ut arta\nnaturae primus portarum claustra cupiret.\nergo vivida vis animi pervicit et extra\nprocessit longe flammantia moenia mundi\natque omne immensum peragravit mente animoque,\nunde refert nobis victor quid possit oriri,\nquid nequeat, finita potestas denique cuique\nqua nam sit ratione atque alte terminus haerens.\nquare religio pedibus subiecta vicissim\nopteritur, nos exaequat victoria caelo.\nIllud in his rebus vereor, ne forte rearis\nimpia te rationis inire elementa viamque\nindugredi sceleris. quod contra saepius illa\nreligio peperit scelerosa atque impia facta.\nAulide quo pacto Triviai virginis aram\nIphianassai turparunt sanguine foede\nductores Danaum delecti, prima virorum.\ncui simul infula virgineos circum data comptus\nex utraque pari malarum parte profusast,\net maestum simul ante aras adstare parentem\nsensit et hunc propter ferrum celare ministros\naspectuque suo lacrimas effundere civis,\nmuta metu terram genibus summissa petebat.\nnec miserae prodesse in tali tempore quibat,\nquod patrio princeps donarat nomine regem;\nnam sublata virum manibus tremibundaque ad aras\ndeductast, non ut sollemni more sacrorum\nperfecto posset claro comitari Hymenaeo,\nsed casta inceste nubendi tempore in ipso\nhostia concideret mactatu maesta parentis,\nexitus ut classi felix faustusque daretur.\ntantum religio potuit suadere malorum.\nTutemet a nobis iam quovis tempore vatum\nterriloquis victus dictis desciscere quaeres.\nquippe etenim quam multa tibi iam fingere possunt\nsomnia, quae vitae rationes vertere possint\nfortunasque tuas omnis turbare timore!\net merito; nam si certam finem esse viderent\naerumnarum homines, aliqua ratione valerent\nreligionibus atque minis obsistere vatum.\nnunc ratio nulla est restandi, nulla facultas,\naeternas quoniam poenas in morte timendum.\nignoratur enim quae sit natura animai,\nnata sit an contra nascentibus insinuetur\n\n### Nothing from Nothing\n\net simul intereat nobiscum morte dirempta\nan tenebras Orci visat vastasque lacunas\nan pecudes alias divinitus insinuet se,\nEnnius ut noster cecinit, qui primus amoeno\ndetulit ex Helicone perenni fronde coronam,\nper gentis Italas hominum quae clara clueret;\netsi praeterea tamen esse Acherusia templa\nEnnius aeternis exponit versibus edens,\nquo neque permaneant animae neque corpora nostra,\nsed quaedam simulacra modis pallentia miris;\nunde sibi exortam semper florentis Homeri\ncommemorat speciem lacrimas effundere salsas\ncoepisse et rerum naturam expandere dictis.\nqua propter bene cum superis de rebus habenda\nnobis est ratio, solis lunaeque meatus\nqua fiant ratione, et qua vi quaeque gerantur\nin terris, tunc cum primis ratione sagaci\nunde anima atque animi constet natura videndum,\net quae res nobis vigilantibus obvia mentes\nterrificet morbo adfectis somnoque sepultis,\ncernere uti videamur eos audireque coram,\nmorte obita quorum tellus amplectitur ossa.\nQuod super est, vacuas auris animumque sagacem\nsemotum a curis adhibe veram ad rationem,\nne mea dona tibi studio disposta fideli,\nintellecta prius quam sint, contempta relinquas.\nnam tibi de summa caeli ratione deumque\ndisserere incipiam et rerum primordia pandam,\nunde omnis natura creet res, auctet alatque,\nquove eadem rursum natura perempta resolvat,\nquae nos materiem et genitalia corpora rebus\nreddunda in ratione vocare et semina rerum\nappellare suemus et haec eadem usurpare\ncorpora prima, quod ex illis sunt omnia primis.\nNec me animi fallit Graiorum obscura reperta\ndifficile inlustrare Latinis versibus esse,\nmulta novis verbis praesertim cum sit agendum\npropter egestatem linguae et rerum novitatem;\nsed tua me virtus tamen et sperata voluptas\nsuavis amicitiae quemvis efferre laborem\nsuadet et inducit noctes vigilare serenas\nquaerentem dictis quibus et quo carmine demum\nclara tuae possim praepandere lumina menti,\nres quibus occultas penitus convisere possis.\nhunc igitur terrorem animi tenebrasque necessest\nnon radii solis neque lucida tela diei\ndiscutiant, sed naturae species ratioque.\nPrincipium cuius hinc nobis exordia sumet,\nnullam rem e nihilo gigni divinitus umquam.\nquippe ita formido mortalis continet omnis,\nquod multa in terris fieri caeloque tuentur,\nquorum operum causas nulla ratione videre\npossunt ac fieri divino numine rentur.\nquas ob res ubi viderimus nil posse creari\nde nihilo, tum quod sequimur iam rectius inde\nperspiciemus, et unde queat res quaeque creari\net quo quaeque modo fiant opera sine divom.\nNam si de nihilo fierent, ex omnibus rebus\nomne genus nasci posset, nil semine egeret.\ne mare primum homines, e terra posset oriri\nsquamigerum genus et volucres erumpere caelo;\narmenta atque aliae pecudes, genus omne ferarum,\nincerto partu culta ac deserta tenerent.\nnec fructus idem arboribus constare solerent,\nsed mutarentur, ferre omnes omnia possent.\nquippe ubi non essent genitalia corpora cuique,\nqui posset mater rebus consistere certa?\nat nunc seminibus quia certis quaeque creantur,\ninde enascitur atque oras in luminis exit,\nmateries ubi inest cuiusque et corpora prima;\natque hac re nequeunt ex omnibus omnia gigni,\nquod certis in rebus inest secreta facultas.\nPraeterea cur vere rosam, frumenta calore,\nvites autumno fundi suadente videmus,\nsi non, certa suo quia tempore semina rerum\ncum confluxerunt, patefit quod cumque creatur,\ndum tempestates adsunt et vivida tellus\ntuto res teneras effert in luminis oras?\nquod si de nihilo fierent, subito exorerentur\nincerto spatio atque alienis partibus anni,\nquippe ubi nulla forent primordia, quae genitali\nconcilio possent arceri tempore iniquo.\nNec porro augendis rebus spatio foret usus\nseminis ad coitum, si e nilo crescere possent;\nnam fierent iuvenes subito ex infantibus parvis\ne terraque exorta repente arbusta salirent.\nquorum nil fieri manifestum est, omnia quando\npaulatim crescunt, ut par est semine certo,\ncrescentesque genus servant; ut noscere possis\nquicque sua de materia grandescere alique.\nHuc accedit uti sine certis imbribus anni\nlaetificos nequeat fetus submittere tellus\nnec porro secreta cibo natura animantum\npropagare genus possit vitamque tueri;\nut potius multis communia corpora rebus\nmulta putes esse, ut verbis elementa videmus,\nquam sine principiis ullam rem existere posse.\nDenique cur homines tantos natura parare\nnon potuit, pedibus qui pontum per vada possent\ntransire et magnos manibus divellere montis\nmultaque vivendo vitalia vincere saecla,\nsi non, materies quia rebus reddita certast\ngignundis, e qua constat quid possit oriri?\nnil igitur fieri de nilo posse fatendumst,\nsemine quando opus est rebus, quo quaeque creatae\naeris in teneras possint proferrier auras.\nPostremo quoniam incultis praestare videmus\nculta loca et manibus melioris reddere fetus,\nesse videlicet in terris primordia rerum\nquae nos fecundas vertentes vomere glebas\nterraique solum subigentes cimus ad ortus;\nquod si nulla forent, nostro sine quaeque labore\nsponte sua multo fieri meliora videres.\n\n### Atoms and Void\n\nHuc accedit uti quicque in sua corpora rursum\ndissoluat natura neque ad nihilum interemat res.\nnam siquid mortale e cunctis partibus esset,\nex oculis res quaeque repente erepta periret;\nnulla vi foret usus enim, quae partibus eius\ndiscidium parere et nexus exsolvere posset.\nquod nunc, aeterno quia constant semine quaeque,\ndonec vis obiit, quae res diverberet ictu\naut intus penetret per inania dissoluatque,\nnullius exitium patitur natura videri.\nPraeterea quae cumque vetustate amovet aetas,\nsi penitus peremit consumens materiem omnem,\nunde animale genus generatim in lumina vitae\nredducit Venus, aut redductum daedala tellus\nunde alit atque auget generatim pabula praebens?\nunde mare ingenuei fontes externaque longe\nflumina suppeditant? unde aether sidera pascit?\nomnia enim debet, mortali corpore quae sunt,\ninfinita aetas consumpse ante acta diesque.\nquod si in eo spatio atque ante acta aetate fuere\ne quibus haec rerum consistit summa refecta,\ninmortali sunt natura praedita certe.\nhaud igitur possunt ad nilum quaeque reverti.\nDenique res omnis eadem vis causaque volgo\nconficeret, nisi materies aeterna teneret,\ninter se nexus minus aut magis indupedita;\ntactus enim leti satis esset causa profecto,\nquippe ubi nulla forent aeterno corpore, quorum\ncontextum vis deberet dissolvere quaeque.\nat nunc, inter se quia nexus principiorum\ndissimiles constant aeternaque materies est,\nincolumi remanent res corpore, dum satis acris\nvis obeat pro textura cuiusque reperta.\nhaud igitur redit ad nihilum res ulla, sed omnes\ndiscidio redeunt in corpora materiai.\npostremo pereunt imbres, ubi eos pater aether\nin gremium matris terrai praecipitavit;\nat nitidae surgunt fruges ramique virescunt\narboribus, crescunt ipsae fetuque gravantur.\nhinc alitur porro nostrum genus atque ferarum,\nhinc laetas urbes pueris florere videmus\nfrondiferasque novis avibus canere undique silvas,\nhinc fessae pecudes pinguis per pabula laeta\ncorpora deponunt et candens lacteus umor\nuberibus manat distentis, hinc nova proles\nartubus infirmis teneras lasciva per herbas\nludit lacte mero mentes perculsa novellas.\nhaud igitur penitus pereunt quaecumque videntur,\nquando alit ex alio reficit natura nec ullam\nrem gigni patitur nisi morte adiuta aliena.\nNunc age, res quoniam docui non posse creari\nde nihilo neque item genitas ad nil revocari,\nne qua forte tamen coeptes diffidere dictis,\nquod nequeunt oculis rerum primordia cerni,\naccipe praeterea quae corpora tute necessest\nconfiteare esse in rebus nec posse videri.\nPrincipio venti vis verberat incita corpus\ningentisque ruit navis et nubila differt,\ninter dum rapido percurrens turbine campos\narboribus magnis sternit montisque supremos\nsilvifragis vexat flabris: ita perfurit acri\ncum fremitu saevitque minaci murmure pontus.\nsunt igitur venti ni mirum corpora caeca,\nquae mare, quae terras, quae denique nubila caeli\nverrunt ac subito vexantia turbine raptant,\nnec ratione fluunt alia stragemque propagant\net cum mollis aquae fertur natura repente\nflumine abundanti, quam largis imbribus auget\nmontibus ex altis magnus decursus aquai\nfragmina coniciens silvarum arbustaque tota,\nnec validi possunt pontes venientis aquai\nvim subitam tolerare: ita magno turbidus imbri\nmolibus incurrit validis cum viribus amnis,\ndat sonitu magno stragem volvitque sub undis\ngrandia saxa, ruit qua quidquid fluctibus obstat.\nsic igitur debent venti quoque flamina ferri,\nquae vel uti validum cum flumen procubuere\nquam libet in partem, trudunt res ante ruuntque\nimpetibus crebris, inter dum vertice torto\ncorripiunt rapidique rotanti turbine portant.\nquare etiam atque etiam sunt venti corpora caeca,\nquandoquidem factis et moribus aemula magnis\namnibus inveniuntur, aperto corpore qui sunt.\nTum porro varios rerum sentimus odores\nnec tamen ad naris venientis cernimus umquam\nnec calidos aestus tuimur nec frigora quimus\nusurpare oculis nec voces cernere suemus;\nquae tamen omnia corporea constare necessest\nnatura, quoniam sensus inpellere possunt;\ntangere enim et tangi, nisi corpus, nulla potest res.\nDenique fluctifrago suspensae in litore vestis\nuvescunt, eaedem dispansae in sole serescunt.\nat neque quo pacto persederit umor aquai\nvisumst nec rursum quo pacto fugerit aestu.\nin parvas igitur partis dispergitur umor,\nquas oculi nulla possunt ratione videre.\nquin etiam multis solis redeuntibus annis\nanulus in digito subter tenuatur habendo,\nstilicidi casus lapidem cavat, uncus aratri\nferreus occulte decrescit vomer in arvis,\nstrataque iam volgi pedibus detrita viarum\nsaxea conspicimus; tum portas propter aena\nsigna manus dextras ostendunt adtenuari\nsaepe salutantum tactu praeterque meantum.\nhaec igitur minui, cum sint detrita, videmus.\nsed quae corpora decedant in tempore quoque,\ninvida praeclusit speciem natura videndi.\nPostremo quae cumque dies naturaque rebus\npaulatim tribuit moderatim crescere cogens,\nnulla potest oculorum acies contenta tueri,\nnec porro quae cumque aevo macieque senescunt,\nnec, mare quae impendent, vesco sale saxa peresa\nquid quoque amittant in tempore cernere possis.\ncorporibus caecis igitur natura gerit res.\nNec tamen undique corporea stipata tenentur\nomnia natura; namque est in rebus inane.\nquod tibi cognosse in multis erit utile rebus\nnec sinet errantem dubitare et quaerere semper\nde summa rerum et nostris diffidere dictis.\nqua propter locus est intactus inane vacansque.\nquod si non esset, nulla ratione moveri\nres possent; namque officium quod corporis exstat,\nofficere atque obstare, id in omni tempore adesset\nomnibus; haud igitur quicquam procedere posset,\nprincipium quoniam cedendi nulla daret res.\nat nunc per maria ac terras sublimaque caeli\nmulta modis multis varia ratione moveri\ncernimus ante oculos, quae, si non esset inane,\nnon tam sollicito motu privata carerent\nquam genita omnino nulla ratione fuissent,\nundique materies quoniam stipata quiesset.\nPraeterea quamvis solidae res esse putentur,\nhinc tamen esse licet raro cum corpore cernas.\nin saxis ac speluncis permanat aquarum\nliquidus umor et uberibus flent omnia guttis.\ndissipat in corpus sese cibus omne animantum;\ncrescunt arbusta et fetus in tempore fundunt,\nquod cibus in totas usque ab radicibus imis\nper truncos ac per ramos diffunditur omnis.\ninter saepta meant voces et clausa domorum\ntransvolitant, rigidum permanat frigus ad ossa.\nquod nisi inania sint, qua possent corpora quaeque\ntransire, haud ulla fieri ratione videres.\nDenique cur alias aliis praestare videmus\npondere res rebus nihilo maiore figura?\nnam si tantundemst in lanae glomere quantum\ncorporis in plumbo est, tantundem pendere par est,\ncorporis officiumst quoniam premere omnia deorsum,\ncontra autem natura manet sine pondere inanis.\nergo quod magnumst aeque leviusque videtur,\nni mirum plus esse sibi declarat inanis;\nat contra gravius plus in se corporis esse\ndedicat et multo vacui minus intus habere.\nest igitur ni mirum id quod ratione sagaci\nquaerimus, admixtum rebus, quod inane vocamus.\nIllud in his rebus ne te deducere vero\npossit, quod quidam fingunt, praecurrere cogor.\ncedere squamigeris latices nitentibus aiunt\net liquidas aperire vias, quia post loca pisces\nlinquant, quo possint cedentes confluere undae;\nsic alias quoque res inter se posse moveri\net mutare locum, quamvis sint omnia plena.\nscilicet id falsa totum ratione receptumst.\nnam quo squamigeri poterunt procedere tandem,\nni spatium dederint latices? concedere porro\nquo poterunt undae, cum pisces ire nequibunt?\naut igitur motu privandumst corpora quaeque\naut esse admixtum dicundumst rebus inane,\nunde initum primum capiat res quaeque movendi.\nPostremo duo de concursu corpora lata\nsi cita dissiliant, nempe aer omne necessest,\ninter corpora quod fiat, possidat inane.\nis porro quamvis circum celerantibus auris\nconfluat, haud poterit tamen uno tempore totum\ncompleri spatium; nam primum quemque necessest\noccupet ille locum, deinde omnia possideantur.\nquod si forte aliquis, cum corpora dissiluere,\ntum putat id fieri quia se condenseat aer,\nerrat; nam vacuum tum fit quod non fuit ante\net repletur item vacuum quod constitit ante,\nnec tali ratione potest denserier aer\n\n### Against Anaxagoras\n\nnec, si iam posset, sine inani posset, opinor,\nipse in se trahere et partis conducere in unum.\nQua propter, quamvis causando multa moreris,\nesse in rebus inane tamen fateare necessest.\nmultaque praeterea tibi possum commemorando\nargumenta fidem dictis conradere nostris.\nverum animo satis haec vestigia parva sagaci\nsunt, per quae possis cognoscere cetera tute.\nnamque canes ut montivagae persaepe ferai\nnaribus inveniunt intectas fronde quietes,\ncum semel institerunt vestigia certa viai,\nsic alid ex alio per te tute ipse videre\ntalibus in rebus poteris caecasque latebras\ninsinuare omnis et verum protrahere inde.\nquod si pigraris paulumve recesseris ab re,\nhoc tibi de plano possum promittere, Memmi:\nusque adeo largos haustus e fontibus magnis\nlingua meo suavis diti de pectore fundet,\nut verear ne tarda prius per membra senectus\nserpat et in nobis vitai claustra resolvat,\nquam tibi de quavis una re versibus omnis\nargumentorum sit copia missa per auris.\nSed nunc ut repetam coeptum pertexere dictis,\nomnis ut est igitur per se natura duabus\nconstitit in rebus; nam corpora sunt et inane,\nhaec in quo sita sunt et qua diversa moventur.\ncorpus enim per se communis dedicat esse\nsensus; cui nisi prima fides fundata valebit,\nhaut erit occultis de rebus quo referentes\nconfirmare animi quicquam ratione queamus.\ntum porro locus ac spatium, quod inane vocamus,\nsi nullum foret, haut usquam sita corpora possent\nesse neque omnino quoquam diversa meare;\nid quod iam supera tibi paulo ostendimus ante.\npraeterea nihil est quod possis dicere ab omni\ncorpore seiunctum secretumque esse ab inani,\nquod quasi tertia sit numero natura reperta.\nnam quod cumque erit, esse aliquid debebit id ipsum\naugmine vel grandi vel parvo denique, dum sit;\ncui si tactus erit quamvis levis exiguusque,\ncorporis augebit numerum summamque sequetur;\nsin intactile erit, nulla de parte quod ullam\nrem prohibere queat per se transire meantem,\nscilicet hoc id erit, vacuum quod inane vocamus.\nPraeterea per se quod cumque erit, aut faciet quid\naut aliis fungi debebit agentibus ipsum\naut erit ut possint in eo res esse gerique.\nat facere et fungi sine corpore nulla potest res\nnec praebere locum porro nisi inane vacansque.\nergo praeter inane et corpora tertia per se\nnulla potest rerum in numero natura relinqui,\nnec quae sub sensus cadat ullo tempore nostros\nnec ratione animi quam quisquam possit apisci.\nNam quae cumque cluent, aut his coniuncta duabus\nrebus ea invenies aut horum eventa videbis.\nconiunctum est id quod nusquam sine permitiali\ndiscidio potis est seiungi seque gregari,\npondus uti saxis, calor ignis, liquor aquai,\ntactus corporibus cunctis, intactus inani.\nservitium contra paupertas divitiaeque,\nlibertas bellum concordia cetera quorum\nadventu manet incolumis natura abituque,\nhaec soliti sumus, ut par est, eventa vocare.\ntempus item per se non est, sed rebus ab ipsis\nconsequitur sensus, transactum quid sit in aevo,\ntum quae res instet, quid porro deinde sequatur;\nnec per se quemquam tempus sentire fatendumst\nsemotum ab rerum motu placidaque quiete.\ndenique Tyndaridem raptam belloque subactas\nTroiiugenas gentis cum dicunt esse, videndumst\nne forte haec per se cogant nos esse fateri,\nquando ea saecla hominum, quorum haec eventa fuerunt,\ninrevocabilis abstulerit iam praeterita aetas;\nnamque aliud terris, aliud regionibus ipsis\neventum dici poterit quod cumque erit actum.\ndenique materies si rerum nulla fuisset\nnec locus ac spatium, res in quo quaeque geruntur,\nnumquam Tyndaridis forma conflatus amore\nignis Alexandri Phrygio sub pectore gliscens\nclara accendisset saevi certamina belli\nnec clam durateus Troiianis Pergama partu\ninflammasset equos nocturno Graiiugenarum;\nperspicere ut possis res gestas funditus omnis\nnon ita uti corpus per se constare neque esse\nnec ratione cluere eadem qua constet inane,\nsed magis ut merito possis eventa vocare\ncorporis atque loci, res in quo quaeque gerantur.\nCorpora sunt porro partim primordia rerum,\npartim concilio quae constant principiorum.\nsed quae sunt rerum primordia, nulla potest vis\nstinguere; nam solido vincunt ea corpore demum.\netsi difficile esse videtur credere quicquam\nin rebus solido reperiri corpore posse.\ntransit enim fulmen caeli per saepta domorum\nclamor ut ac voces, ferrum candescit in igni\ndissiliuntque fero ferventi saxa vapore;\ncum labefactatus rigor auri solvitur aestu,\ntum glacies aeris flamma devicta liquescit;\npermanat calor argentum penetraleque frigus,\nquando utrumque manu retinentes pocula rite\nsensimus infuso lympharum rore superne.\nusque adeo in rebus solidi nihil esse videtur.\nsed quia vera tamen ratio naturaque rerum\ncogit, ades, paucis dum versibus expediamus\nesse ea quae solido atque aeterno corpore constent,\nsemina quae rerum primordiaque esse docemus,\nunde omnis rerum nunc constet summa creata.\nPrincipio quoniam duplex natura duarum\ndissimilis rerum longe constare repertast,\ncorporis atque loci, res in quo quaeque geruntur,\nesse utramque sibi per se puramque necessest.\nnam qua cumque vacat spatium, quod inane vocamus,\ncorpus ea non est; qua porro cumque tenet se\ncorpus, ea vacuum nequaquam constat inane.\nsunt igitur solida ac sine inani corpora prima.\nPraeterea quoniam genitis in rebus inanest,\nmateriem circum solidam constare necessest;\nnec res ulla potest vera ratione probari\ncorpore inane suo celare atque intus habere,\nsi non, quod cohibet, solidum constare relinquas.\nid porro nihil esse potest nisi materiai\nconcilium, quod inane queat rerum cohibere.\nmateries igitur, solido quae corpore constat,\nesse aeterna potest, cum cetera dissoluantur.\nTum porro si nil esset quod inane vocaret,\nomne foret solidum; nisi contra corpora certa\nessent quae loca complerent quae cumque tenerent\nomne quod est spatium, vacuum constaret inane.\nalternis igitur ni mirum corpus inani\ndistinctum, quoniam nec plenum naviter extat\nnec porro vacuum; sunt ergo corpora certa,\nquae spatium pleno possint distinguere inane.\nhaec neque dissolui plagis extrinsecus icta\npossunt nec porro penitus penetrata retexi\nnec ratione queunt alia temptata labare;\nid quod iam supra tibi paulo ostendimus ante.\nnam neque conlidi sine inani posse videtur\nquicquam nec frangi nec findi in bina secando\nnec capere umorem neque item manabile frigus\nnec penetralem ignem, quibus omnia conficiuntur.\net quo quaeque magis cohibet res intus inane,\ntam magis his rebus penitus temptata labascit.\nergo si solida ac sine inani corpora prima\nsunt ita uti docui, sint haec aeterna necessest.\nPraeterea nisi materies aeterna fuisset,\nantehac ad nihilum penitus res quaeque redissent\nde nihiloque renata forent quae cumque videmus.\nat quoniam supra docui nil posse creari\nde nihilo neque quod genitumst ad nil revocari,\nesse inmortali primordia corpore debent,\ndissolui quo quaeque supremo tempore possint,\nmateries ut subpeditet rebus reparandis.\nsunt igitur solida primordia simplicitate\nnec ratione queunt alia servata per aevom\nex infinito iam tempore res reparare.\ndenique si nullam finem natura parasset\n\n### The Sweet Honey of the Muses\n\nfrangendis rebus, iam corpora materiai\nusque redacta forent aevo frangente priore,\nut nihil ex illis a certo tempore posset\nconceptum summum aetatis pervadere finem.\nnam quidvis citius dissolvi posse videmus\nquam rursus refici; qua propter longa diei\ninfinita aetas ante acti temporis omnis\nquod fregisset adhuc disturbans dissoluensque,\nnumquam relicuo reparari tempore posset.\nat nunc ni mirum frangendi reddita finis\ncerta manet, quoniam refici rem quamque videmus\net finita simul generatim tempora rebus\nstare, quibus possint aevi contingere florem.\nHuc accedit uti, solidissima materiai\ncorpora cum constant, possint tamen omnia reddi,\nmollia quae fiunt, aer aqua terra vapores,\nquo pacto fiant et qua vi quaeque gerantur,\nadmixtum quoniam semel est in rebus inane.\nat contra si mollia sint primordia rerum,\nunde queant validi silices ferrumque creari,\nnon poterit ratio reddi; nam funditus omnis\nprincipio fundamenti natura carebit.\nsunt igitur solida pollentia simplicitate,\nquorum condenso magis omnia conciliatu\nartari possunt validasque ostendere viris.\nporro si nullast frangendis reddita finis\ncorporibus, tamen ex aeterno tempore quaeque\nnunc etiam superare necessest corpora rebus,\nquae non dum clueant ullo temptata periclo.\nat quoniam fragili natura praedita constant,\ndiscrepat aeternum tempus potuisse manere\ninnumerabilibus plagis vexata per aevom.\nDenique iam quoniam generatim reddita finis\ncrescendi rebus constat vitamque tenendi,\net quid quaeque queant per foedera naturai,\nquid porro nequeant, sancitum quando quidem extat,\nnec commutatur quicquam, quin omnia constant\nusque adeo, variae volucres ut in ordine cunctae\nostendant maculas generalis corpore inesse,\ninmutabilis materiae quoque corpus habere\ndebent ni mirum; nam si primordia rerum\ncommutari aliqua possent ratione revicta,\nincertum quoque iam constet quid possit oriri,\nquid nequeat, finita potestas denique cuique\nqua nam sit ratione atque alte terminus haerens,\nnec totiens possent generatim saecla referre\nnaturam mores victum motusque parentum.\nTum porro quoniam est extremum quodque cacumen\ncorporis illius, quod nostri cernere sensus\niam nequeunt, id ni mirum sine partibus extat\net minima constat natura nec fuit umquam\nper se secretum neque post hac esse valebit,\nalterius quoniamst ipsum pars primaque et una,\ninde aliae atque aliae similes ex ordine partes\nagmine condenso naturam corporis explent;\nquae quoniam per se nequeunt constare, necessest\nhaerere unde queant nulla ratione revelli.\nsunt igitur solida primordia simplicitate,\nquae minimis stipata cohaerent partibus arte.\nnon ex illorum conventu conciliata,\nsed magis aeterna pollentia simplicitate,\nunde neque avelli quicquam neque deminui iam\nconcedit natura reservans semina rebus.\nPraeterea nisi erit minimum, parvissima quaeque\ncorpora constabunt ex partibus infinitis,\nquippe ubi dimidiae partis pars semper habebit\ndimidiam partem nec res praefiniet ulla.\nergo rerum inter summam minimamque quod escit,\nnil erit ut distet; nam quamvis funditus omnis\nsumma sit infinita, tamen, parvissima quae sunt,\nex infinitis constabunt partibus aeque.\nquod quoniam ratio reclamat vera negatque\ncredere posse animum, victus fateare necessest\nesse ea quae nullis iam praedita partibus extent\net minima constent natura. quae quoniam sunt,\nilla quoque esse tibi solida atque aeterna fatendum.\nDenique si minimas in partis cuncta resolvi\ncogere consuesset rerum natura creatrix,\niam nihil ex illis eadem reparare valeret\npropterea quia, quae nullis sunt partibus aucta,\nnon possunt ea quae debet genitalis habere\nmateries, varios conexus pondera plagas\nconcursus motus, per quas res quaeque geruntur.\n\n### The Boundless Universe\n\nQuapropter qui materiem rerum esse putarunt\nignem atque ex igni summam consistere solo,\nmagno opere a vera lapsi ratione videntur.\nHeraclitus init quorum dux proelia primus,\nclarus <ob> obscuram linguam magis inter inanis\nquamde gravis inter Graios, qui vera requirunt;\nomnia enim stolidi magis admirantur amantque,\ninversis quae sub verbis latitantia cernunt,\nveraque constituunt quae belle tangere possunt\nauris et lepido quae sunt fucata sonore.\nNam cur tam variae res possent esse, requiro,\nex uno si sunt igni puroque creatae?\nnil prodesset enim calidum denserier ignem\nnec rare fieri, si partes ignis eandem\nnaturam quam totus habet super ignis haberent.\nacrior ardor enim conductis partibus esset,\nlanguidior porro disiectis <dis>que supatis.\namplius hoc fieri nihil est quod posse rearis\ntalibus in causis, ne dum variantia rerum\ntanta queat densis rarisque ex ignibus esse.\nId quoque: si faciant admixtum rebus inane,\ndenseri poterunt ignes rarique relinqui;\nsed quia multa sibi cernunt contraria quae sint\net fugitant in rebus inane relinquere purum,\nardua dum metuunt, amittunt vera viai\nnec rursum cernunt exempto rebus inane\nomnia denseri fierique ex omnibus unum\ncorpus, nil ab se quod possit mittere raptim,\naestifer ignis uti lumen iacit atque vaporem,\nut videas non e stipatis partibus esse.\nQuod si forte alia credunt ratione potesse\nignis in coetu stingui mutareque corpus,\nscilicet ex nulla facere id si parte reparcent,\noccidet ad nihilum ni mirum funditus ardor\nomnis et <e> nihilo fient quae cumque creantur;\nnam quod cumque suis mutatum finibus exit,\ncontinuo hoc mors est illius quod fuit ante.\nproinde aliquid superare necesse est incolume ollis,\nne tibi res redeant ad nilum funditus omnes\nde nihiloque renata vigescat copia rerum.\nNunc igitur quoniam certissima corpora quaedam\nsunt, quae conservant naturam semper eandem,\nquorum abitu aut aditu mutatoque ordine mutant\nnaturam res et convertunt corpora sese,\nscire licet non esse haec ignea corpora rerum.\nnil referret enim quaedam decedere, abire\natque alia adtribui mutarique ordine quaedam,\nsi tamen ardoris naturam cuncta tenerent;\nignis enim foret omnimodis quod cumque crearet.\nverum, ut opinor, itast: sunt quaedam corpora, quorum\nconcursus motus ordo positura figurae\nefficiunt ignis mutatoque ordine mutant\nnaturam neque sunt igni simulata neque ulli\npraeterea rei quae corpora mittere possit\nsensibus et nostros adiectu tangere tactus.\ndicere porro ignem res omnis esse neque ullam\nrem veram in numero rerum constare nisi ignem,\nquod facit hic idem, perdelirum esse videtur.\nnam contra sensus ab sensibus ipse repugnat\net labefactat eos, unde omnia credita pendent,\nunde hic cognitus est ipsi quem nominat ignem;\ncredit enim sensus ignem cognoscere vere,\ncetera non credit, quae nilo clara minus sunt.\nquod mihi cum vanum tum delirum esse videtur;\nquo referemus enim? quid nobis certius ipsis\nsensibus esse potest, qui vera ac falsa notemus?\nPraeterea quare quisquam magis omnia tollat\net velit ardoris naturam linquere solam,\nquam neget esse ignis, <aliam> tamen esse relinquat?\naequa videtur enim dementia dicere utrumque.\nQuapropter qui materiem rerum esse putarunt\nignem atque ex igni summam consistere posse,\net qui principium gignundis aera rebus\nconstituere aut umorem qui cumque putarunt\nfingere res ipsum per se terramve creare\nomnia et in rerum naturas vertier omnis,\nmagno opere a vero longe derrasse videntur.\nadde etiam qui conduplicant primordia rerum\naera iungentes igni terramque liquori,\net qui quattuor ex rebus posse omnia rentur\nex igni terra atque anima procrescere et imbri.\nquorum Acragantinus cum primis Empedocles est,\ninsula quem triquetris terrarum gessit in oris,\nquam fluitans circum magnis anfractibus aequor\nIonium glaucis aspargit virus ab undis\nangustoque fretu rapidum mare dividit undis\nAeoliae terrarum oras a finibus eius.\nhic est vasta Charybdis et hic Aetnaea minantur\nmurmura flammarum rursum se colligere iras,\nfaucibus eruptos iterum vis ut vomat ignis\nad caelumque ferat flammai fulgura rursum.\nquae cum magna modis multis miranda videtur\ngentibus humanis regio visendaque fertur\nrebus opima bonis, multa munita virum vi,\nnil tamen hoc habuisse viro praeclarius in se\nnec sanctum magis et mirum carumque videtur.\ncarmina quin etiam divini pectoris eius\nvociferantur et exponunt praeclara reperta,\nut vix humana videatur stirpe creatus.\nHic tamen et supra quos diximus inferiores\npartibus egregie multis multoque minores,\nquamquam multa bene ac divinitus invenientes\nex adyto tam quam cordis responsa dedere\nsanctius et multo certa ratione magis quam\nPythia quae tripodi a Phoebi lauroque profatur,\nprincipiis tamen in rerum fecere ruinas\net graviter magni magno cecidere ibi casu.\nPrimum quod motus exempto rebus inani\nconstituunt et res mollis rarasque relinquunt\naera solem ignem terras animalia frugis\nnec tamen admiscent in eorum corpus inane;\ndeinde quod omnino finem non esse secandis\ncorporibus facient neque pausam stare fragori\nnec prorsum in rebus minimum consistere qui<cquam>,\ncum videamus id extremum cuiusque cacumen\nesse quod ad sensus nostros minimum esse videtur,\nconicere ut possis ex hoc, quae cernere non quis\nextremum quod habent, minimum consistere <rerum>.\nHuc accedit item, quoniam primordia rerum\nmollia constituunt, quae nos nativa videmus\nesse et mortali cum corpore, funditus ut qui\ndebeat ad nihilum iam rerum summa reverti\nde nihiloque renata vigescere copia rerum;\nquorum utrumque quid a vero iam distet habebis.\nDeinde inimica modis multis sunt atque veneno\nipsa sibi inter se; quare aut congressa peribunt\naut ita diffugient, ut tempestate coacta\nfulmina diffugere atque imbris ventosque videmus.\nDenique quattuor ex rebus si cuncta creantur\natque in eas rursum res omnia dissoluuntur,\nqui magis illa queunt rerum primordia dici\nquam contra res illorum retroque putari?\nalternis gignuntur enim mutantque colorem\net totam inter se naturam tempore ab omni.\n[fulmina diffugere atque imbris ventosque videmus.]\nsin ita forte putas ignis terraeque coire\ncorpus et aerias auras roremque liquoris,\nnil in concilio naturam ut mutet eorum,\nnulla tibi ex illis poterit res esse creata,\nnon animans, non exanimo cum corpore, ut arbos;\nquippe suam quicque in coetu variantis acervi\nnaturam ostendet mixtusque videbitur aer\ncum terra simul et quodam cum rore manere.\nat primordia gignundis in rebus oportet\nnaturam clandestinam caecamque adhibere,\nemineat ne quid, quod contra pugnet et obstet\nquo minus esse queat proprie quodcumque creatur.\nQuin etiam repetunt a caelo atque ignibus eius\net primum faciunt ignem se vertere in auras\naeris, hinc imbrem gigni terramque creari\nex imbri retroque a terra cuncta reverti,\numorem primum, post aera, deinde calorem,\nnec cessare haec inter se mutare, meare\na caelo ad terram, de terra ad sidera mundi.\nquod facere haud ullo debent primordia pacto.\nimmutabile enim quiddam superare necessest,\nne res ad nihilum redigantur funditus omnes;\nnam quod cumque suis mutatum finibus exit,\ncontinuo hoc mors est illius quod fuit ante.\nquapropter quoniam quae paulo diximus ante\nin commutatum veniunt, constare necessest\n\n### No Center; No End\n\nex aliis ea, quae nequeant convertier usquam,\nne tibi res redeant ad nilum funditus omnis;\nquin potius tali natura praedita quaedam\ncorpora constituas, ignem si forte crearint,\nposse eadem demptis paucis paucisque tributis,\nordine mutato et motu, facere aeris auras,\nsic alias aliis rebus mutarier omnis?\n'At manifesta palam res indicat' inquis 'in auras\naeris e terra res omnis crescere alique;\net nisi tempestas indulget tempore fausto\nimbribus, ut tabe nimborum arbusta vacillent,\nsolque sua pro parte fovet tribuitque calorem,\ncrescere non possint fruges arbusta animantis.'\nscilicet et nisi nos cibus aridus et tener umor\nadiuvet, amisso iam corpore vita quoque omnis\nomnibus e nervis atque ossibus exsoluatur;\nadiutamur enim dubio procul atque alimur nos\ncertis ab rebus, certis aliae atque aliae res.\nni mirum quia multa modis communia multis\nmultarum rerum in rebus primordia mixta\nsunt, ideo variis variae res rebus aluntur.\natque eadem magni refert primordia saepe\ncum quibus et quali positura contineantur\net quos inter se dent motus accipiantque;\nnamque eadem caelum mare terras flumina solem\nconstituunt, eadem fruges arbusta animantis,\nverum aliis alioque modo commixta moventur.\nquin etiam passim nostris in versibus ipsis\nmulta elementa vides multis communia verbis,\ncum tamen inter se versus ac verba necessest\nconfiteare et re et sonitu distare sonanti.\ntantum elementa queunt permutato ordine solo;\nat rerum quae sunt primordia, plura adhibere\npossunt unde queant variae res quaeque creari.\nNunc et Anaxagorae scrutemur homoeomerian\nquam Grai memorant nec nostra dicere lingua\nconcedit nobis patrii sermonis egestas,\nsed tamen ipsam rem facilest exponere verbis.\nprincipio, rerum quam dicit homoeomerian,\nossa videlicet e pauxillis atque minutis\nossibus hic et de pauxillis atque minutis\nvisceribus viscus gigni sanguenque creari\nsanguinis inter se multis coeuntibus guttis\nex aurique putat micis consistere posse\naurum et de terris terram concrescere parvis,\nignibus ex ignis, umorem umoribus esse,\ncetera consimili fingit ratione putatque.\nnec tamen esse ulla de parte in rebus inane\nconcedit neque corporibus finem esse secandis.\nquare in utraque mihi pariter ratione videtur\nerrare atque illi, supra quos diximus ante.\nAdde quod inbecilla nimis primordia fingit;\nsi primordia sunt, simili quae praedita constant\nnatura atque ipsae res sunt aequeque laborant\net pereunt, neque ab exitio res ulla refrenat.\nnam quid in oppressu valido durabit eorum,\nut mortem effugiat, leti sub dentibus ipsis?\nignis an umor an aura? quid horum? sanguen an ossa?\nnil ut opinor, ubi ex aequo res funditus omnis\ntam mortalis erit quam quae manifesta videmus\nex oculis nostris aliqua vi victa perire.\nat neque reccidere ad nihilum res posse neque autem\ncrescere de nihilo testor res ante probatas.\nPraeterea quoniam cibus auget corpus alitque,\nscire licet nobis venas et sanguen et ossa\n* * *                                             860a\nsive cibos omnis commixto corpore dicent\nesse et habere in se nervorum corpora parva\nossaque et omnino venas partisque cruoris,\nfiet uti cibus omnis et aridus et liquor ipse\nex alienigenis rebus constare putetur,\nossibus et nervis sanieque et sanguine mixto.\nPraeterea quae cumque e terra corpora crescunt,\nsi sunt in terris, terram constare necessest\nex alienigenis, quae terris exoriuntur.\ntransfer item, totidem verbis utare licebit:\nin lignis si flamma latet fumusque cinisque,\nex alienigenis consistant ligna necessest,\n[praeterea tellus quae corpora cumque alit auget]\nex alienigenis, quae lignis <ex>oriuntur.\nLinquitur hic quaedam latitandi copia tenvis,\nid quod Anaxagoras sibi sumit, ut omnibus omnis\nres putet inmixtas rebus latitare, sed illud\napparere unum, cuius sint plurima mixta\net magis in promptu primaque in fronte locata.\nquod tamen a vera longe ratione repulsumst;\nconveniebat enim fruges quoque saepe, minaci\nrobore cum in saxi franguntur, mittere signum\nsanguinis aut aliquid, nostro quae corpore aluntur.\ncum lapidi in lapidem terimus, manare cruorem\nconsimili ratione herbis quoque saepe decebat,\net latices dulcis guttas similique sapore\nmittere, lanigerae quali sunt ubere lactis,\nscilicet et glebis terrarum saepe friatis\nherbarum genera et fruges frondesque videri\ndispertita inter terram latitare minute,\npostremo in lignis cinerem fumumque videri,\ncum praefracta forent, ignisque latere minutos.\nquorum nil fieri quoniam manifesta docet res,\nscire licet non esse in rebus res ita mixtas,\nverum semina multimodis inmixta latere\nmultarum rerum in rebus communia debent.\n'At saepe in magnis fit montibus' inquis 'ut altis\narboribus vicina cacumina summa terantur\ninter se validis facere id cogentibus austris,\ndonec flammai fulserunt flore coorto.'\nscilicet et non est lignis tamen insitus ignis,\nverum semina sunt ardoris multa, terendo\nquae cum confluxere, creant incendia silvis.\nquod si facta foret silvis abscondita flamma,\nnon possent ullum tempus celarier ignes,\nconficerent volgo silvas, arbusta cremarent.\niamne vides igitur, paulo quod diximus ante,\npermagni referre eadem primordia saepe\ncum quibus et quali positura contineantur\net quos inter se dent motus accipiantque,\natque eadem paulo inter se mutata creare\nignes et lignum? quo pacto verba quoque ipsa\ninter se paulo mutatis sunt elementis,\ncum ligna atque ignes distincta voce notemus.\nDenique iam quae cumque in rebus cernis apertis\nsi fieri non posse putas, quin materiai\ncorpora consimili natura praedita fingas,\nhac ratione tibi pereunt primordia rerum:\nfiet uti risu tremulo concussa cachinnent\net lacrimis salsis umectent ora genasque.\nNunc age, quod super est, cognosce et clarius audi.\nnec me animi fallit quam sint obscura; sed acri\npercussit thyrso laudis spes magna meum cor\net simul incussit suavem mi in pectus amorem\nMusarum, quo nunc instinctus mente vigenti\navia Pieridum peragro loca nullius ante\ntrita solo. iuvat integros accedere fontis\natque haurire iuvatque novos decerpere flores\ninsignemque meo capiti petere inde coronam,\nunde prius nulli velarint tempora Musae;\nprimum quod magnis doceo de rebus et artis\nreligionum animum nodis exsolvere pergo,\ndeinde quod obscura de re tam lucida pango\ncarmina musaeo contingens cuncta lepore.\nid quoque enim non ab nulla ratione videtur;\nsed vel uti pueris absinthia taetra medentes\ncum dare conantur, prius oras pocula circum\ncontingunt mellis dulci flavoque liquore,\nut puerorum aetas inprovida ludificetur\nlabrorum tenus, interea perpotet amarum\nabsinthi laticem deceptaque non capiatur,\nsed potius tali facto recreata valescat,\nsic ego nunc, quoniam haec ratio plerumque videtur\ntristior esse quibus non est tractata, retroque\nvolgus abhorret ab hac, volui tibi suaviloquenti\ncarmine Pierio rationem exponere nostram\net quasi musaeo dulci contingere melle,\nsi tibi forte animum tali ratione tenere\nversibus in nostris possem, dum perspicis omnem\nnaturam rerum, qua constet compta figura.\nSed quoniam docui solidissima materiai\ncorpora perpetuo volitare invicta per aevom,\nnunc age, summai quaedam sit finis eorum\nnec<ne> sit, evolvamus; item quod inane repertumst\nseu locus ac spatium, res in quo quaeque gerantur,\npervideamus utrum finitum funditus omne\nconstet an immensum pateat vasteque profundum.\nOmne quod est igitur nulla regione viarum\nfinitumst; namque extremum debebat habere.\nextremum porro nullius posse videtur\nesse, nisi ultra sit quod finiat, ut videatur\nquo non longius haec sensus natura sequatur.\nnunc extra summam quoniam nihil esse fatendum,\nnon habet extremum, caret ergo fine modoque.\nnec refert quibus adsistas regionibus eius;\nusque adeo, quem quisque locum possedit, in omnis\ntantundem partis infinitum omne relinquit.\nPraeterea si iam finitum constituatur\nomne quod est spatium, si quis procurrat ad oras\nultimus extremas iaciatque volatile telum,\nid validis utrum contortum viribus ire\nquo fuerit missum mavis longeque volare,\nan prohibere aliquid censes obstareque posse?\nalterutrum fatearis enim sumasque necessest.\nquorum utrumque tibi effugium praecludit et omne\ncogit ut exempta concedas fine patere.\nnam sive est aliquid quod probeat efficiatque\nquo minus quo missum est veniat finique locet se,\nsive foras fertur, non est a fine profectum.\nhoc pacto sequar atque, oras ubi cumque locaris\nextremas, quaeram: quid telo denique fiet?\nfiet uti nusquam possit consistere finis\neffugiumque fugae prolatet copia semper.\nPraeterea spatium summai totius omne\nundique si inclusum certis consisteret oris\nfinitumque foret, iam copia materiai\nundique ponderibus solidis confluxet ad imum\nnec res ulla geri sub caeli tegmine posset\nnec foret omnino caelum neque lumina solis,\nquippe ubi materies omnis cumulata iaceret\nex infinito iam tempore subsidendo.\nat nunc ni mirum requies data principiorum\ncorporibus nullast, quia nil est funditus imum,\nquo quasi confluere et sedes ubi ponere possint.\nsemper in adsiduo motu res quaeque geruntur\npartibus <in> cunctis, infernaque suppeditantur\nex infinito cita corpora materiai.\nPostremo ante oculos res rem finire videtur;\naer dissaepit collis atque aera montes,\nterra mare et contra mare terras terminat omnis;\nomne quidem vero nihil est quod finiat extra.\nest igitur natura loci spatiumque profundi,\nquod neque clara suo percurrere fulmina cursu\nperpetuo possint aevi labentia tractu\nnec prorsum facere ut restet minus ire meando;\nusque adeo passim patet ingens copia rebus\nfinibus exemptis in cunctas undique partis.\nIpsa modum porro sibi rerum summa parare\nne possit, natura tenet, quae corpus inane\net quod inane autem est finiri corpore cogit,\nut sic alternis infinita omnia reddat,\naut etiam alterutrum, nisi terminet alterum eorum,\nsimplice natura pateat tamen inmoderatum,\nnec mare nec tellus neque caeli lucida templa\nnec mortale genus nec divum corpora sancta\nexiguum possent horai sistere tempus;\nnam dispulsa suo de coetu materiai\ncopia ferretur magnum per inane soluta,\nsive adeo potius numquam concreta creasset\nullam rem, quoniam cogi disiecta nequisset.\nnam certe neque consilio primordia rerum\nordine se suo quaeque sagaci mente locarunt\nnec quos quaeque <darent motus pepigere profecto>\nsed quia multa modis multis mutata per omne\nex infinito vexantur percita plagis,\nomne genus motus et coetus experiundo\ntandem deveniunt in talis disposituras,\nqualibus haec rerum consistit summa creata,\net multos etiam magnos servata per annos\nut semel in motus coniectast convenientis,\nefficit ut largis avidum mare fluminis undis\nintegrent amnes et solis terra vapore\nfota novet fetus summissaque gens animantum\nfloreat et vivant labentis aetheris ignes.\nquod nullo facerent pacto, nisi materiai\nex infinito suboriri copia posset,\nunde amissa solent reparare in tempore quaeque.\nnam vel uti privata cibo natura animantum\ndiffluit amittens corpus, sic omnia debent\ndissolui simul ac defecit suppeditare\nmateries aliqua ratione aversa viai.\nnec plagae possunt extrinsecus undique summam\nconservare omnem, quae cumque est conciliata.\ncudere enim crebro possunt partemque morari,\ndum veniant aliae ac suppleri summa queatur;\ninter dum resilire tamen coguntur et una\nprincipiis rerum spatium tempusque fugai\nlargiri, ut possint a coetu libera ferri.\nquare etiam atque etiam suboriri multa necessest,\net tamen ut plagae quoque possint suppetere ipsae,\ninfinita opus est vis undique materiai.\nIllud in his rebus longe fuge credere, Memmi,\nin medium summae quod dicunt omnia niti\natque ideo mundi naturam stare sine ullis\nictibus externis neque quoquam posse resolvi\nsumma atque ima, quod in medium sint omnia nixa,\nipsum si quicquam posse in se sistere credis,\net quae pondera sunt sub terris omnia sursum\nnitier in terraque retro requiescere posta,\nut per aquas quae nunc rerum simulacra videmus;\net simili ratione animalia suppa vagari\ncontendunt neque posse e terris in loca caeli\nreccidere inferiora magis quam corpora nostra\nsponte sua possint in caeli templa volare;\nilli cum videant solem, nos sidera noctis\ncernere et alternis nobiscum tempora caeli\ndividere et noctes parilis agitare diebus.\nsed vanus stolidis haec * * *\namplexi quod habent perv * * *\nnam medium nihil esse potest * * *\ninfinita; neque omnino, si iam <medium sit>,\npossit ibi quicquam consistere * * *\nquam quavis alia longe ratione * * *\nomnis enim locus ac spatium, quod in<ane vocamus>,\nper medium, per non medium, concedere <debet>\naeque ponderibus, motus qua cumque feruntur.\nnec quisquam locus est, quo corpora cum venerunt,\nponderis amissa vi possint stare <in> inani;\nnec quod inane autem est ulli subsistere debet,\nquin, sua quod natura petit, concedere pergat.\nhaud igitur possunt tali ratione teneri\nres in concilium medii cuppedine victae.\nPraeterea quoniam non omnia corpora fingunt\nin medium niti, sed terrarum atque liquoris\numorem ponti magnasque e montibus undas,\net quasi terreno quae corpore contineantur,\nat contra tenuis exponunt aeris auras\net calidos simul a medio differrier ignis,\natque ideo totum circum tremere aethera signis\net solis flammam per caeli caerula pasci,\nquod calor a medio fugiens se ibi conligat omnis,\nnec prorsum arboribus summos frondescere ramos\nposse, nisi a terris paulatim cuique cibatum\n* * *                                             1094-1101\nne volucri ritu flammarum moenia mundi\ndiffugiant subito magnum per inane soluta\net ne cetera consimili ratione sequantur\nneve ruant caeli tonitralia templa superne\nterraque se pedibus raptim subducat et omnis\ninter permixtas rerum caelique ruinas\ncorpora solventes abeat per inane profundum,\ntemporis ut puncto nihil extet reliquiarum\ndesertum praeter spatium et primordia caeca.\nnam qua cumque prius de parti corpora desse\nconstitues, haec rebus erit pars ianua leti,\nhac se turba foras dabit omnis materiai.\nHaec sic pernosces parva perductus opella;\nnamque alid ex alio clarescet nec tibi caeca\nnox iter eripiet, quin ultima naturai\npervideas: ita res accendent lumina rebus.\nLucretius","download_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/lucretius-1/original.txt"},"translations":[{"id":"trn_lucretius_1_mouseia","translator":"Mouseia","kind":"curated","note":"Mouseia's complete machine-assisted Musean translation, made directly from the complete Latin text of Book 1 as printed by The Latin Library, in flowing prose that preserves the argument's order, images, and force.","text":"### Invocation to Venus\n\nMother of the Aeneadae, delight of men and gods, nurturing Venus: beneath the gliding signs of heaven you fill the ship-bearing sea and the fruit-bearing lands, since through you every race of living things is conceived, and, born, beholds the light of the sun. Before you, goddess, the winds flee; the clouds of heaven flee before your coming; for you the cunning earth puts up its sweet flowers; for you the levels of the sea laugh, and the sky grows calm and shines with outspread light. For as soon as the face of the spring day is unveiled, and the quickening breeze of the west wind is set free and flourishes, first the birds of the air proclaim you and your coming, stricken to the heart by your power; then the wild beasts and the cattle leap about the glad pastures and swim across the rushing rivers: so seized by your charm they follow you eagerly, wherever you go on, leading each of them onward. Through seas and mountains and rushing rivers, through the leafy homes of birds and the green plains, you breathe a soft love into every breast, and make them eagerly breed their generations, each after its kind.\n\nSince you alone govern the nature of things, and without you nothing rises into the shining shores of light, nothing is made glad, nothing lovable — I long for you as my partner in writing the verses I strive to set out on the nature of things, for our Memmius, whom you, goddess, have willed to be adorned with every excellence at every season. All the more, then, grant, goddess, an everlasting charm to my words, and make the wild works of war lie hushed in sleep through all seas and lands; for you alone can delight mortals with quiet peace, since Mars, mighty in arms, rules the savage works of war — and he often flings himself into your lap, conquered forever by the wound of love, and gazing up, with neck thrown back and supple, feeds his eager eyes with love, gaping on you, goddess, and his breath hangs from your lips as he lies back. Let it pour around him, goddess, as he reclines against your holy body, soft words from your mouth, asking, bright lady, quiet peace for the Romans. For we cannot do this work with an easy mind in an evil season of our country, nor could Memmius' glorious line be wanting to the common weal in such times.\n\n### The Light of Reason\n\nFor the nature of the gods in itself must needs enjoy immortal age in the deepest peace, far removed and parted from our affairs — free from all pain, free from peril, strong in its own resources, needing nothing of us: neither won by good service nor touched by anger.\n\nWhen human life lay foul before our eyes upon the earth, crushed beneath the weight of Religion, which showed her head from the regions of heaven, hanging over mortals with terrible aspect, first a man of Greece dared to raise mortal eyes against her, and first to stand against her. Him neither tales of gods nor thunderbolts nor heaven with its threatening murmur could quell — but the more they provoked, the more the keen courage of his spirit sharpened, to desire first of all to burst the tight shutters of nature's gates. Therefore the living force of his mind prevailed, and he passed out far beyond the flaming walls of the world and traversed the immeasurable whole in mind and spirit — from which, a victor, he brings us back report of what can arise and what cannot: in a word, how each thing has its power bounded, and its deep-set boundary mark. Therefore Religion in her turn lies crushed beneath our feet, and his victory makes us equal with heaven.\n\nI fear in this matter that you may suppose you are entering the beginning of an unholy course, the path of crime. On the contrary: more often it is Religion that has given birth to wicked and unholy deeds. As at Aulis, when the chosen leaders of the Greeks, the first of men, foully stained the altar of the Virgin Goddess with the blood of Iphianassa. As soon as the ribbon had been bound around the maiden's hair and hung down her cheeks on either side, and she saw her sorrowing father stand before the altars, and near him the attendants hiding the knife, and the citizens pouring out tears at the sight of her — mute with fear she sank on her knees to the ground. Nor did it avail the wretched girl in such an hour that she had been the first to give the king the name of father. For, lifted in men's hands, she was led trembling to the altars — not that after the rite was done she might be attended by the bright hymeneal song, but that in the very season of her wedding, a chaste girl might fall as a foul sacrifice, slain sadly by her own father, to give the fleet a lucky, a prosperous sailing. So much could Religion persuade to evil!\n\nYou yourself, at some time, trembling at the words of prophets, will fall away from us. How many dreams they will conjure for you, whose waking fear you must guard against! Not that they will seem to trouble your peace of mind greatly. But if you once give yourself up to them, away go all your plans: fear will set you running from the place where you stand; you will wish to escape — and that is to flee yourself. O unhappy race of men, when they have done such things and confess it! Then a guilt breeds at once for itself by its own deserving: fear of the gods makes men throng to rites and altars — as now at Taormina, at the turning of the year, even as they did of old, the wretched people of the whole city pour out their shepherds' offering to Bacchus, with the noise of horns and the beating of drums, that the goddess may be appeased. Many, too, are the races and peoples that learned this from dreams: they come to the altars, kneel on the ground, shed tears, and raise their hands. And they do not pray to be able to undo the guilt and go unpunished, but only to be able to forget it.\n\nAnd yet the mere unreason of the thing is often enough to uproot us. As when they lie awake in sleepless nights, and take on the anxieties of a burdened heart, they ask themselves whether they have done any deed that now torments them, and cannot say what it was: they strive to shake off the unaccountable terror, and fear it is still there — for they cannot see what the evil is that they flee. And so they mutter again, and stand still, and are troubled, and dread.\n\nThe riddle is solved: a mind unquiet, and the whole of life troubled, strive to change their place, as if they could lay the burden down. The traveler is hardly seated in his hall, and his heart is still abroad. He fancies he is followed: the image of his fear is at his shoulder. He cannot unbend, and the old trouble clings — the trouble the man himself makes. The cup is heavy with the wine, and the man grows more uneasy. He cannot sleep: he tosses from side to side, and strives to find, in words without sense, some easy passage out of a great trouble, like children trying to escape a nightmare. They cannot understand what they are saying, and cannot see through the veil of the trouble they bring upon themselves.\n\nSo it is not hard to see why men are afraid. If they saw a clear end to their troubles, they would have strength to despise the fears of religion and the threats of seers. But there is no way out, no end of power: and so they must go on, haunted by a fear that grows forever: for they cannot know what will be, and they cannot see what they must do to escape. And so a man labors for himself, and wastes the hours, and cannot sit quiet, and cannot go away — for his trouble runs with him.\n\n### Nothing from Nothing\n\nFirst, then, I will set out the principle: nothing is ever made out of nothing by the gods' will. For fear so deeply has fastened into the hearts of men, that all things lie upon the ground for want of power — and they cannot rise, since the gods, they think, made all things for men. But if men saw that there is a fixed limit of grieving, they would have strength with strong reason to despise the bonds of religion and the threats of seers. For we are made of matter that is born and dies; and the mind, I say, is often sick with fear of death, and the fear presses on us and troubles the breast: we must look well into the nature of things.\n\nI say this: things cannot be born from nothing. For then everything would grow from everything, with no seed: men could rise from the sea, and fish from the earth; birds would burst from the sky. Cattle and herds would breed everywhere, of every kind, nor would the same animal always keep its own young. The fruit tree would bear fruit of every kind in the same field. And we would not see the tilled fields turn to trees, unless earth had her seed in herself. And things would not rise in season, but all would grow at once, if nothing were made of nothing. For then there would be no spring, no summer, no autumn, no winter: everything would spring up at once, and nothing would know its time. And nothing would be set in order. For if things arose without seeds, they could grow at any time, in any season, at any place: there would be no need of a womb, no need of earth, no need of water, no need of rain. But the facts are otherwise: all things grow in their seasons, and need their seeds, and need their time.\n\nAnd besides: why do flowers appear in spring, and the corn in summer, and the grapes in autumn? Why does the tree put out leaves in spring, and drop them in autumn? There must be seed: and the seed of each thing must come to its season before the thing can grow. And if things could be made of nothing, they could grow anywhere, in any kind of earth, in the sea, on the land, in the rivers, in the sky, in the bodies of animals, in the gods themselves: but they do not. So there is seed, and the seed of each thing is its own.\n\nAnother: labor would not be needed. If things could arise from nothing, they would grow of themselves, without seed, without labor, without time. Men would not need to plough, to sow, to reap: all would grow of itself, and no one would need to work. And things would not be set in order, nor be kept in order. For nothing needs order unless it has a nature that needs it. And nothing has a nature unless it has seeds. And nothing has seeds unless it is made of matter. And matter is not made of nothing.\n\nAnd last: we see that things grow, and are nourished, and change. If there were no seed, growth would be impossible. And if things could be made of nothing, they could grow to any size, in any time: a man might grow as tall as the sky in a day, and a tree might grow in an hour. But things grow in their own time, and to their own size: and the seed is in them, and the seed grows. So nothing is made of nothing: all things grow by seed.\n\nAnd now: nothing is ever annihilated, so that it is all destroyed. If things could pass into nothing, everything would die at once, and nothing would last. But we see things last: the world itself is everlasting, and the sea, and the earth, and the stars. And we see things change, and pass into other things. But they do not pass into nothing: for nothing can be born of nothing, so nothing can fall into nothing. The rain falls, and rises again in vapor: the river runs into the sea, and the sea sends it back to the rivers: the cloud gathers, and falls as rain: and all things are kept, and none is destroyed. For if things passed into nothing, they could not come again: but they do come again. So nothing is annihilated.\n\nAnd if there were no seed, and things could be made of nothing, and could fall into nothing, they could not be kept in order, nor be governed: for there would be nothing to govern them. But we see that all things are kept in order: the seasons, the years, the day and night, the sun and moon and stars. So there is matter, and the matter is eternal.\n\n### Atoms and Void\n\nNature, then, works through body and through void: for there is void in things — this you must admit, both because otherwise nothing could move, and because the sea would be solid, and the earth would be solid, and nothing could grow, and nothing could be born. For matter is not solid: for there is room in it. The river runs, and the wind blows, and light passes through: so there is room in matter, and matter is not solid through and through.\n\nAnd there are two kinds of things: body and void. Body is that which is, and void is that which is not — the empty room in which body is, and by which body moves. And body is not nothing; and void is not body. Body touches body; and void does not touch: for there is nothing in it to touch. But body can move in void: and body cannot move in body. So there is void, and there is body.\n\nAnd body is made of matter; and matter is made of atoms: for matter can be broken, and the atoms cannot. The atom is the smallest thing: for if it could be broken, it would be made of parts; and if it were made of parts, it would not be the smallest thing. And if there were no smallest thing, everything would be made of nothing, and would fall into nothing: for everything would be divisible forever. So there are atoms, and they are the seeds of things.\n\nAnd the atoms are solid, and eternal, and indivisible: and they move in the void, and meet, and cling, and make things. And things are made of atoms as words are made of letters: the letters are few, and the words are many; and the atoms are few, and the things are many. And as the same letters make different words, so the same atoms make different things: the same atoms make the sea, and the earth, and the sky, and the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and the living things, and the trees, and men. And the atoms differ only in shape, and size, and weight: and by these differences all things are made.\n\nAnd the atoms are not made, and do not perish: for they are the seeds. And if the atoms could be made or perish, everything could be made or perish at any time, in any way: but the facts are otherwise. The atoms are eternal, and matter is eternal.\n\n### Against Anaxagoras\n\nBut one man, Anaxagoras, said that all things lie hidden in all things, mingled: and that only that thing appears of which there is the most, and which lies foremost and first in front. But this is far from the truth of things. For then the corn would often show blood, when the stalks are broken by the mighty crushing of the stone: and blood would often drip from the stone when we grind stone on stone: and the grass would drip sweet drops like the milk of the sheep: and the clods of earth, crumbled, would show blades and corn and leaves scattered minute among the earth: and in the wood, when it is broken, we should see ash and smoke, and fire hidden minute. But since nothing of the kind appears, you may know that things are not so mingled in things: but that seeds of many things lie hidden, mingled in common ways, in things.\n\nAnd you say: \"Often on high mountains the tops of the high trees grind against one another, when the strong south winds drive them — and then flame flashes out with its flower.\" Certainly — but fire is not grafted in the wood: rather there are many seeds of heat in it; and when they meet, rubbed together, they make fires in the forests. And if the flame had been hidden ready-made in the woods, the fires could not be hidden for a moment: they would consume the forests at once, and burn the orchards. Do you not see, then, what I said a little before: that it matters greatly with what other seeds the same seeds are held, and in what position, and what motions they give and take among themselves — and that the same seeds, changed a little among themselves, make fire and wood? Just so the words themselves are made of letters changed a little among themselves, when we mark with a distinct voice \"fire\" and \"wood.\"\n\nAnd now, whatever you see plainly in things, if you think it cannot be otherwise than that the bodies of matter are made of a like nature to it, you destroy by this reason the first-beginnings of things: it will come to pass that laughter shakes the cheeks with trembling mirth, and salt tears moisten the face.\n\n### The Sweet Honey of the Muses\n\nNow then: learn what remains, and hear more clearly. Nor does it escape me how dark it is: but the great hope of praise has struck my heart with a sharp thyrsus, and at the same time has struck into my breast the sweet love of the Muses, by which, so quickened, I range with vigorous mind the pathless places of the Pierides, never yet trodden by the foot of man. It is joy to come to untouched springs, and to drink; joy to pluck new flowers, and to seek from there a crown for my head, from where before now the Muses have never veiled the temples of any man. First, because I teach of great things, and strive to loose the mind from the tight knots of religion; then, because on a dark subject I compose verses so full of light, touching all with the charm of the Muse. For this too does not seem without reason: but just as physicians, when they try to give foul wormwood to children, first touch the rim of the cup all around with the sweet and yellow juice of honey, so that the heedless age of childhood is beguiled as far as the lips, and meanwhile drinks up the bitter draught of wormwood, and is not caught by deceit, but rather, refreshed by such a means, recovers strength — so I now, since this doctrine generally seems bitter to those who have not handled it, and the crowd shrinks back from it, have wished to set out our doctrine to you in sweet-speaking Pierian song, and as it were to touch it with the delicious honey of the Muse: if by chance I might hold your mind fast with such verses, while you see through all the nature of things, and what shape it has.\n\n### The Boundless Universe\n\nBut since I have taught that the most solid bodies of matter fly about forever unconquered through all time, come now: let us unfold whether there is any limit to their sum, or none. And likewise what has been found to be void — or place and space, in which all things are carried out — let us see whether it is altogether bounded, or stretches measureless and deep.\n\nThe whole of what is, then, is bounded in no direction of ways: for it must have an end. But nothing is seen to have an end, unless there be something beyond to bound it, so that the place may be seen where the force of sense ceases to follow. Now since we must confess that outside the sum there is nothing, it has no end: it is therefore without limit and without measure. Nor does it matter at what regions of it you stand: so much is it, that whatever place anyone has taken, he leaves the whole infinite alike in all directions.\n\nFurthermore: if for the moment the whole of space were set as bounded, and if anyone ran forward to the last shores and hurled a flying spear, would you rather that the spear, hurled with mighty force, went where it was sent and flew far, or do you think something can hinder and stop it? One or the other you must confess and take. Either of which shuts out all flight for you, and forces you to grant that all things lie open, with no end taken away. For whether there is something to check and prevent the spear from going where it was sent and placing itself at the end, or whether it is carried beyond — it did not set out from an end. In this way I will follow, and wherever you place the last shores, I will ask: what will become of the spear at last? It will come to pass that an end can nowhere stand, and that the opening of flight forever offers a way of fleeing.\n\nFurthermore: if all the space of the whole sum were shut in and stood bounded on every side with fixed shores, then the store of matter would have flowed together from everywhere with solid weights to the bottom, and nothing could be done beneath the cover of heaven: there would be no heaven at all, nor the lights of the sun — since all matter, heaped together, would have lain from infinite time, sinking down. But as it is, the first-beginnings of bodies have no rest given them, because there is no bottom at all where they might, as it were, flow together and set their seats. Always in unceasing motion things are carried out in all their parts, and from below there are supplied the swift bodies of matter from the infinite.\n\nLastly, before our eyes one thing seems to bound another: air fences hills from air, mountains fence air from air, land fences the sea, and the sea in turn bounds all lands. But truly there is nothing outside to bound. Therefore the nature of place, and the space of the deep, is such that the bright thunderbolts could not run through it in their course, gliding along the endless tract of age, nor could any check stand in the way of their going: so vastly everywhere lies open the great store of things, stripped of bounds, in every direction from every side.\n\n### No Center; No End\n\nMoreover, nature holds that the sum of things cannot have set a limit for itself: since it compels body to bound void, and void again to bound body, that so it may render all things infinite by alternation; or if neither of the two is bounded by the other, yet each, of simple nature, must lie unbounded — so that neither sea nor land nor the bright temples of heaven nor the race of mortals nor the holy bodies of gods could stand for a brief hour: for the store of matter, driven from its gathering, would be carried dissolved through the great void — or rather, it would never have created anything concretely, since it could not have been driven together when dispersed. For surely the first-beginnings of things did not place themselves each in their order by counsel, with keen mind bargaining which motions each should give; but because many, changed in many ways through all, are tossed and driven by blows from infinite time, trying every kind of motion and meeting, at last they come into such arrangements as this sum of things is created of, kept through many great years, once cast into motions that fit — and make the greedy sea replenished by the lavish waves of rivers, and the earth renewed by the sun's warmth, refreshed, bring forth her young, and the race of living things flourish and live, and the fires of the gliding ether live. Which they could in no wise do, unless the store of matter could arise from the infinite, from which each thing is wont in due season to renew what is lost. For even as the nature of living things, deprived of food, melts away and loses body, so all things must be dissolved at once, if matter should fail to be supplied in any way along the way of turning aside. And blows from outside cannot on every side keep the whole, whatever it is that has been gathered. For they can beat often and hold back a part, until others come and the sum can be supplied: yet now and then they are forced to bound back, and to grant space and time of flight to the first-beginnings of things, that they may be able, free from the meeting, to be carried. Therefore again and again many things must needs arise; and yet that the blows themselves may be supplied, an infinite force of matter is needed from every side.\n\nFlee far from believing this, Memmi: that they say all things press toward the middle of the sum, and therefore the nature of the world stands without outward blows, and cannot now be loosened in any direction, bottom and top — because all things press toward the middle. If you believe that anything can stand on itself in itself, and that all the weights beneath the earth press upward, and rest on the earth turned backward, as we see the images of things now through waters; and they contend in like manner that living things creep upward, and cannot fall from earth into the places of heaven, any more than our bodies can of themselves fly up into the temples of heaven: that when they see the sun, we see the stars of night, and the seasons of the sky they share with us in turn, and pass nights equal to our days. But vain is this doctrine of the foolish: for there can be no middle in infinite space; and indeed, even if there were a middle, nothing could stand there for that reason, any more than for any other reason whatever. For all place and space, which we call void, must yield alike through middle and through non-middle to the weights, wherever the motions carry them. Nor is there any place where bodies, when they have come, can stand in the void with the force of weight lost; nor ought the void itself to sustain anything, but must needs continue to yield, as its nature seeks. So things cannot be held by such a reason, won by the greed of a middle.\n\nFurthermore: since not all bodies press toward the middle, but the earthly and the liquid humor of the sea, and the great waves from the mountains, and all things held, as it were, in an earthly body — while on the other hand they set forth the thin breezes of air, and at the same time hot fires are carried from the middle — and therefore the whole ether trembles round with its signs, and the flame of the sun feeds on the blue of heaven — because heat, fleeing from the middle, gathers itself there: and trees cannot put forth their topmost branches into leaf, unless each is fed little by little from the lands: lest, flying like birds, the walls of the world suddenly scatter, dissolved through the great void, and the rest follow in like manner, and the thundering temples of heaven rush down from above, and the earth slip from beneath our feet, and all bodies, dissolving amid the mingled ruins of things and heaven, go away through the deep void — so that in a point of time nothing would be left, desolate, except empty space and hidden first-beginnings.\n\nFor wherever you should hold that bodies first failed from any part, that part would be the door of death to things: the whole crowd of matter would give itself forth there.\n\nThis you will learn well, led on with little labor: for one thing will grow clear from another, and blind night shall not rob you of the road, so that you fail to see the last things of nature: so kindle light upon things.","download_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/lucretius-1/translations/trn_lucretius_1_mouseia.txt"},{"id":"trn_lucretius_1_plain","translator":"Mouseia","kind":"plain","note":"Mouseia's complete Plain English edition, made independently and directly from the same Latin text of Book 1.","text":"### Invocation to Venus\n\nMother of the Romans, joy of people and gods, good Venus — you who make the sky, the sailing sea, and the fertile earth come alive: every living thing is born through you, and sees the sunlight. You, goddess, are the one the winds and clouds run from; the earth puts out sweet flowers for you; the sea smiles; the sky shines with calm light. When spring shows its face and the warm west wind blows free, the birds in the air feel you first, struck through the heart by your power. Then wild animals and cattle jump through happy fields and swim fast rivers — they love you so much they follow wherever you lead. Through seas and mountains, rivers, bird-filled forests, and green fields you pour sweet love into every heart, and make each kind of creature keep on having babies.\n\nYou steer the nature of things. Nothing comes into the light without you — nothing happy, nothing lovable. So I want you as my partner in writing this poem about the nature of things, for our friend Memmius, whom you've always made the best of men. Give my words lasting charm, goddess. And while I write, make war sleep — let the violence of battle rest everywhere, on sea and land. Only you can give humans true peace: Mars, the god of war, often falls into your lap, beaten forever by love's wound. Lying back, he looks up at you, drinks you in with hungry eyes, and his breath hangs on your lips. Goddess, lean over him as he rests on your sacred body. Pour sweet words into his ears. Ask for quiet peace for Rome. We can't do this work with a calm heart while our country is in trouble — and Memmius must be free to serve the common good.\n\n### The Light of Reason\n\nThe gods live their own life, by nature: endless years in perfect peace, far away from us, apart from our world. No pain reaches them, no danger. They are strong in their own riches; they need nothing from us. Kindness doesn't win them; anger doesn't touch them.\n\nHuman life used to lie disgusting on the ground, crushed under the weight of Religion — that showed its face from the sky, hanging over people, terrifying. The first person to fight back was a Greek: a mortal man who dared raise his eyes against it. Stories of gods, thunder, sky rumbling threats — nothing scared him. Instead his spirit got sharper. He wanted to be the first to smash the locked gates of nature. So the living power of his mind won: he traveled far past the flaming walls of the world, wandering the endless universe in thought. And he came back a winner, and told us what can exist and what can't — in short, how everything has its limits and its deep-set boundary stone. So Religion lies crushed under our feet — his victory makes us equal to the sky.\n\nBut here I worry you might think you're stepping onto an unholy road, into crime. It's the other way around: Religion has bred more crimes than anything — wicked, unholy acts. Think of Aulis, where the chosen leaders of the Greeks, the finest men, stained the altar of the maiden goddess with Iphigenia's blood. The ribbon had just been tied around her hair, hanging by her cheeks; she saw her father crying beside the altars, the men hiding the knives, the citizens weeping at the sight of her. She dropped to her knees, frozen with fear. And what good did it do her that she had been the first to call the king \"father\"? Men picked her up and carried her, shaking, to the altar — not so she could be married with the joyful wedding song, but so that a pure girl could be killed, right at marriage age, by her own grieving father, as a sacrifice for a lucky voyage. That's how much evil Religion can talk people into.\n\nYou might yourself, one day, get scared by the prophets' words and leave us. How many dreams they can invent for you! All that waking fear. It might not seem like much — but once you give in to it, everything else goes: fear chases you from where you're standing; you want to run away — which means running from yourself. People are fools to do such things and admit them. The guilt feeds itself: fear of the gods drives crowds to altars. And whole nations learn it from dreams: they crawl to altars, kneel, cry, raise their hands — not praying to undo their guilt and be let off, but just to forget it.\n\nOften the sheer nonsense is enough to ruin us. People lie awake at night, hearts heavy, asking themselves what they did to deserve this torment — and can't name it. They try to shake off the fear without a cause, and it stays — because they can't even see what they're running from. They mutter to themselves, stop, worry, and dread.\n\nHere's the cure: an anxious mind, a whole troubled life, keeps trying to change places — as if the burden could be dropped there. The man is barely home, and his heart is still out on the road. He thinks something is following him: the shadow of his own fear, right at his shoulder. He can't relax. The old worry clings — the one he built himself. Wine fills the cup, and he gets more anxious. He can't sleep; he tosses and turns, mumbling for a way out of a big trouble, like children fighting nightmares. They don't know what they're saying, and they can't see through the fog of the trouble they make themselves.\n\nSo it's easy to see why people are afraid. If they saw a clear end to their pain, they'd have the strength to laugh off religion's fears and the priests' threats. But there's no way out, no limit to power — so the fear just grows forever. They don't know what's coming, or what to do about it. So a man works for himself, wastes his hours, can't sit still, can't leave — because his trouble runs with him.\n\n### Nothing from Nothing\n\nFirst principle: nothing is ever created out of nothing by the gods' will. Fear has sunk so deep into human hearts that everything lies dying at their feet — because they think the gods made everything for them. But if people saw that grief has a fixed limit, they would have real strength to laugh off religion and the threats of prophets.\n\nHere's the principle: things cannot be born from nothing. If they could, everything could grow from everything, with no seeds: people would rise from the sea, fish from the ground, birds from the sky. Cattle would breed everywhere, of every kind; the same animal wouldn't always keep its own young. The same field would grow fruit of every kind. And nothing would have its season: everything would sprout at once — no spring, no summer, no autumn, no winter. And nothing would be orderly: things would grow anywhere, any time, in any soil — in the sea, on land, in rivers, in the sky, in animals, even in the gods. They don't. So there are seeds, and each thing has its own.\n\nAnd work wouldn't be needed. If things came from nothing, they'd grow on their own — no ploughing, no sowing, no reaping. Everything would just appear. But things don't: everything grows in its season, from its own seed, in its own time.\n\nAnd nothing is ever destroyed into nothing. If things could vanish into nothing, everything would already be gone. But the world lasts; the sea, the earth, the stars last. Things change — rain falls, rises as vapor, falls again; rivers run to the sea and the sea feeds the rivers. Everything is kept. Nothing is lost. If things passed into nothing, they couldn't come back — but they do come back.\n\nSo there is matter, and matter is eternal.\n\n### Atoms and Void\n\nNature works through body and through void. There is emptiness in things — admit it: otherwise nothing could move; the sea would be one solid block, the earth one solid block; nothing could grow, nothing could be born. Matter isn't solid all the way through: rivers run, wind blows, light passes — so there's room inside matter.\n\nTwo kinds of thing: body and void. Body is what exists; void is the empty space where body sits and moves. Body isn't nothing; void isn't body. Body touches body; void doesn't touch anything. Body can move in void, but can't move inside solid body. So: void exists, and body exists.\n\nBody is made of matter, and matter is made of atoms. Matter can be broken; atoms can't. An atom is the smallest thing: if it could be split, it would have parts, and wouldn't be smallest. And if there were no smallest thing, everything would be built from nothing and would crumble into nothing forever. So atoms exist: they are the seeds of things.\n\nAtoms are solid, eternal, indivisible. They move in the void; they meet, cling, and build things. Things are made of atoms the way words are made of letters: few letters, many words; few atoms, many things. The same letters make different words; the same atoms make the sea, the earth, the sky, the sun, the stars, animals, trees, people. Atoms differ only in shape, size, and weight — and by those differences, everything is made.\n\nAtoms aren't created and don't die: they are the seeds. If they could be made or destroyed, everything could come and go any way, any time. But the facts say otherwise: atoms are eternal, and matter is eternal.\n\n### Against Anaxagoras\n\nBut Anaxagoras said everything is hidden inside everything, all mixed together — and the thing you see is just whichever ingredient there's most of, sitting in front. That's far from the truth. If it were so, corn-ground would often drip blood when the millstone crushed it; grinding stone on stone would drip blood; grass would ooze milk like a sheep; broken clods of earth would show corn and leaves scattered through the dirt; split wood would show ash, smoke, and bits of fire. None of that happens. So things are not mixed that way: seeds of many things lie hidden in things, mixed in ordinary ways.\n\nYou say: \"On high mountains, treetops grind against each other in the strong south wind — and fire flashes out.\" True — but fire isn't grafted in the wood. There are seeds of heat in it; rubbed together they make forest fires. If fire were already made and waiting in the woods, fires couldn't hide for a moment: forests would burn instantly. See, then, what I said before: it matters hugely what other seeds touch the same seeds, how they're arranged, what motions they give and take. The same seeds, shifted slightly, make fire — or wood. Just as the same letters, shifted slightly, make different words.\n\nAnd one more thing: if you insist that everything visible must be made of parts just like itself, you destroy the very first-beginnings of things. You'd have to say laughter is made of laughing bits, tears of salty drops.\n\n### The Sweet Honey of the Muses\n\nNow learn what remains, and hear more clearly. I know how dark the subject is. But the great hope of praise has struck my heart like a sharp thyrsus — and into my breast has struck the sweet love of the Muses. On that strength I wander the pathless places of the Muses' mountain, where no human foot has walked. It's a joy to reach untouched springs and drink; a joy to pick new flowers and weave a crown for my head from a place no poet has ever crowned before. First, because I teach great things, and try to free the mind from the tight knots of religion. Then, because on a dark subject I make verses full of light, touching everything with the Muse's charm.\n\nThat's not vanity: doctors, trying to give children nasty wormwood, first brush the rim of the cup with sweet golden honey — so the child, fooled at the lips, drinks the bitter medicine down, and isn't cheated but refreshed, and gets its strength back. Just so, since this philosophy usually seems bitter to people who haven't tried it, and the crowd pulls away — I wanted to set out our doctrine in sweet song for you, to touch it with the Muse's honey: if maybe I could hold your mind with poetry while you take in the whole nature of things, and what shape it has.\n\n### The Boundless Universe\n\nNow that I've taught that the most solid bodies of matter fly about forever, unconquered, through all time — the next question: is there a limit to how many of them there are, or not? And the void — the space in which everything moves — is it bounded, or does it stretch endless and deep?\n\nThe whole of what exists has no edge in any direction. If it had an end, it would have something beyond the end to bound it — you'd be able to see the spot where your senses give out. But since nothing exists outside the whole, it has no end: it is without limit, without measure. And it makes no difference where in it you stand: wherever anyone stands, the whole infinite spreads out equally in every direction.\n\nHere's a picture: suppose all of space were bounded for a moment, and someone ran to the farthest edge and threw a flying spear. Would the spear, thrown with all its force, fly onward where it was aimed — or would something stop it? You must pick one. Either answer breaks your wall and forces you to admit that everything lies open, edgeless. For whether something blocks the spear at the edge, or it flies on past — the spear did not stop at an edge. I'll keep asking: wherever you set the last shore, what happens to the spear then? There can be no edge anywhere; escape is always open.\n\nMore: if all of space were shut in, bounded on every side by fixed shores, then all matter, weighed down, would have sunk to the bottom long ago — piled into one heap — and nothing could happen under the sky: there'd be no sky, no sunlight, since all matter would have lain there from infinite time, sunk. But as it is, the atoms have no rest: there's no bottom where they could collect and settle. Everything is carried in unceasing motion through every part, and more matter streams in from the infinite from below.\n\nFinally: before your eyes, one thing bounds another. Air borders hills; mountains border air; land borders the sea; the sea borders every land. But outside the whole there is nothing to bound it. So the nature of space is such that the bright lightning could fly through it forever, and no barrier could ever stand in its way: so vastly everywhere lies open the great store of things — boundless, in every direction from every side.\n\n### No Center; No End\n\nAnd nature says the sum of things can't have set a limit for itself. It makes body bound void, and void bound body, alternating — making everything infinite. Or if neither bounds the other, then each, simple in itself, must stretch unbounded — in which case neither sea nor land nor the bright temples of heaven nor the race of mortals nor the holy bodies of the gods could last even a single hour: the store of matter, shaken loose from its gathering, would scatter through the great void — or rather, nothing would ever have formed at all, since dispersed matter could never have collected. For surely the atoms didn't set themselves in order by clever planning, deciding each motion in advance. But because many of them, shifted in many ways, have been tossed and driven by blows from infinite time — trying every kind of motion and combination — at last they fall into arrangements like this world of ours, held through many great years once the fitting motions begin: and these make the greedy sea fed by the rivers' waves, the earth renewed by the sun's warmth bringing forth life, the races of living things flourishing, and the fires of the sky alive. None of that could happen unless matter kept streaming in from the infinite, from which everything in season renews what it loses. Just as living things, without food, waste away — so everything would dissolve at once if matter failed along the way. And blows from outside can't keep the whole thing together forever: they batter a part and hold it, until more blows come and the whole is supplied — but now and then they must bounce away, giving the atoms space and time to flee. So many things must keep arising; and to keep the blows supplied, an infinite store of matter is needed on every side.\n\nDon't believe this, Memmius — the claim that everything presses toward the middle of the universe, and that's why the world stands without being hit from outside, unable to fall apart in any direction, bottom or top — because everything pushes to the middle. If you believe anything can stand on itself by itself — that all the weight under the earth presses upward and rests on the earth upside-down, the way we see things through water — and that living things crawl along the upper side, unable to fall from earth into the sky, just as our bodies can't fly up to heaven — and that when they see our sun, we see their night stars, and they share our seasons, their nights equal to our days — that doctrine is vain, the dream of fools. There is no middle in infinite space. And even if there were, nothing could stand there for that reason — no more than for any other. All place and space, which we call void, yields equally — middle or not — to weights, wherever motion carries them. No place exists where bodies, once arrived, can stand in the void with their weight suspended; the void must keep yielding, as its nature demands. So nothing can be held up by a \"center.\"\n\nBesides: not all bodies press toward a middle. Earth and the sea's liquid and everything earthy press downward — while thin breezes of air and hot fires are carried away from it. That's why the whole sky trembles with its stars, and the sun's flame feeds on heaven's blue: heat, fleeing the center, gathers there. Trees can't put out leafy tops unless each is fed little by little from the ground. If matter had no endless supply, the walls of the world would fly apart like birds, scattered through the great void — and everything else after them: heaven's temples rushing down from above, the earth slipping from under our feet, all bodies dissolving in the mixed ruin of things and sky, vanishing through the deep void — so that in an instant nothing would be left anywhere but empty space and hidden atoms.\n\nWherever you think matter failed first, that place is death's door for things: the whole crowd of matter would pour out there.\n\nYou'll learn this well, led on with little effort: one thing grows clear from another, and blind night won't rob you of the road, so you fail to see the last things of nature. So kindle light upon things.","download_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/lucretius-1/translations/trn_lucretius_1_plain.txt"}],"retex_markdown_url":"https://mouseia.org/api/works/lucretius-1/retex.md"}}