On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (25 page)

Images borne to us that we see in sleep)—

Now therefore, when you see from a broken pot

Water or liquid spread out all around

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And see how cloud and smoke dissolve into air,

Believe that the spirit also is diffused

And much more quickly dies and is dissolved

Into its primal atoms once it has left

The limbs. And if the body which is its vessel,

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As it were, cannot hold it when broken up

By anything, or rarefied when blood

Flows out from the veins, how then do you suppose

That any air could hold it? How could a thing

More rarefied than our body ever hold it?

We feel moreover that the mind is born

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Together with the body and grows up with it,

And ages with it. Children run about

With weak and tender bodies, and their minds

Are tender too. Next, when maturing years

Have given them strength, the wisdom and the power

Of mind grows stronger also. Last, when time

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With its strong hours has marred them, and the limbs

Have fallen beneath its blows, the intelligence

Limps, the tongue rambles, the mind gives way,

All fails and in one single moment dies.

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Therefore it follows that like smoke the spirit

Is melted into air, into thin air,

Since with the body equally it is born

And grows, and dies when old age wearies it.

Another point: just as the body itself

Is prone to foul diseases and harsh pain,

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So we can see the mind to suffer also

Anxiety and grief and fear; it follows

That the mind equally partakes of death.

Moreover, even in bodily diseases,

Often the mind wanders astray, demented,

Delirious; sometimes the heavy weight

Of lethargy brings everlasting sleep,

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Closed eyes and drooping head; no voices now

He hears, nor looks can recognize, of friends

Standing beside the bed, calling him back

To light and life, their cheeks bedewed with tears.

Wherefore you must confess that the mind also

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Is dissolved, since the contagion of disease

Penetrates into it, and disease and pain

Make death, as well we have been taught ere now.

Now let’s consider wine. When its strong power

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Has entered into a man and through the veins

Its fire has spread, then what a weight is there

In all his limbs! His legs give way, he staggers,

His speech is slow, his mind is sodden, his eyes

Swim, and he shouts and belches and fights. He’s drunk.

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Why does this happen, why, I say, unless

Because the spirit, whole still in the body,

Is shaken by the violence of wine?

But this confusion and impediment

Shows that if something slightly stronger should

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Find its way in, then robbed of his future life

The man must die. Now, take another case—

A man’s struck suddenly before our eyes

As if by lightning, falls to the ground and foams

At the mouth, shudders and groans and raves, grows rigid,

Twists, pants, convulsions rack him. Why? for sure

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Because the force of the disease spread through the limbs

Tears him and spews the spirit out in foam,

As when the sea is lashed by violent waves.

Groans are forced out since limbs are racked with pain,

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And gathering in the mouth the seeds of voice

Rush out, as it were along the road they know.

Raving occurs because the mind and spirit

Are racked and torn and, as I have shown, divided

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By that same poison, drawn apart, split up.

Then when at last the disease is spent, and back

To its secret haunts the bitter humour goes

Of the corrupted being, swaying then

A man begins to rise, and by degrees

Returns to his full senses and receives

His spirit back. Now therefore, since the spirit

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Within the body itself by such diseases

Is tossed about and worn and torn apart,

Why do you think that without a body the same

In the open air, blown by strong winds, can live?

And when we see that the mind like a sick body

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Can be restored to health by medicine,

This also shows that the living mind is mortal.

For if a man sets out to change the mind

Or anything in nature, then he must

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Remove a part, however small, or add one,

Or change its position. But what is immortal

Suffers no change of its parts, nor anything added

Or taken away. Its boundaries are fixed;

Transgress them, and death follows instantly.

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Therefore, as I have taught, a sick mind shows

Signs of mortality and equally

A mind that’s changed by medicine. So strongly

Does truth oppose false reasoning and cuts off

The flight of lies in full retreat surrounded,

And by a double refutation conquers them.

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Another point—we often see how a man

Passes slowly away and limb by limb

Loses the sense of life. First toes grow livid

And then the nails, and then the feet and legs

Die, and then over all his body creep

The cold footsteps of death. And so we see

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The spirit’s divided, and does not depart

All at one time. This shows that it is mortal.

But if perchance you think the spirit can

Pull itself inwards through the limbs, and draw

All of its parts together and in this way

Remove sensation from the limbs, why then

The place where all this spirit collects should be

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More sensitive, and form a single seat of feeling.

Nowhere does this exist. And so the spirit,

As I have said before, is torn to pieces,

Scattered abroad, and therefore perishes.

Moreover, if I were prepared to lie,

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And grant you that the spirit could form a mass

Within the body of those who leave the light

Slowly, and slowly die, you must confess

That the spirit is mortal. For whether it dies

Dispersed into the air or drawn together

From all its parts, it matters not at all;

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Since more and more the senses leave a man

Everywhere, and less and less of life remains.

The mind has its own place within the body

Fixed, just as eyes and ears are fixed, and noses,

And the other organs of sense that govern life;

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If they’re cut off, they’re useless, only fit

For the dustbin. Likewise by itself the mind

Is useless, can’t exist without the body,

Which holds it like a jar holds water or

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Whatever simile you care to choose

Of closeness, since the body clings to it.

In close conjunction body and mind are strong

With quickened power, enjoying life together.

Nor without body can the mind alone

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Make living movements, nor deprived of mind

Can body last, and use the senses. Eyes

Torn from their roots can see nothing. Likewise

Mind and spirit alone can do nothing.

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Yes, mixed through veins and flesh, sinews and bones

Their elements are held in by the body,

Not free to spring apart; and so, shut in,

They act as sense-bringers, which after death

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They cannot do, ejected from the body

Into the winds of air, held in no more.

For air will be a body and have life

If the spirit can keep itself together, and

Enclose within itself those motions which

It used to make within the limbs and body.

Wherefore again and yet again I say

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When all the body’s clothing is undone

And the breath of life’s thrown out outside, at once

Mind meets its end, and spirit too, since both

Are by one cause united and combined.

Again, since body cannot endure division

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From spirit without it dies with loathsome stench,

Why do you doubt the cause of this? The spirit

From its deep depths arising has like smoke