On the Nature of Things Part 6

For as to what men sometimes will affirm: That more than Tartarus (the realm of death) They fear diseases and a life of shame, And know the substance of the soul is blood, Or rather wind (if haply thus their whim), And so need naught of this our science, then Thou well may'st note from what's to follow now That more for glory do they braggart forth Than for belief. For mark these very same: Exiles from country, fugitives afar From sight of men, with charges foul attaint, Abased with every wretchedness, they yet Live, and where'er the wretches come, they yet Make the ancestral sacrifices there, Butcher the black sheep, and to G.o.ds below Offer the honours, and in bitter case Turn much more keenly to religion.

Wherefore, it's surer testing of a man In doubtful perils--mark him as he is Amid adversities; for then alone Are the true voices conjured from his breast, The mask off-stripped, reality behind.

And greed, again, and the blind l.u.s.t of honours Which force poor wretches past the bounds of law, And, oft allies and ministers of crime, To push through nights and days with hugest toil To rise untrammelled to the peaks of power-- These wounds of life in no mean part are kept Festering and open by this fright of death.

For ever we see fierce Want and foul Disgrace Dislodged afar from secure life and sweet, Like huddling Shapes before the doors of death.

And whilst, from these, men wish to scape afar, Driven by false terror, and afar remove, With civic blood a fortune they ama.s.s, They double their riches, greedy, heapers-up Of corpse on corpse they have a cruel laugh For the sad burial of a brother-born, And hatred and fear of tables of their kin.

Likewise, through this same terror, envy oft Makes them to peak because before their eyes That man is lordly, that man gazed upon Who walks begirt with honour glorious, Whilst they in filth and darkness roll around; Some perish away for statues and a name, And oft to that degree, from fright of death, Will hate of living and beholding light Take hold on humankind that they inflict Their own destruction with a gloomy heart-- Forgetful that this fear is font of cares, This fear the plague upon their sense of shame, And this that breaks the ties of comradry And oversets all reverence and faith, Mid direst slaughter. For long ere to-day Often were traitors to country and dear parents Through quest to shun the realms of Acheron.

For just as children tremble and fear all In the viewless dark, so even we at times Dread in the light so many things that be No whit more fearsome than what children feign, Shuddering, will be upon them in the dark.

This terror, then, this darkness of the mind, Not sunrise with its flaring spokes of light, Nor glittering arrows of morning sun disperse, But only nature's aspect and her law.

NATURE AND COMPOSITION OF THE MIND

First, then, I say, the mind which oft we call The intellect, wherein is seated life's Counsel and regimen, is part no less Of man than hand and foot and eyes are parts Of one whole breathing creature. [But some hold]

That sense of mind is in no fixed part seated, But is of body some one vital state,-- Named "harmony" by Greeks, because thereby We live with sense, though intellect be not In any part: as oft the body is said To have good health (when health, however, 's not One part of him who has it), so they place The sense of mind in no fixed part of man.

Mightily, diversly, meseems they err.

Often the body palpable and seen Sickens, while yet in some invisible part We feel a pleasure; oft the other way, A miserable in mind feels pleasure still Throughout his body--quite the same as when A foot may pain without a pain in head.

Besides, when these our limbs are given o'er To gentle sleep and lies the burdened frame At random void of sense, a something else Is yet within us, which upon that time Bestirs itself in many a wise, receiving All motions of joy and phantom cares of heart.

Now, for to see that in man's members dwells Also the soul, and body ne'er is wont To feel sensation by a "harmony"

Take this in chief: the fact that life remains Oft in our limbs, when much of body's gone; Yet that same life, when particles of heat, Though few, have scattered been, and through the mouth Air has been given forth abroad, forthwith Forever deserts the veins, and leaves the bones.

Thus mayst thou know that not all particles Perform like parts, nor in like manner all Are props of weal and safety: rather those-- The seeds of wind and exhalations warm-- Take care that in our members life remains.

Therefore a vital heat and wind there is Within the very body, which at death Deserts our frames. And so, since nature of mind And even of soul is found to be, as 'twere, A part of man, give over "harmony"-- Name to musicians brought from Helicon,-- Unless themselves they filched it otherwise, To serve for what was lacking name till then.

Whate'er it be, they're welcome to it--thou, Hearken my other maxims.

Mind and soul, I say, are held conjoined one with other, And form one single nature of themselves; But chief and regnant through the frame entire Is still that counsel which we call the mind, And that cleaves seated in the midmost breast.

Here leap dismay and terror; round these haunts Be blandishments of joys; and therefore here The intellect, the mind. The rest of soul, Throughout the body scattered, but obeys-- Moved by the nod and motion of the mind.

This, for itself, sole through itself, hath thought; This for itself hath mirth, even when the thing That moves it, moves nor soul nor body at all.

And as, when head or eye in us is smit By a.s.sailing pain, we are not tortured then Through all the body, so the mind alone Is sometimes smitten, or livens with a joy, Whilst yet the soul's remainder through the limbs And through the frame is stirred by nothing new.

But when the mind is moved by shock more fierce, We mark the whole soul suffering all at once Along man's members: sweats and pallors spread Over the body, and the tongue is broken, And fails the voice away, and ring the ears, Mists blind the eyeb.a.l.l.s, and the joints collapse,-- Aye, men drop dead from terror of the mind.

Hence, whoso will can readily remark That soul conjoined is with mind, and, when 'Tis strook by influence of the mind, forthwith In turn it hits and drives the body too.

And this same argument establisheth That nature of mind and soul corporeal is: For when 'tis seen to drive the members on, To s.n.a.t.c.h from sleep the body, and to change The countenance, and the whole state of man To rule and turn,--what yet could never be Sans contact, and sans body contact fails-- Must we not grant that mind and soul consist Of a corporeal nature?--And besides Thou markst that likewise with this body of ours Suffers the mind and with our body feels.

If the dire speed of spear that cleaves the bones And bares the inner thews. .h.i.ts not the life, Yet follows a fainting and a foul collapse, And, on the ground, dazed tumult in the mind, And whiles a wavering will to rise afoot.

So nature of mind must be corporeal, since From stroke and spear corporeal 'tis in throes.

Now, of what body, what components formed Is this same mind I will go on to tell.

First, I aver, 'tis superfine, composed Of tiniest particles--that such the fact Thou canst perceive, if thou attend, from this: Nothing is seen to happen with such speed As what the mind proposes and begins; Therefore the same bestirs itself more swiftly Than aught whose nature's palpable to eyes.

But what's so agile must of seeds consist Most round, most tiny, that they may be moved, When hit by impulse slight. So water moves, In waves along, at impulse just the least-- Being create of little shapes that roll; But, contrariwise, the quality of honey More stable is, its liquids more inert, More tardy its flow; for all its stock of matter Cleaves more together, since, indeed, 'tis made Of atoms not so smooth, so fine, and round.

For the light breeze that hovers yet can blow High heaps of poppy-seed away for thee Downward from off the top; but, contrariwise, A pile of stones or spiny ears of wheat It can't at all. Thus, in so far as bodies Are small and smooth, is their mobility; But, contrariwise, the heavier and more rough, The more immovable they prove. Now, then, Since nature of mind is movable so much, Consist it must of seeds exceeding small And smooth and round. Which fact once known to thee, Good friend, will serve thee opportune in else.

This also shows the nature of the same, How nice its texture, in how small a s.p.a.ce 'Twould go, if once compacted as a pellet: When death's unvexed repose gets hold on man And mind and soul retire, thou markest there From the whole body nothing ta'en in form, Nothing in weight. Death grants ye everything, But vital sense and exhalation hot.

Thus soul entire must be of smallmost seeds, Twined through the veins, the vitals, and the thews, Seeing that, when 'tis from whole body gone, The outward figuration of the limbs Is unimpaired and weight fails not a whit.

Just so, when vanished the bouquet of wine, Or when an unguent's perfume delicate Into the winds away departs, or when From any body savour's gone, yet still The thing itself seems minished naught to eyes, Thereby, nor aught abstracted from its weight-- No marvel, because seeds many and minute Produce the savours and the redolence In the whole body of the things. And so, Again, again, nature of mind and soul 'Tis thine to know created is of seeds The tiniest ever, since at flying-forth It beareth nothing of the weight away.

Yet fancy not its nature simple so.

For an impalpable aura, mixed with heat, Deserts the dying, and heat draws off the air; And heat there's none, unless commixed with air: For, since the nature of all heat is rare, Athrough it many seeds of air must move.

Thus nature of mind is triple; yet those all Suffice not for creating sense--since mind Accepteth not that aught of these can cause Sense-bearing motions, and much less the thoughts A man revolves in mind. So unto these Must added be a somewhat, and a fourth; That somewhat's altogether void of name; Than which existeth naught more mobile, naught More an impalpable, of elements More small and smooth and round. That first transmits Sense-bearing motions through the frame, for that Is roused the first, composed of little shapes; Thence heat and viewless force of wind take up The motions, and thence air, and thence all things Are put in motion; the blood is strook, and then The vitals all begin to feel, and last To bones and marrow the sensation comes-- Pleasure or torment. Nor will pain for naught Enter so far, nor a sharp ill seep through, But all things be perturbed to that degree That room for life will fail, and parts of soul Will scatter through the body's every pore.

Yet as a rule, almost upon the skin These motion aIl are stopped, and this is why We have the power to retain our life.

Now in my eagerness to tell thee how They are commixed, through what unions fit They function so, my country's pauper-speech Constrains me sadly. As I can, however, I'll touch some points and pa.s.s. In such a wise Course these primordials 'mongst one another With inter-motions that no one can be From other sundered, nor its agency Perform, if once divided by a s.p.a.ce; Like many powers in one body they work.

As in the flesh of any creature still Is odour and savour and a certain warmth, And yet from all of these one bulk of body Is made complete, so, viewless force of wind And warmth and air, commingled, do create One nature, by that mobile energy a.s.sisted which from out itself to them Imparts initial motion, whereby first Sense-bearing motion along the vitals springs.

For lurks this essence far and deep and under, Nor in our body is aught more shut from view, And 'tis the very soul of all the soul.

And as within our members and whole frame The energy of mind and power of soul Is mixed and latent, since create it is Of bodies small and few, so lurks this fourth, This essence void of name, composed of small, And seems the very soul of all the soul, And holds dominion o'er the body all.

And by like reason wind and air and heat Must function so, commingled through the frame, And now the one subside and now another In interchange of dominance, that thus From all of them one nature be produced, Lest heat and wind apart, and air apart, Make sense to perish, by disseverment.

There is indeed in mind that heat it gets When seething in rage, and flashes from the eyes More swiftly fire; there is, again, that wind, Much, and so cold, companion of all dread, Which rouses the shudder in the shaken frame; There is no less that state of air composed, Making the tranquil breast, the serene face.

But more of hot have they whose restive hearts, Whose minds of pa.s.sion quickly seethe in rage-- Of which kind chief are fierce abounding lions, Who often with roaring burst the breast o'erwrought, Unable to hold the surging wrath within; But the cold mind of stags has more of wind, And speedier through their inwards rouses up The icy currents which make their members quake.

But more the oxen live by tranquil air, Nor e'er doth smoky torch of wrath applied, O'erspreading with shadows of a darkling murk, Rouse them too far; nor will they stiffen stark, Pierced through by icy javelins of fear; But have their place half-way between the two-- Stags and fierce lions. Thus the race of men: Though training make them equally refined, It leaves those pristine vestiges behind Of each mind's nature. Nor may we suppose Evil can e'er be rooted up so far That one man's not more given to fits of wrath, Another's not more quickly touched by fear, A third not more long-suffering than he should.

And needs must differ in many things besides The varied natures and resulting habits Of humankind--of which not now can I Expound the hidden causes, nor find names Enough for all the divers shapes of those Primordials whence this variation springs.

But this meseems I'm able to declare: Those vestiges of natures left behind Which reason cannot quite expel from us Are still so slight that naught prevents a man From living a life even worthy of the G.o.ds.

So then this soul is kept by all the body, Itself the body's guard, and source of weal: For they with common roots cleave each to each, Nor can be torn asunder without death.

Not easy 'tis from lumps of frankincense To tear their fragrance forth, without its nature Perishing likewise: so, not easy 'tis From all the body nature of mind and soul To draw away, without the whole dissolved.

With seeds so intertwined even from birth, They're dowered conjointly with a partner-life; No energy of body or mind, apart, Each of itself without the other's power, Can have sensation; but our sense, enkindled Along the vitals, to flame is blown by both With mutual motions. Besides the body alone Is nor begot nor grows, nor after death Seen to endure. For not as water at times Gives off the alien heat, nor is thereby Itself destroyed, but unimpaired remains-- Not thus, I say, can the deserted frame Bear the dissevering of its joined soul, But, rent and ruined, moulders all away.

Thus the joint contact of the body and soul Learns from their earliest age the vital motions, Even when still buried in the mother's womb; So no dissevering can hap to them, Without their bane and ill. And thence mayst see That, as conjoined is their source of weal, Conjoined also must their nature be.

If one, moreover, denies that body feel, And holds that soul, through all the body mixed, Takes on this motion which we t.i.tle "sense,"

He battles in vain indubitable facts: For who'll explain what body's feeling is, Except by what the public fact itself Has given and taught us?"But when soul is parted, Body's without all sense." True!--loses what Was even in its life-time not its own; And much beside it loses, when soul's driven Forth from that life-time. Or, to say that eyes Themselves can see no thing, but through the same The mind looks forth, as out of opened doors, Is--a hard saying; since the feel in eyes Says the reverse. For this itself draws on And forces into the pupils of our eyes Our consciousness. And note the case when often We lack the power to see refulgent things, Because our eyes are hampered by their light-- With a mere doorway this would happen not; For, since it is our very selves that see, No open portals undertake the toil.

Besides, if eyes of ours but act as doors, Methinks that, were our sight removed, the mind Ought then still better to behold a thing-- When even the door-posts have been cleared away.

Herein in these affairs nowise take up What honoured sage, Democritus, lays down-- That proposition, that primordials Of body and mind, each super-posed on each, Vary alternately and interweave The fabric of our members. For not only Are the soul-elements smaller far than those Which this our body and inward parts compose, But also are they in their number less, And scattered spa.r.s.ely through our frame. And thus This canst thou guarantee: soul's primal germs Maintain between them intervals as large At least as are the smallest bodies, which, When thrown against us, in our body rouse Sense-bearing motions. Hence it comes that we Sometimes don't feel alighting on our frames The clinging dust, or chalk that settles soft; Nor mists of night, nor spider's gossamer We feel against us, when, upon our road, Its net entangles us, nor on our head The dropping of its withered garmentings; Nor bird-feathers, nor vegetable down, Flying about, so light they barely fall; Nor feel the steps of every crawling thing, Nor each of all those footprints on our skin Of midges and the like. To that degree Must many primal germs be stirred in us Ere once the seeds of soul that through our frame Are intermingled 'gin to feel that those Primordials of the body have been strook, And ere, in pounding with such gaps between, They clash, combine and leap apart in turn.

But mind is more the keeper of the gates, Hath more dominion over life than soul.

For without intellect and mind there's not One part of soul can rest within our frame Least part of time; companioning, it goes With mind into the winds away, and leaves The icy members in the cold of death.

But he whose mind and intellect abide Himself abides in life. However much The trunk be mangled, with the limbs lopped off, The soul withdrawn and taken from the limbs, Still lives the trunk and draws the vital air.

Even when deprived of all but all the soul, Yet will it linger on and cleave to life,-- Just as the power of vision still is strong, If but the pupil shall abide unharmed, Even when the eye around it's sorely rent-- Provided only thou destroyest not Wholly the ball, but, cutting round the pupil, Leavest that pupil by itself behind-- For more would ruin sight. But if that centre, That tiny part of eye, be eaten through, Forthwith the vision fails and darkness comes, Though in all else the unblemished ball be clear.

'Tis by like compact that the soul and mind Are each to other bound forevermore.

THE SOUL IS MORTAL

Now come: that thou mayst able be to know That minds and the light souls of all that live Have mortal birth and death, I will go on Verses to build meet for thy rule of life, Sought after long, discovered with sweet toil.

But under one name I'd have thee yoke them both; And when, for instance, I shall speak of soul, Teaching the same to be but mortal, think Thereby I'm speaking also of the mind-- Since both are one, a substance inter-joined.

First, then, since I have taught how soul exists A subtle fabric, of particles minute, Made up from atoms smaller much than those Of water's liquid damp, or fog, or smoke, So in mobility it far excels, More p.r.o.ne to move, though strook by lighter cause Even moved by images of smoke or fog-- As where we view, when in our sleeps we're lulled, The altars exhaling steam and smoke aloft-- For, beyond doubt, these apparitions come To us from outward. Now, then, since thou seest, Their liquids depart, their waters flow away, When jars are shivered, and since fog and smoke Depart into the winds away, believe The soul no less is shed abroad and dies More quickly far, more quickly is dissolved Back to its primal bodies, when withdrawn From out man's members it has gone away.

For, sure, if body (container of the same Like as a jar), when shivered from some cause, And rarefied by loss of blood from veins, Cannot for longer hold the soul, how then Thinkst thou it can be held by any air-- A stuff much rarer than our bodies be?

Besides we feel that mind to being comes Along with body, with body grows and ages.

For just as children totter round about With frames infirm and tender, so there follows A weakling wisdom in their minds; and then, Where years have ripened into robust powers, Counsel is also greater, more increased The power of mind; thereafter, where already The body's shattered by master-powers of eld, And fallen the frame with its enfeebled powers, Thought hobbles, tongue wanders, and the mind gives way; All fails, all's lacking at the selfsame time.

Therefore it suits that even the soul's dissolved, Like smoke, into the lofty winds of air; Since we behold the same to being come Along with body and grow, and, as I've taught, Crumble and crack, therewith outworn by eld.

Then, too, we see, that, just as body takes Monstrous diseases and the dreadful pain, So mind its bitter cares, the grief, the fear; Wherefore it tallies that the mind no less Partaker is of death; for pain and disease Are both artificers of death,--as well We've learned by the pa.s.sing of many a man ere now.

Nay, too, in diseases of body, often the mind Wanders afield; for 'tis beside itself, And crazed it speaks, or many a time it sinks, With eyelids closing and a drooping nod, In heavy drowse, on to eternal sleep; From whence nor hears it any voices more, Nor able is to know the faces here Of those about him standing with wet cheeks Who vainly call him back to light and life.

Wherefore mind too, confess we must, dissolves, Seeing, indeed, contagions of disease Enter into the same. Again, O why, When the strong wine has entered into man, And its diffused fire gone round the veins, Why follows then a heaviness of limbs, A tangle of the legs as round he reels, A stuttering tongue, an intellect besoaked, Eyes all aswim, and hiccups, shouts, and brawls, And whatso else is of that ilk?--Why this?-- If not that violent and impetuous wine Is wont to confound the soul within the body?

But whatso can confounded be and balked, Gives proof, that if a hardier cause got in, 'Twould hap that it would perish then, bereaved Of any life thereafter. And, moreover, Often will some one in a sudden fit, As if by stroke of lightning, tumble down Before our eyes, and sputter foam, and grunt, Blither, and twist about with sinews taut, Gasp up in starts, and weary out his limbs With tossing round. No marvel, since distract Through frame by violence of disease.