On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (12 page)

Are made of very small and tiny bones,

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And flesh of small and tiny bits of flesh,

And blood created out of many drops

Of blood combined together, and that gold

Can be built up from grains of gold, and earth

Grows out of little earths, and fire from fires,

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Water from water drops, and all the rest

He fancies are formed on the same principle.

But he does not conclude that void exists,

Nor any limit to the division of things.

Therefore on both these points he plainly errs

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Just as those did of whom I spoke before.

Add that he makes his elements too frail,

If elements they are that are endowed

With a nature similar to the things themselves,

Suffer like them and perish, nowhere reined back

By anything from ruin and destruction.

Which of them under huge pressure will endure

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And escape destruction right in the jaws of death?

Will fire or air or water? Which of them?

Will blood or bones? Not one, in my belief,

But everything alike will in its essence

Be as perishable as those things we clearly see

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Visibly perishing, vanquished by some force.

I call to witness what I proved before:

That nothing ever can be reduced to nothing

Nor anything again grow out of nothing.

Again, since food builds up the body and nourishes it,

Plainly our veins and blood and bones and sinews

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Must needs be made of parts unlike themselves.

Or if they say that all food is a mixture

Incorporating little bits of bones

And sinews, yes, and little drops of blood,

All food both solid and liquid must be held

To be composed of things unlike itself,

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A mixture of bones and sinews, pus and blood.

And all those things that grow out from the earth,

If they are in the earth, earth must consist

Of things unlike itself that spring from it.

Take other cases, and the same words will apply

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If flame, smoke, ashes lurk unseen in wood

It follows that the wood must be composed

Of things unlike itself, that rise from it.

And here is left some small chance of escape

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Which Anaxagoras puts to good use.

All things, he holds, lie hidden in all things

Mixed up with them, but only one is seen,

The one that has the most parts in the mixture,

Set on the surface, readier to see.

But this is very far removed from truth.

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For then it would be natural that corn

Ground by the millstone’s crushing strength would show

Some signs of blood or other substances

Which find their nourishment within the body;

And that, when we rub stone on stone, then blood should trickle,

And grass and water likewise should emit

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Drops sweet and flavoured like the milk of sheep.

And often too when clods of earth are crumbled

One should see various plants and corn and leaves

Lurking in miniature amid the soil.

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Lastly, when wood is broken one should see

That ash and smoke and tiny flames lie hid.

But plain facts show that none of this occurs.

It follows therefore that one sort of thing

Is not mixed with another in this way.

No. But seeds common to many things

In many ways must needs lie hid inside them.

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‘But often on great mountains’, you will say,

‘It happens that the high tops of tall trees

Are rubbed together, forced by strong south winds,

Until they blaze in bursting flower of flame.’

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Agreed. But fire is not implanted in the wood,

But there are many seeds of heat which the friction

Concentrates, to make the forest fires.

If flame were hiding in forests ready-made,

Not for one moment could the fires be hid,

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But everywhere they’ld burn the woods, turn trees to ashes.

Now do you see the point I made before,

That often it is a matter of great importance

How these same atoms combine, in what positions

They are held, what motions they give and take,

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And that these same by quite small mutual changes

Can make both fires and firs? As the words themselves

Consist of elements a little changed

When we say fires or firs with different sounds?

And if you cannot explain the things you see

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Without inventing tiny parts of matter

Endowed with the same nature as the whole,

This reasoning puts an end to all your atoms.

They’ll simply shake their sides and rock with laughter,

And salt tears run in rivers down their cheeks.

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Come now, and learn what follows, and listen to it

More keenly. I know how dark these matters are.

But the high hope of fame has struck my heart

Sharply with holy wand and filled my breast

With sweet love of the Muses. Thus inspired

With mind and purpose flourishing and free

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A pathless country of the Pierides

I traverse, where no foot has ever trod.

A joy it is to come to virgin springs

And drink, a joy it is to pluck new flowers

To make a glorious garland for my head

From fields whose blooms the Muses never picked

To crown the brows of any man before.

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First, since of matters high I make my theme,

Proceeding to set free the minds of men

Bound by the tight knots of religion.

Next, since of things so dark in verse so clear

I write, and touch all things with the Muses’ charm.

In this no lack of purpose may be seen.

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For as with children, when the doctors try

To give them loathsome wormwood, first they smear

Sweet yellow honey on the goblet’s rim,

That childhood all unheeding may be deceived

At the lip’s edge, and so drink up the juice

Of bitter medicine, tricked but not betrayed,

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And by such means gain health and strength again,

So now do I: for oft my doctrine seems

Distasteful to those that have not sampled it

And most shrink back from it. My purpose is

With the sweet voices of Pierian song

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To expound my doctrine, and as it were to touch it

With the delicious honey of the Muses;

So in this way perchance my poetry

Can hold your mind, while you attempt to grasp

The nature of the world, and understand

The great design and pattern of its making.

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And now, since I have shown that primal atoms

Completely solid unimpaired for ever

Fly everywhere around, let us unfold

Whether or not there is a limit to their number.

Likewise the void which we have found to exist,

Or place or space, in which all things occur,

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Let us see whether its extent is limited

Or stretches wide immeasurable and profound.

We find then that the universe is not bounded

In any direction. If it were, it would need to have

An extremity. But nothing can have an extremity

Unless there is something outside to limit it,

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Something beyond to bound it, some clear point

Further than which our senses cannot reach.

Now since we must admit that there is nothing

Beyond the sum of things, it has no extremity.

Therefore it has no end, nor any limit.

Nor does it matter in what part of it

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You stand: wherever a man takes his place

It stretches always boundless, infinite.

Suppose moreover that the whole of space

Were finite, if one ran right to the edge,

Its farthest shore, and threw a flying lance,

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Which would you rather say, that hurled amain

It flies straight on, as aimed, far far away,

Or that something can check it and block its path?

One or the other you are bound to choose.

But each cuts off your escape route, and compels you

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To concede that the universe continues without end.

For whether there is some object that can thwart