Lecture #15: Lucretius: The Nature of the Universe
The Nature of the Universe
Lucretius
Mother
of Aeneas and his race, delight of men and gods, life-giving Venus, it is
your doing that under the wheeling constellations of the sky all nature teems
with life, both the sea that buoys up our ships and the earth that yields our
food. Through you all living creatures are conceived and come forth to look
upon the sunlight. Before you the winds flee, and at your coming the clouds
forsake the sky. For you the inventive
earth flings up sweet flowers. For you the ocean levels laugh, the sky is
calmed and glows with diffused radiance. When first the day puts on the aspect
of spring, when in all its force the fertilizing breath of Zephyr is unleashed,
the, great goddess, the birds of air give the first intimation of your entry;
for yours is the power that has pierced them to the heart. Next the cattle run
wild, frisk through the lush pastures and swim the swift-flowing streams.
Spell-bound by your charm, they follow your lead with fierce desire. So, throughout
seas and uplands, rushing torrents, verdurous meadows and the leafy shelters of
the birds, into the breasts of one and all you instill alluring love, so that
with passionate longing they reproduce their several breeds.
Since
you alone are the guiding power of the universe and without you nothing emerges
into the shining sunlit world to grow in joy and loveliness, yours is the
partnership I seek in striving to compose these lines ON THE NATURE OF THE
UNIVERSE for my noble Memmius. For him,
great goddess, you have willed outstanding excellence in every field and
everlasting fame. For his sake, therefore, endow my verse with everlasting charm.
Meanwhile,
grant that this brutal business of war by sea and land may everywhere be lulled
to rest. For you alone have power to bestow on mortals the blessing of quiet
peace. In your bosom Mars himself, supreme commander in this brutal business,
flings himself down at times, laid low by the irremediable world of love.
Gazing upward, his neck a prostrate column, he fixes hungry eyes on you, great
goddess, and gluts them with love. As he lies outstretched, his breath hangs
upon your lips. Stoop, then, goddess most glorious, and enfold him at treat in
your hallowed bosom and whisper with those lips sweet words of prayer,
beseeching for the people of
For
what is to follow, my Memmius, lay aside your
cares and lend undistracted ears and an attentive mind to true reason. Do not
scornfully reject, before you have understood them, the gifts I have marshaled
for you with zealous devotion. I will set out to discourse to you on the
ultimate realities of heaven and the gods. I will reveal those ATOMS from which
nature creates all things and increases and feeds them, and into which, when
they perish, nature again resolves them. To these in my discourse I commonly
give such names as the "raw material," or "generative
bodies" or "seeds" of things. Or I may call them "primary
particles," because they come first and everything else is composed of
them.
When
human life lay groveling in all men's sight, crushed to the earth under the
dead weight of superstition whose grim features lured menacingly upon mortals
from the four quarters of the sky, a man of
One
thing that worries me is the fear that you may fancy yourself embarking on an
impious course, setting your feet on the path of sin. Far
from it. More often it is this very superstition that is the mother of
sinful and impious deeds. Remember how at
You,
yourself, if you surrender your judgment at any time to the blood-curdling
declamations of the prophets, will want to desert our ranks. Only think what
phantoms they can conjure up to overturn the tenor of your life and wreck your
happiness with fear. And, not without cause. For, if
men saw that a term was set to their troubles, they would find strength in some
way to withstand the hocus-pocus and intimidations of the prophets. As it is,
they have no power of resistance, because they are haunted by the fear of
eternal punishment after death. They know nothing of the nature of the spirit.
It is born, or it is implanted in us at birth? Does it perish with us,
dissolved by death, or does it visit the murky depths and dreary sloughs of
Hades? Or, is it transplanted by divine power into other creatures, as
described in the poems of our own Ennius, who first
gathered on the delectable slopes of Helicon an evergreen garland destined to
win renown among the nations of
I
must, therefore, give an account of celestial phenomena, explaining the
movements of sun and moon and also the forces that determine events on earth.
Next, and no less important, we must look with keen insight into the make-up of
spirit and mind: we must consider those alarming phantasms that strike upon our
minds when they are awake but disordered by sickness, or when they are buried
in slumber, so that we seem to see and hear before us men whose dead bones lie
in the embraces of earth.
I
am well aware that it is not easy to elucidate in Latin verse the obscure
discoveries of the Greeks. The poverty of our language and the novelty of the
theme compel me often to coin new words for the purpose. But your merit and the
joy I hope to derive from our delightful friendship encourage me to face any
task however hard. This it is that leads me to stay awake through the quiet of
the night, studying how by choice of words and the poet's art I can display
before your mind a clear light by which you can gaze into the heart of hidden
things.
This
dread and darkness of the mind cannot be dispelled by the sunbeams, and shining
shafts of day, but only by an understanding of the outward form and inner
workings of nature. In tackling this theme, our starting-point will be this
principle: NOTHING CAN EVER BE CREATED BY DIVINE POWER OUT OF NOTHING.
The reason why all mortals are so gripped by fear is that they see all sorts of
things happening on the earth and in the sky with no discernible cause, and
these they attribute to the will of a god. Accordingly, when we have seen that
nothing can be created out of nothing, we shall then have a clearer picture of
the path ahead, the problem of how things are created and occasioned without
the aid of the gods.
First
then, if things were made out of nothing, any species could spring from any
source and nothing would require seed. Men could arise from the sea and scaly
fish from the earth, and birds could be hatched out of the sky. Cattle and
other domestic animals and every kind of wild beast, multiplying
indiscriminately, would occupy cultivated and waste lands alike. The same
fruits would not grow constantly on the same trees, but they would keep
changing: any tree might bear any fruit. If each species were not composed of
its own generative bodies, why should each be born always of the same kind of
mother? Actually, since each is formed out of specific seeds, it is born and
emerges into the sunlit world only from a place where there exists the right
material, the right kind of atoms. This is why everything cannot be born of
everything, but a specific power of generation inheres in specific objects.
Again,
why do we see roses appear in spring, grain in summer's heat, grapes under the
spell of autumn? Surely, because it is only after specific seeds have drifted
together at their own proper time that every created thing stands revealed,
when the season is favorable and the life-giving earth can safely deliver
delicate growths into the sunlit world. If they were made out of nothing, they
would spring up suddenly after varying lapses of time and at abnormal seasons,
since there would of course be no primary bodies that could be prevented by the
harshness of the season from entering into generative unions. Similarly, in
order that things might grow, there would be no need of any lapse of time for
the accumulation of seed. tiny tots would turn
suddenly into grown men, and trees would shoot up spontaneously out of the
earth. But, it is obvious that none of these things happens, since everything
grows gradually, as is natural, from a specific seed and retains its specific
character. It is a fair inference that each is increased and nourished by its own
raw material.
Here
is a further point. Without seasonable showers the earth cannot send up
gladdening growths. Lacking food, animals cannot reproduce their kind or
sustain life. This points to the conclusion that many elements are common to
many things, as letters are to words, rather than to the theory that anything
can come into existence without atoms.
Or,
again, why has not nature been able to produce men on such a scale that they
could ford the ocean on foot or demolish high mountains with their hands or
prolong their lives over many generations? Surely, because each thing requires
for its birth a particular material which determines what can be produced. It
must therefore be admitted that nothing can be made out of nothing, Because everything must be generated from a seed before it
can emerge into the unresisting air.
Lastly,
we see that tilled plots are superior to untilled, and their fruits are
improved by cultivation. This is because the earth contains certain atoms that
we rouse to productivity by turning the fruitful clods with the plough-share
and stirring up the soil. But for these, you would see great improvements
arising spontaneously without any aid from our labors.
The
second great principle is this: NATURE RESOLVES EVERYTING INTO ITS COMPONENT
ATOMS AND NEVER REDUCES ANYTHING TO NOTHING. If anything were perishable in
all its parts, anything might perish all of a sudden and vanish from sight.
There would be no need of any force to separate its parts and loosen their
links. In actual fact, since everything is composed of indestructible seeds,
nature obviously does not allow anything to perish till it has encountered a
force that shatters it with a blow of creeps into chinks and unknits it.
If
the things that are banished from the scene by age are annihilated through the
exhaustion of their material, from what source does Venus bring back the
several races of animals into the light of life? And, when they are brought
back, where does the inventive earth find for each the special food required
for its sustenance and growth? From what fount is the sea replenished by its
native springs and the streams that flow into it from afar? Whence does the
ether draw nutriment for the stars? For everything consisting of a mortal body
must have been exhausted by the long day of time, the illimitable past. If
throughout this bygone eternity there have persisted bodies from which the
universe has been perpetually renewed, they must certainly be possessed of
immortality. Therefore, things cannot be reduced to nothing.
Again,
all objects would regularly be destroyed by the same force and the same cause, were it not that they are sustained by imperishable matter
more or less tightly fastened together. Why, a mere touch would be enough to
bring about destruction supposing there were no imperishable bodies whose union
could be dissolved only by the appropriate force. Actually, because the
fastenings of the atoms are of various kinds while their matter is
imperishable, compound objects remain intact until one of them encounters a
force that proves strong enough to break up its particular constitution.
Therefore, nothing returns to nothing, but everything
is resolved into its constituent bodies.
Lastly,
showers perish when father ether has flung them down into the lap of mother
earth. But, the crops spring up fresh and gay; the branches on the trees burst
into leaf; the trees themselves grow and are weighed down with fruit. Hence, in
turn, man and brute draw nourishment. Hence we see flourishing cities blest
with children and every leafy thicket loud with new broods of songsters. Hence,
in lush pastures cattle wearied by their bulk fling down their bodies, and the
white milky juice oozes from their swollen udders. Hence, a
new generation frolic friskily on wobbly legs through the fresh grass,
their young minds tipsy with undiluted milk. Visible objects, therefore, do not
perish utterly, since nature repairs one thing from another and allows nothing
to be born without the aid of another's death.
Well,
Memmius, I have taught you that things cannot
be created out of nothing, nor, once born, be summoned back to nothing.
Perhaps, however, you are becoming mistrustful of my words, because these atoms
of mine are not visible to the eye. Consider, therefore, this further evidence
of BODIES WHOSE EXISTENCE YOU MUST ACKNOWLEDGE
THOUGH THEY CANNOT BE SEEN. First, wind, when its force is roused, whips up
waves, founders tall ships and scatters cloud-rack. Sometimes scouring plains
with hurricane force it strews them with huge trees and batters mountain peaks
with blasts that hew down forests. Such is wind in its fury, when it whoops
aloud with a mad menace in its shouting. Without question, therefore, there
must be invisible particles of wind that sweep sea and land and the clouds in
the sky, swooping upon them and whirling them along in a headlong hurricane. In
the way they flow and the havoc they spread they are no different from a
torrential flood of water when it rushes down in a sudden spate from the
mountain heights, swollen by heavy rains, and heaps together wreckage from the
forest and entire trees. Soft though it is by nature, the sudden shock of
oncoming water is more than even stout bridges can withstand, so furious is the
force with which the turbid, storm-flushed torrent surges against their piers.
With a mighty roar it lays them low, rolling huge
rocks under its waves and brushing aside every obstacle from its course. Such,
therefore, must be the movement of blasts of winds, also. When they have come
surging along some course like a rushing river, they push obstacles before them
and buffet them with repeated blows; and sometimes, eddying round and round,
they snatch them up and carry them along in a swiftly circling vortex. Here
then is proof upon proof that winds have invisible bodies, since in their
actions and behavior they are found to rival great rivers, whose bodies are
plain to see.
Then,
again, we smell the various scents of things though we never see them
approaching our nostrils. Similarly, heat and cold cannot be detected by our
eyes, and we do not see sounds. Yet all these must be composed of bodies, since
they are able to impinge upon our senses. For nothing can touch or be touched
except body.
Again,
clothes hung out on a surf-beaten shore grow moist. Spread in the sun they grow
dry. But, we do not see how the moisture has soaked into them, nor again how it has been dispelled by the heat. It follows
that the moisture is split up into minute parts that the eye cannot possibly
see.
Again,
in the course of many annual revolutions of the sun, a ring is worn thin next
to the finger with continual rubbing. Dripping water hollows a stone. A curved
plowshare, iron though it is, dwindles imperceptibly in the furrow. We see the
cobble-stones of the highway worn by the feet of many wayfarers. The bronze
statues by the city gates show their right hands worn thin by the touch of
travelers who have greeted them in passing. We see that all these are being
diminished, since they are worn away. But, to perceive what particles drop off
at any particular time is a power grudged to us by our ungenerous sense of
sight.
To
sum up, whatever is added to things gradually by nature and the passage of
days, causing a cumulative increase, eludes the most attentive scrutiny of our eyes.
Conversely, you cannot see what objects loose by the wastage of age—sheer
sea-cliffs, for instance, exposed to prolonged erosion by the mordant brine—or
at what time the loss occurs. It follows that nature works through the agency
of invisible bodies.
On
the other hand, things are not hemmed in by the pressure of solid bodies in a
tight mass. This is because THERE IS VACUITY IN THINGS. A grasp of this
fact will be helpful to you in many respects and will save you from much
bewildered doubting and questioning about the universe and from mistrust of my
teaching. Well then, by vacuity I mean intangible and empty space. If it did
not exist, things could not move at all. For the distinctive action of matter,
which is counteraction and obstruction, would be in force always and
everywhere. Nothing could proceed, because nothing would give it a
starting-point by receding. As it is, we see with our own eyes at sea and on
land and high up in the sky that all sorts of things in all sorts of ways are
on the move. If there were no empty space, these things would be denied the
power of restless movement -- or rather, they could not possibly have come into
existence, embedded as they would have been in motionless matter.
Besides,
there are clear indications that things that pass for solid are in fact porous.
Even in rocks a trickle of water seeps through into caves, and copious drops
ooze from every surface. Food percolates to every part of an animal's body.
Trees grow and bring forth their fruit in season, because their food is
distributed throughout their length from the tips of the roots through the
trunk and along every branch. Noises pass through walls and fly into closed
buildings. Freezing cold penetrates to the bones. If there were no vacancies
through which the various bodies could make their way, none of these phenomena
would be possible.
Again,
why do we find some things outweigh others of equal volume? If there is as much
matter in a ball of wool as in one of lead, it is natural that it should weigh
as heavily, since it is the function of matter to press everything downwards,
while it is the function of space on the other hand to remain weightless.
Accordingly, when one thing is not less bulky than another, but obviously
lighter, it plainly declares that there is more vacuum
in it, while the heavier object proclaims that there is more matter in it and
much less empty space. We have therefore reached the goal of our diligent
enquiry: there is in things an admixture of what we call vacuity.
In
case you should be misled on this question by the idle imagining of certain
theorists, I must anticipate their argument. They maintain that water yields
and opens a penetrable path to the scaly bodies of fish that push against it,
because they leave spaces behind them into which the yielding water can flow
together. In the same way, they suppose, other things can move by mutually
changing places, although every place remains filled. This theory has been
adopted utterly without warrant. For how can the fish advance till the water
has given way? And, how can the water retire when the fish cannot move? There
are thus only two alternatives: either all bodies are devoid of movement, or
you must admit that things contain an admixture of vacuity whereby each is
enabled to make the first move.
Lastly,
if two bodies suddenly spring apart from contact on a broad surface, all the
intervening space must be void until it is occupied by air. However quickly the
air rushes in all round, the entire space cannot be filled instantaneously. The
air must occupy one spot after another until it has taken possession of the
whole space. If anyone supposes that this consequence of such springing apart
is made possible by the condensation of air, he is mistaken. For condensation
implies that something that was full becomes empty, or vice versa.
And, I contend that air could not condense so as to produce this effect; or at
any rate, if there were no vacuum, it could not thus shrink into itself and
draw its parts together.
However
many pleas you may advance to prolong the argument, you must end by admitting
that there is vacuity in things. There are many other proofs I could add to the
pile in order to strengthen conviction; but for an acute intelligence these
small clues should suffice to enable you to discover the rest for yourself. As
hounds that range the hills often smell out the lairs of wild beasts screened
in thickets, when once they have got on to the right trail, so in such
questions one thing will lead on to another, till you can succeed by yourself
in tracking down the truth to its lurking-places and dragging it forth. If you
grow weary and relax from the chase, there is one thing, Memmius,
that I can safely promise you: my honeyed tongue will pour from the treasury of
my breast such generous draughts, drawn from inexhaustible springs, that I am
afraid slow-plodding age may creep through my limbs and unbolt the bars of my
life before the full flood of my arguments on any single point has flowed in
verse through your ears.
To
pick up the thread of my discourse, all nature as it is in itself consists
of two things—bodies and the vacant space in which the bodies are situated
and through which they move in different directions. The existence of bodies is
vouched for by the agreement of the senses. If a belief resting directly on
their foundation is not valid, there will be no standard to which we can refer
any doubt on obscure questions for rational confirmation. If there were no
place and space, which we call vacuity, these bodies could not be situated
anywhere or move in any direction whatever. This I have just demonstrated. It
remains to show that NOTHING EXISTS THAT IS DISTINCT BOTH FROM BODY AND FROM
VACUITY and could be ranked with the others as a third substance. For,
whatever IS, must also be something. If it offers resistance to touch, however light and slight, it will
increase the mass of body by such amount, great or small, as it may amount to,
and will rank with it. If, on the other hand, it is intangible, so that
it offers no resistance whatever to anything passing through it, then it will
be that empty space which we call vacuity. Besides, whatever it may be in
itself, either it will act in some way, or react to other things acting upon
it, or else it will be such that things can be and happen in it. But, without
body, nothing can act or react; and nothing can afford a place except emptiness
and vacancy. Therefore, besides matter and vacuity, we cannot include in the
number of things any third substance that can either affect our senses at any
time or be grasped by the reasoning of our minds.
You
will find that anything that can be named is either a property or an accident
of these two. A property is something that cannot be detached or
separated from a thing without destroying it, as weight is a property of rocks,
heat of fire, fluidity of water, tangibility of all bodies, intangibility
of vacuum. On the other hand, servitude and liberty, poverty and riches, war
and peace, and all other things whose advent or departure leaves the essence of
a thing intact, all these it is our practice to call by their appropriate name,
accidents.
Similarly,
time by itself does not exist; but from things themselves there results a sense
of what has already taken place, what is now going on and what is to ensue. It
must not be claimed that anyone can sense time by itself apart from the
movement of things or their restful immobility.
Again,
when men say it is a fact that Helen was ravished or the Trojans
were conquered, do not let anyone drive you to the admission that any such
event is independently of any object, on the ground that the
generations of men of whom these events were accidents have been swept away by
the irrevocable lapse of time. For we could put it that
whatever has taken place is an accident of a particular tract of earth or of
the space it occupied. If there had been no matter and no space or place
in which things could happen, no spark of love kindled by the beauty of Tyndareus' daughter would ever have stolen into the breast
of Phrygian Paris to light that dazzling blaze of pitiless war; no Wooden
Horse, unmarked by the sons of Troy, would have set the towers of Ilium aflame
through the midnight issue of Greeks from its womb. So you may see that events
cannot be said to be by themselves like matter or in the same
sense as space. Rather, you should describe them as accidents of matter, or of
the place in which things happen.
MATERIAL
OBJECTS ARE OF TWO KINDS, ATOMS AND COMPOUNDS OF ATOMS. THE ATOMS THEMSELVES
CANNOT BE SWAMPED BY ANY FORCE, FOR THEY ARE PRESERVED INDEFINITELY BY THEIR
ABSOLUTE SOLIDITY. Admittedly, it is hard to believe that anything can
exist that is absolutely solid. The lightning stroke from the sky penetrates
closed buildings, as do shouts and other noises. Iron glows molten in the fire,
and hot rocks are cracked by untempered scorching.
Hard gold is softened and melted by heat; and bronze, ice-like, is liquefied by
flame. Both heat and piercing cold seep through silver, since we feel both
alike when a cooling shower of water is poured into a goblet that we hold
ceremonially in our hands. All these facts point to the conclusion that nothing
is really solid. But, sound reasoning and nature itself drive us to the
opposite conclusion. Pay attention, therefore, while I demonstrate in a few
lines that there exist certain bodies that are absolutely solid and
indestructible, namely those atoms which according to our teaching are the
seeds or prime units of things from which the whole universe is built up.
In
the first place, we have found that nature is twofold, consisting of two
totally different things, matter and the space in which things happen. Hence,
each of these must exist by itself without admixture of the other. For, where
there is empty space (what we call vacuity), there matter is not; where matter
exists, there cannot be a vacuum. Therefore, the prime units of matter are
solid and free from vacuity.
Again,
since composite things contain some vacuum, the surrounding matter must be
solid. For you cannot reasonably maintain that anything can
hide vacuity and hold it within its body unless you allow that the container
itself is solid. And, what contains the vacuum in things can only be an
accumulation of matter. Hence, matter, which possesses absolute solidity, can
be everlasting when other things are decomposed.
Again,
if there were no empty space, everything would be one solid mass; if there were
no material objects with the property of filling the space they occupy, all
existing space would be utterly void. It is clear, then, that there is an
alternation of matter and vacuity, mutually distinct, since the whole is
neither completely full nor completely empty. There are, therefore, solid
bodies, causing the distinction between empty space and full. And these, as I
have just shown, can be neither decomposed by blows
from without nor invade and unknit from within, nor
destroyed by any other form of assault. For it seems that a thing without
vacuum can be neither knocked to bits nor snapped nor chopped in two by
cutting; nor can it let in moisture or seeping cold or piercing fire -- the
universal agents of destruction. The more vacuum a thing contains within it,
the more readily it yields to these assailants. Hence, if the
units of matter are solid and without vacuity, as I have shown, they must be
everlasting.
Yet
again, if the matter in things had not been everlasting, everything by now
would have gone back to nothing, and the things we see would be the product of
rebirth out of nothing. But, since I have already shown that nothing can be
created out of nothing nor any existing thing be summoned back to nothing, the
atoms must be made of imperishable stuff into which everything can be resolved
in the end, so that there may be a stock of matter for building the world anew.
The atoms, therefore, are absolutely solid and unalloyed. In no other way could
they have survived throughout infinite time to keep the world in being.
Furthermore,
if nature had set no limit to the breaking of things, the particles of matter
in the course of ages would have been ground so small that nothing could be
generated from them so as to attain in the fullness of time to the summit of
its growth. For we see that anything can be more speedily disintegrated than
put together again. Hence, what the long day of time, the bygone eternity, has
already shaken and loosened to fragments could never in the residue of time be
reconstructed. As it si, there is evidently a limit
set to breaking, since we see that everything is renewed and each according to
its kind has a fixed period in which to grow to its prime.
Here is a further argument. Granted that the
particles of matter are absolutely solid, we can still explain the composition
and behavior of soft things -- air, water, earth, fire
-- by their intermixture with empty space. On the other hand, supposing the
atoms to be soft, we cannot account for the origin of hard flint and iron. For there would be no foundation for nature to build on.
Therefore, there must be bodies strong in their unalloyed solidity by whose
closer clustering things can be knit together and display unyielding toughness.
If
we suppose that there is no limit set to the breaking of matter, we must still
admit that material objects consist of particles that throughout eternity have
resisted the forces of destruction. To say that these are breakable does not
square with the fact that they have survived throughout eternity under a
perpetual bombardment of innumerable blows.
Again,
there is laid down for each thing a specific limit to its growth and its tenure
of life, and the laws of nature ordain what each can
do and what it cannot. No species is ever changed, but each remains so much
itself that every kind of bird displays on its body its own specific markings.
This is a further proof that their bodies are composed of changeless matter.
For, if the atoms could yield in any way to change, there would be no certainty
as to what could arise and what could not, at what point the power of
everything was limited by an immovable frontier-post; nor could successive
generations so regularly repeat the nature, behavior, habits, and movements of
their parents.
To
proceed with our argument, there is an ultimate point in visible objects that
represents the smallest thing that can be seen. So also there must be an
ultimate point in objects that lie below the limit of perception by our senses.
This point is without parts and is the smallest thing that can exist. It never
has been and never will be able to exist by itself, but only as one primary
part of something else. It is with a mass of such parts, solidly jammed
together in order, that matter is filled up. Since
they cannot exist by themselves, they must need stick together in a mass from
which they cannot by any means be pried loose. The atoms, therefore, are
absolutely solid and unalloyed, consisting of a mass of least parts tightly
packed together. They are not compounds formed by the coalescence of their
parts, but bodies of absolute and everlasting solidity. To these, nature allows
no loss or diminution, but guards them as seeds for things. If there are no
such least parts, even the smallest bodies will consist of an infinite number
of parts, since they can always be halved and their halves halved again without
limit. On this showing, what difference will there be between the whole
universe and the very least of things? None at all! For, however endlessly
infinite the universe may be, yet the smallest things will equally consist of
an infinite number of parts. Since true reason cries out against this and denies
that the mind can believe it, you must needs give in and admit that there are
least parts which themselves are partless. Granted
that these parts exist, you must needs admit that the
atoms they compose are also solid and everlasting. But, if all things were
compelled by all-creating nature to be broken up into these least parts, nature
would lack the power to rebuild anything out of them. For partless
objects cannot have the essential properties of generative matter -- those
varieties of attachment, weight, impetus, impact and movement on which
everything depends . . . .
Well
then, since I have shown that there are completely solid indestructible
particles of matter flying about through all eternity, let us elucidate whether
or not there is any limit to their number. Similarly, as we have found that
there is a vacuum, the place or space in which things happen, let us see
whether its whole extent is limited or whether it stretches far and wide into
immeasurable depths.
Learn,
therefore, that THE UNIVERSE IS NOT BOUNDED IN ANY DIRECTION. If it
were, it would necessarily have a limit somewhere. But, clearly, a thing cannot
have a limit unless there is something outside to limit it, so that the eye can
follow it up to a certain point but not beyond. Since you must admit that there
is nothing outside the universe, it can have no limit and is accordingly
without end or measure. It makes no difference in which part of it you may take
your stand: whatever spot anyone may occupy, the universe stretches away from him
just the same in all directions without limit. Suppose for a moment that the
whole of space were bounded and that someone made his way to its uttermost
boundary and threw a flying dart.
Do you choose to suppose that the missile,
hurled with might and main, would speed along the course on which it was aimed?
Or, do you think something would block the way and stop it? You must assume one
alternative or the other. But neither of them leaves you a loophole. Both force
you to admit that the universe continues without end. Whether there is some
obstacle lying on the boundary line that prevents the dart from going farther
on its course, or whether flies on beyond, it cannot in fact have started from
the boundary. With this argument I will pursue you. Wherever you may place the
ultimate limit of things, I will ask you: "Well then, what does happen to
the dart?" The result is that the boundary cannot stand firm anywhere, and
final escape from this conclusion is precluded by the limitless possibility of
running away from it.
It
is a matter of observation that one thing is limited by another. The hills are
demarcated by air, and air by the hills. Land sets bounds to sea, and sea to
every land. But, the universe has nothing outside to limit it.
Further,
if all the space in the universe were shut in and confined on every side by
definite boundaries, the supply of matter would already have accumulated by its
own weight at the bottom, and nothing could happen under the dome of the sky --
indeed, there would be no sky and no sunlight, since all the available matter
would have settled down and would be lying in a heap throughout eternity. As it
is, no rest is given to the atoms, because there is no bottom where they can
accumulate and take up their abode. Things go on happening all the time through
ceaseless movement in every direction; and atoms of matter bouncing up from
below are supplied out of the infinite. There is therefore a limitless abyss of
space, such that even the dazzling flashes of the lightning cannot traverse it
in their course, racing through an interminable tract of time, nor can they
even shorten the distance still to be covered. So vast is the scope that lies
open to things far and wide without limit in any dimension.
The
universe is restrained from setting any limit to itself by nature, which
compels body to be bounded by vacuum and vacuum by body. Thus, nature either
makes them both infinite in alternation, or else one of them, if it is not
bounded by the other, must extend in a pure state without limit. Space,
however, being infinite, so must matter be. Otherwise, neither sea nor land nor
the bright zones of the sky nor mortal beings nor the holy bodies of the gods
could endure for one brief hour of time. The supply of matter would be shaken
loose from combination and swept through the vastness of the void in isolated
particles; or rather, it would never have coalesced to form anything, since its
scattered particles could never have been driven into union.
Certainly
the atoms did not post themselves purposefully in due order by an act of
intelligence, nor did they stipulate what movements each should perform. As
they have been rushing everlastingly throughout all space in their myriads,
undergoing myriad changes under the disturbing impact of collisions, they have
experienced every variety of movement and conjunction till they have fallen
into the particular pattern by which this world of ours is constituted. This
world has persisted many a long year, having once been set going in the
appropriate motions. From these, everything else follows. The rivers replenish
the thirsty sea with profuse streams of water. Incubated by the sun's heat, the
earth renews its fruits, and the brood of animals that springs from it grows
lustily. The gliding fires of ether sustain their life. None of these results
would be possible if there were not an ample supply of matter to bounce up out
of infinite space in replacement of all that is lost. Just as animals deprived
of food waste away through loss of body, so everything must decay as soon as
its supply of matter goes astray and is cut off.
Whatever
world the atoms have combined to form, impacts from without cannot preserve it
at every point. By continual battering, they can hold back part of it till
others come along to make good the deficiency. But, they are compelled now and
then to bounce back and in so doing to leave space and time for the atoms to
break loose from combination. It is, thus, essential that there should be great
numbers of atoms coming up. Indeed, the impacts themselves could not be
maintained without an unlimited supply of matter from all quarters.
There
is one belief, Memmius, that you must beware
of entertaining -- THE THEORY THAT EVERYTHING TENDS TOWARDS WHAT THEY CALL
"THE
Besides,
they do not claim that all bodies have this tendency towards the center, but
only those of moisture and earth -- the waters of the deep and the floods that
pour down from the hills and in general whatever is composed of a more or less
earthy body. But according to their teaching, the light breaths of air and hot
fires are simultaneously wafted outwards away from the center. The reason why
the encircling ether twinkles with stars and the sun feeds its flames in the
blue pastures of the sky is supposed to be that fire all congregates there in
its flight from the center. Similarly, the topmost branches of trees could not
break into leaf unless their food had this same upward urge. But, if you allow
matter to escape from the world in this way, you are leaving the ramparts of
the world at liberty to crumble of a sudden and take flight with the speed of
flame into the boundless void. The rest will follow. The thunder-breeding
quarters of the sky will rush down from aloft. The ground will fall away from
our feet, its particles dissolved amid the mingled wreckage of heaven and
earth. The whole world will vanish into the abyss, and in the twinkling of an
eye no remnant will be left but empty space and invisible atoms. At whatever
point you first allow matter to fall short, this will be the gateway to
perdition. Through this gate the whole concourse of matter will come streaming
out . . . .
Give
your mind now to the true reasoning I have to unfold. A new fact is battling
strenuously for access to your ears. A new aspect of the universe is striving
to reveal itself. But, no fact is so simple that it is not harder to believe
than to doubt at the first presentation. Equally, there is nothing so mighty or
so marvelous that the wonder it evokes does not tend to diminish in time. Take
first the pure and undimmed luster of the sky and all that it enshrines: the
stars that roam across its surface, the moon and the surpassing splendor of the
sunlight. If all these sights were now displayed to mortal view for the first
time by a swift unforeseen revelation, what miracle could be recounted greater
than this? What would men before the revelation have been less prone to
conceive as possible? Nothing, surely. So marvelous
would have been that sight -- a sight that no one now, you will admit, thinks
worthy of an upward glance into the luminous regions of the sky. So has satiety
blunted the appetite of our eyes. Desist, therefore,
from thrusting out reasoning from your mind because of its disconcerting
novelty. Weigh it, rather, with discerning judgment. Then, if it seems to you
true, give in. If it is false, gird yourself to oppose it. For the mind wants
to discover by reasoning what exists in the infinity of space that lies out
there, beyond the ramparts of this world -- that region into which the
intellect longs to peer and into which the free projection of the mind does
actually extend its flight.
Here,
then, is my first point. In all dimensions alike, on this side or that, upward
or downward through the universe, there is no end. This I have shown, and
indeed the fact proclaims itself aloud and the nature of space makes it crystal
clear. Granted, then, that empty space extends without limit in every direction
and that seeds innumerable in number are rushing on countless courses through
an unfathomable universe under the impulse of perpetual motion, IT IS IN THE
HIGHEST DEGREE UNLIKELY THAT THIS EARTH AND SKY IS THE ONLY ONE TO HAVE BEEN
CREATED and that all those particles of matter outside are accomplishing
nothing. This follows from the fact that our world has been made by nature
through the spontaneous and casual collision and the multifarious, accidental,
random and purposeless congregation and coalescence of atoms whose suddenly
formed combinations could serve on each occasion as the starting-point of
substantial fabrics -- earth and sea and sky and the races of living creatures.
On every ground, therefore, you must admit that there exist
elsewhere other congeries of matter similar to this one which the ether clasps
in ardent embrace.
When
there is plenty of matter in readiness, when space is available and no cause or
circumstance impedes, then surely things must be wrought and affected. You have
a store of atoms that could not be reckoned in full by the whole succession of
living creatures. You have the same natural force to congregate them in any place
precisely as they have been congregated here. You are bound, therefore, to
acknowledge that in other regions there are other earths and various tribes of
men and breeds of beasts.
Add
to this the fact that nothing in the universe is the only one of its kind,
unique and solitary in its birth and growth; everything is a member of a
species comprising many individuals. Turn your mind first to the animals. You
will find the rule apply to the brutes that prowl the mountains, to the
children of men, the voiceless scaly fish and all the forms of flying things.
So, you must admit that sky, earth, sun, moon, sea, and the rest are not
solitary, but rather numberless. For a firmly established
limit is set to their lives also and their bodies also are a product of birth,
no less than that of any creature that flourishes here according to its kind.
Bare
this well in mind, and you will immediately perceive that NATURE IS FREE AND
UNCONTROLLED BY PROUD MASTERS and runs the universe by herself without the
aid of gods. For who—by the sacred hearts of the gods who pass their unruffled
lives, their placid aeon, in calm and peace!—Who can rule the sum total of the measureless? Who can hold
in coercive hand the strong reins of the unfathomable? Who can spin all the
firmaments alike and foment with the fires of either all the fruitful earths?
Who can be in all places at all times, ready to darken the clear sky with
clouds and rock it with a thunderclap—to launch bolts that may often wreck his
own temples, or retire and spend his fury letting fly at deserts with that
missile which often passes by the guilty and slays the innocent and blameless?
After
the natal season of the world, the birthday of sea and lands and the uprising
of the sun, many atoms have been added from without, many seeds contributed on
every side by bombardment from the universe at large. From these the sea and
land could gather increase; the dome of heaven could gain more room and lift
its rafters high above the earth, and the air could climb upwards. For to each
are allotted its own atoms from every quarter under the impact of blows. They
all rejoin their own kind: water goes to water, earth swells with earthy
matter; fire is forged by fires, ether by ether. At length, everything is
brought to its utmost limit of growth by nature, the creatress
and perfectress. This is reached when what is poured
into its vital veins is no more than what flows and drains away. Here, the
growing-time of everything must halt. Here, nature checks the increase of her
own strength. The things you see growing merrily in stature and climbing step
by step the stairs of maturity -- these are gaining more atoms than they lose.
The food is easily introduced into all their veins; and they themselves are not
so widely expanded as to shed much matter and squander more than their age
absorbs as nourishment. It must, of course, be conceded that many particles ebb
and drain away from things. But, more particles must accrue, until they have
touched the topmost peak of growth. Thereafter, the strength and vigor of
maturity is gradually broken, and age slides down the path of decay. Obviously
the bulkier anything is and the more expanded when it begins to wane, the more
particles it sheds and gives off from every surface. The food is not easily
distributed through all its veins, or supplied in sufficient quantities to make
good the copious effluences it exudes. For everything must be restored and
renewed by food, and by food buttressed and sustained. And, the process is
doomed to failure, because the veins do not admit enough, and nature does not
supply all that is needed. It is natural, therefore,
that everything should perish when it is thinned out by the ebbing of matter
and succumbs to blows from without. the food supply is
no longer adequate for its aged frame, and the deadly bombardment of particles
from without never pauses in the work of dissolution and subdual.
In
this way, the ramparts of the great world also will be breached and collapse in
crumbling ruin about us. Already, it is far past its prime. The earth, which
generated every living species and once brought forth from its womb the bodies
of huge beasts, has now scarcely strength to generate animalcules. For I assume
that the races of mortal creatures were not let down into the fields from
heaven by a golden cord, nor generated from the sea or the rock-beating surf,
but born of the same earth that now provides their nurture. The same earth, in
her prime, spontaneously generated for mortals smiling crops and lusty vines,
sweet fruits and gladsome pastures, which now can scarcely be made to grow by
our toil. We wear down the oxen and wear out the strength of husbandmen, and
the plowshare is scarcely a match for fields that grudge their fruits and
multiply our toil. Already the plowman of ripe years shakes his head with many
a sigh that his heavy labors have gone for nothing; and, when he compares the
present with the past, he often cries up his father's luck and grumbles that
past generations, when men were old-fashioned and god-fearing, supported life
easily enough on their small farms, though one man's holding was then far less
than now. In the same despondent vein, the cultivator of old and wilted vines
decries the trend of the times and rails at heaven. He does not realize that
everything is gradually decaying and nearing its end, worn out by old age.
THE END