On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (20 page)

Barren of sound and starved of taste they move.

Their bodies emit no odour of their own.

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When you set out to make a pleasing scent

From marjoram or myrrh or the sweet flower

Of spikenard breathing nectar to our nostrils

Among the first things that you need to seek

Is an oil that is, so far as you may find one,

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Odourless and emits no breath of anything.

For this will least with harsh taint of its own

Corrupt the scents concocted with its substance.

For the same reason atoms must not bring

An odour of their own in making things,

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Nor sound, since they can emit nothing from themselves,

Nor similarly taste of any kind,

Nor cold likewise nor heat nor gentle warmth

And all the rest. All these are perishable—

The softness of their substance makes them pliant,

Its hollowness porous, its brittleness makes them crumble—

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All must be kept well separate from atoms,

If we wish to lay a strong and sure foundation,

Immortal, on which the sum of life may rest;

Lest you find all things utterly returned to nothing.

Now here is another point. Things that we see have feeling

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Consist of atoms that are devoid of feeling.

Nor do things plainly known to us

And manifest refute this or fight against it.

Rather they take us by the hand and make us believe

That living things, as I say, are born from insentient atoms.

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Why, you can see that living worms emerge

From filthy dung when the wet earth is soaked

And rotted by unseasonable rains.

All other things are seen likewise to change.

Rivers and leaves and joyful pastures change

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Into cattle, and cattle change into our bodies,

And often too our bodies build the strength

Of wild beasts and winged masters of the air.

So nature turns all foods to living bodies

And from them makes all the senses of animals

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In much the same way as she makes dry logs

Unfold in flames and turns them into fire.

Now do you see how very important is

The order in which all the atoms are placed,

How they combine, what motions they give and take?

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What is it then that strikes the mind itself

And moves it, and compels it to express

Ideas which forbid you to believe

That the sentient comes from the insentient?

Doubtless it is that a mixture of water and logs

And earth cannot produce a vital sense.

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And here you will please bear this in mind:

I do not say that all the substances

Which produce sentient bodies always do so.

It all depends how small the atoms are

That make a sentient thing, what shapes they have,

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What motions and arrangements and positions.

None of these things is found in wood or clods,

Yet these, when rotted as it were by rain,

Produce small worms, because the bodies of matter,

Moved by a new thing from their ancient order,

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Combine in a way that must make living creatures.

Further, those who maintain that sentient things

Can be created from things sentient,

Themselves from other sentient things created,

Make the foundations of our senses perishable,

Because they make them soft; for all sensation

Is linked with flesh, veins, sinews, all of which

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Being soft consist of substance which is mortal.

However, let us assume, for the sake of argument,

That these things last for ever. Then they must

Either have the sensation of a part

Or else instead be like whole animals.

But parts can have no feeling by themselves:

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Sensation in our limbs involves the whole body.

A hand or any part severed from the body

Cannot retain sensation on its own.

It follows that they are like whole animals.

So they must have the same feelings as ourselves

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So as to share in all our vital senses.

How then can they be called first elements

And escape the paths of death? They are animate,

And animate and mortal are the same.

Even if they could, their unions and combinations

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Would make nothing more than a crowd of living things,

Any more than men and cattle and wild beasts

By combination could make anything.

But if they were to give up from their bodies

Their own power of feeling, and acquire another one,

What was the point of giving them in the first place

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What is taken away? Besides, as we saw before,

Since we see eggs of birds produce live chicks

And worms swarm out when by untimely rains

Earth has been rotted, then we may be sure

That sense can be produced from the insentient.

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Suppose, however, someone should maintain

That sense can indeed arise from the insentient,

But is produced by some process of change

Or by some kind of birth that gives it being,

It will suffice to prove quite clearly to him

That birth does not occur without previous union,

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And nothing changes except by combination.

There can be no sensation in any body

Until the living thing itself is born;

Because of course its matter is held dispersed

In air and rivers and earth and earth-born things,

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And has not yet assembled, nor combined

Within itself the vitalizing motions

By which the all-perceiving senses kindled

See to the safety of all living things.

Consider this also: some living creature

Is suddenly prostrated by a blow

More powerful than its nature can withstand,

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And all the senses then of mind and body

Are stunned, and thrown at once into confusion.

For all the arrangements of the primal atoms

Are broken up, the vital motions checked

Deep down inside, until the substance fails,

Battered through every limb, and loosens all

The vital knots that bind the soul to body

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And scatters it, forced out through every pore.

What else are we to think a blow can do

Than shatter what it strikes and break it up?

And often, when a blow strikes with less force,

The vital motions that remain will win,

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Yes, win, and calm its vast disturbances,

Recalling every part to its own course

And shattering the impetus of death

Now all but lord and master of the body,

Kindling once more sensations almost lost.

How else could creatures at the door of death

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Return to life, their minds restored again,

Rather than make their exit by a route

They have travelled almost to the end, and pass away?

Pain occurs when particles of matter

Attacked by some force in the limbs and flesh

Quiver and tremble in their deep abodes;

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And when they settle back into their places

That is a soothing joy. So you may know

That atoms cannot suffer any pain

Nor in themselves experience any pleasure,

Since they possess no primal particles

From whose new movements they might feel distress

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Or reap some fruit of life-giving delight.

Therefore they cannot be endowed with senses.

And if, to enable animals to feel,

We must attribute senses to their atoms,

What are we then to say about those atoms

Which give the human race its character?

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Doubtless they shake their sides and rock with laughter

And weeping oft bedew their cheeks with tears,

Engage in long and brilliant disputation

About the mix of things that makes the world,

And then proceed to enquire about themselves

To find what atoms they themselves are made of.

For if they resemble complete mortal men,

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They must also consist of other particles

And those in turn of others, and then others;

There’s nowhere you could dare to call a halt.