On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (53 page)

In this way we must think that heaven and earth

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Are from the infinite supplied with all that’s needed

For earth to move and quake in sudden shock

And the swift whirlwind scour the land and sea,

The fires of Etna flow, the sky to flame.

For this does happen, and the realms of heaven

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Are set on fire; and a heavier fall

Of rain storms down, when by some chance the atoms

Of water have been massed and concentrated.

‘But surely this tumultuous conflagration

Is much too huge for such an origin.’

Well, any river may appear immense

To a man who has never seen a greater one;

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So does a tree or a man; and everything,

When a man has seen no larger, he thinks vast.

But all these things, with earth and sea and sky

Added together, are as nothing compared

With the sum total of the universe.

Now, none the less, I shall explain the ways

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In which the flame excited suddenly

Blasts out from Etna’s mighty furnaces.

First, the whole mountain is hollow underneath,

Supported mostly on caverns in the rock.

In all the caves there is both air and wind;

For air makes wind when strongly agitated.

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Now when the wind has grown extremely hot,

And heated in fury all the rocks around

Wherever it touches, and also the earth,

And struck from them hot fires and rushing flames,

It rises, and straight through the mountain’s throat

Hurls itself upward in a mighty blast.

Then far and wide the heat is spread, and wide

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The fall of ashes; and in darkness thick

It rolls its smoke, and all the while throws out

Rocks of amazing weight. Beyond a doubt

This is the work of wind most turbulent.

Besides, for a space of many miles the sea

Breaks on the mountain’s roots, sucks back its waves,

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And from this sea caves spread out underneath

Right to the deep throat of the mountain, and through these

It cannot be doubted that wind mixed with water

Comes in from the open sea and penetrates it

Deeply within, thus causing an explosion

And upward blast of flame, throwing out rocks

And raising everywhere great clouds of sand.

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For on the topmost summit there are craters,

The ‘mixing bowls’ as the Sicilians call them,

To which we give the name of throats or mouths.

There is also a number of things for which

It is not enough to state one cause; we must

Consider many, and one of them is right.

For example, if from a distance you should see

The lifeless body of some man, then all

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The causes of death you might think well to mention,

So that the one true cause of it be named.

For though you could not prove that steel or cold

Had caused his death, or disease perhaps, or poison,

We know quite well that what has happened to him

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Is something of this kind. And so we shall

In many cases argue in this way.

The Nile, the river of all Egypt, swells

And flows across the fields in summertime,

Unique among the rivers of the world.

It waters Egypt through midsummer heats,

Either because North winds oppose its mouth

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In summer, which blowing at that time of year

Are called Etesian, or ‘seasonal’;

These blowing against the stream arrest its flow,

And piling up the water fill its banks

And hold up its advance; for there’s no doubt

That these blasts coming from the Pole’s cold star

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Do blow against the current of the river.

For the great Nile comes from the land of heat,

The south, where deep among the race of men

Burnt black by sun it rises from the noonday.

It may be also that a great sandbar

Is heaped against the river’s mouths, confronting the flow

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When the sea driven strongly by the winds

Rolls the sand shorewards. In this way the river

Has less freedom of exit, and the current

Has a less easy downflow to the sea.

Or it may be perhaps that heavier rains

Fall on its source at the season of the year

When the Etesian breezes of the north

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Drive all the clouds into those parts together.

You may be sure that when they have massed together

Driven out towards the region of the noonday

There they at length beating against high mountains

Are crushed and with great violence compressed.

Or deep within the Ethiopian highlands

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Perhaps the river grows, when the hot sun

Traversing all things with his burning rays

Makes the white snows run down into the plains.

I shall now explain the nature of the lakes

And other places that are called Avernian.

Firstly, the name Avernian is given

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Because no birds can live within these places.

For any birds that fly directly above them,

Their wings’ oars all forgotten and the sails

Let loose, and neck all limp and lifeless,

Down they fall headlong to the ground,

If it so happens that earth lies below,

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Or into the water, if perchance a lake

Of Avernus lies outspread. There is near Cumae

A place like this, where the hills filled with sulphur

Give off a pungent smoke fed by hot springs.

There is another within the walls of Athens

Right at the summit of the citadel

Hard by the temple of Tritonian Pallas,

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Where the crows never wing their raucous way,

Not even when altars smoke with offerings;

Such care they take to flee, not from the anger

Of Pallas, as the Greek poets have sung,

Because of that fateful vigil; but the nature

Of the place itself produces this effect.

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In Syria also there’s another place

Like this, they say, where as soon as quadrupeds

Have set foot on it, its natural potency

Makes them to fall down flat, as if suddenly

Slaughtered in sacrifice to the gods below.

But all these things have a natural origin

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And the causes that produce them are quite clear.

Do not believe that in these regions lie

The gates of Hell, and that the gods below

Down to the shores of Acheron draw thence

The souls of men, as the light-footed stags

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By the breath of their nostrils are often thought to draw

The tribes of creeping creatures from their holes.

How far removed all that is from the truth

Learn now; for of the true facts I try to speak.

Firstly I say, as I have often said before,

That in the earth are atoms of every kind.

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Many that are in food bring life; and many

Can strike us with disease and hasten death.

And I have shown before that substances

Vary in their power to support life

In different animals, because of their different natures

And different textures and atomic shapes.

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For many noxious elements make their way

Through the ears, and many through the nostrils

Slip in that are injurious and prickly,

And not a few touch tells us to avoid

And sight to shun, or taste proclaims them bitter.

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Next it is plain to see how many things

Are violently hostile to the senses,

Noisome and dangerous. First certain trees

Have shade so dangerous that it brings headache

If you should lie outstretched on the grass beneath.

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And on the great high hills of Helicon

There grows a tree whose flower can kill a man

By the vile nature of its loathsome scent.

And all these things, for sure, rise from the soil

Since many seeds of many things Earth holds

Mixed up in many ways, then separates and delivers them.

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A lamp at night is extinguished, and its wick

Sends out a pungent smell. If this assails

The nostrils of some epileptic, prone