On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (67 page)

1191
night-wandering torches of heaven
: theists tended to distinguish between regular and irregular phenomena of the heavens as causes of divine belief (cf. Cicero,
On the Nature of the Gods
2. 13 ff., the fourth and third reasons for belief offered by the Stoic Cleanthes (fourth–third century
BC
)), but for Lucretius there is no difference: neither should lead to belief in the gods.

1228
elephants
: although the use of elephants was especially associated with the Carthaginians (cf. 5. 1303), the Romans also used them, for example, at the battle of Cynoscephalae (197
BC
, cf. Livy 33. 8. 3).

1241
metals first were found
: cf. e.g. Seneca,
Letters
90. 12 (arguing against Posidonius). In traditional accounts of the Golden Age, there were no metals (cf. Ovid,
Amores
3. 8. 35 ff.): Lucretius has none of this idealization of the past, but he does not refrain from moralizing comment (1259, 1273 ff.).

1283
ancient weapons
: the discovery of iron leads to an account of developments in warfare, and the intensification of the moralizing criticism of the uses to which technological developments were put. Lucretius rationalizes mythical accounts of the decline from the Bronze to the Iron Age (cf. Hesiod,
Works and Days
176 ff.).

1289
with bronze they tilled the soil
: a close imitation of Hesiod,
Works and Days
150–1.

1303
men of Carthage
: the Carthaginians used elephants in both the First and Second Punic Wars, most famously when Hannibal crossed the Alps in 218
BC
.

1308
Bulls too were pressed into the service of war
: a famous passage, sometimes used to substantiate allegations of madness against Lucretius. But although there is no close parallel, there is no reason to doubt that the practice of using wild animals was attested in some lost source, and the notion that if this did not happen in our world, it will have done so in another is straight-forward Epicurean doctrine about possibility (see above on 5. 528). The main focus is on the moral implications of the perverted ingenuity displayed.

1350
The plaited garment
: cf. Diogenes of Oenoanda fr. 12.

1354
men’s work
: for Herodotus (fifth century
BC
), one of the reversals of normal custom seen in Egypt was that the men did the weaving (2. 35, cf. Sophocles,
Oedipus at Colonus
(404
BC
), 337). Lucretius’ observation that men are ‘more
clever’ is not without some irony: his other use of the word translated as ‘clever’ is in 1010, ‘today with greater skill they poison others’.

1367
cherished plots
: the description of the gardens of early man suggests the ‘Garden’ of Epicurus (cf. also
Catalepton
(ascribed to Virgil) 5. 8–10, 8. 11 ff.): a fragment of Diogenes of Oenoanda (56) says that, when everyone becomes an Epicurean, ‘[we ourselves shall plough] and dig and tend [the plants] and [divert rivers and watch over the crops]’.

1383
First taught the country-folk to blow through pipes
: Lucretius’ picture is in the spirit of pastoral (and was in fact influential on later pastoral, from Virgil,
Eclogue
1. 1 ff. on).

1391
When they had had their fill of food
: cf. Democritus fr. B144: ‘Music… is one of the younger arts… [because] necessity did not decree it, but it arose only when there already existed a superfluity.’

1392–6
So often, lying in company together…
: repeated from 2. 29–33.

1436–8
sun and moon… | Have taught men well
: the reference is perhaps to the discovery of philosophy from the observation of the motions of the heavenly bodies: cf. Plato,
Timaeus
47a. Contrast 1183 ff. on belief in the gods.

1440
fenced in with strong towers
: cf. Thucydides (fifth century
BC
),
Histories
1. 8–10.

1447
Except where reason may point out the traces
: Lucretius self-reflexively draws attention to the very procedure that he has been adopting in
Book 5
. See above on 1. 402.

1450
all the delights of life
: i.e. all the things that it is natural to desire but not necessary to have: see above on 1391.

1456
brighten in their minds
: the imagery of light and dark recalls the end of
Book 1
.

1–2
Athens of glorious name
:
Book 6
opens with another ‘Priamel’ or focusing device (see above on 2. 1 ff.) in which the achievements of Athens are capped by its production of Epicurus. The book thus opens with a celebration of the greatness of Athenian civilization, and closes with the account of the plague there in 430–426
BC
and of that civilization brought low (see below on 1138 ff.). Athens, as one of the most praised cities in antiquity (cf. e.g. Pindar,
Pythian
7 (486
BC
) 1 ff., Isocrates,
Panegyricus
(380
BC
) 47), is a representative of the ‘peak’ of civilization that humanity was said to have reached at the end of
Book 5
, but all of this achievement cannot bring human happiness without the Epicurean message.

First brought corn-bearing crops
: an allusion to the myth of Triptolemus, who was said to have been taught agriculture by Demeter and then to have carried
the gift throughout the world (see above on 5. 20) in a winged chariot. The story was told for example in Sophocles’ lost play
Triptolemus
(468
BC
): cf. Dionysus of Halicarnassus (first century
BC
),
Roman Antiquities
1. 12. 2.

8
exalted to the skies
: cf. the victory over religion on 1. 79. The language is used in Homer of the fame of the ‘good king’ (
Odyssey
19. 108, cf. 8. 74).

9–10
nearly all those things | Which need demands
: for the Epicureans, human needs were easily satisfied by simple means: cf. Epicurus,
Letter to Menoeceus
130,
Master Sayings
15, 18, 21, Diogenes of Oenoanda fr. 2, and see above on 2. 17 ff.

14
deep in every home
: cf. 5. 43 ff.

17
He understood
: Epicurus in this passage acts like a doctor, noting the symptoms (9–16), understanding their cause (17–23), and providing a two-stage cure, removing what is diseased (24–5) and providing a positive regimen for the future (26–34).

the vessel itself | Produced the flaw
: a Platonic analogy (cf.
Gorgias
493a ff.), but one which links to a complex of imagery within the poem: see above on 3. 936, 1003, and cf. Epicurus fr. 396.

22
tainted everything that entered it
: the image comes from the Cynic Diogenes, cf. Maximus the Confessor,
Commonplaces
44c.

24
purged men’s hearts
: philosophical imagery of ‘purgation’ goes back to Plato (cf. e.g.
Cratylus
396e, 405a,
Sophist
227c) and is part of the general conception of the philosopher as a doctor or a religious healer. In Epicureanism, pleasure is ‘pure’ when uncontaminated by pain or the fear of pain: see above on 4. 1075. The essentials of the philosophy are simple, and based on nature: much of its effort is directed towards cleaning out false ideas that spoil happiness.

26
that highest good
: in the Latin
bonum summum
, the philosophers’ term for the good to which all other goods are referred. In Epicureanism, this is pleasure, which we all instinctively pursue, but which has been obscured by false opinions: Epicurus brings us consciously to pursue this natural goal.

27
the strait and narrow path
: cf. 1. 81, 406, 1116; 1. 926 = 4. 1, 2. 10 ff., etc. The metaphor of the path in life is another common philosophical image: Epicurus is ‘the way, the truth, and the life’ (John 14: 6). Seneca reports Epicurus as dividing Epicureans into three groups: the first ‘makes its own way’, the others follow eagerly or reluctantly (
Letters
52. 3–4, 11. 8–9): Epicurus and his close associates were known as the ‘leaders’; for Lucretius as a ‘follower’, cf. 3. 3 ff., 5. 55 ff. With the straitness of the way, contrast the wanderings of the unphilosophic at 2. 10 ff.: it is a narrow or small path because little is needed for happiness (and cf. 1. 926).

31
by natural chance
: although there was indeterminacy at the atomic level in the Epicurean universe because of the ‘swerve’ (see above on 2. 219 ff.), this
was probably not usually with effect outside the human soul, and chance events were those not predicted by a particular causal chain, rather than in any sense uncaused (cf. Epicurus,
Letter to Menoeceus
133 ff.,
Master Sayings
16, fr. 489, Diogenes of Oenoanda fr. 71–2).

38
like children frightened of the dark
: see above on 2. 55 ff.

58–66
For men who have been well taught about the gods…
: 58–66 are repeated from 5. 82–90: see notes there.

73
in their untroubled peace
: cf. Edwin Muir, ‘The Labyrinth’, ‘But they, the gods, as large and bright as clouds, | Conversed across the sounds in tranquil voices | High in the sky, above the untroubled sea, | And their eternal dialogue was peace.’

75
To come before their shrines with quiet mind
: cf. 5. 1161 ff.

86
the sky | Divided into parts
: in Etruscan augury (see below on 6. 381), it was significant from which part of the sky lightning came, and to which part it went (it not being known that the return path was identical to the path of arrival). The heavens were accordingly divided into sixteen regions (cf. Cicero,
On Divination
2. 42–5, Seneca,
Natural Questions
41–2).

94
Calliope
: the roles of the muses were still fluid in Lucretius’ day, although set functions had begun to be assigned to them. Calliope was usually the muse of epic poetry, but she had famously been invoked by Empedocles (fr. B131) and also had links with philosophy (cf. Plato,
Phaedrus
259d): she was the mother and teacher of Orpheus.

Solace of men, delight of gods
: recalling the opening address to Venus in 1.1 ff.

96
First, thunder shakes the blue expanse of sky
: Lucretius deals first with thunder, lightning, and thunderbolts (96–422), the phenomena of the sky most associated with fears of divine action. He then deals with waterspouts (423–50), clouds (451–94), rain (495–523), rainbows (524–6), and miscellaneous phenomena of weather (527–34); earthquakes (535–607), the constancy of the sea (608–38), and Etna (639–702), followed by an excursus on multiple causation (703–11); the Nile (712–37), Avernian sites (738–839), wells and springs (840–905), and the magnet (906–1089); and finally the aetiology of disease (1090–1137) followed by the plague at Athens (1138–1286). All of these topics were frequent subjects of discussion amongst scientists and philosophers: see especially Aristotle’s
Meteorologica
(‘meteorologia’ in Greek has a wider semantic range than the English equivalent) and Seneca’s
Natural Questions
. Aristotle’s follower Theophrastus (fourth–third century
BC
) wrote an influential
Meteorology
(known through Syriac and Arabic translations: see Bibliography), and many of these topics were also discussed in his treatise
Opinions of the Physicists
, which was the foundation for the later ‘doxographic’ tradition (see above on 1. 635–920) seen in ‘Aetius’ (first century
AD
). The extant
Letter to Pythocles
, which may not be completely by
Epicurus himself, deals with a number of these topics: for thunder and lightning, see 100–4. Lucretius offers ten possible explanations for thunder (seven are given in Theophrastus,
Meteorology
1) and four each for lightning and thunderbolts: cf. in general ‘Aetius’ 3. 3, who deals in the same order with thunder, lightning, thunderbolts, waterspouts, and whirlwinds.

96–107
clouds… | Are dashed together
: explanations of thunder by means of cloud collisions were widespread: cf. e.g. Democritus A93, Aristophanes,
Clouds
383 ff., Theophrastus,
Meteorology
1. 3–5, Epicurus,
Letter to Pythocles
100–1, Cicero,
On Divination
2. 44.

99
no sound comes from a clear sky
: cf. 247 ff.

109
awnings
: see above on 4. 76.

130
a small bladder
: the analogy is already parodied in Aristophanes’
Clouds
(404 ff.): cf. Theophrastus,
Meteorology
1. 17, Seneca,
Natural Questions
2. 27. 3.

148–9
As red-hot iron… | Hisses
: for the comparison cf. Archelaus fr. A16, Theophrastus,
Meteorology
1. 10–11, Pliny,
Natural Histories
2. 112. The theory was widespread amongst the pre-Socratic philosophers (Empedocles fr. A63, Archelaus fr. A16, Diogenes of Apollonia fr. A16) but is not in the
Letter to Pythocles
.

154
Phoebus’ Delphic laurel
: the laurel or bay was sacred to Apollo, and was burnt by the priestess in his oracle at Delphi.

161–2
as stone | Strikes stone or iron
: for the analogy, cf. Pliny,
Natural Histories
2. 113.

164
Our ears receive the sound of thunder later
: cf. Epicurus,
Letter to Pythocles
102–3, Democritus fr. A126a, Aristotle,
Meteorologica
369
^b
, Theophrastus,
Meteorology
5, Seneca,
Natural Questions
2. 12. 1. Epicurus’ account was close to that of Theophrastus, giving two possible explanations: first, that lightning actually occurred before thunder, and, second, that they occurred simultaneously but the lightning moved faster. The woodcutter example is in Theophrastus (5. 5): cf. also Sextus Empiricus,
Against the Professors
5. 69.