On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (33 page)

Therefore one voice is suddenly dispersed

Into many voices, since it divides itself

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Into separate ears, stamping on them

The form of the word and its distinctive sound.

But those voices that do not strike the ear

Are carried past, and lost, and all in vain

Are scattered through the air and perish there.

Some, hitting solid objects, give back a sound

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And at times delude with the image of a word.

And when you clearly see this You’ll be able

To give the reason to yourself and others

Why cliffs and rocks standing in lonely places

Give back the sounds in the same shape and order

When straying comrades in thick mountain country

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We seek and with loud voices call to them.

Six times or even seven I have heard come back

One voice, so skilfully did hill from hill

Repeat the words and throw them back again.

Nymphs and goat-footed satyrs haunt these places,

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So country-folk make out; and fauns they say

Are there as well, when their night-wandering noises

And merry pranks break the deep silences;

And there are sounds of strings; and sweet laments

The flute pours out pressed by a player’s fingers;

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And everywhere the farm-folk listen, while Pan

Shaking the pine-leaves from his half-wild head

Runs his curved lips along the hollow reeds

And pipes all day his woodland melody.

And other signs and wonders they relate

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Lest they be thought to live in haunts so wild

That even the gods have left them; or maybe

They have some other reason, for mankind

Is greedy aye for things that please the ear.

Well now, here’s something you can well believe:

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That voices can come and impact on the ears

From places through which eyes can never see.

We hear a conversation through closed doors

Doubtless because the voice can travel safe

Through tortuous paths, while images refuse.

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For they are split apart unless they swim

Through straight passages, such as glass contains,

Through which all things that can be seen can fly.

The voice is spread about in all directions

Since voices beget voices, when one voice

Once spoken has sprung apart into many, as fires

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Lit by a spark break out into many fires.

So places are filled with voices, and though withdrawn

And hidden from sight they are stirred and boil with sound.

But images all travel in straight paths

When once they have been sent out. And therefore no one

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Can see beyond a wall, though he hear voices through it.

Yet the voice itself passing through the walls of a house

Comes blunted and confused into the ears

And we seem to hear a sound rather than words.

The tongue now, and the palate, which give us taste

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Need no more work of reasoning to explain.

In the first place we sense flavour in the mouth

When we press it out in chewing food, as a sponge

When full of water is pressed and begins to dry.

Next, what we press out is distributed

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Abroad through all the passages of the palate

And winding channels of the porous tongue.

Therefore when bodies of the oozing juice

Are smooth, they sweetly touch and sweetly stroke

All the wet trickling regions round the tongue.

But contrariwise they prick the sense and tear it,

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Being pressed out, the more they are filled with roughness.

The pleasure of flavour stops short at the palate.

When it has dropped down through the throat no pleasure

Is given while it disperses through our limbs.

It matters not what food is given the body

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Provided good digestion waits on it

Letting its virtue spread through all the limbs

And keep intact the moisture of the stomach.

Now I shall explain why different food

Is sweet and nourishing for different creatures,

And why what is to some unpleasant and bitter

Can yet to others seem truly delicious,

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Why in these things there is such great difference

That one man’s meat is another’s deadly poison.

It is like the snake, which touched by human spittle,

Bites itself to death, and perishes.

And hellebore to us is deadly poison

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But fed to goats and quails it makes them fat.

Now, that you may understand why these things happen

You must first remember what I said before

That things contain seeds mixed in many ways.

In fact all living creatures that take food

As they are different externally

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And the contour and circumscription of their limbs

Compass each according to its kind,

So they are made of seeds of different shape;

And since the seeds differ, so also must

The intervals and paths, which we call channels,

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Differ throughout our body, and in our mouth and palate.

Some therefore must be larger and some smaller,

And some triangular and others square,

And many round, and some with many angles,

Disposed in many different arrangements.

For as the order and motions of figures require

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The channels of the figures must be different

And the paths vary as the texture compels.

Therefore if what is sweet to some is bitter to others,

When it is sweet to one, very small bodies

Must enter the pores of the palate with soothing touch.

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But if it tastes bitter, that is no doubt because

Rough and hooked atoms penetrate the throat.

Thus it is easy to understand each case.

For when fever grips a man through excess of bile

Or disease is excited in some other way,

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Then the whole body is thrown into confusion

And all the positions of its atoms are upset,

So that all the bodies which conformed with the senses

Conform no longer, and others come more apt

To penetrate and produce a bitter taste.

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Indeed in honey both these tastes are mixed,

A thing which I have explained to you before.

I now examine how the impact of smell

Affects the nose. First of necessity

There must be many things from all of which

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Flows rolling out a varied stream of odours

Which flow and are sped and scattered everywhere.

But different scents suit different animals

Because of their different shapes. Bees are attracted

Over great distances by the smell of honey,

Vultures by carcasses. A pack of hounds

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Leads where the cloven hoof of game has gone.

And from afar the scent of man is caught

By the white goose that saved Rome’s citadel.

So different scent is given to different creatures

And leads each to its food, and forces it

To leap back from loathsome poison; and in this way

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The generations of wild beasts are preserved.

Take all the smells then that assail the nostrils:

One may be carried farther than another

But yet no smell can ever travel as far

As sound or voice or (and I need not add)

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Those things which strike the eye and give us sight.

It wanders slowly coming and dies first

Gradually dispersed into the winds of air.

There are two reasons for this; first because

It comes with difficulty from the depths of things:

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Things have a stronger smell when broken up,

Or crushed, or melted down by fire; this means

That scent flows out released from deep within.

Second, it may be seen that smell is made

Of larger elements than voice, since through stone walls

It cannot pass as voice and sounds may do.

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Wherefore also you will see that it is not so easy

To trace out where scent is coming from,

For the flow grows cold as it dawdles through the air

And no messenger runs hot-foot to the sense.

This is why in the chase we often see

Hounds are at fault and cast about for scent.

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