PROEM
O thou who first uplifted in such darkSo clear a torch aloft, who first shed lightUpon the profitable ends of man,O thee I follow, glory of the Greeks,And set my footsteps squarely planted nowEven in the impress and the marks of thine-Less like one eager to dispute the palm,More as one craving out of very loveThat I may copy thee!- for how should swallowContend with swans or what compare could beIn a race between young kids with tumbling legsAnd the strong might of the horse? Our father thou,And finder-out of truth, and thou to usSuppliest a father's precepts; and from outThose scriven leaves of thine, renowned soul(Like bees that sip of all in flowery wolds),We feed upon thy golden sayings all-Golden, and ever worthiest endless life.For soon as ever thy planning thought that sprangFrom god-like mind begins its loud proclaimOf nature's courses, terrors of the brainAsunder flee, the ramparts of the worldDispart away, and through the void entireI see the movements of the universe.Rises to vision the majesty of gods,And their abodes of everlasting calmWhich neither wind may shake nor rain-cloud splash,Nor snow, congealed by sharp frosts, may harmWith its white downfall: ever, unclouded skyO'er roofs, and laughs with far-diffused light.And nature gives to them their all, nor aughtMay ever pluck their peace of mind away.But nowhere to my vision rise no moreThe vaults of Acheron, though the broad earthBars me no more from gazing down o'er allWhich under our feet is going on belowAlong the void. O, here in these affairsSome new divine delight and trembling aweTakes hold through me, that thus by power of thineNature, so plain and manifest at last,Hath been on every side laid bare to man! And since I've taught already of what sortThe seeds of all things are, and how, distinctIn divers forms, they flit of own accord,Stirred with a motion everlasting on,And in what mode things be from them create,Now, after such matters, should my verse, meseems,Make clear the nature of the mind and soul,And drive that dread of Acheron without,Headlong, which so confounds our human lifeUnto its deeps, pouring o'er all that isThe black of death, nor leaves not anythingTo prosper- a liquid and unsullied joy.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, thenThou well may'st note from what's to follow nowThat more for glory do they braggart forthThan for belief. For mark these very same:Exiles from country, fugitives afarFrom sight of men, with charges foul attaint,Abased with every wretchedness, they yetLive, and where'er the wretches come, they yetMake the ancestral sacrifices there,Butcher the black sheep, and to gods belowOffer the honours, and in bitter caseTurn much more keenly to religion.Wherefore, it's surer testing of a manIn doubtful perils- mark him as he isAmid adversities; for then aloneAre the true voices conjured from his breast,The mask off-stripped, reality behind.And greed, again, and the blind lust of honoursWhich force poor wretches past the bounds of law,And, oft allies and ministers of crime,To push through nights and days with hugest toilTo rise untrammelled to the peaks of power-These wounds of life in no mean part are keptFestering and open by this fright of death.For ever we see fierce Want and foul DisgraceDislodged 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 amass,They double their riches, greedy, heapers-upOf corpse on corpse they have a cruel laughFor the sad burial of a brother-born,And hatred and fear of tables of their kin.Likewise, through this same terror, envy oftMakes them to peak because before their eyesThat man is lordly, that man gazed uponWho 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 lightTake hold on humankind that they inflictTheir 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 comradryAnd oversets all reverence and faith,Mid direst slaughter. For long ere to-dayOften were traitors to country and dear parentsThrough quest to shun the realms of Acheron.For just as children tremble and fear allIn the viewless dark, so even we at timesDread in the light so many things that beNo 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 callThe intellect, wherein is seated life'sCounsel and regimen, is part no lessOf man than hand and foot and eyes are partsOf 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 therebyWe live with sense, though intellect be notIn any part: as oft the body is saidTo have good health (when health, however, 's notOne part of him who has it), so they placeThe sense of mind in no fixed part of man.Mightily, diversly, meseems they err.Often the body palpable and seenSickens, while yet in some invisible partWe feel a pleasure; oft the other way,A miserable in mind feels pleasure stillThroughout his body- quite the same as whenA foot may pain without a pain in head.Besides, when these our limbs are given o'erTo gentle sleep and lies the burdened frameAt random void of sense, a something elseIs yet within us, which upon that timeBestirs itself in many a wise, receivingAll motions of joy and phantom cares of heart.Now, for to see that in man's members dwellsAlso the soul, and body ne'er is wontTo feel sensation by a "harmony"Take this in chief: the fact that life remainsOft 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 mouthAir has been given forth abroad, forthwithForever deserts the veins, and leaves the bones.Thus mayst thou know that not all particlesPerform like parts, nor in like manner allAre 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 isWithin the very body, which at deathDeserts our frames. And so, since nature of mindAnd 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 entireIs still that counsel which we call the mind,And that cleaves seated in the midmost breast.Here leap dismay and terror; round these hauntsBe blandishments of joys; and therefore hereThe 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 thingThat moves it, moves nor soul nor body at all.And as, when head or eye in us is smitBy assailing pain, we are not tortured thenThrough all the body, so the mind aloneIs sometimes smitten, or livens with a joy,Whilst yet the soul's remainder through the limbsAnd 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 onceAlong man's members: sweats and pallors spreadOver the body, and the tongue is broken,And fails the voice away, and ring the ears,Mists blind the eyeballs, and the joints collapse,-Aye, men drop dead from terror of the mind.Hence, whoso will can readily remarkThat soul conjoined is with mind, and, when'Tis strook by influence of the mind, forthwithIn turn it hits and drives the body too. And this same argument establishethThat nature of mind and soul corporeal is:For when 'tis seen to drive the members on,To snatch from sleep the body, and to changeThe countenance, and the whole state of manTo rule and turn,- what yet could never beSans contact, and sans body contact fails-Must we not grant that mind and soul consistOf a corporeal nature?- And besidesThou markst that likewise with this body of oursSuffers the mind and with our body feels.If the dire speed of spear that cleaves the bonesAnd bares the inner thews hits 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, sinceFrom stroke and spear corporeal 'tis in throes. Now, of what body, what components formedIs this same mind I will go on to tell.First, I aver, 'tis superfine, composedOf tiniest particles- that such the factThou canst perceive, if thou attend, from this:
Nothing is seen to happen with such speedAs what the mind proposes and begins;Therefore the same bestirs itself more swiftlyThan aught whose nature's palpable to eyes.But what's so agile must of seeds consistMost 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 honeyMore stable is, its liquids more inert,More tardy its flow; for all its stock of matterCleaves more together, since, indeed, 'tis madeOf atoms not so smooth, so fine, and round.For the light breeze that hovers yet can blowHigh heaps of poppy-seed away for theeDownward from off the top; but, contrariwise,A pile of stones or spiny ears of wheatIt can't at all. Thus, in so far as bodiesAre 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 smallAnd 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 space'Twould go, if once compacted as a pellet:When death's unvexed repose gets hold on manAnd mind and soul retire, thou markest thereFrom 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 limbsIs unimpaired and weight fails not a whit.Just so, when vanished the bouquet of wine,Or when an unguent's perfume delicateInto the winds away departs, or whenFrom any body savour's gone, yet stillThe thing itself seems minished naught to eyes,Thereby, nor aught abstracted from its weight-No marvel, because seeds many and minuteProduce the savours and the redolenceIn the whole body of the things.
And so,Again, again, nature of mind and soul'Tis thine to know created is of seedsThe tiniest ever, since at flying-forthIt 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 allSuffice not for creating sense- since mindAccepteth not that aught of these can causeSense-bearing motions, and much less the thoughtsA man revolves in mind. So unto theseMust added be a somewhat, and a fourth;That somewhat's altogether void of name;Than which existeth naught more mobile, naughtMore an impalpable, of elementsMore small and smooth and round. That first transmitsSense-bearing motions through the frame, for thatIs roused the first, composed of little shapes;Thence heat and viewless force of wind take upThe motions, and thence air, and thence all thingsAre put in motion; the blood is strook, and thenThe vitals all begin to feel, and lastTo bones and marrow the sensation comes-Pleasure or torment. Nor will pain for naughtEnter so far, nor a sharp ill seep through,But all things be perturbed to that degreeThat room for life will fail, and parts of soulWill scatter through the body's every pore.Yet as a rule, almost upon the skinThese motion aIl are stopped, and this is whyWe have the power to retain our life. Now in my eagerness to tell thee howThey are commixed, through what unions fitThey function so, my country's pauper-speechConstrains me sadly. As I can, however,I'll touch some points and pass.
In such a wiseCourse these primordials 'mongst one anotherWith inter-motions that no one can beFrom other sundered, nor its agencyPerform, if once divided by a space;Like many powers in one body they work.As in the flesh of any creature stillIs odour and savour and a certain warmth,And yet from all of these one bulk of bodyIs made complete, so, viewless force of windAnd warmth and air, commingled, do createOne nature, by that mobile energyAssisted which from out itself to themImparts initial motion, whereby firstSense-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 frameThe energy of mind and power of soulIs mixed and latent, since create it isOf 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 heatMust function so, commingled through the frame,And now the one subside and now anotherIn interchange of dominance, that thusFrom 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 getsWhen seething in rage, and flashes from the eyesMore 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 passion 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 upThe 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 behindOf each mind's nature. Nor may we supposeEvil can e'er be rooted up so farThat 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 besidesThe varied natures and resulting habitsOf humankind- of which not now can IExpound the hidden causes, nor find namesEnough for all the divers shapes of thosePrimordials whence this variation springs.But this meseems I'm able to declare:Those vestiges of natures left behindWhich reason cannot quite expel from usAre still so slight that naught prevents a manFrom living a life even worthy of the gods. 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 frankincenseTo tear their fragrance forth, without its naturePerishing likewise: so, not easy 'tisFrom all the body nature of mind and soulTo 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, enkindledAlong the vitals, to flame is blown by bothWith mutual motions. Besides the body aloneIs nor begot nor grows, nor after deathSeen to endure. For not as water at timesGives off the alien heat, nor is therebyItself destroyed, but unimpaired remains-Not thus, I say, can the deserted frameBear the dissevering of its joined soul,But, rent and ruined, moulders all away.Thus the joint contact of the body and soulLearns 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 seeThat, 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 title "sense,"He battles in vain indubitable facts:For who'll explain what body's feeling is,Except by what the public fact itselfHas given and taught us? "But when soul is parted,Body's without all sense." True!- loses whatWas even in its life-time not its own;And much beside it loses, when soul's drivenForth from that life-time. Or, to say that eyesThemselves can see no thing, but through the sameThe mind looks forth, as out of opened doors,Is- a hard saying; since the feel in eyesSays the reverse. For this itself draws onAnd forces into the pupils of our eyesOur consciousness. And note the case when oftenWe 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 mindOught then still better to behold a thing-When even the door-posts have been cleared away. Herein in these affairs nowise take upWhat honoured sage, Democritus, lays down-That proposition, that primordialsOf body and mind, each super-posed on each,Vary alternately and interweaveThe fabric of our members. For not onlyAre the soul-elements smaller far than thoseWhich this our body and inward parts compose,But also are they in their number less,And scattered sparsely through our frame. And thusThis canst thou guarantee: soul's primal germsMaintain between them intervals as largeAt least as are the smallest bodies, which,When thrown against us, in our body rouseSense-bearing motions.
Hence it comes that weSometimes don't feel alighting on our framesThe clinging dust, or chalk that settles soft;Nor mists of night, nor spider's gossamerWe feel against us, when, upon our road,Its net entangles us, nor on our headThe 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 skinOf midges and the like. To that degreeMust many primal germs be stirred in usEre once the seeds of soul that through our frameAre intermingled 'gin to feel that thosePrimordials 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 notOne part of soul can rest within our frameLeast part of time; companioning, it goesWith mind into the winds away, and leavesThe icy members in the cold of death.But he whose mind and intellect abideHimself abides in life. However muchThe 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 notWholly 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 mindAre each to other bound forevermore.
THE SOUL IS MORTAL Now come: that thou mayst able be to knowThat minds and the light souls of all that liveHave mortal birth and death, I will go onVerses 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, thinkThereby I'm speaking also of the mind-Since both are one, a substance inter-joined.First, then, since I have taught how soul existsA subtle fabric, of particles minute,Made up from atoms smaller much than thoseOf water's liquid damp, or fog, or smoke,So in mobility it far excels,More prone to move, though strook by lighter causeEven 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 comeTo us from outward. Now, then, since thou seest,Their liquids depart, their waters flow away,When jars are shivered, and since fog and smokeDepart into the winds away, believeThe soul no less is shed abroad and diesMore quickly far, more quickly is dissolvedBack to its primal bodies, when withdrawnFrom out man's members it has gone away.For, sure, if body (container of the sameLike as a jar), when shivered from some cause,And rarefied by loss of blood from veins,Cannot for longer hold the soul, how thenThinkst thou it can be held by any air-A stuff much rarer than our bodies be?
Besides we feel that mind to being comesAlong with body, with body grows and ages.For just as children totter round aboutWith frames infirm and tender, so there followsA weakling wisdom in their minds; and then,Where years have ripened into robust powers,Counsel is also greater, more increasedThe power of mind; thereafter, where alreadyThe 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 comeAlong with body and grow, and, as I've taught,Crumble and crack, therewith outworn by eld. Then, too, we see, that, just as body takesMonstrous diseases and the dreadful pain,So mind its bitter cares, the grief, the fear;Wherefore it tallies that the mind no lessPartaker is of death; for pain and diseaseAre both artificers of death,- as wellWe've learned by the passing of many a man ere now.Nay, too, in diseases of body, often the mindWanders 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 hereOf those about him standing with wet cheeksWho vainly call him back to light and life.Wherefore mind too, confess we must, dissolves,Seeing, indeed, contagions of diseaseEnter 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 wineIs 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, bereavedOf any life thereafter.
And, moreover,Often will some one in a sudden fit,As if by stroke of lightning, tumble downBefore our eyes, and sputter foam, and grunt,Blither, and twist about with sinews taut,Gasp up in starts, and weary out his limbsWith tossing round. No marvel, since distractThrough frame by violence of disease. . . . . . .Confounds, he foams, as if to vomit soul,As on the salt sea boil the billows roundUnder the master might of winds. And nowA groan's forced out, because his limbs are griped,But, in the main, because the seeds of voiceAre driven forth and carried in a massOutwards by mouth, where they are wont to go,And have a builded highway. He becomesMere fool, since energy of mind and soulConfounded is, and, as I've shown, to-riven,Asunder thrown, and torn to pieces allBy the same venom. But, again, where causeOf that disease has faced about, and backRetreats sharp poison of corrupted frameInto its shadowy lairs, the man at firstArises reeling, and gradually comes backTo all his senses and recovers soul.Thus, since within the body itself of manThe mind and soul are by such great diseasesShaken, so miserably in labour distraught,Why, then, believe that in the open air,Without a body, they can pass their life,Immortal, battling with the master winds?And, since we mark the mind itself is cured,Like the sick body, and restored can beBy medicine, this is forewarning tooThat mortal lives the mind. For proper it isThat whosoe'er begins and undertakesTo alter the mind, or meditates to changeAny another nature soever, should addNew parts, or readjust the order given,Or from the sum remove at least a bit.But what's immortal willeth for itselfIts parts be nor increased, nor rearranged,Nor any bit soever flow away:For change of anything from out its boundsMeans instant death of that which was before.Ergo, the mind, whether in sickness fallen,Or by the medicine restored, gives signs,As I have taught, of its mortality.So surely will a fact of truth make head'Gainst errors' theories all, and so shut offAll refuge from the adversary, and routError by two-edged confutation.
And since the mind is of a man one part,Which in one fixed place remains, like ears,And eyes, and every sense which pilots life;And just as hand, or eye, or nose, apart,Severed from us, can neither feel nor be,But in the least of time is left to rot,Thus mind alone can never be, withoutThe body and the man himself, which seems,As 'twere the vessel of the same- or aughtWhate'er thou'lt feign as yet more closely joined:Since body cleaves to mind by surest bonds. Again, the body's and the mind's live powersOnly in union prosper and enjoy;For neither can nature of mind, alone of selfSans body, give the vital motions forth;Nor, then, can body, wanting soul, endureAnd use the senses. Verily, as the eye,Alone, up-rended from its roots, apartFrom all the body, can peer about at naught,So soul and mind it seems are nothing able,When by themselves. No marvel, because, commixedThrough veins and inwards, and through bones and thews,Their elements primordial are confinedBy all the body, and own no power freeTo bound around through interspaces big,Thus, shut within these confines, they take onMotions of sense, which, after death, thrown outBeyond the body to the winds of air,Take on they cannot- and on this account,Because no more in such a way confined.For air will be a body, be alive,If in that air the soul can keep itself,And in that air enclose those motions allWhich in the thews and in the body itselfA while ago 'twas making. So for this,Again, again, I say confess we must,That, when the body's wrappings are unwound,And when the vital breath is forced without,The soul, the senses of the mind dissolve,-Since for the twain the cause and ground of lifeIs in the fact of their conjoined estate. Once more, since body's unable to sustainDivision from the soul, without decayAnd obscene stench, how canst thou doubt but thatThe soul, uprisen from the body's deeps,Has filtered away, wide-drifted like a smoke,Or that the changed body crumbling fellWith ruin so entire, because, indeed,Its deep foundations have been moved from place,The soul out-filtering even through the frame,And through the body's every winding wayAnd orifice? And so by many meansThou'rt free to learn that nature of the soulHath passed in fragments out along the frame,And that 'twas shivered in the very bodyEre ever it slipped abroad and swam awayInto the winds of air.
For never a manDying appears to feel the soul go forthAs one sure whole from all his body at once,Nor first come up the throat and into mouth;But feels it failing in a certain spot,Even as he knows the senses too dissolveEach in its own location in the frame.But were this mind of ours immortal mind,Dying 'twould scarce bewail a dissolution,But rather the going, the leaving of its coat,Like to a snake. Wherefore, when once the bodyHath passed away, admit we must that soul,Shivered in all that body, perished too.Nay, even when moving in the bounds of life,Often the soul, now tottering from some cause,Craves to go out, and from the frame entireLoosened to be; the countenance becomesFlaccid, as if the supreme hour were there;And flabbily collapse the members allAgainst the bloodless trunk- the kind of caseWe see when we remark in common phrase,"That man's quite gone," or "fainted dead away";And where there's now a bustle of alarm,And all are eager to get some hold uponThe man's last link of life. For then the mindAnd all the power of soul are shook so sore,And these so totter along with all the frame,That any cause a little stronger mightDissolve them altogether.- Why, then, doubtThat soul, when once without the body thrust,There in the open, an enfeebled thing,Its wrappings stripped away, cannot endureNot only through no everlasting age,But even, indeed, through not the least of time? Then, too, why never is the intellect,The counselling mind, begotten in the head,The feet, the hands, instead of cleaving stillTo one sole seat, to one fixed haunt, the breast,If not that fixed places be assignedFor each thing's birth, where each, when 'tis create,Is able to endure, and that our framesHave such complex adjustments that no shiftIn order of our members may appear?To that degree effect succeeds to cause,Nor is the flame once wont to be createIn flowing streams, nor cold begot in fire.
Besides, if nature of soul immortal be,And able to feel, when from our frame disjoined,The same, I fancy, must be thought to beEndowed with senses five,- nor is there wayBut this whereby to image to ourselvesHow under-souls may roam in Acheron.Thus painters and the elder race of bardsHave pictured souls with senses so endowed.But neither eyes, nor nose, nor hand, aloneApart from body can exist for soul,Nor tongue nor ears apart. And hence indeedAlone by self they can nor feel nor be. And since we mark the vital sense to beIn the whole body, all one living thing,If of a sudden a force with rapid strokeShould slice it down the middle and cleave in twain,Beyond a doubt likewise the soul itself,Divided, dissevered, asunder will be flungAlong with body. But what severed isAnd into sundry parts divides, indeedAdmits it owns no everlasting nature.We hear how chariots of war, areekWith hurly slaughter, lop with flashing scythesThe limbs away so suddenly that there,Fallen from the trunk, they quiver on the earth,The while the mind and powers of the manCan feel no pain, for swiftness of his hurt,And sheer abandon in the zest of battle:With the remainder of his frame he seeksAnew the battle and the slaughter, nor marksHow the swift wheels and scythes of ravin have draggedOff with the horses his left arm and shield;Nor other how his right has dropped away,Mounting again and on. A third attemptsWith leg dismembered to arise and stand,Whilst, on the ground hard by, the dying footTwitches its spreading toes. And even the head,When from the warm and living trunk lopped off,Keeps on the ground the vital countenanceAnd open eyes, until 't has rendered upAll remnants of the soul. Nay, once again:If, when a serpent's darting forth its tongue,And lashing its tail, thou gettest chance to hewWith axe its length of trunk to many parts,Thou'lt see each severed fragment writhing roundWith its fresh wound, and spattering up the sod,And there the fore-part seeking with the jawsAfter the hinder, with bite to stop the pain.So shall we say that these be souls entireIn all those fractions?- but from that 'twould followOne creature'd have in body many souls.Therefore, the soul, which was indeed but one,Has been divided with the body too:Each is but mortal, since alike is eachHewn into many parts. Again, how oftenWe view our fellow going by degrees,And losing limb by limb the vital sense;First nails and fingers of the feet turn blue,Next die the feet and legs, then o'er the restSlow crawl the certain footsteps of cold death.And since this nature of the soul is torn,Nor mounts away, as at one time, entire,We needs must hold it mortal. But perchanceIf thou supposest that the soul itselfCan inward draw along the frame, and bringIts parts together to one place, and soFrom all the members draw the sense away,Why, then, that place in which such stock of soulCollected is, should greater seem in sense.But since such place is nowhere, for a fact,As said before, 'tis rent and scattered forth,And so goes under. Or again, if nowI please to grant the false, and say that soulCan thus be lumped within the frames of thoseWho leave the sunshine, dying bit by bit,Still must the soul as mortal be confessed;Nor aught it matters whether to wrack it go,Dispersed in the winds, or, gathered in a massFrom all its parts, sink down to brutish death,Since more and more in every region senseFails the whole man, and less and less of lifeIn every region lingers. And besides,If soul immortal is, and winds its wayInto the body at the birth of man,Why can we not remember something, then,Of life-time spent before? why keep we notSome footprints of the things we did of, old?But if so changed hath been the power of mind,That every recollection of things doneIs fallen away, at no o'erlong removeIs that, I trow, from what we mean by death.Wherefore 'tis sure that what hath been beforeHath died, and what now is is now create. Moreover, if after the body hath been builtOur mind's live powers are wont to be put in,Just at the moment that we come to birth,And cross the sills of life, 'twould scarcely fitFor them to live as if they seemed to growAlong with limbs and frame, even in the blood,But rather as in a cavern all alone.(Yet all the body duly throngs with sense.)But public fact declares against all this:For soul is so entwined through the veins,The flesh, the thews, the bones, that even the teethShare in sensation, as proven by dull ache,By twinge from icy water, or grating crunchUpon a stone that got in mouth with bread.Wherefore, again, again, souls must be thoughtNor void of birth, nor free from law of death;Nor, if, from outward, in they wound their way,Could they be thought as able so to cleaveTo these our frames, nor, since so interwove,Appears it that they're able to go forthUnhurt and whole and loose themselves unscathedFrom all the thews, articulations, bones.But, if perchance thou thinkest that the soul,From outward winding in its way, is wontTo seep and soak along these members ours,Then all the more 'twill perish, being thusWith body fused- for what will seep and soakWill be dissolved and will therefore die.For just as food, dispersed through all the poresOf body, and passed through limbs and all the frame,Perishes, supplying from itself the stuffFor other nature, thus the soul and mind,Though whole and new into a body going,Are yet, by seeping in, dissolved away,Whilst, as through pores, to all the frame there passThose particles from which created isThis nature of mind, now ruler of our body,Born from that soul which perished, when dividedAlong the frame.
Wherefore it seems that soulHath both a natal and funeral hour. Besides are seeds of soul there left behindIn the breathless body, or not? If there they are,It cannot justly be immortal deemed,Since, shorn of some parts lost, 'thas gone away:But if, borne off with members uncorrupt,'Thas fled so absolutely all awayIt leaves not one remainder of itselfBehind in body, whence do cadavers, then,From out their putrid flesh exhale the worms,And whence does such a mass of living things,Boneless and bloodless, o'er the bloated frameBubble and swarm? But if perchance thou thinkestThat souls from outward into worms can wind,And each into a separate body come,And reckonest not why many thousand soulsCollect where only one has gone away,Here is a point, in sooth, that seems to needInquiry and a putting to the test:Whether the souls go on a hunt for seedsOf worms wherewith to build their dwelling places,Or enter bodies ready-made, as 'twere.But why themselves they thus should do and toil'Tis hard to say, since, being free of body,They flit around, harassed by no disease,Nor cold nor famine; for the body laboursBy more of kinship to these flaws of life,And mind by contact with that body suffersSo many ills. But grant it be for themHowever useful to construct a bodyTo which to enter in, 'tis plain they can't.Then, souls for self no frames nor bodies make,Nor is there how they once might enter inTo bodies ready-made- for they cannotBe nicely interwoven with the same,And there'll be formed no interplay of senseCommon to each.
Again, why is't there goesImpetuous rage with lion's breed morose,And cunning with foxes, and to deer why givenThe ancestral fear and tendency to flee,And why in short do all the rest of traitsEngender from the very start of lifeIn the members and mentality, if notBecause one certain power of mind that cameFrom its own seed and breed waxes the sameAlong with all the body? But were mindImmortal, were it wont to change its bodies,How topsy-turvy would earth's creatures act!The Hyrcan hound would flee the onset oftOf antlered stag, the scurrying hawk would quakeAlong the winds of air at the coming dove,And men would dote, and savage beasts be wise;For false the reasoning of those that sayImmortal mind is changed by change of body-For what is changed dissolves, and therefore dies.For parts are re-disposed and leave their order;Wherefore they must be also capableOf dissolution through the frame at last,That they along with body perish all.But should some say that always souls of menGo into human bodies, I will ask:How can a wise become a dullard soul?And why is never a child's a prudent soul?And the mare's filly why not trained so wellAs sturdy strength of steed? We may be sureThey'll take their refuge in the thought that mindBecomes a weakling in a weakling frame.Yet be this so, 'tis needful to confessThe soul but mortal, since, so altered nowThroughout the frame, it loses the life and senseIt had before. Or how can mind wax strongCoequally with body and attainThe craved flower of life, unless it beThe body's colleague in its origins?Or what's the purport of its going forthFrom aged limbs?- fears it, perhaps, to stay,Pent in a crumbled body? Or lest its house,Outworn by venerable length of days,May topple down upon it? But indeedFor an immortal perils are there none.
Again, at parturitions of the wildAnd at the rites of Love, that souls should standReady hard by seems ludicrous enough-Immortals waiting for their mortal limbsIn numbers innumerable, contending madlyWhich shall be first and chief to enter in!-Unless perchance among the souls there beSuch treaties stablished that the first to comeFlying along, shall enter in the first,And that they make no rivalries of strength! Again, in ether can't exist a tree,Nor clouds in ocean deeps, nor in the fieldsCan fishes live, nor blood in timber be,Nor sap in boulders: fixed and arrangedWhere everything may grow and have its place.Thus nature of mind cannot arise aloneWithout the body, nor exist afarFrom thews and blood. But if 'twere possible,Much rather might this very power of mindBe in the head, the shoulders or the heels,And, born in any part soever, yetIn the same man, in the same vessel abide.But since within this body even of oursStands fixed and appears arranged sureWhere soul and mind can each exist and grow,Deny we must the more that they can haveDuration and birth, wholly outside the frame.For, verily, the mortal to conjoinWith the eternal, and to feign they feelTogether, and can function each with each,Is but to dote: for what can be conceivedOf more unlike, discrepant, ill-assorted,Than something mortal in a union joinedWith an immortal and a secularTo bear the outrageous tempests? Then, again,Whatever abides eternal must indeedEither repel all strokes, because 'tis madeOf solid body, and permit no entranceOf aught with power to sunder from withinThe parts compact- as are those seeds of stuffWhose nature we've exhibited before;Or else be able to endure through timeFor this: because they are from blows exempt,As is the void, the which abides untouched,Unsmit by any stroke; or else becauseThere is no room around, whereto things can,As 'twere, depart in dissolution all,-Even as the sum of sums eternal is,Without or place beyond whereto things mayAsunder fly, or bodies which can smite,And thus dissolve them by the blows of might.